“To earn respect, you must give respect.”
“What goes around comes around.”
“Every pride has a fall.”
We are all familiar with these sayings. In fact, these are those “Pearls of Wisdom” that have been passed on to us since generations. However, most of you will agree when I say that often being humble, courteous, and respectful to others makes one suffer at the cost of ones own dignity. It, at times, does more harm than good. One feels that he or she is taken-for-granted especially in professional life. One then regrets being so kind, nice and graceful towards others. Consequently, one feels like questioning the veracity of these very sayings. Do these sayings even hold true?
Virtues and the corporate world
The corporate world awaits us. It is therefore imperative for our personal development to proactively understand this. Take humility for instance, why often the person who is humble is considered weak, docile and servile? To answer this, we must first understand what exactly humility is? Humility is when one does not consider himself or herself better than others. It is such a beautiful and admirable quality, isn’t it? But here is the catch and here is where we make the mistake.
Virtues of being humble
When will a people recognize a person as being truly humble? It is when one actually possesses something that makes him or her better than others. It may be personal achievements, wealth, knowledge, fame, beauty or position. In other words, when someone is of “value” or has something “valuable” and acts humbly, people respect his humility. It makes such down-to-earth people appear attractive because being humble is not their only choice. They tend to demonstrate high moral values. Otherwise our society, that idolize power and influence, considers even good moral qualities as weakness. Even in corporate world, being humble is often considered as being submissive.
Virtues of Forgiveness
To illustrate further, many people advocate the Divine virtue of forgiveness. If someone has wronged another person, he/she can always forgive the abuser. This will definitely cause the victim to feel mentally “peaceful”. Holding grudges, after all, is detrimental to one’s mental well-being. However, it is often observed that the same people mistreat the victims again. They do not respect the fact that they were forgiven. Why is this so? This is because forgiveness suits the one who has the power to respond, and yet chooses not to. It is therefore important to highlight the fact that retaliation is possible, yet forgiveness is granted to the abuser. It is then when one’s forgiveness is respected and even given example of. In the corporate world, the one who is easy going and is often forgiving, people start taking their sentiments lightly.
Conclusion
In a nutshell, our society cherishes virtues such as humility, forgiveness, and courtesy at large. The corporate world also values these; when one chooses these qualities and when they are not the only option. In other words, the brutal truth is that one has to be “someone” or have “something” for the society to respect even one`s moral virtues. Therefore, it is important to keep rising and shining and aim to become the best at what one does. Once he climbs that “ladder to success”, one can help others too to reach those heights. Then such helpers will become quintessential and one will become a trendsetter of how “Kindness wins even in the Corporate”.
