Pride

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  direction of least resistance is downwards, that would be no reason for its not being upwards now and then. Just so with our voluntary acts of attention. They are momentary arrests, coupled with a peculiar feeling, or portions of the stream. But the arresting force, instead of being this peculiar feeling itself, may be nothing but the processes by which the collision is produced. The feeling of effort may be 'an accompaniment,' as Mr. Bradley says,' more or less superfluous,' and no more contribute to the result than the pain in a man's finger, when a hammer falls on it, contributes to the hammer's weight. Thus the notion that our effort in attending is an original faculty, a force additional to the others of which brain and mind are the seat, may be an abject superstition. Attention may have to go, like many a faculty once deemed essential, like many a verbal phantom, like many an idol of the tribe. It may be an excrescence on Psychology. No need of it to drag ideas before consciousness or fix them, when we see how perfectly they drag and fix each other there. I have stated the effect-theory as persuasively as I can.[378] It is a clear, strong, well-equipped conception, and like all such, is fitted to carry conviction, where there is no contrary proof. The feeling of effort certainly may be an inert accompaniment and not the active element which it seems. No measurements are as yet performed (it is safe to say none ever will be performed) which can show that it contributes energy to the result. We may then regard attention as a superfluity, or a 'Luxus,' and dogmatize against its causal function with no feeling in our hearts but one of pride that we are applying Occam's razor to an entity that has multiplied itself 'beyond necessity.' But Occam's razor, though a very good rule of method, is certainly no law of nature. The laws of stimulation and of association may well be indispensable actors in all attention's performances, and may even be a good enough 'stock-company' to carry on many performances without aid; and yet they may at times simply form the background for a 'star-performer,' who is no more their 'inert accompaniment' or their 'incidental product' than Hamlet is Horatio's and Ophelia's. Such a star-performer would be the voluntary effort to attend, if it were an original psychic force. Nature may , I say, indulge in these complications; and the conception that she has done so in this case is, I think, just as clear (if not as 'parsimonious' logically) as the conception that she has not. To justify this assertion, let us ask just what the effort to attend would effect if it were an original force. It would deepen and prolong the stay in consciousness of innumerable ideas which else would fade more quickly away. The delay thus gained might not be more than a second in duration—but that second might be critical ;

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  stream of consciousness, with its lapses of memory, cannot possibly be as 'responsible' as a soul which is at the judgment day all that it ever was. To modern readers, however, who are less insatiate for retribution than their grandfathers, this argument will hardly be as convincing as it seems once to have been. One great use of the Soul has always been to account for, and at the same time to guarantee, the closed individuality of each personal consciousness. The thoughts of one soul must unite into one self, it was supposed, and must be eternally insulated from those of every other soul. But we have already begun to see that, although unity is the rule of each man's consciousness, yet in some individuals, at least, thoughts may split away from the others and form separate selves. As for insulation, it would be rash, in view of the phenomena of thought-transference, mesmeric influence and spirit-control, which are being alleged nowadays on better authority than ever before, to be too sure about that point either. The definitively closed nature of our personal consciousness is probably an average statistical resultant of many conditions, but not an elementary force or fact; so that, if one wishes to preserve the Soul, the less he draws his arguments from that quarter the better. So long as our self, on the whole, makes itself good and practically maintains itself as a closed individual, why, as Lotze says, is not that enough? And why is the being -an-individual in some inaccessible metaphysical way so much prouder an achievement?[275] My final conclusion, then, about the substantial Soul is that it explains nothing and guarantees nothing. Its successive thoughts are the only intelligible and verifiable things about it, and definitely to ascertain the correlations of these with brain-processes is as much as psychology can empirically do. From the metaphysical point of view, it is true that one may claim that the correlations have a rational ground; and if the word Soul could be taken to mean merely some such vague problematic ground, it would be unobjectionable. But the trouble is that it professes to give the ground in positive terms of a very dubiously credible sort. I therefore feel entirely free to discard the word Soul from the rest of this book. If I ever use it, it will be in the vaguest and most popular way. The reader who finds any comfort in the idea of the Soul, is, however, perfectly free to continue to believe in it; for our reasonings have not established the non-existence of the Soul; they have only proved its superfluity for scientific purposes. The next theory of the pure Self to which we pass is The Associationist Theory. Locke paved the way for it by the hypothesis he suggested of the same substance having two successive consciousnesses, or of the same consciousness being supported by more than one substance. He made his readers feel that the important unity of the Self was

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  of the volume, however, I may permit myself to revert again to the doubts here provisionally mooted, and will indulge in some metaphysical reflections suggested by them. At present, then, the only conclusion I come to is the following: That (in some persons at least) the part of the innermost Self which is most vividly felt turns out to consist for the most part of a collection of cephalic movements of 'adjustments' which, for want of attention and reflection, usually fail to be perceived and classed as what they are; that over and above these there is an obscurer feeling of something more; but whether it be of fainter physiological processes, or of nothing objective at all, but rather of subjectivity as such, of thought become 'its own object,' must at present remain an open question,—like the question whether it be an indivisible active soul-substance, or the question whether it be a personification of the pronoun I, or any other of the guesses as to what its nature may be. Farther than this we cannot as yet go clearly in our analysis of the Self's constituents. So let us proceed to the emotions of Self which they arouse. 2. SELF-FEELING. These are primarily self-complacency and self-dissatisfaction . Of what is called 'self-love,' I will treat a little farther on. Language has synonyms enough for both primary feelings. Thus pride, conceit, vanity, self-esteem, arrogance, vainglory, on the one hand; and on the other modesty, humility, confusion, diffidence, shame, mortification, contrition, the sense of obloquy and personal despair. These two opposite classes of affection seem to be direct and elementary endowments of our nature. Associationists would have it that they are, on the other hand, secondary phenomena arising from a rapid computation of the sensible pleasures or pains to which our prosperous or debased personal predicament is likely to lead, the sum of the represented pleasures forming the self-satisfaction, and the sum of the represented pains forming the opposite feeling of shame. No doubt, when we are self-satisfied, we do fondly rehearse all possible rewards for our desert, and when in a fit of self-despair we forebode evil. But the mere expectation of reward is not the self-satisfaction, and the mere apprehension of the evil is not the self-despair, for there is a certain average tone of self-feeling which each one of us carries about with him, and which is independent of the objective reasons we may have for satisfaction or discontent. That is, a very meanly-conditioned man may abound in unfaltering conceit, and one whose success in life is secure and who is esteemed by all may remain diffident of his powers to the end. One may say, however, that the normal provocative of self-feeling is one's actual success or failure, and the good or bad actual position one holds in the world. "He put in his thumb and pulled out a plum, and said what a good boy am I." A man with a broadly extended empirical Ego, with powers

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  form of a brain-cell played upon from two directions. Whilst the object excites it from without, other brain-cells, or perhaps spiritual forces, arouse it from within. The latter influence is the 'adaptation of the attention.' The plenary energy of the brain-cell demands the co-operation of both factors : not when merely present, but when both present and attended to, is the object fully perceived. A few additional experiences will now be perfectly clear. Helmholtz, for instance, adds this observation to the passage we quoted a while ago concerning the stereoscopic pictures lit by the electric spark. "These experiments," he says, "are interesting as regards the part which attention plays in the matter of double images. . . . For in pictures so simple that it is relatively difficult for me to see them double, I can succeed in seeing them double, even when the illumination is only instantaneous, the moment I strive to imagine in a lively way how they ought then to look . The influence of attention is here pure; for all eye movements are shut out."[363] In another place[364] the same writer says: "When I have before my eyes a pair of stereoscopic drawings which are hard to combine, it is difficult to bring the lines and points that correspond, to cover each other, and with every little motion of the eyes they glide apart. But if I chance to gain a lively mental image (Anschauungsbild ) of the represented solid form (a thing that often occurs by lucky chance), I then move my two eyes with perfect certainty over the figure without the picture separating again." Again, writing of retinal rivalry, Helmholtz says: "It is not a trial of strength between two sensations, but depends on our fixing or failing to fix the attention. Indeed, there is scarcely any phenomenon so well fitted for the study of the causes which are capable of determining the attention. It is not enough to form the conscious intention of seeing first with one eye then with the other; we must form as clear a notion as possible of what we expect to see. Then it will actually appear ."[365] [image file=Image00042.jpg] In figures 37 and 38, where the result is ambiguous, we can make the change from one apparent form to the other by imagining strongly in advance the form we wish to see. Similarly in those puzzles where certain lines in a picture form by their combination an object that has no connection with what the picture ostensibly represents; or indeed in every case where an object is inconspicuous and hard to discern from the background; we may not be able to see it for a long time; but, having once seen it, we can attend to it again whenever we like, on account of the mental duplicate of it which our imagination now bears. In the meaningless French words 'pas de lieu Rhône que nous, ' who can recognize immediately the English 'paddle your own canoe'?[366] But

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  There is a normal type of character, for example, in which impulses seem to discharge so promptly into movements that inhibitions get no time to arise. These are the 'dare-devil' and 'mercurial' temperaments, overflowing with animation, and fizzling with talk, which are so common in the Latin and Celtic races, and with which the cold-blooded and long-headed English character forms so marked a contrast. Monkeys these people seem to us, whilst we seem to them reptilian. It is quite impossible to judge, as between an obstructed and an explosive individual, which has the greatest sum of vital energy. An explosive Italian with good perception and intellect will cut a figure as a perfectly tremendous fellow, on an inward capital that could be tucked away inside of an obstructed Yankee and hardly let you know that it was there. He will be king of his company, sing all the songs and make all the speeches, lead the parties, carry out the practical jokes, kiss all the girls, fight the men, and, if need be, lead the forlorn hopes and enterprises, so that an onlooker would think he has more life in his little finger than can exist in the whole body of a correct judicious fellow. But the judicious fellow all the while may have all these possibilities and more besides, ready to break out in the same or even a more violent way, if only the brakes were taken off. It is the absence of scruples, of consequences, of considerations, the extraordinary simplification of each moment's mental outlook, that gives to the explosive individual such motor energy and ease; it need not be the greater intensity of any of his passions, motives, or thoughts. As mental evolution goes on, the complexity of human consciousness grows ever greater, and with it the multiplication of the inhibitions to which every impulse is exposed. But this predominance of inhibition has a bad as well as a good side; and if a man's impulses are in the main orderly as well as prompt, if he has courage to accept their consequences, and intellect to lead them to a successful end, he is all the better for his hair-trigger organization, and for not being 'sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought.' Many of the most successful military and revolutionary characters in history have belonged to this simple but quick-witted impulsive type. Problems come much harder to reflective and inhibitive minds. They can, it is true, solve much vaster problems; and they can avoid many a mistake to which the men of impulse are exposed. But when the latter do not make mistakes, or when they are always able to retrieve them, theirs is one of the most engaging and indispensable of human types.[487]

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  But whilst eliminating the question about the amount of our efforts as one which psychology will never have a practical call to decide, I must say one word about the extraordinarily intimate and important character which the phenomenon of effort assumes in our own eyes as individual men. Of course we measure ourselves by many standards. Our strength and our intelligence, our wealth and even our good luck, are things which warm our heart and make us feel ourselves a match for life. But deeper than all such things, and able to suffice unto itself without them, is the sense of the amount of effort which we can put forth. Those are, after all, but effects, products, and reflections of the outer world within. But the effort seems to belong to an altogether different realm, as if it were the substantive thing which we are, and those were but externals which we carry. If the 'searching of our heart and reins' be the purpose of this human drama, then what is sought seems to be what effort we can make. He who can make none is but a shadow; he who can make much is a hero. The huge world that girdles us about puts all sorts of questions to us, and tests us in all sorts of ways. Some of the tests we meet by actions that are easy, and some of the questions we answer in articulately formulated words. But the deepest question that is ever asked admits of no reply but the dumb turning of the will and tightening of our heartstrings as we say, "Yes, I will even have it so!" When a dreadful object is presented, or when life as a whole turns up its dark abysses to our view, then the worthless ones among us lose their hold on the situation altogether, and either escape from its difficulties by averting their attention, or if they cannot do that, collapse into yielding masses of plaintiveness and fear. The effort required for facing and consenting to such objects is beyond their power to make. But the heroic mind does differently. To it, too, the objects are sinister and dreadful, unwelcome, incompatible with wished-for things. But it can face them if necessary, without for that losing its hold upon the rest of life. The world thus finds in the heroic man its worthy match and mate; and the effort which he is able to put forth to hold himself erect and keep his heart unshaken is the direct measure of his worth and function in the game of human life. He can stand this Universe. He can meet it and keep up his faith in it in presence of those same features which lay his weaker brethren low. He can still find a zest in it, not by 'ostrich-like forgetfulness,' but by pure inward willingness to face the world with those deterrent objects there. And hereby he becomes one of the masters and the lords of life. He must be counted with henceforth; he forms a part of human destiny. Neither in the theoretic nor in the practical sphere do we care for, or go for help to, those who have no head for risks, or sense for living on the perilous edge. Our religious life lies more, our practical life lies less, that it used to, on the perilous edge. But just as our courage is so often a reflex of another's courage, so our faith is apt to be, as Max Müller somewhere says, a faith in some one else's faith. We draw new life from the heroic example. The prophet has drunk more deeply than anyone of the cup of bitterness, but his countenance is so unshaken and he speaks such mighty words of cheer that his will becomes our will, and our life is kindled at his own.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  that have uniformly brought him success, with place and wealth and friends and fame, is not likely to be visited by the morbid diffidences and doubts about himself which he had when he was a boy. "Is not this great Babylon, which I have planted?"[262] Whereas he who has made one blunder after another, and still lies in middle life among the failures at the foot of the hill, is liable to grow all sicklied o'er with self-distrust, and to shrink from trials with which his powers can really cope. The emotions themselves of self-satisfaction and abasement are of a unique sort, each as worthy to be classed as a primitive emotional species as are, for example, rage or pain. Each has its own peculiar physiognomical expression. In self-satisfaction the extensor muscles are innervated, the eye is strong and glorious, the gait rolling and elastic, the nostril dilated, and a peculiar smile plays upon the lips. This whole complex of symptoms is seen in an exquisite way in lunatic asylums, which always contain some patients who are literally mad with conceit, and whose fatuous expression and absurdly strutting or swaggering gait is in tragic contrast with their lack of any valuable personal quality. It is in these same castles of despair that we find the strongest examples of the opposite physiognomy, in good people who think they have committed 'the unpardonable sin' and are lost forever, who crouch and cringe and slink from noticean, d are unable to speak aloud or look us in the eye. Like fear and like anger, in similar morbid conditions, these opposite feelings of Self may be aroused with no adequate exciting cause. And in fact we ourselves know how the barometer of our self-esteem and confidence rises and falls from one day to another through causes that seem to be visceral and organic rather than rational, and which certainly answer to no corresponding variations in the esteem in which we are held by our friends. Of the origin of these emotions in the race, we can speak better when we have treated of— 3. SELF-SEEKING AND SELF-PRESERVATION. These words cover a large number of our fundamental instinctive impulses. We have those of bodily self-seeking , those of social self-seeking , and those of spiritual self-seeking . All the ordinary useful reflex actions and movements of alimentation and defence are acts of bodily self-preservation. Fear and anger prompt to acts that are useful in the same way. Whilst if by self-seeking we mean the providing for the future as distinguished from maintaining the present, we must class both anger and fear with the hunting, the acquisitive, the home-constructing and the tool-constructing instincts, as impulses to self-seeking of the bodily kind. Really, however, these latter instincts, with amativeness, parental fondness, curiosity and emulation, seek not only the development of the bodily Self, but that of the material Self in the widest possible sense of the word. Our social self-seeking , in turn, is carried on directly

• From Story of O (1954)

  marks, O derived a feeling of inordinate pride. Had Jacqueline been there, instead of trying to conceal from her the fact that she bore them, as she had tried to hide the traces of the welts raised by the riding crop which Sir Stephen had wielded during those last days before her departure, she would have gone running in search of Jacqueline, to show them to her. But Jacqueline was not due back for another week. René wasn't there. During that week, O, at Sir Stephen's behest, had several summer dresses made, and a number of evening gowns of a very light material. He allowed her only two models, but let her order variations on both: one with a zipper all the way down the front (O already had several like it), the other a full skirt, easy to lift, always with a corselet above, which came up to below the breasts and was worn with a high-necked bolero. All one had to do was remove the bolero and the shoulders and breasts were bare, or simply to open it if one desired to see the breasts. Bathing suits, of course, were out of the question; the nether irons would hang below the suit. Sir Stephen had told her that this summer she would have to swim naked whenever she went swimming. Beach slacks were also out. However, Anne-Marie, who was responsible for the two basic models of dresses, knowing where Sir Stephen's preference lay in using O, had proposed a type of slacks which would be supported in front by the blouse and, on both sides, have long zippers, thus allowing the back flap to be lowered without taking off the slacks. But Sir Stephen refused. It was true that he used O, when he did not have recourse to her mouth, almost invariably as he would have a boy. But O had had ample opportunity to notice that when she was near him, even when he did not particularly desire her, he loved to take hold of and tug at her fleece with his hand, to pry her open and burrow at length within. The pleasure O derived from holding Jacqueline in much the same way, moist and burning between her locked fingers, was ample evidence and a guarantee of Sir Stephen's pleasure. She understood why he did not want any extraneous obstacles set in the path of that pleasure.

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  Funny that research also shows some 65 percent of today’s workers feel shortchanged when it comes to receiving individualized feedback from their bosses. To offer constructive feedback, we steer leaders away from the commonly recommended “sandwich” approach of offering a negative between two positives. In these cases, the constructive suggestions can get suffocated under a pillow full of praise, or employees may focus only on the negatives. No, the best constructive feedback includes specific ideas for improvement, instead of generalities, along with meaningful praise in the right measure. One of our coaching clients admitted he had never been good at giving feedback but was game to try again. One of his first attempts was with an employee who had been missing some deadlines. He recounted to us a private conversation with her. He said, “I’ve noticed some changes in the way you are working and your results over the past few weeks. I know how focused and driven you normally are, so I wanted to see if there was anything at all you are having trouble with that I could help with.” That was terrific, we told him. He got to the point and acknowledged the issue openly without hedging, but he also let her know how valued her work was to the team. He also offered to work together with her to fix the problem. The employee admitted to some personal struggles outside the job, and the manager was able to empathize. After listening, he offered her a couple of afternoons off to address the challenges, and together they worked on prioritizing her assignments for the coming weeks. They kept meeting weekly, and soon after she delivered a project ahead of time. We encouraged him to publicly reward that achievement, and he did in his next staff meeting. He said how proud she’d been to share with the team how she’d pulled off the win. When we ask leaders why they aren’t living up to their employees’ expectations in giving clear feedback, they often tell us that it is not only uncomfortable but time-consuming. “No one wants to hear what they are doing wrong,” they say. We understand. We had an employee in our corporate days who we tried to coach to collaborate better with his peers, but the fellow didn’t believe he had a problem. He was a friend of the CEO, so we had to tread lightly. In our next coaching session, we gave him specifics about the kind of behaviors we were expecting, and we offered facts about when he hadn’t lived up to expectations with actual things said about him by peers around the company (with their permission). The employee was still skeptical. Why hadn’t these colleagues told him themselves?

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  If people complain [about his hours] or you pick up on gossip, head it off at the pass. Say, ‘I encourage you to pay attention to what people are accomplishing and contributing as opposed to the sheer number of hours they work.’” Reallocating work and dispersing tasks among team members takes time and effort, typically several hours in a manager’s week. It involves thinking critically about who is getting overloaded, who is motivated by what, who needs an opportunity to develop, and what our priorities are right now. Achieving balance is never easy, and never perfect. It’s inevitable that at any given time, a few people will be doing a disproportionate amount of work. But the key is to ensure that no one person is overloaded all the time. That kind of effort on the part of a manager can greatly reduce stress levels for everyone. Kyle Arteaga, CEO of The Bulleit Group, points to one example from early in his career when he headed up a team at Reuters. He managed a star performer named Janice. A high-profile and interesting assignment arose, and Arteaga’s impulse was to hand it to Janice. Before, however, he had a candid one-on-one with her to find out what was currently on her plate and if she could handle this new project. “I also encouraged her to talk to her clients and team members to determine if this additional work would fit into her schedule.” Janice was able to take on the extra work, but Arteaga helped her be strategic about other tasks that came her way after to avoid pushing her too far toward burnout. “Sometimes, she would purposefully put herself on the bench to wait for a better opportunity around the corner,” he said. “I helped her assess opportunities.” This process is made easier by having team members participate in setting the balance as part of a team effort. Admittedly this can be tricky. If you asked a random group of employees, most will tell you they are pulling their own weight, and then some. Typically, the ones who will agree to take on additional assignments are the Janices—those who are already carrying more than their fair share. It’s also true that few employees will want to inconvenience their fellow teammates by dumping their work on them. Yet we have found that teams can work together very effectively when everyone engages in regular load-balancing discussions. During the meetings, managers typically should assume the role of facilitator (guiding the discussion and ensuring everyone is involved) or assign someone to the role who can effectively run the meeting. At a minimum, the team leader should have all possible facts and figures at hand to help adjudicate and make workloads fairer (e.g., Todd took on the last two new projects, let’s give someone else a turn , or Sarah, you just ended your assignment with IT, do you have bandwidth now? ).

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  And their manager is there to help them succeed. Method 5: Team Them UpAnother method for helping perfectionists recognize their tendencies and work to change is to pair them up with employees who don’t have the problem. We heard a terrific example of this from a manager we spoke with. Liz told us one of her sales reps, Sara, was driving her mad with an attention to detail that was not necessary. For example, when it came to her monthly sales reports, Sara’s were far more elaborate than Liz needed—including pages of graphs and charts of her sales mix. Liz sat Sara down on several occasions to explain that kind of detail wasn’t necessary and was more than any manager could process. Liz wanted her charge to spend her extra time doing more prospecting calls; Sara’s cold calls were below average for the team. The months went by, however, and Sara kept turning in reports that way. When challenged, she would say, “I don’t mind. It helps me to look at things in this way.” In truth, Sara couldn’t help herself. Having realized she would need to take a different approach, Liz applied a strategy that proved more effective. When she found Sara bogged down on unnecessary activities in her work, she paired her with less detail-oriented partners so she would be forced to accept “good enough” results to get the task done by deadline. And, as she began to be praised for her team-oriented, on-time work, Sara began to slowly change. Liz also continued to meet with Sara regularly to help her with her self-awareness. Instead of challenging her to change, Liz invited Sara to be actively involved in her coaching and think of ways that she could improve her sense of urgency on projects and where to devote the bulk of her time. With patience, said Liz, the result has been a salesperson who now has increased confidence and self-awareness, and is getting a lot more done. Method 6: Discuss the Issue OpenlyTalking with people about such personal issues as being a perfectionist can be quite uncomfortable, we know. But with the right approach, an honest discussion can really open people’s eyes to the issue, and then, with that recognition, make headway. Many people who suffer from perfectionism don’t see that’s the case. Benjamin Cherkasky is a great example. It took him years, and a graduate degree in counseling psychology from Northwestern, to help him spot his tendencies. The best way we’ve found to help employees see the problem, and for managers to talk with them about it, is to kindly acknowledge that they clearly like to get things right and that’s appreciated. Since discussing the problem that someone seems to be somewhat perfectionistic can lead them to be defensive, the phrasing is important.

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  Your native genius is finding potential pitfalls. What a terrific thing to have someone on the team who can find holes in our plans, who can look at the underbelly.” While some managers might lament that Brian was a downer, a talent magnet would market his native genius to the team as a quality they needed. “We are going to use Brian whenever we are considering launching something major.” Adds Wiseman, this creates a real appreciation of diversity, and becomes incredibly engaging for the employee. “It’s a pretty good gig when you can go to work and your boss and peers understand and appreciate your natural brilliance,” she said. “And when a boss does that, she earns the right to say, ‘You know, Brian, we also could use a little more from you here,’ or ‘I need you to do this differently.’” The results for talent magnets can be astonishing, and they become widely recognized around a company. Ryan Westwood, CEO of Simplus, told us proudly of one of his employees: “He was in our marketing group as a graphic designer. He said he’d like to dip his toe into Salesforce consulting and get a certification. Two years later, he was the most certified person we had, with twenty-four, and he was considered one of the top one hundred Salesforce architects in the world. He became director of our solution department and started building intellectual property. All this because he was interested and ambitious and we opened up possibilities for him.” In contrast, one of Adrian’s first jobs after earning his undergraduate degree was at a monthly magazine where he was hired as an editorial assistant. The promotion structure had been in place since the days of Gutenberg (it seemed). Editors were expected to remain in a role for about seven years, advancing like the march of a regimented clock from editorial assistant to assistant editor to associate editor. When he expressed interest in learning more and growing—he had an interest in leadership—Adrian was told the only opportunity for a higher-level job was to become the assistant managing editor, typically in your fifties, and then hope that the managing editor would quit or retire. He stayed only a short time and moved on to a company with actual opportunities, where those with ambition could aspire to follow their motivators. To best understand what drives your people, we recommend having them take the Motivators Assessment, or at the very least take the time to observe and discuss what they seem to be most interested and engaged in at work. Again, this only happens when managers take the time to have more frequent assessments of skills and motivations with their people, and have honest discussions about what’s realistic and what might not be.

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  By doing this, Digby helped me build credibility with my new colleagues. He took action as an ally, using his position of privilege to sponsor me. His shout-outs made a difference, and definitely made me feel great.” What we learn from this is twofold. First, Digby Horner is probably the coolest name ever. And second, more on point, when allies take on the role of sponsor, they vocally support the work of colleagues from underrepresented groups in all contexts, specifically in situations that will help boost their reputation. This can’t be pandering but has to be honest promotion of people’s expertise. The goal for leaders is to support and promote those from oft-marginalized groups. For example, for several years Adrian has been asked to deliver keynotes on corporate culture at the Women’s Foodservice Forum, an industry group with the goal of advancing female leaders in foodservice. Three thousand attendees arrive each year to hear messages from luminaries such as Brené Brown and Maya Angelou. Adrian has been inspired by those attending and found it significant that about 10 percent of the attendees are senior male leaders—there to learn and champion the women in their organizations to greater success. These men are not benevolent benefactors, but wise leaders who intentionally invest in and rely on the skills of their protégés to achieve greater things for their organizations. Method 3: Stand Up Good allies don’t hide in the shadows, says Isaac Sabat, assistant professor of organizational psychology at Texas A&M University. Instead, they show their support through actions, even by seemingly small things like attending events, adding comments on Slack, or affixing stickers to their cubicles. He said, “Research shows that confronting bad behavior in the moment—responding to someone’s insensitive remark or calling attention to the lack of representation in the room—can be more effective when it comes from an ally.” If a person of color, for instance, calls out a microaggression, other teammates might see them as complaining or self-serving, he added, but when allies initiate a similar confrontation, others typically view it as objective. “If you can signal your allyship identity, then it shows people that you are supportive and that you are there for them if something goes down.”

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  But the young workers coming in perceived it as a slow passing of years with nothing to show for it on their resumes. Cenedella admits that, at first, he tried badgering younger colleagues into seeing things his way. But eventually he realized he’d have better results by adapting his own point of view. He revised the program to provide six promotions over two years—with performance hurdles, title increases, and pay bumps every step of the way. “We kept the same performance standards, the same final pay rate, and the same progression toward expertise over time,” he says. “We learned that more frequent career feedback, with better chances for getting ahead, and some self-direction were actually very effective tools for building morale and contributing to the success of our company.” Sadly, providing a reassuring sense of achievement like this comes off like delusional coddling to some managers we’ve discussed the process with (ironically, many of the same people who helped raise the new generation). So, we share the results Ladders has seen. Cenedella said new hires have worked hard to reach each new level and take every promotion seriously. When, after just four months, they move from junior analyst to analyst, they celebrate, call Mom and Dad, and share fist bumps with team members. Leaders quickly realized the moves weren’t being seen by employees as fake promotions but were significant signposts of success on their career journey. And thanks to a focus on mastering specific levels of accomplishment before moving to each promotion, Cenedella also says Ladders now boasts a more capable and focused workforce for new hires of every age. Many managers who’ve implemented similar steps in promotion have told us it’s great not only for employee engagement but for training. It provides more opportunities for manager-employee coaching, and also facilitates richer discussions with people about their big-picture development goals. Method 2: Coach Employees about How to Get AheadFor many employees who experience anxiety about advancing in their careers, we find it’s due in part to a lack of understanding about the best tactics for standing out as a candidate for promotion. Managers can open employees’ eyes to the ways in which they can take charge of their own career development, including adding new skills, gaining experience, and producing the kind of results that senior leaders will care about, which will make them more qualified for moving up. Dr. David B.

• From Anxiety at Work: 8 Strategies to Help Teams Build Resilience, Handle Uncertainty, and Get Stuff Done

  He acknowledges he could have been doing the wet bench work that he was brought in to tackle. He also could have run the analysis on Excel, a program he was familiar with. But his lab leader knew that R would be important for Anthony to learn as he expanded his progress as a scientist. After he had a foundational grasp of the language and was able to start contributing, Dr. Aston told him, “There’s a lot more to learn on R, but this will do. Thanks for your contribution.” And Anthony left the lab that day knowing that his efforts had been valued. “I became even more dedicated to the lab after that. It made me feel like they cared about me ten times more,” he said. “Developing a new skill made me feel like I was growing personally but also gaining stock and contributing to the lab’s goals.” Method 5: Make Learning Real-TimeWant to see eyes glaze over or anxiety amp up? Mandate that busy employees attend a training session on “business writing skills,” or “negotiating,” or some such course that has little alignment to their day-to-day needs, says Steve Glaveski, CEO of Collective Campus in Melbourne, Australia. Since the dawn of civilization when our ancestors first figured out how to use weapons to fight off pesky saber-toothed tigers, we humans have learned best when the learning is essential. (Jeopardy champ Ken Jennings may be the exception.) Matthieu Boisgontier of the University of British Columbia’s Brain Behaviour Lab says, “Conserving energy has been essential for human survival, as it allowed us to be more efficient in searching for food and shelter, competing for sexual partners, and avoiding predators.” Our brains are our bodies’ biggest energy consumers, and for the sake of energy efficiency, they’re designed to quickly forget information we don’t need. After all, do you remember how to play a song on the recorder? Of course, classes and virtual training in foundational business skills can be quite valuable, but the learning that will most excite employees, and make the most immediate impact on their performance, is about how to tackle the specific challenges they’re facing in their work day-to-day. Say one of your employees admits avoiding having a difficult, but necessary, conversation with a challenging colleague in another department she needs information from. She doesn’t feel confident in knowing how to get a productive discussion going. You could walk her through an approach with some role-playing, providing her with language you might use. In addition, you could suggest she read the book Crucial Conversations , which is packed with gritty insights into dealing with troublesome colleagues. Steering employees toward literature you’ve found helpful, that is truly relevant, and that has pithy advice is a great way to foster their development (hey, as business book authors, we’d be horribly remiss not to endorse this practice).

• From Sex at Dawn (2010)

  They have no words for murder, war, or rape. The Mosuo’s relaxed and respectful tranquility is accompanied by a nearly absolute sexual freedom and autonomy for both men and women. 4 In 1265, Marco Polo passed through the Mosuo region and later recalled their unashamed sexuality, writing, “They do not consider it objectionable for a foreigner, or any other man, to have his way with their wives, daughters, sisters, or any other women in their home. They consider it a great benefit, in fact, saying that their gods and idols will be disposed in their favor and offer them material goods in great abundance. This is why they are so generous with their women toward foreigners.” “Many times,” wrote Polo, with a wink and a nudge, “a foreigner has wallowed in bed for three or four days with a poor sap’s wife.” 5 Macho Italian that he was, Polo completely misread the situation. He misinterpreted the women’s sexual availability as a commodity controlled by the men, when in fact, the most striking feature of the Mosuo system is the fiercely defended sexual autonomy of all adults, women as well as men. The Mosuo refer to their arrangement as sese, meaning “walking.” True to form, most anthropologists miss the point by referring to the Mosuo system as “walking marriage,” and including the Mosuo on their all-encompassing lists of cultures that practice “marriage.” The Mosuo themselves disagree with this depiction of their system. “By any stretch of the imagination, sese are not marriages,” says Yang Erche Namu, a Mosuo woman who published a memoir about her childhood along the shores of Mother Lake. “All sese are of the visiting kind, and none involves the exchange of vows, property, the care of children, or expectations of fidelity.” The Mosuo language has no word for husband or wife, preferring the word azhu, meaning “friend.” 6 The Mosuo are a matrilineal, agricultural people, passing property and family name from mother to daughter(s), so the household revolves around the women. When a girl reaches maturity at about thirteen or fourteen, she receives her own bedroom that opens both to the inner courtyard of the house and to the street through a private door. A Mosuo girl has complete autonomy as to who steps through this private door into her babahuago (flower room). The only strict rule is that her guest must be gone by sunrise. She can have a different lover the following night—or later that same night—if she chooses.

• From Sex at Dawn (2010)

  This is simply illogical: Van Gogh’s famous painting The Starry Night is not a “yellow painting,” though there is plenty of yellow in it. The second problem with this citation is that Peggy Reeves Sanday, the anthropologist Goldberg cites, has consistently argued that the Minangkabau are matriarchal. In fact, her most recent book about the Minangkabau is called Women at the Center: Life in a Modern Matriarchy. 15 Having spent over twenty summers living among the Minangkabau, Sanday says, “The power of Minangkabau women extends to the economic and social realms,” noting, for example, that women control land inheritance and that a husband typically moves into the wife’s household. The four million Minangkabau living in West Sumatra consider themselves to be a matriarchal society. “While we in the West glorify male dominance and competition,” Sanday says, “the Minangkabau glorify their mythical Queen Mother and cooperation.” She reports that “males and females relate more like partners for the common good than like competitors ruled by egocentric self-interest,” and that as with bonobo social groups, women’s prestige increases with age and “accrues to those who promote good relations….” 16 As happens so often in trying to understand and discuss other cultures, wording trips up specialists. When they claim never to have found a “true matriarchy,” these anthropologists are envisioning a mirror image of patriarchy, a vision that ignores the differing ways males and females conceptualize and wield power. Sanday says that among the Minangkabau, for example, “Neither male nor female rule is possible because of [their] belief that decision-making should be by consensus.” When she kept asking people which sex ruled, she was finally told that she was asking the wrong question. “Neither sex rules … because males and females complement one another.” 17 Remember this when some loudmouth at the bar declares that “patriarchy is universal, and always has been!” It’s not, and it hasn’t. But rather than feel threatened, we’d recommend that our male readers ponder this: Societies in which women have lots of autonomy and authority tend to be decidedly male-friendly, relaxed, tolerant, and plenty sexy. Got that, fellas? If you’re unhappy at the amount of sexual opportunity in your life, don’t blame the women. Instead, make sure they have equal access to power, wealth, and status.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  Beside the finished building another had been begun, surrounded by scaffolding. Workmen in aprons, standing on scaffolds, were laying bricks, pouring mortar out of vats, and smoothing it with trowels. 'How quickly work gets done with you!' said Sviazhsky. 'When I was here last time the roof was not on.' 'By the autumn it will all be ready. Inside almost everything is done,' said Anna. 'And what's this new building?' 'That's the house for the doctor and the dispensary,' answered Vronsky, seeing the architect in a short jacket coming towards him; and excusing himself to the ladies, he went to meet him. Going round a hole where the workmen were slaking lime, he stood still with the architect and began talking rather warmly. 'The front is still too low,' he said to Anna, who had asked what was the matter. 'I said the foundation ought to be raised,' said Anna. 'Yes, of course it would have been much better, Anna Arkadyevna,' said the architect, 'but now it's too late.' 'Yes, I take a great interest in it,' Anna answered Sviazhsky, who was expressing his surprise at her knowledge of architecture. 'This new building ought to have been in harmony with the hospital. It was an afterthought, and was begun without a plan.' Vronsky, having finished his talk with the architect, joined the ladies, and led them inside the hospital. Although they were still at work on the cornices outside and were painting on the ground-floor, upstairs almost all the rooms were finished. Going up the broad cast-iron staircase to the landing, they walked into the first large room. The walls were stuccoed to look like marble, the huge plate-glass windows were already in, only the parquet floor was not yet finished, and the carpenters, who were planing a block of it, left their work, taking off the bands that fastened their hair, to greet the gentry. 'This is the reception-room,' said Vronsky. 'Here there will be desk, tables, and benches, and nothing more.' 'This way; let us go in here. Don't go near the window,' said Anna, trying the paint to see if it were dry. 'Alexey, the paint's dry already,' she added. From the reception-room they went into the corridor. Here Vronsky showed them the mechanism for ventilation on a novel system. Then he showed them marble baths, and beds with extraordinary springs. Then he showed them the wards one after another, the store-room, the linen-room, then the heating-stove of a new pattern, then the trolleys, which would make no noise as they carried everything needed along the corridors, and many other things. Sviazhsky, as a connoisseur in the latest mechanical improvements, appreciated everything fully. Dolly simply wondered at all she had not seen before, and, anxious to understand it all, made minute inquiries about everything, which gave Vronsky great satisfaction. 'Yes, I imagine that this will be the solitary example of a properly fitted hospital in Russia,' said Sviazhsky. 'And won't you have a lying-in ward?' asked Dolly.

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  'But then you make complaints to the justice too,' said Sviazhsky. 'I lodge complaints? Not for anything in the world! Such a talking, and such a to-do, that one would have cause to regret it. At the works, for instance, they pocketed the advance-money and made off. What did the justice do? Why, acquitted them. Nothing keeps them in order but their own communal court and their village elder. He'll flog them in the good old style! But for that there'd be nothing for it but to give it all up and run away.' Obviously the landowner was chaffing Sviazhsky, who, far from resenting it, was apparently amused by it. 'But you see we manage our land without such extreme measures,' said he, smiling: 'Levin and I and this gentleman.' He indicated the other landowner. 'Yes, the thing's done at Mihail Petrovitch's, but ask him how it's done. Do you call that a rational system?' said the landowner, obviously rather proud of the word 'rational'. 'My system's very simple,' said Mihail Petrovitch, 'thank God. All my management rests on getting the money ready for the autumn taxes, and the peasants come to me, "Father, master, help us!" Well, the peasants are all one's neighbours; one feels for them. So one advances them a third, but one says: "Remember, lads, I have helped you, and you must help me when I need it—whether it's the sowing of the oats, or the hay-cutting, or the harvest"; and well, one agrees, so much for each taxpayer—though there are dishonest ones among them too, it's true.' Levin, who had long been familiar with these patriarchal methods, exchanged glances with Sviazhsky and interrupted Mihail Petrovitch, turning again to the gentleman with the grey whiskers. 'Then what do you think?' he asked; 'what system is one to adopt nowadays?' 'Why, manage like Mihail Petrovitch, or let the land for half the crop or for rent to the peasants; that one can do—only that's just how the general prosperity of the country is being ruined. Where the land with serf-labour and good management gave a yield of nine to one, on the half-crop system it yields three to one. Russia has been ruined by the emancipation!'

• From Anna Karenina (1877)

  He thought not of his wife, but of a complication that had arisen in his official life, which at the time constituted the chief interest of it. He felt that he had penetrated more deeply than ever before into this intricate affair, and that he had originated a leading idea—he could say it without self-flattery —calculated to clear up the whole business, to strengthen him in his official career, to discomfit his enemies, and thereby to be of the greatest benefit to the government. Directly the servant had set the tea and left the room, Alexey Alexandrovitch got up and went to the writing-table. Moving into the middle of the table a portfolio of papers, with a scarcely perceptible smile of self-satisfaction, he took a pencil from a rack and plunged into the perusal of a complex report relating to the present complication. The complication was of this nature: Alexey Alexandrovitch's characteristic quality as a politician, that special individual qualification that every rising functionary possesses, the qualification that with his unflagging ambition, his reserve, his honesty, and his self-confidence had made his career, was his contempt for red tape, his cutting down of correspondence, his direct contact, wherever possible, with the living fact, and his economy. It happened that the famous Commission of the 2nd of June had set on foot an inquiry into the irrigation of lands in the Zaraisky province, which fell under Alexey Alexandrovitch's department, and was a glaring example of fruitless expenditure and paper reforms. Alexey Alexandrovitch was aware of the truth of this. The irrigation of these lands in the Zaraisky province had been initiated by the predecessor of Alexey Alexandrovitch's predecessor. And vast sums of money had actually been spent and were still being spent on this business, and utterly unproductively, and the whole business could obviously lead to nothing whatever. Alexey Alexandrovitch had perceived this at once on entering office, and would have liked to lay hands on the Board of Irrigation. But at first, when he did not yet feel secure in his position, he knew it would affect too many interests, and would be injudicious. Later on he had been engrossed in other questions, and had simply forgotten the Board of Irrigation.