Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 34, Number 12, 1 December 2017 — “To Thine Own Self Be True”... A series of Future Strong [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

“To Thine Own Self Be True”... A series of Future Strong

/ LEOELELE " TRUSTEE MESSAGES

Eaeh of us, whether we realize it or not, has a selfimage. We see ourselves in some way - smart, slow, kindly, well-intentioned, lazy, misunderstood, meticulous, or shrewd. We all ean piek adjectives that describe ourselves. This is the "I" behind the face in the mirror. The "I" that thinks, dreams, talks, feels, and believes. The "I" that no one knows fully. In this month's eolumn, I will explore the meaning of the self-image, particularly in relation to changing behavior in growing managers, and how changes in self-concept eome about. The self-concept is important because everything we do or say, everything we hear, feel, or otherwise perceive, is influenced by how we see ourselves. One reason this self-concept is crucial is that it has a great deal to do with manager development - with being a growing person and eventually realizing one's self-potential. Note the term " manager development " rather than management development. The purpose of such development is to help individual managers to I grow; after all, they have to do ! most of the job themselves. No one ean tell managers exactly how to grow. Rather, the most one ean I do is to help managers understand

themselves in their own situations, and then trust them to ftnd the best directions themselves. Developing knowledge of "the self ' is no simple task and often goes underdeveloped because we often tend to resist it. "Many people have a hard time looking at themselves in the mirror and dealing with the ravages of time. Fortunately, we ean be grateful to the mirror for showing us only our external appearance." - Manfred Kets De Vries, Reflections on Leadership and Career DeveIopment (2010) Only through self-knowledge, openness to criticism, and being receptive to facts and perspectives that challenge our own, we ean arm ourselves against denial. That, of course, is easier said than done and requires a special quality that does not eome naturally to us either: humility. "Taking on a disposition of humility

and learning keeps us open to changing ourselves and consequently keeps us from claiming to be perfect." - Bill Welter and Jean Egmon, The Prepared Minel ofa Leader (2006) Rather than see ourselves as we truly are, we see ourselves as we would like to be. Sometimes self-deception ean be more comforting than self-knowledge. We like to fool ourselves because confronting our failings ean be too painful. The inability to see ourselves clearly ean be described by an eeonomie term

called "behavioral economics." This is the intersection of psychology and economics, a fteld that challenges the strict rationality of most modern eeonomie models. - Adam Smith, The Wealth ofNations The physicist, Richard Feynman, said, "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - you are the easiest person to fool." Polonius' famous quote: "This above all: to Lhine own selfbe true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not ihen befalse to any man I want to wish you and your 'Ohana a very Mele Kalikimaka and Hau'oli Makahiki Hou! A hui hou till 201 8, Trustee Leina' ala ■

Self reflection.- Photo: benscbonewiHe, odobestock.com