Managing Leadership^®

When I was a teenager, I asked my father for his advice as to how I should decide an issue that involved a potential collision of principle and personal relationships. He didn’t tell me what decision to make; just to make one, and then resist the temptation to reverse it for at least two weeks.

So, I made a decision and it was, of course, the wrong one. But I disciplined myself to follow his advice, and stuck with it. The result was that the catastrophe drew on like a slow-motion train wreck before my eyes. Unanticipated factors entered the dynamics, upsetting all calculations. One metaphorical car careened off the track, the one behind it slammed in to the one before, flames burst out, screaming people poured out through windows.

And I watched it all unfolding before me, a silent spectator to a disaster film that I had written. But I learned that I had only written with the beginning in mind, not the end, and only with my own concerns close to my heart, and not those of my actors or viewers.

Now, the interesting thing is that my own concerns weren’t, in this instance, exclusively selfish. Although that element was present, I worked hard to see the issue at hand from a ruthlessly ethical perspective.

And that, actually, was a big part of the problem.

Were my ethical considerations clouded by my personal stake in the issue? Were they simply insufficiently informed by the perspectives and viewpoints of others? Were they too moralistically unyielding and uni-dimensional to serve any really ethical end in life as it is actually lived by well-meaning people?

The brilliance of my dad’s advice was not (obviously) in the answers he gave me, but in the vivid vehicle for discovering new questions; and, in particular, the lesson to cast a wide net and look hard for evidence of all the potential consequences – especially those not anticipated when the issue first comes up – of any decision.

Now, this doesn’t mean, either, to avoid decisions or prolong the process of making them. Just develop the habit of incorporating into that process the understanding that there will be consequences, including those you had not anticipated that are of real import to people.

Then, having determined your ground, take your stand. Watch, observe, learn, repeat.

Carmine Coyote has written a deeply felt, powerfully presented, and intelligent piece on this topic at Slow Leadership. She argues that business must always be taken personally – that is, that our actions must not be dismissed as just business in order to numb us to their ethical implications. I strongly recommend that you read this.

As for me, I agree that we should always be alert to the ethical consequences of our decisions and actions in all aspects of our lives. However, it may be that the best way to see them most clearly is to take them less personally – to step outside of the issue and try to watch it unfold as a clear-eyed spectator. Then step back in and do what you can to keep the train on track.

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Today’s tips: Stop over to Eric Brown‘s site for a refreshingly concise and actionable approach to perceiving and pursuing competitive advantage. Also, visit Jonathon Farrington‘s Blog for one of the better pieces I’ve seens on how to understand successful negotiation behaviors.

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Technorati Tags: principle, decision, discipline, advice, calculation, Carmine Coyote, Eric Brown, competitive advantage, Jonathon Farrington, decision-making, ethics, morals