Soul's Wisdom

Reflecting on the death of Nelson Mandela, one of the political leadership icons of the world, I, along with others, have learned a crucial lesson – the value of forgiveness and reconciliation in bringing about leadership excellence. Leave alone in such a tormented leadership historic time and scenario as that of great Mandela, we as lay professionals have personally several times experienced and witnessed that forgiveness is not something that comes very naturally to humans, especially for someone who bestows us great harm in one way or another. Despite being one of the defining core Christian values, most of us abysmally fail in practicing forgiveness and reconciliation however frequently we have been told to take this amazing gesture on a daily basis in our lives since our childhood. Why? I believe because it is not that simple to forgive and reconcile as much as it seems apparently. Besides, I guess the closest response for most of us when we are harmed by an individual,

My recent round table encounter with a couple of line managers and a CEO of a company has prompted me to write this article. In response to one of the straight forward manager’s reports, the CEO suddenly blurted, “I know you’ve tried your best, but your best isn’t good enough as it didn’t yield any fruit.” (From his careful wording and vivid body language, I felt that the CEO was mocking at the manager’s integrity as he was unable to generate the expected financial returns, perhaps even at the cost of deception, rather than reporting to him such a “ludicrous” monetary benefits). Our experience with the real world reveals that leaders undergo stormy periods, as well as several zenith epochs. Both of these times are considered momentous chapters from which all ought to learn a great deal. I believe successful leaders are measured not merely on their discernible efficacious outcomes; rather, the litmus test for them is how they manage and react to the inescapable failure. While thi

Most writings about leadership point out things leaders should do while engaging in their day to day tasks. Or, what they ought to be as individual frontrunners, the charisma they must be endowed with, or some kind of eccentricity they’re expected to exhibit. They seldom emphasize the necessity of orderly break from their work, an impelling cause that enables them to return and act with robustness and wisdom. And a potential reason for their failure in performances. Maybe I overlooked their articles ☺ Let’s look at some of the common corporate leaders’ responsibilities starting from strategic to operational ones: leverage opportunities and resolve issues, develop a long-range course of action or set of goals to align with the organization’s vision, identify and exploit opportunities for new products, services, and markets; And, specifically, on a regular basis: absorbing daily briefings from their assistants and co-workers; come up with hard and swift decisions that require much de

I think understanding the merits of the two C’s - Competition and Complementariness- is vital as they’re the hallmarks of great leadership. Just because the two concepts are divergent, it doesn’t mean they can’t go together. It simply requires exceptional leadership to appropriately utilize them for various purposes. First of all, there’s a lot of virtue in positive competition in business. Here, I’m not referring the ones that deceitfully scheme in order to win and those that often compromise moral principles and ethical standards. That’s why ‘positive’ intervenes. Management in some organizations uses competition as a crucial tool in bringing out the best out of its personnel; and thereby increases productivity. Rewarding outshining staff or/and team is always appropriate, as the individuals deserve appreciation in having brought something worthy to the organization, striving all the way long. This scheme not only drives workers to excel, but most importantly, serves as an instrume

When thinking of leadership per se, what comes to me first is the Biblical illustration that describes the relationship between shepherds and the sheep – leaders and followers. It’s their strong bond and intimacy that constituted the vivacity of their daily business. The shepherds named their sheep, gently communicated to them each day, and patted them on the head to settle them down each evening. Rather than distancing themselves and monitoring their followers by some other means, (if, at all, they had any) they ensured that they stayed close enough to observe their followers’ activities. In short, referring back to these illustrations would enable us to see that staying amicable, vulnerable and intimate with their followers were the crucial leadership tools leaders implemented to attaining their goals then. Can't we use these models, today? I bet we can.   One might say that for the 21st century leaders, patting their followers on the head may be taking things a bit too far.

Attitude as defined by the Dictionary.com  as a manner, disposition, feeling, position, etc., with regard to a person or thing; tendency or orientation, especially of the mind : I believe my disposition with regard to a person or thing matters whether I would succeed in what I want to achieve in life. If my mind believes that I could really do a certain task despite its challenges, I am sure I would attain it…. maybe it could take more time than I first thought, but eventually, I would succeed. This is because I set my disposition in the direction of success, so the force that attempts to push against my will doesn’t have the power to crush the building stones I gather toward my destination. On the other hand, if my state of mind, what we actually call ‘attitude’, toward that particular task I mentioned above considers that I don’t have the guts and will to do so, I could easily be defeated. This is because my attitude was originally crippled. In this case I'm defeated even be