In human interactions as well as
human-organization interactions we encounter, all the time, individuals and
institutions displaying diverse traits, each at different points of a
respective spectrum. For example, we may encounter individuals who are
optimistic or pessimistic or at some point in optimism-pessimism spectrum. Similar
positioning could be true of institutions as well; institutions that would
never abandon growth path despite adversities and those that immediately
downsize at the first sign of demand recession. The number of such traits on
which individuals and institutions can be so classified are many. However, two traits
that govern the relationships within and between individuals as well as
institutions are extremely critical to individual and institutional
development.
The two traits that are particularly
important in this context are humility and arrogance. These two traits are the
visible or felt expressions of how individuals and institutions think or behave
with and among each other. While these are fairly commonplace words, they are
also commonly misunderstood; it is, therefore, worthwhile to recall their
essence. Humility is the endearing way of thinking and behaving that comes from
considering that one is not necessarily better, smarter or more important than
other people, whether one actually is or not. Arrogance, in direct contrast, is the
insulting way of thinking and behaving that comes from believing that one is better,
smarter or more important than other people, whether one actually is or not. Like
all positive and pristine traits, humility is hard to ingrain while like all
negative and crude traits, arrogance is easy to embrace.
Fusion, diffusion
Ironically, behaviour and action patterns
that are so dissimilar as humility and arrogance are built on common foundations.
Perceptions of knowledge, capability, competence and accomplishment usually
drive one’s own as well as others’ belief of what one is. It is human nature to
continuously evaluate oneself and others on these aspects, and position oneself
to be superior or inferior vis-à-vis others. It is easy to feel egoistic (which
is just a step away from arrogance) in the context of one’s superiority and
feel defeatist (which is just a step away from worthlessness) in awareness of
one’s inferiority. In contrast, it requires a special kind of personality
disposition to be humble in spite of superiority and strong in spite of inferiority.
This challenge is compounded as one receives continuous feedback, direct and
indirect as well as genuine and timeserving, from one’s network.
These traits are independent of scaling in
competence. For example, a teacher is naturally required to be highly
knowledgeable compared to the students. That does not bestow any right to be
arrogant on the part of the teacher because that differential capability is the
fundamental basis of such teacher-student relationship. On the other hand, a
great teacher remains humble by believing that he or she needs to learn more to
teach better, and even accepts the occasional brilliant repartees and queries
from the students. Similarly, a manager or a specialist by virtue of his or her
experience ought to know more than his or her staff but, by no means, it is an
unnatural accomplishment that should make the manager or a specialist even a
wee bit arrogant. On the other hand, a great manager or specialist always looks
to expand his or her frontiers of knowledge besides welcoming the fresh
thoughts of youngsters.
Trending, branding
Institutions have a different set of
influencers. Their competence is reflected in terms of their market share and profitability.
As a result of their achievements on these two dimensions, they trend as
performers, and as performers they get branded too. Most start-ups and young
firms achieve this by being capable as well as humble. However, with positive
trending and branding, they keep acquiring scale. Most institutions as they grow
in scale face an inflection point, unique in each case, from which point they
start behaving and acting less vulnerable and more invincible. Akin to the
individual recount earlier, this also represents a humility-arrogance tipping
point. Scale often leads to distance; between employees and the management,
within employees, and more importantly between organizations and their
customers.
At and from such an inflection point, an
institution starts believing that it knows what is right –for itself as well as
its employees and customers. The level of functional specialization and sophistication
of data analytics may well sustain the institutions on performance journey but radically
alter how they are perceived in terms of their relative humility and arrogance.
For example, an increment letter that arrives in the mail box of each employee
of a one-lakh employee strong company as immediately as the day after
performance year close, despite its efficiency, would be perceived to be
shockingly impersonal (which is a step or two away from arrogance). If in that organization,
the increment letter, duly signed by a CXO, is personally handed over by the
manager to each employee (even if with a few days of delay), the act would
reflect continuing institutional care (which is a shade or two closer to
humility).
Interlays, interplays
Adding complexity to the situation is that
humility and arrogance are capable of being faked. An individual or institution
may be intrinsically arrogant but may make it appear as aggression (which is
considered a surrogate for competitiveness!). Others may cultivate humility as
a means to an end, notwithstanding not so modest views of themselves. Some
individuals or institutions may take humility to the extremes of perpetual
silence and acceptance leading to doubts on intrinsic capability (also, as surrogates
of passive aggression). Others may alternate between flashes of arrogance and
swathes of humility to reconcile their inner contradictions. Given that human
nature is not perfect, having humility inside and faking aggression outside or
vice versa is hardly an appropriate state of individual or institutional
thought and action.
The ideal ecosystem would comprise
interactions on three dimensions; between individuals, between individuals and
institutions and between institutions. In terms of levels of endowments or
competencies, the players can never be equal but the relationships can
certainly be equitable. Individual level collaboration, between the competent
and not-so-component, is the foundation of building humility in organizational
ecosystem. Collaboration between individuals and institutions, howsoever
seemingly giver an institution is and receiver an individual is, constitutes the
foundation of social ecosystem. Collaboration across any value chain
constitutes the foundation of industrial ecosystem. An Original Equipment
Manufacturer(OEM) could be endowed with better marketing and financial power
than a small component maker but the former ought to be cognizant of the
essentiality (and not the optionality) of the component maker to the OEM.
Gross, subtle
When concepts such as humility and arrogance
are discussed, the focus tends to be on the visibly gross or misleadingly subtle
aspects of the concepts. Just as being silent is not being humble, being in an
agreeing or obsequious mode does not constitute humility. Similarly proposing
or communicating an alternative way of thought or action does not reflect lack
of humility (let alone display of arrogance). Humility is the ability to convey
what is correct and appropriate to context and content in a manner that does
not reflect superiority, and in a manner that the recipient is inspired to
absorb the context. Humility is the ability to learn as much as possible and
relevant from other individuals and institutions. In the ultimate analysis,
humility is the ability share, spread and enhance knowledge in a collaborative
and inspirational manner.
In a similar manner, arrogance does not mean
only insulting way of thought, expression or action. Arrogance can be very subtle
too. When sales executives in a retail store of iconic brands chat amongst themselves
for minutes without connecting with customers it is nothing but subtle
institutional arrogance. When members of organizations, private or public,
provide inadequate responses or take inordinate time to serve stakeholders that
too is institutional arrogance. In several cases, the line between individual
and institutional arrogance is rather thin. Humility needs to be a key anchor
of family and organizational culture to be able to nurture humility and
eliminate arrogance even when they are in the respective subtlest forms,
Off harm’s way, through HARM model
While we have all grown to accept humility as
a rare sparkle and arrogance as a common inevitability of high-stress life, we
need to take a break, and recognize the insidiously harmful effects of lack of
humility or exertion of arrogance, gross or subtle, on enhancing stress levels
in the society. We should aim to develop greater and more perceptive
understanding of these commonly misunderstood concepts and reflect on them through
a Humility-Arrogance Relational Matrix (HARM). Fundamentally, being humble knowing one’s
limitations is a source of strength but being humble with all the awareness of one’s
competences is an even greater source of strength. Similarly, forsaking ego despite
the weaknesses of others is a source of strength but eschewing ego despite the
awareness of one’s superiority is an even greater source of strength.
Four combinations are possible. Individuals
can be humble but institutions can be arrogant – especially commercially and
rapidly successful organizations; it requires individuals to persevere even as it
behoves key decision makers to launch a culture journey in institutions.
Individuals can be arrogant but institutions, especially service oriented and non-governmental
organizations can be humble; it requires individuals to reflect and remediate
even as the organizations persevere on their path. Both individuals and
institutions can be arrogant – this could be a concomitant of a despotic culture
which smothers creativity and demands servility; mercifully such combinations
are few but unless they are transformed the overall national ecosystem can be
destroyed. In the virtuous grid, the individual as well as the institution
would be competent and capable; such individuals and institutions would
paradoxically render a great service to the nation by being less modest about
their uniqueness and imbibing other individuals and institutions with their implicit
drivers of humility.
Posted by Dr CB Rao on April 10, 2016
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