Thoughts About Leadership: The Discipline of Learning

Proverbs 12: 1 (MSG) If you love learning, you love the discipline that goes with it--how shortsighted to refuse correction!

(AMP) Whoever loves instruction and correction loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is like a brute beast, stupid and indiscriminating.
Eccl 7:5 (NIV) It is better to heed a wise man’s rebuke than to listen to the song of fools.
Matthew 7:26-27 (MSG) [Jesus speaking] But if you just use my words in Bible studies and don't work them into your life, you are like a stupid carpenter who built his house on the sandy beach. 27When a storm rolled in and the waves came up, it collapsed like a house of cards.
John 7:7 (MSG) The world has nothing against you, but it's up in arms against me. It's against me because I expose the evil behind its pretensions.
Heb 12:5 (NIV) And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons: “My son do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you…”

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Humans are not perfect! We often require correction. But we don’t like it; so much so, we often take offence and even go so far as to “do it our way” despite advice to the contrary. And in the workplace, if the correction comes from a peer or from a subordinate, some people really respond inappropriately!

At home, as young people, most of us have grown to expect correction – even discipline. This has been part of the parenting paradigm since the first family.

It is in the workplace where we must learn to always be open to learning. We have to rely on those around us (all around – above, beside and below) to be effective and productive and achieve expected results. Positive collaboration produces those results. The problem is that many workplace cultures are more directed to catching people in a mistake instead of catching them being good. The cultural energy flows to the mistake or bad behavior – trying to fix problems, instead of understanding the issues surrounding the genesis for the mistake and redirecting the behavior toward a positive result.

Years ago, when I was a teacher, I used the

paradigm of “Catching U Being Good,” rewarding even the smallest increases in positive behavior. In my consulting work, I suggested the same principle to help clients change employee behavior and set an example of positive reinforcement. Ken Blanchard has taken that a step further in his book Whale Done, which I heartily a recommend.

A wise person’s rebuke is centered on reinforcing what is done well and redirecting what has caused the mistake or bad behavior. If this approach had been the dominant paradigm in parenting, we all would love to learn. The scripture is very clear about our attitude in learning. It must be an attitude based on humility. God rewards positive behavior and disciplines with love our pride and willful refusal to do it His way.

I’m learning as I daily write that there is much to be corrected in me. It’s often pretty clear and it is amazing how easily I rationalize my thinking or behavior.

There are times when I resist humbling myself. I don’t want the discipline – just the reward. Can you relate?

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