Chad Silverstein argues that leaders who laugh at themselves and stay transparent about their flaws create better teams. When leaders take feedback personally instead, they poison the room.
Chapters
So I'm just going to pick one of these today. And it's a little nuance that I think is really powerful. And it's a great discipline. If you're a leader and you're trying to grow, it's the ability to be transparent and vulnerable, but to learn to laugh at yourself, not make fun of yourself, but to laugh at your tendencies. A lot of times when things are brought to our attention about the way we are, it could hurt sometimes. You hear people say it, you know it's true, but you hear people say it, and even if you don't think it's true and you think, you know, maybe they're wrong, but it can, it can. It can hurt you, especially if you take things personal. And to be able to learn how to laugh at yourself is a complete swing. Because the difference between someone calling you out on something that's true and you feeling a little hurt that you got called out because you're a little too sensitive versus being able to just laugh it off and realize, okay, you know, it is what it is and there's some truth to it, and. And you just learn to laugh at yourself. There's something very attractive about leaders who have that humility, and they can do that. And the best leaders, they can call themselves out before anyone else even has a chance to call them out on it. And not in a negative way, but just in an honest way. And I think there, again, there's just something really cool about a leader who can kind of not poke fun at themselves, but laugh at their tendencies. Everybody's got them, and many times they're funny, and it can lighten the mood of whatever it is that's going on and whoever you're with, when the leader can do that. And the opposite is that a leader with influence can just literally bring the entire vibe of an office, a group, a dinner, a project down the tubes. When they take things personal and they let people know that they've taken it personal, there's nothing worse than that. So learn to laugh at yourself.
