What we have found, increasingly since 1979, is that giving advice produces almost nothing. It seems as if people will only pursue what they seem to have discovered for themselves.
Wisdom and counsel cannot be transferred, only developed. So our philosophy is to avoid coming in as some kind of heroes or saviors - - that kind of thing never works anyway, at least not in the long run. Instead we try our very best to make the people at our clients more powerful, more participative and more self-realized (or as Abraham Maslow called it, self-actualized). An engaged, involved and eager workforce can be very powerful. In that way our humility is our strength as we work to free the worker bees to achieve great things to the glory of their company.
How do we define employee success (as we see beyond the P&L)? Great leadership, fair & ethical business practices, adaptive & evolving business strategies based on employee and outside stakeholder feedback, sound governance with wide participation, powerful brands emanating from the staff at every level of the organization, values-based decision-making, and of course, growing long-term financial strength of both the company and its staff.
When employees have a voice, innovation starts to appear from everywhere. One very important aspect of such motivation is the willingness to stop and to look at things that no one else has bothered to look at. This simple process of focusing on things that are normally taken for granted is a powerful source of creativity. Imagination grows by freedom and exercise; further, contrary to common belief, imagination is more powerful in the mature than in the young. Yet that imagination needs to be channeled and that is accomplished through visionary leadership. Visualization is one of the most powerful means of achieving corporate, and along with it, personal goals.
What we actually learn from leadership, in any given set of circumstances, determines whether we become increasingly powerless or more powerful. Leadership is an active role; 'lead' is a verb. But the leader who tries to do it all is headed for burnout, and in a powerful hurry. Good leadership distributes power as widely as possible. John Kotter says the key to leadership is to “encourage the heart” throughout the organization.
In Nelson Mandela's 1994 Inaugural Presidential Speech he said:
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate; our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God.
You're playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. And as we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
Helping others around us feel powerful is a matter of knowing what’s going on inside ourselves and extrapolating that to apply what’s going on in the people we are with. The sensation of never feeling good enough or attractive enough will always be there. It's a constant dialogue, and we just have to learn to be more powerful than that other voice. When we hear it come up, we shut it down. It's our own small voice within that is our oppressor; it says we are not worthy, not good enough and not powerful enough.
Our limited beliefs are the real foes we need to fight and conquer. Guilt is just as powerful, but its influence is positive, while shame's is destructive. Shame erodes our courage and fuels disengagement.
What we believe is very powerful. If we have toxic emotions of fear, guilt and depression, it is because we have wrong thinking, and we have wrong thinking because of wrong believing.
Guilt or else a common enemy, combined with a convicted belief in the vision ahead of us, can be a huge motivator towards our mutual empowerment. If we develop the absolute sense of certainty that powerful beliefs provide, then we can get ourselves to accomplish virtually anything, including those things that other people are certain are impossible.
The two important things we have learned are that (1) we are as powerful and strong as we allow our self to be, and (2) that the most difficult part of any endeavor is taking the first step, making the first decision. That’s what we mean by encouraging the heart; that is what throwing off the shackles of self-limitation is all about.
When we dare to be powerful - - to use our strength in the service of our vision - - then it becomes less and less important whether we are afraid or have other self-esteem issues. We must never give up on what we really want to do.
The company with big dreams is more powerful than the one with all the facts. The dreams from a vivid vision are most powerful. We have to dream of success to make it happen, and if we don't believe in our self and our company, nobody else will. We must not allow anybody to keep us from our destiny.
The most powerful weapon in our organization is our human soul on fire. Imagination is stronger than knowledge and dreams are more powerful than facts. The dreams and passions stored within our hearts are the powerful keys which can unlock the wealth of our shared potential. On this hope we can triumph over our past experiences.
Hope, as a state of mind, gives us the ability to work for something because it is good, and rights to right and true. Something emerges from within us that is deeper than who we thought we were. So, the person is still there, but one could almost say that something more powerful shines through us as this certain kind of being. Our network is the people who want to help us, and we want to help them, and that's really powerful. The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation.
Now what if our job or our company is too mundane? What is the profit in turning this very ordinary widget over and over again? What meaning or significance is there in that? Say our company makes sugar water - - are we stuck doing that, forever?
So many entrepreneurs have built infrastructure and with it cash flow in order to do something else, in order to do what really makes a difference for them. The first company was simply a means to get to another enterprise, a business that would truly make a difference to their world.
Likewise, individual employees may simply use their current position as a building block for their next job - - if there is no future or personal meaning for them where they are. Often though, we are sitting on our personal gold mine and just don’t know it.
We all have to learn to stand on our own two feet and take root in ourselves. No one can do that for us. We grow up to that and it’s called maturing as a human being, passing from childhood to adulthood to leader. In that self-reliance we can find happiness.
Yet there seems to be a conspiracy against cooperation throughout the business world, found in a spirit of competition: to get, take and hurt. It’s good old-fashioned human nature. Rising up against our nature is not easy, perhaps because it’s so “natural”. It is certainly true that we need “help” to go beyond our “self”. There is nothing mysteriously wonderful within us; there is no special “good” deep down inside us. We need to develop a spirit of cooperation, learn it and nurture it. With the right help, it can be achieved to differing degrees of success. We can build into our character a different way of “being”. Then there is something special, something so valuable and meaningful. Change is hard, sometimes very hard, but the rewards are most worthwhile. It’s our decision to move upwards, and it’s a big one.
There are certain geniuses of individualism - - they are very few and far between - - who live their lives completely on their own terms; they are very powerful and have a great amount of happiness. We all should aspire to that.
Here if we can put together the genius of individualism into a collective effort we have something amazing. Working together there is an excitement to pushing back previous boundaries, of doing something truly important, something that has never been done before. “Genius is rare and the chance to exercise it in a dance with others is rarer still” said Warren Bennis. This kind of genius only comes from using our own power and the height of genius is using this genius together.
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