Honest to Greatness by Peter Kozodoy

Author:Peter Kozodoy
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781948836753
Publisher: BenBella Books, Inc.
Published: 2020-06-04T00:00:00+00:00

Positive reinforcement seems like a wonderful tool for teams that you, as a leader, need to keep happy, open, and satisfied if they are to pass you the insights you need. But let’s not kid ourselves: the reason positive reinforcement works is because of our delicate egos. We should at least agree that directness is more efficient, if nothing else.

Thinking that you’re truthful and transparent is one thing. And hearing the truth from your peers—that your work this month sucks—is one thing. But being able to use that brutal feedback as a constructive exercise in self-improvement (without it crushing your soul) is something else entirely. If you can stomach it, though, that feedback represents a massive opportunity for more effective communication, productivity, innovation, and profits. Not to mention, you get to discover the real you—one of the most wonderful gifts we can receive, in my humble opinion.

The upside of the 25 percent of Bridgewater employees consistently leaving after eighteen months is that those who remain are absolutely committed to radical truth and radical transparency. As another former (but apparently content) employee wrote:

It was hard for me at first to adjust; but, in my opinion, every company should be run the same as Bridgewater. The culture was simple if you understood what the goals were. Just getting to the best information possible, the best possible outcome, the best results require ULTIMATE truth, transparency, and not letting your emotions get in the way of constructive criticism. There is more to it than that, but there was a set of 200+ principles that employees are to understand and try and live (or at least work) by those standards. These principles make sense. For example, principle #9, Trust in truth: While truth, itself, may sometimes be scary (like you are bad at something), it won’t change reality and it will allow you to deal with it better. It always leads to the best outcome. This may seem a simple, obvious concept, but it’s not in reality. People who are one way on the inside and believe that they need to be another way outside to please others become conflicted and often lose touch with what they really think and feel. It’s difficult for them to be happy and almost impossible for them to be at their best. Thinking solely about what’s accurate, instead of how it is perceived, helps [employees] be more straightforward and focused on important things.17

So what are the important things in your personal and professional life? If Dalio’s right, then all you have to do to achieve your best results is embrace honesty.

Simple, obvious, honesty.

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