Eliminate The Expensive Ballast

Learn to perceive the highest quality of a man, without getting lost in his own world.

In my freshman year, I had an excellent schoolfellow, but not in a good way. He was rather a cheater, meaning a person who knows how to fool people and use them to obtain various advantages.

On weekends, I used to go out with my group mates in a club in town. I could not help noticing a pretty obvious thing regarding my colleague. Whenever we met, he used to take out his wallet and show us how much money he was carrying: 1.000 Euros. He always had a lot of money with him.

But do you know what is really funny? He had never, absolutely never paid for his drink and that is because there were always some colleagues offering to buy him a drink. These ones had lost in his world, without perceiving his true nature.

And so, our colleague, who was carrying so much money on him and, on top of it, had a convertible car, enjoyed himself at the expense of others.

Are you amplifying the frame of a response determined by an appearance that defines you as a loser, or reducing the cause of a reaction that ends up becoming consent?

I think the moral is the following: "resourceful" people know how to take advantage from the naive and easily manipulated. Are you proud and self-conscious enough to become easily manipulated? Do you lose yourself in the world of speculators?

This is what makes the difference between people: some give and receive nothing in return, while others with real manipulative qualities take and never get tired.

In leadership, the price is put on the existence of reality that beats the appearance. You cannot reach your potential as long as you use your skills in a wrong, degrading way. Just as some brochures and alluring slogans will never be able to hide an incompetent leadership, so your negative qualities will surface even if they are concealed by your power of influence.

Are you proud with your qualities? Can they confirm that you are a reliable person? Until when?

To agree with the qualities that people display is to support the cause of an event that tends to become the acceptance of an offer you cannot refuse. Your form of reply should be clothed with unpredictability, exigency, and prudence, so that the role you play in a given circumstance is not that of a man defeated by appearances.

To what extent are you able to turn a favorable situation into an exercise in honesty, refusing to further project a false aura onto your own image?

In many companies, there are such individuals, like my former colleague who, with indescribable ease, get everything all found – big salaries, benefits etc. – although, in reality, they do absolutely nothing, they don’t bring any contribution to the development of the company, to the achievement of some objectives of special interest and do not involve themselves virtually at all in the projects undertaken. But they spend more than 90% of the time in front of the computer, doing nothing productive or walking around from place to place in vain. They basically get paid for the work performed by other employees.

Such people are not hard to find, everybody notices and knows them, but nobody does anything, no one takes action, and they always enjoy an extended "holiday". And it is pretty clear who has the most to lose, the company. Do you stay away from people with which you have only to lose?

A man with a mature thinking pushes things up to the point of recognizing a picture that does not present a perfect projection of the model that boasts achievements beyond expectations. He considers the possibility of not assuming an attention that expresses charm and goodwill in terms of denying a reality that he considers too generous for himself.

When a man displays too many positive qualities, he should be aware that something is not right with him.

Do you argue your refusal to validate a value that some take advantage of, without becoming a pole of attraction for easily influenced people?

During cold season, especially winter, when human body is weaker, possibly with a vitamin deficiency, viruses find an open door in the body’s immune system.

A person who has nothing to offer to the company is a waste of money. He is like a virus that finds an open door in the immune system of the company’s leader. Do you leave a door open for viruses?

Would you allow for such "viruses and parasites" to exist in your company? What remedies should you use to prevent them?

In order to grow, a company needs serious people, able to produce profits, not losses. If an employee does not prove total seriousness, especially after having invested so much money and time in his training and improvement, he must be removed immediately from the company because he represents an expensive ballast.

The only value that some can take from you is the respect they receive without deserving it, because of the kindness you always show them.

Conclusion: A company cannot reach a high level of development unless it comprises valuable people, but it can only lose if it has irresponsible and speculative employees. Therefore, as a manager, you should hire very good people, who have potential and are able to do a great job, and get rid as quickly as possible of those unnecessary in the company.

Learn to perceive the highest qualities of a man (especially his negative qualities), without getting lost in his own world – otherwise, you will only lose.