Leadership and change – SCARF way

Social interactions are developed according to the way our brain sees different situations as threats or rewards. If there is an anticipated reward, we go towards it; if there is an anticipated threat, we go away from it. These are known alternatively as toward responses and away responses. Personal development guru Tony Robbins uses this principle to advocate his method to change bad habits.

What are the drivers of the reward and threat responses? Dr. David Rock identified five domains that control social experience (3) and published the findings in the Journal of Neuro Leadership Journal in 2008.

These are:

Status, Certainty, Autonomy, Relatedness, Fairness.

I have found that these principles are already contained in the ideas of Dale Carnegie’s celebrated book ‘How to win friends and influence people,’ which was published nearly 80 years ago without the help of any scientific research like Dr.David. Dale Carnegie was a theoretical psychologist -much like Stephen Hawkins is a theoretical physicist – and Dr. David is the scientist. In a way Dr.David is approving Carnegie’s hypothesis with his neurological findings.

I would elaborate the first of these five domains, namely status, today.

But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell. (Matthew 5:22 NIV)

Isn’t it interesting to read the above biblical verse? It always astounds me think that there is huge hidden wisdom in some of the biblical verses. What happens when you call someone a fool is that neurologically the status of the hearer is reduced and he/ she sees it as a threat situation, the response will be to avoid you.The unfortunate result is that you sadly FAILED the very moment you called this person a fool!

Deceivers know this technique very well. They don’t need to read any book or study neuro science. The principle is already hard wired into our brains already. Soothsayers abound in typical authoritarian leadership situations where most subordinates try to curry favour with the boss by falsely praising him. what they are doing is trying to raise the status of the boss, which is a reward for him. When he is happy, he will naturally help the soothsayers in return.

Now imagine a clever leader using the same technique for correcting wrong behaviour in the team.

He allows the team member to save face. He is aware that oftentimes a direct attempt to correct the behaviour will lead to stubborn denial and even evil plans. The subject may team up with other disgruntled workers to spread rumours, or set you up the leader for failure. Imagine that the clever leader points out the the mistake indirectly and even refers to his own similar mistakes, sometimes totally made-up! This approach has the effect of keeping the status of the offender in tact. He/ she even feels falsely superior to the boss for a time! Little does he realize that the leader is actually cleverly leading him to think like that. The denial and aggression do not show up in this case.

A clever leader will be also able to show the worker a way to improve. He may want to share some tips, but he may make it so subtle that the points will be ‘discovered’ by the subject and may even claim them as his own inventions!

Eventually the offender changes his ways with such an urgency that the team performance improves substantially. Now the clever leader has the last laugh! But he would be laughing to himself and will make sure to compliment the offender for his improvements in public, which is again a status booster for him/ her.

It is difficult to practice, but if you agree with Machiavelli’s principles of power, these are some clever possible additions to them, with a remarkable difference. You can openly talk about this leadership style as a virtue, whereas Machiavelli’s methods are pure evil.

I think some of the 48 tips in the book by Robert Green (1) are gems, but they all appear as evil. Nobody can talk about actually having to practice it, although strangely, everyone uses some of these principles in everyday life, knowingly or unknowingly. Incidentally Machiavelli lived some hundred years before Shakespeare, and guess what the bard of Warwickshire has to say about Machiavelli? ‘A bastard’.

REFERENCES:

1. Robert Green (1998), 48 Laws of Power, Viking Books

An amazing book that substantially improves our understanding of human behaviour.

2. http://www.scarf360.com/about/index.shtml

I came across this link above that explains the SCARF model succinctly.

3. http://www.scarf360.com/files/SCARF-NeuroleadershipArticle.pdf

The original article by Dr. David Rock can be found in the above link. A must-read for those who like to know more.

“First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, and then you win.”

Ever heard of de-Christianized Christendom, or de-Islamized Muslim World, or a de-Buddhizised Buddhist World?

Globe and Mail correspondent Doug Sanders’s recommendation for a peaceful world in his recent book ‘Myth of Muslim World’ boils down to just that.

According to him the first part has already arrived in the West, while it is very inconceivable to expect the second.

I definitely want to agree with him. But that reminds me of Mohandas Gandhi, the famous Indian leader who mobilized the entire nation to rise against their English rulers with peaceful disobedience. Gandhi’s quote is the title of my post.

I am intrigued that the core values of every self-help and managerial best seller nowadays are the same.

All men and women are created equal. Everyone has the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Wisdom and the path of wisdom are the best bet for man. The secret of happiness and fulfillment is right within everyone, there is no need to search elsewhere. The past is history, future is mystery, today is a gift, otherwise called the present. In other words, the past has no influence other than that which one chooses assign to it. Or, in other words, God has forgiven your trespasses, if you also do not hold grudge against others, no matter what. Love, hope and faith (or belief) are the biggest empowering emotions. If one believes, he can move even a mountain by mere wishing (this may be an exaggeration). If one believes, he can heal every sickness. One should wish well for even his enemies. There is nothing that can be achieved by worrying. Living in the present and being alive to the world are the essence of life. If everyone behaved like this, the world will become a New World, which could be called Heaven on Earth.

Now take this metaphor – ‘me and my father are one.’ Another : ‘the observer and the observed are the same single being.’ Yet another simplification: ‘the awareness and the thinker are actually one.’ Well, many recent philosophers like Jiddu Krishnamurthy, Nathaniel Brandon and Eckart Tolle have tried to explain this concept.

I am pleasantly surprised that these are all the core values one would find in Jesus’s teachings. Of course for hundreds of years, they ridiculed him, fought him, but now it is the time of Jesus’s victory. But victory for him is the so-called de-Christianized world! That is what Gandhi mentioned too.

UN Charter of Human Rights, American Declaration of Independence, Canadian Charter of Rights, the code of ethics of every professional body (accounting, engineering, medicine, project management ), the basis of every national constitution, the list goes on… The foundation would certainly be the above inalienable rights and principles. These ‘facts’ have now become adopted as ‘truth’ into the human psyche cutting across every national boundary imaginable. Yet, these principles do not go by the name of Christianity any more, which is the secret of de-Christianized Christendom. Christendom is becoming increasingly pervasive universally and Jesus is winning; but it is a victory that started with ridicule.

 

Stronger Together

This blog post is the part of a six-post series paraphrased from the sermons of Pastor Mark Hughes of the Church of the Rock, Winnipeg in connection with the ‘40-Days of Community’ small-groups initiative. 40-Days of Community is a method of extending love in the way Pastor Rick Warren of Saddleback church has demonstrated. Ideas in this series are not mine, I have only a paraphrasing role. 

One of the indelible images from the 1992 Games: Jim Redmond, right, guided his injured son, Derek, across the finish line in a 400-meter semifinal. Taking up another’s burden is an exemplary community initiative. Even Jesus needed Simon of Cyrene to carry the cross. Picture and the first line courtesy of Wikipedia. 

VERSE OF THE WEEK: 

1 Thessalonians 5:11

New International Version (NIV)

¹¹ Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

God intended us to be interdependent, not independent. There are 58 instances of ‘one another’s in the New Testament. 

David transformed a rag tag men into mighty men from 1 Samuel 22  to 1 Chronicles 11!

1 Samuel 22

New International Version (NIV)

David at Adullam and Mizpah

22 David left Gath and escaped to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and his father’s household heard about it, they went down to him there. ² All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him, and he became their commander. About four hundred men were with him.

1 Chronicles 11

New International Version (NIV)

David’s Mighty Warriors

¹⁰ These were the chiefs of David’s mighty warriors—they, together with all Israel, gave his kingship strong support to extend it over the whole land, as the Lord had promised — ¹¹ this is the list of David’s mighty warriors:

Examples of inter-dependencies:

• First-ever Everest climbing feat of Edmund Hillary in 1953 could not have been possible without his more experienced companion Tensing Norgay. 
•  Olympians, rock stars, actors can’t do the feats alone. 
• Gates’s strategy is not to do it alone, but hire the best candidates even better than himself. 
• Single snow flakes are the most ephemeral of things that would melt in the palm, but once joined into a big mass, it would stop anything -even an oceangoing vessel (like Titanic). 

ACRONYM FOR TODAY – TNT

T- tell them they can do it; N- Never stand alone; T- Take up the burden when they can no longer take it. 

T – Tell : 

 Matthew 10

New International Version (NIV)

As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ ⁸ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy,^[a] drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give.

Jesus was not teaching here, he was motivating the disciples. 

He encouraged, affirmed and empowered them. 

People do amazing things when they are encouraged. Examples: 

• University experiment – endurance of people to stand in bucket of ice doubled in time when cheered on. 
• Writing club in the University of Wisconsin. Two groups were formed – female club called Wranglers always encouraged writers with positive feedbacks,  men’s club called Stranglers always excoriated and eviscerated the writers. In the end the encouragers produced five world class writers, while the Stranglers produced none. 
• Pastor Keith’s son made a dive back into a shallow pool when egged on by onlookers. But he landed flat on water and suffered excruciating pain. When asked why he did it, he said everyone wanted him to do it. 

Even Jesus need affirmation! 

• God spoke to Joshua to be strong and courageous. 
• God calls Gideon ‘mighty man of valour’. 
• Even Jesus was encouraged by God. The voice from heaven said: ” He is my favourite son.’
• Everyone craves for encouragement. 9th graders in a Morris school were asked to write positives about their friends. Many years later one of them died in Vietnam war. But he was discovered carrying the battered piece of paper in which his friends had written words of encouragement. They were precious to him. It was found out in his funeral that most of his old classmates were holding on to these pieces of paper as well. 

We empower children to walk by calling out sweetly to them. 

But later we forget and refuse to encourage our children when they are teenagers. If we did, they would do amazing things. 

N – Never Stand Alone. 

• Samson failed, not because womanizing was his weakness, but because he was a loner, never obeying even his parents.
• David captained 400 ragtag men to make them mighty, but he fell to Bethsada when he sent all of them away to war and when David was alone.
• Daniel 3. ^{16 “}Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to him, “King Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. ¹⁷ If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us^[c] from Your Majesty’s hand. “If they were not three together, they probably would not defy the mighty king. They resisted peer pressure and refused to smoke into crispy critters. \
• Don Bennet lost his one leg in a boating accident; but he later he founded amputee soccer and did even mountain climbing. He attributed the success to others who helped him. 

T- Take up the burden

• Even Jesus had his burden of cross taken off him near Golgotha. Simon helped him. 
• Everyone needs somebody to take their burdens when they can no longer bear it. \
• Derek Redmond was a record holding British sprinter. But in Soul Olympics he could not win. He injured his hamstring and was unable to finish the race. His father helped him to finish the race, which became the subject of one of Olympic committee’s  ’Celebrate Humanity’ videos. 

As a postscript: It is Jim Redmond, not Derek who was selected to carry the 2012 London Olympic torch. 

Shelly, Dylan Thomas and Arundhati Roy: My Take

An young English poet‘s revolutionary outburst against an 1819 English massacre in which he advocates non-violent resistance. Dylan Thomas talks about raging against injustices in mid-twentieth century. Arundhati Roy uses a footprint-less and fingerprint-less character Velutha. I am trying to combine these three treatises into a unified theme with ‘My Take’. Please read through. I will be honored if you would choose to comment. Thanks in advance.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLY (1792-1822)

“Stand ye calm and resolute,

Like a forest close and mute,

With folded arms and looks which are

Weapons of unvanquished war.

And if then the tyrants dare,

Let them ride among you there,

Slash, and stab, and maim and hew,

What they like, that let them do.

With folded arms and steady eyes,

And little fear, and less surprise

Look upon them as they slay

Till their rage has died away

Then they will return with shame

To the place from which they came,

And the blood thus shed will speak

In hot blushes on their cheek.

Rise like Lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number,

Shake your chains to earth like dew

Which in sleep had fallen on you-

Ye are many — they are few.

 

DYLAN THOMAS (1914-53)

Dylan advocates raging against injustice. But what are the tools available to Dylan? Please read.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

 

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

 

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

 

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

MY TAKE

Shelly’s poem seems to suggest he is an advocate of peaceful resistance. In that sense he fed ideas into Gandhi and Mandela; Shelly wasn’t a Gandhi himself.  I don’t think that is his main purpose, though. Why is that? Well, let me explain.

Idea of peaceful resistance was not invented by Gandhi, or even by Shelly: Jesus implanted the metaphor of ‘showing the other cheek’. So all are followers of Jesus- Shelly, Gandhi, Mandela and all!

Shelly died young, was he murdered? Also Keats and Byron, who were contemporaries, died young too! They were three too many young men dying  to be coincidences.

The poem itself wasn’t published until after Shelly’s death, fearing reprisals!

I am reminded of Chinese activist Wei Wei, Danish cartoonists, Indian painter Hussain.

Thomas’s poem reminds me the plight of sensitive poets. Rage, rage against dying of light: don’t go gently accepting your predicament even if it is the end of your life.

I am reminded of God of Small Things. Author Roy uses special tools to describe the character Velutha, a man without finger prints, who doesn’t leave foot prints on sand. Velutha raged in his youth as a communist activist, but when he was up against the brutal system, he chose to be fingerprint-less and footprint-less.

Isn’t Thomas saying: “DON’T EVER DO THAT; RAGE-RAGE-RAGE.” But he is not clear what the tools with which to rage are. Peace or Violence – Thomas either doesn’t know or doesn’t make it clear. This is the plight of sensitive poets: all they know is to rage-rage. It may be futile, darkness may be temporarily right, but they do want to keep up the rage.

Shelly’s attitude seems to approve Velutha’s methods of fingerprint-less and footprint-less passing out into oblivion. But he is hoping that the sacrifice would rise like Lion later to humble the oppressors. In that context, is Shelly actually looking for creating powerful symbols or martys as rallying point for larger  number of activists ?

Thomas actually wrote the poem when his father was dying. But it was not written for his father . Thomas probably wants his readers to RAGE, RAGE like Shelly’s Lion. But there is no sacrifice involved in Thomas’s poem and hence the symbolism is not powerful enough. He is appealing to the intellect of the people to rage, whereas Shelly is hoping that the emotional appeal of innocent sacrifice would provoke people to action.  Life is too precious to be thrown away. But Shelly lost it anyhow on the altar of radical thinking.

NOW TO THE IMPORTANT PART – WHAT ARE YOUR VIEWS?

 

Easter message for Tiger Woods

This long weekend of Good Friday and Easter is the lasting and almost the last legacy of Christianity in many countries that were traditionally ‘Christian’. Now it is a time of merry making and outdoor fun, weather permitting.

I have three lines of thoughts to share on this day. The first line of thought centers on historicity of Christian beliefs.

The historic Jesus and the Jesus of the modern religious institutions are not exactly the same. Disputes have appeared among followers of Jesus at various times right from the days of the apostles. Disputes have been resolved at what were known as synods. The very first synod is known as the Synod of Jerusalem, which was attended by the apostles Paul and Peter themselves among others. The chief dispute at the time was whether circumcision was necessary for gentiles to be accepted in Christianity and whether Jewish restrictions on eating foods such as pork could be waived. Both were permitted with the exception that food sacrificed to idols shouldn’t be eaten.

The next dispute resolution occurred at the behest of Constantine in 325 AD at Nicea where the foundation of modern Christian beliefs was laid out, especially in terms of accepting Jesus’s divinity and the trinity and also the selection of books to be included in the bible. By that time there were so many old books available to choose from including some written in second century that were at variance with the currently adopted gospels. At the time of this synod churches of Rome, Alexandria and Antioch where all of equal status. Church of Jerusalem where Christianity originated almost came to naught by then. There have been other disputes and synods too. One point of contention was iconoclasm or making of idols, which was approved.

All kinds of beliefs about Jesus were rampant during the first few centuries in and around Jerusalem so much so  Prophet Mohammed was influenced by some of them during his trade visits there as a boy assisting his uncle.

The second line of thought I want to share is about the events of Jesus’s death and resurrection as told in the gospels. As a boy I have grown up following most of the biblical stories relating to these events, but little did I realize the sequence of events and their relative importance in the big salvation picture. In fact a book titled “The Historic Jesus” or similar title so many years back was also only speculating why Jesus had to be killed by Jews. I clearly recall the book saying that it was a mystery for what immediate reason the Jews wanted to kill him on Passover day. Now I have a better idea of this sequence, starting with resurrection of Lazar, anointing of Jesus by a woman as a portentous funeral rite, riding into Jerusalem on a donkey to tumultuous welcome, melee at the temple where he drove away the traders, secret Passover meal, Gethsemane, Judas’ kiss, night-long trial, 3pm – crucifixion and 3rd day-resurrection. These events all occurred in the space of just over a week and a substantial portion of each of the synoptic gospels deals with these events. Even the word rebellion, ceremonial release of a prisoner like Barabbas and the ‘thieves’ crucified on right and left of Jesus have a unifying theme of constant rebellion of Jews against Roman occupation. If the reader doesn’t find a cohesive story running through all of the above sub-stories, and if he is interested, I could help further. Please let me know using  ’comments’! Whether or not Jesus came back to life is central to the theme of gospels; many books have been written recently to claim success with the investigation into the truth of resurrection. Having said that, I do not think that today the resurrection is a major millstone for christian faith. The reasons for saying that constitute my third line of thought.

My third line of thought today is the most important, though. This is about the relevance of Christianity today and for the future. Regardless of how Christology evolved, Jesus as preached today is my hero! I believe his memory and teachings has an enduring value. The memes such as supreme sacrifice, all encompassing love and hope for the future are so powerful and real that anyone who invokes those thoughts has a very strong tool in his hands. Churches may be losing attendance over North America and Europe now, but a different type of Christendom is being increasingly accepted knowingly or unknowingly by almost everyone, superimposing itself on the existing political and geographic mosaic of the world. I do not talk about literal religious conversion; rather, I do talk about the acceptance of memes or precincts such as love, forgiveness, minimalism, sacrifice, faith and hope as a universality.

The self-check mechanisms of our society are becoming so much more and more robust that even celebrity superstars like Tiger Woods or politicians like Clinton and Dominique Strauss Kahn are finding themselves in a bind for sexual promiscuity. Human rights watchdogs are working everywhere with electronic eyes and ears, ever ready to pick up a violation of hallowed principles that, believe it or not, match with Jesus’s teachings. Therefore, I contend that, contrary to popular belief, Jesus’s story is becoming more relevant today, albeit not in church attendance.