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There’s no room for arrogance among influential leaders

arrogant

Arrogant people do not care much about how people feel when treated poorly. FILE PHOTO | NMG

A young man was once walking with his grandfather through the busy by-lanes of the city. While they were walking, they found an interesting sight: the sight of a shoemaker being mistreated by a client.

The shoemaker felt bad about the way his client treated him, especially for no fault, yet he listened calmly to the complaint. In fact he apologised for not noticing it and promised to correct the error. Both the young man and his grandfather noticed what had happened but did not talk about it any further.

They stopped by a café for coffee. As they were waiting for the coffee to arrive, they noticed that at the table next to them, the waiter asked a man to move his chair a little (who had spread carelessly) to create space so he could serve another customer.

That man complained and refused to move. The young man and his grandfather noticed this incident as it happened so close to them.

“Never forget what you have seen today,” the grandfather said. “The shoemaker accepted the complaint, despite not being at fault, while this man next to us didn’t want to move, despite being at fault. Useful men, who do useful things, don’t mind being treated as useless. But the useless always judge themselves as being important and hide all their incompetence behind authority,” he addressed the young man.

“Humility is the greatest quality that man can have and arrogance is definitely the worst.”

Arrogance is often said as being full of yourself, feeling you’re always right, and believing your accomplishments or abilities make you better than other people. People often believe arrogance is excessive confidence, but it’s really a lack of confidence. Arrogant people are insecure, and often repel others.

Arrogance diminishes wisdom: Arrogance is weakness disguised as strength. Arrogance essentially makes us less receptive to people, ideas, responsibility and compassion. Arrogant people do not care much about how people feel when treated poorly. In fact, they think of themselves as above others.

The more informed you are, the less arrogant and aggressive you are. Arrogant people live in their own paradise. They make no effort to understand people or the situation and always think of themselves as highly knowledgeable. When you shed arrogance, you are in a better position to understand people and circumstances better.

Knowledge makes people humble, arrogance makes people ignorant. Accept responsibility for your actions, be accountable for your results, take ownership of your mistakes.

Confidence is silent, insecurities are loud: If you ever wondered why arrogant people are loud, they are looking for attention because they are insecure. You would rarely notice a confident and satisfied person to be loud.

With great power comes great responsibility; leadership is not a position where you can wield authority, a good leader empowers people and walks the path with them.