Tuesday, July 21, 2015

An Angary Mind: The Two Sides of Anger in Leadership

Sometimes we need to get angry to change the status quo, but control the negative side of it, to improve EQ and leadership maturity.

Leadership is all about change. Anger as an emotion has both positive and negative impact in leadership effectiveness. To be angry, one can be angry at self or another, but in order for that emotion/thought/ feeling to appear, it does not just pop up out of nowhere. Something has to be in the brain of the one angered. That something, or thought form, is the perception. On the positive side, every authentic leader feels sense of anger to see or experience certain dark side of things, because human world is still far away from perfect, such situational emotions will evoke their intention to lead, to change the things, to turn around and discover their purpose to be the change they want to see; but the negative side of anger implies the low EQ, lose the temper easily, or lack of discipline to manage emotions effectively.


Anger can be a catalyst to drive changes: Fear and anger, although undesirable in general, but can be great catalysts also in jolting curiosity and inciting creativity so essential to turnaround undesirable situations. Anger can be positive to create a movement or motion against injustices, and the safety of others. Anger can propel us to make change. Sometimes we need to get angry to change the status quo. Anger and fear forces someone to quickly learn or allowing people to seek the knowledge will allow more critical thinking to develop. The key is that the message or the information conveyed by the leader/messenger must reflect true integrity and transparency. Anger cannot be ignored, it is much too strong of an influence, but leaders have to be careful with it. Leaders who express their anger, carefully and professionally, can improve team unity, lead change, motivate, improve standards, and professionally develop others. They should confront it, be in touch with it, have conversation with their emotions and check and see what their innermost has to say for it. The answers lie within us. All we need to do is seek..and we shall find them.
It is objective to view leadership in its full regalia: fear, anger, blame, resentment, small mindedness, dislike, inspiration, passion, commitment, charisma and out-and-out brilliance. Looking back, it's the examples of brilliance that shine brightest in memory rather than those that left you feeling disappointed and wretched. Those leaders that are brilliant are often kind, self-critical, empowering, unbelievably wise and endlessly patient. The excessive anger leads to destructive darkness. Anger can be terribly destructive and brutal. That is when the source of the anger is lost and one holds onto the emotion or reaction versus deal with the actual situation. “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”  One thing that is true, more often, excessive fear and anger operate on the lowest level and can do little more than create order. When leaders realize that if you want to achieve greatness in your realm, you will have to touch the other levels, thus eliminating fear and anger as options. Once you realize that you have to find other options, you begin to investigate the real motivators like passion and trust. There is no substitute for creating an environment of success.


Escalating anger is growing for all kinds of reasons. Unintended consequences always happen with escalating anger. People cannot think and act objectively when they are emotionally charged with anger. A good strategy for dealing with anger is to prevent yourself from becoming angry in the first place. After all, when you really boil it down to its simplest form, anger is nothing more than you feeling annoyed, irritated, angry about someone or circumstances not turning out the way you want. Leaders cannot suppress their anger because it is such a strong emotion that it will find its way out anyway, and then it cannot be controlled for you gets the brunt of it, or if it can be constructive. Showing that you can control and embrace your emotions will help you demonstrate your stability as a leader; there is a time, place and method for everything.


Now finding reason worthy of one's anger is real hard work. Getting angry occasionally for the reasons worthy of one's anger is OK as being human with different emotions. Now finding reason worthy of one's anger is real hard work. Sometimes, our anger and frustration are caused by very real and inescapable problems in our lives or in the society. Not all anger is misplaced, and often it's a healthy, natural response to these difficulties. There is also a cultural belief that every problem has a solution, and it adds to our frustration to find out that this isn't always the case. The best thing is to bring to such a situation, then, is not to focus on finding the solution, but rather on how to handle and face the problem. And there are some inescapable adverse situations people have to deal with, some more than others. And it's understandable that people would get angry or frustrated in those situations, But in the end, it's the way they think, think about, or perceive things that ultimately determines how they feel, and how strongly. The simple evidence of that can often be found in the fact that people can have different emotional responses to the same event that affects all of them. As the event gets more adverse, people's emotional reactions probably become more similar. Even whether they perceive it as adverse is ultimately determined by the way they think.


"Anger on a hanger."But people can learn to prevent anger. And the way they can do that is to learn to control their cognitive thermostats. Some do it naturally more than others. Anyone can learn to do it better. And the world will be a better place is we start working on prevention instead of simply trying to teach people to manage it once it's happened. One should work to prevent others from being angry at him/herself, and should learn to do so by managing him/herself with the help of the strengths of wisdom and understanding of the powers of knowledge of anger management. Anger MANAGEMENT often largely entails teaching people how to express it, or channel it in healthier, more acceptable ways, potentially productive ways.


Anger is an important emotion as well as reaction. In extreme any emotion and reaction is negative. Anger can get out of control, and covers or masks many emotions. Anger and emotion are controlled by mind or society where you live. It totally depends on the person how he/she perceive/accept the reality. Becoming angry is easy while controlling emotion is difficult. This is very true and to make it a productive emotion or reaction, one needs to really look within it and see what the underlying cause is. The right dose of anger could catalyze the positive changes, but control the negative side of it, to improve EQ and leadership maturity.

0 comments:

Post a Comment