"Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words. Keep your words positive because your words become your behavior. Keep your behavior positive because your behavior becomes your habits. Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values. Keep your values positive because your values become your destiny." -- Mahatma Gandhi
I love this quote, which I just randomly came across on Twitter, from the great Indian political and spiritual leader. And though no doubt it originally was intended for a higher plane than business, I feel it has real relevance for management. Because a consistently positive mindset is one of the most indispensable long-term assets a manager will ever have.
I fully recognize the power of positive thinking is not exactly a unique insight. But a couple of clear connections to the practice of management are worth emphasizing.
Over the course of your career there will be ample negative headwinds a consistently positive mindset needs to counter. People often think management has it made in the shade, but the reality is, for most people, over the long run management is a darn tough job. Let's start with the stresses of having to please -- or at least relate constructively to -- a wide array of audiences including employees, your own management, boards, clients, investors and sales reps, among many others. You're constantly "on" and often publicly performing. If you're lucky enough to last a good long while in the role you'll likely face the capricious pressures of being reorganized, downsized, rightsized... or whatever the current buzzword is for "sliced and diced." Yep, you're well paid for your problems. But resilience still matters. A lot. (Which is one of the reasons that lack of resilience in our younger population, a phenomenon being increasingly noted, is a worrisome trend.) Odd as it may sound, I once wrote that the hide of an armadillo is one of the most valuable traits a successful leader can have. I still believe that. On this long and winding road a positive attitude is a great traveling companion.
It's always easier to follow someone with a positive outlook. Than a negative one. It's easy to overlook the subtle everyday chemistry that constitutes effective management. How often we forget the simple truth that successful management has nothing to do with individual brilliance or performance but everything to do with accomplishing work through others. And getting your people to want to do their best for you -- day after day, month after month, and year after year. Toward this end the everyday cast of your personality -- your attitude, your optimism, your general mindset -- is invariably a managerial difference maker. People are drawn to positivity. No one wants to take a long ride on a downbound train.
To return to our quote at the outset, the incomparable Gandhi of course applied his talents to other walks of life. Had he chosen management I've no doubt he would have been great as they come.
