Jan refers to the "white lies" of executives who say they want to
change and then don't. My first take is to not consider them "white
lies" - or worse - but to consider that they are authentic enough in
their desire and lacking in sufficient confidence and understanding.
Also, executives are very often lacking in courage. That is, they
are afraid of other executives and/or of other people in the company.
For the fairly good reason that they are inept at communication and
do not trust authenticity. This does not make them "liars". It just
means that they cannot carry into action what in their more private
conversations they know to be true. What is missing is support that
works for them - not invalidation or demands for "courage". (If we
do the latter, we fall into the exhortation trap that we are
accusing them of.)
And then there are those who tell me that I am naive and that there
is corruption and power and that is dominating the show. To those I
say, "That may be true. However, the only way that I know to deal
with corruption and power is with my own authenticity."
Michael McMaster
Michael@kbddean.demon.co.uk
--Michael McMaster <Michael@kbddean.demon.co.uk>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>