Asif Osman briefly discusses Jack Welch's concept of 'candor' from the book Winning. He equates candor with frankness, argues most organizations and managers default to hypocrisy or insincere language, and recommends cultivating polite frankness in managers to improve meetings and organizational effectiveness. He notes candor is cultural and not easy to instill.
Hi there. My name is Asif Aswan, and I always like to talk about the books that I've read. And books really give you an education, especially if you read the right books. One of the best books that I've ever read when I got into management was a book by Jack Welch, who is considered one of the greatest CEOs ever. And it's a book called Winning. And you can pretty much buy it online or get it off most bookstores around the world. In the book, one of the things that Jack Welch talks about, which is interesting to me, is a word called candor. He calls it candor. But I think the most easy way to use the word candor is to just call it frankness. Candor means frankness, and Jack Welch says candor should be a part of every organization. Most people in today's organizations tend to be the opposite of candor. They apply hypocrisy. They apply meanings which they don't really mean. Candor implies frankness. You be frank about what you mean and what your opinion is. But being candor in a polite way, I really think this is a quality that most managers of today lack and they should apply onto themselves. It's not going to be easy because it's part of culture, not to be frank, and it's part of people's nature from their very childhood, not to be frank. But if you can inculcate that into managers, you'll have much more effective meetings, much more effective run organizations.
If these are God's chosen people then God chose them to test the rest of us.
