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Manu Melwin Joy
The Art of
Zen Leadership
In today’s frantic, fast-paced world, it’s
all too easy to feel overwhelmed by
our own lives. This often leads us into
a coping mode, the sense that some
force outside of you is somehow
imposing upon you, limiting your freedom,
restricting your creativity and pushing you
into an unhealthy cycle of reactivity and
anxiety. Zen leaders are the ones who
can channelize their attention inwards
and nd a sense of calm and peace that
draws others to them. They can still be
powerful, inuential and productive, no
matter how tough a boss, team member,
client or project can be. These are leaders
who are highly motivated for the greater
good and feel no need to inate their own
egos. And they, according to research, make
the best business leaders. The three key
characteristics of Zen leaders are humility,
self-awareness and empathy.
BE HUMBLE
Humility is a preferred, but often neglected
characteristic of Zen leadership. A recent
Catalyst report has found that humility
is one of the most important leadership
behaviours that help build an atmosphere
where all organizational members feel
included. Another research done among
Chinese executives found that humble
TRENDING
[52]
Pallikkutam / September 2017
CEOs tend to do a superior job of
empowering managers at lower
levels of the rm. One of the most
praised qualities of Darwin E. Smith,
CEO of Kimberly-Clark was his
humility. Smith was an exception
from the characters of larger than
life leaders we have known of. He
came from a humble background.
He was a farm boy in Indiana who
put himself through night school,
who cut his nger on the job, yet
went to work the next day. A man
with a diagnosis of cancer with one
year to live but lived for 25 more
and who was Harvard-educated
despite his humble beginnings.
When the board appointed Smith
at the helm of Kimberly Clark,
they were not so sure that they
had made the right decision. In
fact, a board member called him
aside once and told Smith that he
required some of the qualications
for the job. Smith was a mild
mannered man who combined
humility with strong professional
will. He remained CEO of Kimberly
Clark for 20 years and turned it into
one of the best consumer paper
rms in the world. When Smith
lessons that it teach are subtle and
easily missed, but very powerful.
Warren Buffett, for instance, has
made it a habit for years to write
down the reasons why he is
making an investment decision
and later reflects to see what went
right or wrong. He seldom starts his
investment process by equating
a bunch of possible investment
alternatives. He does not depend
heavily on quantitative screening
tools. Instead, Buffett automatically
gravitates towards an organization
he finds exciting and understands.
He then analyses the firm, its
industry, and its valuation to
decide if the investment makes
sense. If it does not, he moves on
to the next firm his intuition leads
him to analyse. If the prospective
investment seems safe or
attractive, Buffett refers back again
to his intuition concerning the
management’s proficiency and
trustworthiness. He also exploits
gut instincts with position sizing,
overall market exposure, and in
identifying danger. For instance, he
doesn’t totally analytically decide
that one investment should be $2
was asked how he turned around
the maker of Kleenex and Huggies,
generating returns to investors that
were four times better than the
stock market’s, he replied: “I was
just trying to become qualied for
the job.”
BE AWARE OF YOURSELF
Another important facet of Zen
leadership is self-awareness. It is a
journey that requires a conscious
effort each and every day. The
Empathy is
pivotal to
creating healthy
relationships with
team members,
customers, and
partners.
September 2017 / Pallikkutam
[53]
billion while another one should
be $400 million. An important
part of that decision is based on
intuition.
BE EMPATHETIC
Finally, empathy is pivotal to
creating healthy relationships
with team members, customers,
and partners. It sounds naive and
trite, but you can never go wrong
when you put others first. The
payoff might not be instant, but it
is worthwhile. This is evident from
the life of Mahatma Gandhi. Once
he was back to India from South
Africa in 1915, Gandhi decided
that if he was going to fight for
independence from the British,
he would need to understand
what life was really like for the
poorest people in the nation. So
he renounced his fancy lawyer’s
suit and collar, wrapped himself
in a dhoti, and established the
Sabamarti Ashram, where he lived
from 1917 to 1930. Ashram life
was about stepping into the shoes
of peasant farmers. He and his
supporters grew their own food,
spun their own cloth, and cleaned
out the latrines -- a job typically
allotted to the Untouchable (Dalit)
caste. Gandhi’s deep empathetic
instinct also took him across
religious boundaries. He was
shocked by the violence between
Hindus and Muslims and ardently
opposed the formation of a
separate Muslim state. A devout
Hindu himself, he once avowed
to a group of Hindu nationalists:
“I am a Muslim! And a Hindu, and
a Christian and a Jew -- and so are
all of you”. These words, which
still echo today, rank amongst the
greatest empathetic statements of
all time.
Humility, self-awareness and
empathy are things that are in
short supply nowadays, and
that is truly sad. Zen leaders who
appreciate self-awareness and act
with humility and empathy will
still make mistakes. But during
times of crisis, their teams will
pull together and move forward
towards success. The advantage
of Zen leadership goes far
beyond your professional life and
has a great influence in overall
well-being. Whether you are
a corporate leader, a CEO, or a
homemaker, you will find these
ideas to be extremely useful and
instantly applicable to your own
life and work.
(The writer is an Asst. Professor at
SCMS School of Technology and
Management, Kochi)
TRENDING
The advantage
of Zen leadership
goes far beyond
your professional
life and has a great
influence in overall
well-being.
Darwin E. Smith Warren Buett
Mahatma Gandhi
[54]
Pallikkutam / September 2017