How many times have you heard the saying, 'misery enjoys company'?
Apparently, this is widely-accepted as a fact of the human condition. And, it has been accepted for quite some time.
Many years ago, I argued that ‘company enjoys misery’ too. I mean, some people get a kick out of knowing others are worse off…as if being less worse off than those unfortunate creatures is a consolation prize. But, I do not argue that anymore. I mean, aside from making the point clear again here in this paragraph I do not argue that anymore.
But, I will argue the following points.
For one reason or another, lots of people have the habit of sharing their stories of woe.
If we sat these people down and asked them if sharing woes is a Good Habit or a Bad Habit I expect the vast majority of people would state, “That’s a Bad Habit”. They might even add, “People who spend time dealing with stories of woe are doing nothing positive or constructive. Those discussions do not bring people closer to their personal goals or to their business goals.”
People know the time is wasted.
People know that damage is done.
Yet, people do it anyhow.
And, some people do a lot of it!
The Bottom Line: Negativity consumes a great deal of people’s lives. It consumes a great deal of business people’s work-lives. It may be consuming a great of your followers’ work-lives.
Every one of us engages in negativity to some degree.
The Leader’s challenge is to minimize that negativity.
Again, the Leader enjoys a unique opportunity – leading by example.
Leaders can lead by example by making a conscious effort to refrain from collecting other people's garbage. Leaders must also work to refrain from dumping garbage on others.
This is one area where leading by example is absolutely within the Leader’s control: the Leader has an exclusive opportunity to send out visible signals of self-confidence and interpersonal harmony.