There’s one very important principle that we hold to steadfastly at Technalink. It is the idea that there is a world of difference between being organized and being controlling. One is essential for business, while the other can quickly avalanche into failure. It’s not something that compassionate leader would engage in, and here’s why.
An Understandable Anxiety
Both professionally and personally, the term “control freak” is often thrown around. It’s used to describe somebody that feels a need to control as many variables in their sphere of influence as possible and this can, unfortunately, mean other people and even how they work and behave.
It’s easy to see why some people become control freaks. If you’ve ever had anything bad happen to you, you’ve often felt that it was because of circumstances you had no influence over. You then come to the understandable conclusion that if you just had control over those influences, bad things wouldn’t happen.
Where this becomes a problem is when that need to avoid worry and anxiety becomes, itself, a thing out of control, as a person seeks to control every single thing they can. Suddenly, the way another person works is something they want to change to their exact specifications, even the way they speak, present themselves, and a host of other factors are now something that are micro-managed by the control freak.
In other words, by attempting to seize control, a control freak deprives others of their own control, thus causing a negative feedback loop that can end very badly for everyone involved. A compassionate leader does not control others. A compassionate leader collaborates, allowing others to work in a natural, orderly fashion according to what the business needs, not any one individual, including the boss.
Be a compassionate leader that understands that sometimes the best results come not from trying to control others but giving that control to the others who are qualified to do exactly what you hired them to!
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