SHARED THOUGHTS..........21.04.2012.
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In office, at home, in life we face situations where we are tempted to do beyond our brief… with good intentions of course, but our good intentions sometimes boomerang much to our dismay. Lesson learnt, we may content doing just what is expected of us… and then we are accused … for not showing initiative to go beyond our call of duty. How can we differentiate or draw the fine line between being accused or appreciated ; being pro-active and not reactive. Nevertheless, I have personally believed and lived by what Desmond Hill said in Law of Success - work more that what you are paid for. This means, be pro-active and exceed your brief. Here again, choice is yours.
Now read on…………
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There was once a washer man who had a donkey and a dog. One night when the
whole world was sleeping, a thief broke into the house, the washer man was
fast asleep too but the donkey and the dog were awake.
The dog decided not to bark since the master did not take good care of him
and wanted to teach him a lesson. The donkey got worried and said to the dog
that if he doesn't bark, the donkey will have to do something himself.
The dog did not change his mind and the donkey started braying loudly.
Hearing the donkey bray, the thief ran away, the master woke up and started
beating the donkey for braying in the middle of the night for no reason.
Moral of the story: "One must not engage in duties other than his own"
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Now take a new look at the same story...
The washer man was a well educated man from a premier management institute.
He had the fundas of looking at the bigger picture and thinking out of the
box. He was convinced that there must be some reason for the donkey to bray
in the night.. He walked outside a little and did some fact finding, applied
a bottom up approach, figured out from the ground realities that there was a
thief who broke in and the donkey only wanted to alert him about it.
Looking at the donkey's extra initiative and going beyond the call of the
duty, he rewarded him with lot of hay and other perks and became his
favorite pet.
The dog's life didn't change much, except that now the donkey was more
motivated in doing the dog's duties as well. In the annual appraisal the dog
managed "ME" (Met Expectations) .
Soon the dog realized that the donkey is taking care of his duties and he
can enjoy his life sleeping and lazing around.
The donkey was rated as "star performer". The donkey had to live up to his
already high performance standards.
Soon he was over burdened with work and always under pressure and now is
looking for a NEW JOB ... !!!!
Disclaimer: All characters in the story are not at all imaginary.
Any resemblance to person living or dying of work is purely intentional
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if one is confused about what leadership, initiative, humility et al, is all about, then this will be truly inspiring.
One of Mr. Ratan N Tata's (RNT) first assignments was the stewardship of the ailing electronics company in the Tata portfolio - Nelco.
Story goes that a team of senior managers from Nelco was driving to Nasik along with RNT. Halfway into the journey, the car had a flat tyre, and as the driver pulled up, the occupants - including Mr. Tata - got off for a comfort break, leaving the driver to replace the tyre.
Some of the managers welcomed the forced break, as it allowed them a much-needed chance to light up a cigarette. Some used the opportunity to stretch, and smile, and share a joke. And then, one of them suddenly noticed that Mr. Tata was not to be seen, and wondered aloud where Ratan Tata might have vanished!
Was he behind some bush?
Had he wandered off inside the roadside dhaba for a quick cup of tea?
Or was he mingling with some passer-bys, listening to their stories?
None of these, in fact, while his colleagues were taking a break, Ratan Tata was busy helping the driver change tyres. Sleeves rolled up, tie swatted away over the shoulder, the hands expertly working the jack and the spanner, bouncing the spare tyre to check if the tyre pressure was ok. Droplets of sweat on the brow, and a smile on the face.
At that moment, the managers accompanying Ratan Tata got a master class in Leadership they haven't forgotten.
And that's a moment that the driver of that car probably hasn't forgotten either!
Questions to ask:
· When was the last time I rolled up my sleeves to do a task much below my hierarchy?
· Do I wait for the big opportunity to showcase my leadership?
· Is that big opportunity ever going to come?
· Am I trying to manage upwards so much that I've lost the feel of the field?
Ideas for action:
· Humility is the essence of success. Be humble and even teach your children to be so.
· To reach the top and remain there, always start from the bottom, else your days at the top will not last long.
· Practice leadership in small things instead of waiting for the big crisis or a major product launch.
· Seek to find opportunities to lead in everyday moments.
· Build your leadership skills one baby step at a time.
· When one’s hands get dirty - The mind remains clean!!
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yet, more food for thought...........thanks to Poorna ( an article by Mr. Mohit Kishore - The Hindu)
Most leadership theories (with a few exceptions, of course) are variants of a ‘hero' based ideal. In other words, the leader is a heroic individual of some sort who summons his followers to accomplish great things.
Additionally, there is a tendency to glorify leadership as an achievement or a sort of reward for one's performance in a specific sphere of life.
This has led to a situation where society tends to confer leadership upon individuals simply because they are able to function effectively in their individual roles without evaluating whether the individual truly possesses the skill to lead others.
Any system that follows such a pattern of leader selection is bound to create a society of unfulfilled ‘followers'.
An Indian definition of leadership - Is there a distinctly Indian definition of leadership? The answer to this may be found in India 's cultural foundations. The central idea of the Indian philosophical tradition is the idea of selflessness.
An individual begins on his path of spiritual evolution with the initial ego-centric belief that he is distinct and special in relation to others, but as he progresses further he realises that while the particularities of his existence or station in life may be distinct from others, the underlying conscious principle is the same.
Lord Krishna's demonstration of his own cosmic form (containing the entire universe within it) to Arjuna in the Gita essentially reinforces the same idea of a universal consciousness that cuts across all beings.
It may be argued that an individual who is able to perceive this unique combination of specificity and universality in other human beings is the one who is best suited to lead others.
In other words, an individual with a greater degree of selflessness is the ideal candidate to be a leader of other human beings.
Ideals of a selfless leader
A leader whose foundation is the idea of selflessness manifests this in many forms in his relationship with followers.
Freedom: The first ideal of such an enlightened leader would be ‘freedom'. A selfless leader would allow other individuals to operate with a high degree of freedom while providing an outline of what needs to be accomplished.
How the follower navigates his way towards the outcome is entirely left to his creative faculties. This approach contradicts the traditional organisational way of getting things accomplished — fear and conformity to pre-defined safe paths.
Fear and conformity-based leadership styles are essentially expressions of a control-based tendency which, in turn, stems from an inherent ego-based foundation which demands that all outcomes bear the stamp of the leader.
A selfless leader, on the other hand, will demonstrate a lesser tendency to control simply due to the absence of any desire in him to stamp his individual personality on everything that his team produces.
Follower evolution centricity: A selfless leader would be constantly conscious of the specific evolutionary state of his follower, and would constantly try to raise him to higher levels of selflessness.
Thus, the role of such a leader is not only to create outcomes through his team, but also to raise followers to his own state of being. In fact, all outcomes are in the distant future, and all that can be done in the present is really to ensure that people working towards those outcomes are raised to higher levels of consciousness (which is essentially the ideal of Karma Yoga).
Enlightened doer-ship: An enlightened leader would constantly reinforce the idea of enlightened doer-ship. This means that credit-seeking would be a shunned practice. This returns once again to the Vedantic ideal that the idea of a specific doer is an ego-centric idea.
Ego-centric behaviour in any team pursuit rapidly diminishes the motivation and performance of other players in addition to creating a zero sum situation where people perceive that for one person to win, another has to lose.
This does not mean that skilled performers are not rewarded — it only means that rewards are structured on a non-zero-sum, non-relative basis.
One may even argue that skilled performance is its own reward and per se does not need any other reward to reinforce that behaviour!
In conclusion, it must be pointed out that a selfless leadership based organisation does not completely shun individualism. In fact, it celebrates individualism in a different manner — through the freedom it offers to its members to creatively express themselves towards the accomplishment of outcomes.
All it does though is to check individualism that is expressed in the desire to possess greater control and power.
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have a good weekend and take care,
MOHANDAS. KP.
