Personality must be accepted for what it is. You musn't mind that a poet is a drunk. - Oscar Wilde
More than a century after the great Oscar Wilde wrote the above line have we yet learned that he was wrong? We know, intellectually, that we are all changeable. Now, science offers proof that we are not doomed to be victims of our genetic program - especially when it comes to personality.
When Cathy Self, Mark Evans and I go about the country speaking to hospitals about creating cultures of loving care, we often encounter leaders and doctors who are stuck in Wilde's 19th century thinking. "You can't change people," they say with a disdain born of ignorance.
What we often say is that human beings have highly changeable behaviors based upon their environment. Leaders can create loving cultures by how they hire, orient, train, and reward staff members. The culture of our country is changing at this very moment as we anticipate the arrival of a new President. Economic conditions affect our daily behavior and attitude. How we are treated in various setting affects our responses.
Can people change? Of course. The truth is that we change and adapt every day.
An article in the December 1 edition of Newsweek magazine offers further proof that our personalities are no longer stuck in genetic programing. Small children who appear shy "by nature" can be gently and effectively encouraged to encounter other children on the playground. As they do, they begin to leave some of their shyness behind. They may still need more quiet time, but they are able to live in a way that is more open and trusting. On the other hand, if they are branded as "shy" and parents do nothing to attempt to alter this, they will remain shy.
Furthermore, and this is instructive for healthcare leaders, if parents attempt to bully their children out of shyness, they may create the opposite effect.
What about personal decisions to change. Programs like Alcoholics Anonymous teach that personal change is difficult but possible. Genetic sensitivity to alcohol need not doom these individuals. Change is possible given 1) a personal decision to change, 2) a culture and setting that support change.
Science now reinforces what we have sensed for a long time. Loving leadership can create a culture in which staff members actually change their behavior as well as some of the thinking that underlies that behavior. In this behavior change, loving behavior will emerge from people who may previously have seemed burned out and cynical. Individuals who refuse to adapt to this change are likely to leave the organization. Gradually, change emerges as Love finds a setting where she can flourish.
Each of us has the power to nurture Loving cultures in all of the settings we inhabit - whether they involve a short encounter in a store or the extended encounters of family or work setting.
What do you think?
-Erie Chapman
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