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I describe ego as the “Desire of the mind to put I first”. This can have positive or negative implications for an organization. An example of positive implication is when an entrepreneur wants to have profits to show to the world “he has arrived”. Unfortunately ego mostly has negative implication to an entrepreneur, his company & people. I had a senior managements person who joined (and left within six months!!) who was good at his work but would believe he was always right. His egocentric style of management was directed towards 100% control with meticulous reviews each day leading to a list of ‘dos’ for his reportees. There was no investment in letting people take ownership beyond tasks assigned. It led to some good results in the beginning but demotivation for subordinates and poor relationship with peers. Many sales managers driven by ego, tend to isolate themselves by taking full credit for what their team does. It takes away contributions that have come through teamwork. They also deliberately refrain from sharing information that very often leads to disaster.
I suffered from many years from a subtle ego problem of believing “ I have no ego”. This led to acceptance & nonsense behavior from employees, investors & customers. I have since realized ego is a natural part of human being.
The good news is that ego need not always lead to negative results. I differentiate ego as “conscious” and “unconscious”. Ego with awareness is conscious ego & can be used to drive big results with no negative fallouts. It can also be a protection against undesirable behavior from others. Ego that lacks awareness can and will, sooner or later, only lead to disaster.
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