The World Sikh Organization is about six years old. After going through some tough infancy years, the organization has now established its roots and credibility in the eyes of the general public and the politicians. Despite many successful public relations project, a segment of the Sikh population continues to criticize the organization for not doing enough. We all come under increased pressure to respond. For the good of the Panth and the Sikh cause we at WSO have always felt that managing the critics is more appropriate then criticizing others.
Those who are able to manage their critics eventually succeed in their goals and those who get entangled in petty tongue lashing, eventually fail and lead their organization to disaster. In this article, I would like to touch on some of the basic criteria needed to manage critics.
Good leaders or managers have similar strengths. Those who know that jealousy is “more self-love than hate” can often incorporate jealous rivals into their plans, confident that regardless of personal feelings, these persons will eventually identify with an organizational objective, in our case Panthic cause, and work for the good of the community. The wise manager tries to build relationships that will permit coworkers to work well with their peers despite antagonistic feelings toward him or her. Thus too, the wise leader must build harmony within the group.
Both leaders and managers know they are going to be hit with criticism. In the wider social context, David Ben Gurian termed this as the test of democracy and James Russell Lowell saw criticism as “wise skepticism”. But many leaders are inclined to share Mark Twain’s sentiment that criticism is the “most degraded of all trades” often more injurious than helpful.
It should be remembered, however, that organization decisions are usually made on a series of assumptions and paucity of facts. Add the elements of time constraint and risk, and it becomes obvious that some judgement will be less than perfect if not clearly wrong thus inviting critical reaction. It is these imperfect decisions made by Sikh leaders which attract the most criticism although it must be noted that the seemingly most perfect of all decisions, always have some critics.
Of course such reaction ranges from friendly and helpful advice, to outright abuse. At midrange, it is often difficult to determine whether criticism is helpful or abusive. Many executives confuse productive criticism with negativism and fail to give their decision making process sufficient time to digest well-meaning and constructive criticism. Thus, they soon tire of what they perceive as mere “sniping” by their peers. In short, they fail to respond effectively to pressure.
Leaders generally choose a life filled with pressures, voluntarily. Harry Truman’s famous dictum “if you can’t stand the heat…” fits well here. The managerial side of leadership responds to the heat by good planning, honest negotiations and well established priorities thus absorbing the pressure for action on matters that cannot be dealt with immediately.
In conclusion, the demands of leadership are heavy; the true Sikh leader must be able to rise above the emotional vindictiveness of others; to accept accountability for the unforeseeable; to pitch headlong into the swirling threatening currents of change and react effectively and quickly always keeping in mind that criticism in any scope of life is inevitable. It is only the good leader who can distinguish between constructive criticism and act on it, and ignore the negative criticism which has no merit.
The World Sikh Organization with your participation and support, holds these philosophies very Crucial to its day to day operations. The success of the organization reflects the importance of these ideals, I thank you all for your support.
Courtesy The Sword
Article extracted from this publication >> June 29, 1990
