Complexity has its shadow

Complexity Has its Shadow
Ali Anani, PhD

2
Managing Partner
Phenomena Communications

3
Dr. Ali Anani - Managing Partner
Dr. Ali Anani : As General Manager, Dr. Ali Anani heads and supervises a team of
talented young professionals, and manages the overall brand strategy - ensuring
the cohesiveness and creative parts of each campaign for all Agency clients.
Dr. Ali Anani holds a PhD from the UK (1972). He has a wide experience in many
fields. His accomplishments include the writing of more than eighty publications in
international journals, the writer of three printed books in Arabic and one E-book in
English. He has written widely for the media and presented a TV program and
many radio programs.
Dr. Anani main credit is his creativity thinking where he scored among the top %5
creative people worldwide. Dr. Anani is an invited lecturer for more than fi y
international conferences and an author of many business slogans. Moreover, he
has travelled to more than fi y countries as an invited speaker and consultant and
has consulted for many international agencies including UNIDO, Atomic Energy
Agency, UNDP, ESCWA, private businesses and governmental agencies.

4
index
Complexity Has its Shadow 6
%100 Transparency Value Questioned 8
On the Edge of Survival 10
Mapping the Journey of Writing 12
The OTHER LOOP Spiral 14
Working Against Our Comfort Zone Comfortably 16
Leaders are Symmetrical, Managers Are Not 19
Designing for Chaos 22
The Fire to Fire 25
We Need New Appraisal Criteria 28
Love and Hate- Which Is Stronger? 30
Our Heads Are Reaction Vessels 32
The One Certain Direction 35
Resonating Hearts 37
The Selected and Happy Few 39
Character Quotient- it is more than IQ and EQ 41
The Hidden Characters of Great Leaders 43

5
Ali Anani, PhD

6
Some comments provoke the author and push him to the edge. A comment by Susrutha
Mantosh Yadav on my post titled «Character Quotient- It more than IQ and EQ». She wrote
the following comment «Human beings are much more complicated than we could even
think of. The concept of CQ is good but I am not sure about how someone›s character can
be rated or measured. A person›s character /emotions /behaviour etc. Can change to a
remarkableextentundervariouscircumstances.Wearenotmineralswhowillexhibitlimited
characteristics and properties under some specific conditions. How can we compare and
caliberate living individuals with some known facts about completely non living things? A
person›s character is an amalgamation of so many varied experiences and processes which
we are not even aware of. There is so much to behaviour and human character we still have
not explored. Same logic applies to IQ and EQ».
This comment merits a post on its own as it is quite challenging. I want to start first by saying
that nature is a great teacher and we may learn from ants and flying birds. We were born
of clay, which is a mineral, our bodies are mostly water. Can we that simply reject our basic
constituents? Minerals stay on the edge to transform into other minerals as we do. Grinding
people and grinding minerals, shining minerals and shining people, lustrous people and
lustrous minerals and the list goes on. We have used minerals as metaphors.
Minerals have their complex structures and our societies have their complexity as well.
Minerals have fractal patterns and we have societal fractal patterns. Like we try to find the
repeating fractal units we try equally well to identify the repeating fractal and behavioral
patterns in our societies. A difficulty in complexity theory is lack of a clear definition for

7
complexity, particularly one that is measurable.Those approaches that provide measurable
definitions for the absolute complexity of a system often impose the requirement of perfect
or near-perfect knowledge of system structure. Perfect and imperfect mineral crystals
might give us clues.
This brings the idea that overwhelms my mind. Complexity has its shadow. Stock markets
are complexities that throw their shadows in patterns of repeated waves. We may study
complexity by studying the shadow or footmarks it leaves on the sands of time. The stock
marketshowstheshadowoftheinvestors;emotions.Peoplebuyandsellandnotthestocks.
We can see the shadow of complexity in posts that have too many passive paragraphs,
words with many syllables and tendency to use long sentences. We may generate simple
rules such as no more than %15 passive sentences, average length of sentences around 17
words and avoid use of words that have more than two syllables. You shall then find that
the writing quality improved a lot.
A real example of complexity having its shadow is the article in Daily Mail «Complex
People Have Complex Writing». It is not only body language, but also writing language.
For example, if handwriting slants to the right the person is open to new experiences and
enjoys meeting new people. If handwriting slants to the left, that person tends to keep
themselves to themselves. The article also claims that a person›s health can be identified
from their handwriting, for example, people with high blood pressure tend to have writing
that is sometimes heavy and dark, and at other times light. How truthful these findings are
warrant further research, but this serves the idea that complexity has its shadow to study
human characters.
Complexity of humans may be studies from similar approaches like cigarette smokers.
There are claims that people who extinguish the cigarette half way ends his relations half
way as well. Smokers who blow the smoke violently or extinguish the cigarette nervously
tend to end their relations with others aggressively. Smokers who change cigarettes brand
frequently aren›t loyal to their friend.
Human have fractal bodies, fractal emotions and fractal behaviors. Some minerals have
fractal structures. Trees have fractal leaves. There is a common ground and one I believe in
is that all have their shadow of complexity. Understanding the shadows of behavior may
help us understand complexity itself.

8
%100 Transparency Value
Questioned
Transparencyishighlyacclaimedasacrucialattributeofgreatleaders.Transparencyhasfive
powerfulbenefits,whichare:fasterproblemsolving,easierteambuilding,authenticgrowth
of relationships, trust-building of leaders and emergence of higher level performances.
Trust and transparency are major attributes of great leaders.
Doweneed%100transparency?IfyousayyesthenIsuggestyoucontinuereadingthispost.
A shadow forms when an opaque or translucent material obstructs light. Not all shadows
are the same. Translucent materials such as tissue paper allow some light to pass through,
which upon scattering produces a faint shadow. In contrast, opaque objects such as trees
block all light leading to the formation of dark shadow. Transparent materials allow all light
through and therefore form no shadow. Transparent leaders are the same and therefore
form no shadow. Is this a good thing?
Shadows are a source of information either directly or by deduction. You shall not get a
straight shadow of a non-straight rod. All organizations have their shadow organizations.
This is a fact. People build their shadow organizations to breathe out their complaints, to
organize around a person they trust, to speak out their minds or whatever reason.There are
always unofficial bonds that may impact how things get done in an organization. As much

9
as we may consider this as a result of not having a transparent organization; the reality is
these shadow organizations exist and it the question becomes what kind of shadows do we
have and how to attune them to the interest of the organization?
Is it better for employees to engage in the politics of their respective shadow organizations?
MyGoogleresearchledmetoaveryinterestingposttitled«Navigatingshadoworganizations
in the workplace». I quote this from the post «Workplace surveys show that the majority of
employers reluctantly engage in office politics, and nearly half of them believe it detracts
from productivity. So how can you boost your career without engaging in dog-eat-dog
politics? Start by reorienting your assumptions about what the term“office politics”means.
Replace the word“politics”with“awareness.”
Recognize that organizational awareness is all about communication and relationships.
Commit to using organizational awareness in a way that benefits everyone, not just you.
My eyes froze on the above quote because it reminded me of what Sara Jacobovici Wrote
in her last post about awareness. In her post titled «To know which the best action to take
is, you need to know when not to act», she wrote very eloquently:
Out of all the verbs and action words, allow is the only one in which you don’t actually“do”
anything but “be”. And “to be” is the existential state in which we have the potential to do
the most.
If we combine the idea of replacing politics with awareness and that awareness itself is a
non-action verb, but is being in a state, brings to the mind that shadow organizations may
have their awareness of being in a state that offers us the opportunity not to act or indulge
in politics, but rather be in that state. To quote again from Sara›s post:
We either allow something to be or allow something not to be. In terms of productivity, this
is the best state in which you can find yourself. In this state you are a keen observer, you are
clear minded, focused and can see the big picture. Why? Because it is in the not-doing that
you are actually doing the most.
I read once that happiness up to %96 increases productivity, but then it becomes an
overdose of happiness that may reduce productivity. By the same token I wonder if %96
transparency, or some nearby figure, is the best for leaders and employees so that they
have shadows, leading to awareness and the state of «to be» to observe at calm. Is %100
transparency is too much of asking? I am asking.

10
On the Edge of Survival
If you think deep, you shall find….
The depth of your idea amazes me….
We all think we are familiar with above statements. In reality, we are far from it. How deep is
deep? Is it the depth of a shallow river, or a vast ocean?
Deep ideas and unfamiliar ones don›t generate from the familiar easily. It is far more
challenging than thinking out-of-the box, or as I titled one of my post, on-the-edge of the
box.
To go into far depths is like going into the bottom of an ocean. On the surface you enjoy
sunlight, ordinary atmospheric pressure, reasonable temperature, safety from marine
predators and feeling how easy it is to go on land. It is a different story in the bottom of
oceans.Thedeeperyougo,thelesssunlightyouhave,thewaterpressurebecomesveryhigh,
the eventual total darkness is aggravated by many marine predators and the challenges are
unthinkable.
It is when we dare to go that deep and experiences an environment that we have never
exposed before those creatively disruptive ideas emerge. Going deep has its price and
rewards. Disruptive thinking flourishes only if we think disruptively in a positive way.
Total darkness- then how to make light if I don›t find it? If I find a solution then I might
be disrupting conventional thinking and products. Marine animals found the solution in

11
many ways. One way is by using i bioluminescence, a chemical reaction in a microbe or
animal body that creates light without heat and it is very common. And yet, this light is low
compared to sunlight, so animals here need special sensory adaptations. Many deep-sea
fish have very large eyes to capture what little light exists. Other animals such as tripod
fishes are essentially blind and instead rely on other, enhanced senses including smell,
touch and vibration.
It is not my intension here to review how marine creatures adapt. If this is of interest to you,
and I hope it is, I strongly advise you to watch this great video:
Let us be accepting the fact that familiar ideas breed familiar ones. We need to experience
unfamiliarity. In one example, the Japanese fishermen used tanks filled with water to
keep fish on the move. How? By adding one or two tiny sharks to each fish tank. The shark
horrified the fish and this idea kept the fish moving and the consumer found them as tasty
as freshly caught ones.
We should dare to go deep in the ocean of knowledge. The deeper we go, the darker we
shall find it because we shall be surrounded by the darkness of our increasing awareness of
our ignorance. This awareness should act like the candle that enlightens our way to deeper
ideas.Whenyoucomeupwithanewideaandpeoplechallengeyou-youhavetounderstand
the being in the deep ocean exposes you to new challenges, environment, insights and
sights that most people have never experienced before. You live the experience whereas
others don›t. Be positively disruptive and be armed with your experience and imagination.
Never stop going deep in the ocean again. You are in one place and other deep places
might be totally different than where you are. Continue the discovery and put yourself on
the edge of survival. That is your real blue ocean strategy. It is diving into the ocean of
people to know more about them, to help them better, to serve them with creative ideas
that broaden their eyes to see more in the darkness benefiting from the twilight of your
experiences and discoveries.
Put People-Before-Profit first and that is the only way to dive into the ocean of new
discoveries- the ocean of people

12
Mapping the Journey of Writing
This is my 100th post to LinkedIn. Writing so many posts has been a journey filled with
challenges, but rich in its experiences. Does my story or journey follow the -3Acts of
storytelling? What are the new challenges for a writer? I share with you my experience.
We live in the age of «Distraction Is the New habit». As I am writing this post many times
the alert for a message pops up, a comment arrives, a new idea springs and I am captured
by it and so Google it and find myself immersed in new domains. What makes this problem
more acute is the Goggle Effect. We are no longer memorizing numbers, names and many
other things. If we forget we search the internet and find out what we forgot. A recent study
(you›ve probably forgotten it by now) suggests 90 per cent of us are suffering from digital
amnesia. More than 70 per cent of people don›t know their children›s phone numbers by
heart, and 49 per cent have not memorized their partner›s number. I am in this trap and lean
heavily on engine search. This Google Effect is weakening the memory so that if we have
less memories then less triggers to evoke those memories. Apparently, what we get in one
hand we lose what is in the other. Getting fast information while losing memory. technology
is accelerating this trend as well. You don›t have to remember the name of a restaurant, for
example, and instead you take its photo with your mobile camera. I wonder how this trend
would affect writers who are constantly losing the trigger for great emotional memories.
Writers need emotions and memories are a rich source of emotions. On the other hand,
Google offers many other benefits to the writers such as Google Translate. No more foreign
languages are that serious barrier.
Will The Google Effect decrease, increase or stay at a steady state? My prediction is that
it shall increase exponentially with the Cloud storing possibilities. The cloud is becoming
an extended place for our brains to store documents. I wonder what shall happen to the
muscles of our memory if we use them less frequently?

13
The Habit of Distraction is throwing its shadow on writers. People are asking for «quick
reads». They want information in a capsule. They wish to visit other places and not spend
long times reading a post. Readers are becoming more visual. Instagram and Twitter allow
now the use of short videos. They want writers to talk to them. Writers may express their
views in visual format. For this reason, the writers› facial expressions, tone of voice and
experiences are growing in importance. The pen isn›t the only talker; it is increasingly the
mouth of the writer. I guess soon we shall be talking about The Cloud Effect. Will this effect
be disruptive?
Every trend creates spillover effects and counter effects. I discussed the spillover effects
somewhere else. I wish to draw attention to what I coined «The Flash Reader Effect». The
writer needs to capture attention of the readers in less than seven seconds with capturing
titles, high quality images and videos or whatever «writing spices» the writer opts to. The
death of time means that the old established three-Act structure is also shrinking. I hope
that stories don›t shrink like clay does with fractured structure.
The Writers› OODA Loop
OODA stands for Observe, Orient, Decide and Act. I wonder how much «observing time»
writers have when time is shrinking. I see that writers are entering the same loop that
warplane fighters face. Writers have to be quick to observe new trends, new tastes, new
effects, new habits of readers and new technologies. The complexity of writing is getting
more complex and soon we shall see publication on the fractals of writing.
Togivetheselfsomebreathingtime,awritermayestablishawritingniche.Mynicheisbased
on using my scientific background to study social behaviors. To what degree I succeeded
that remains beyond my power to decide. I am lost of the D in the OODA Loop

14
The OTHER LOOP Spiral
Amazinghowideasstoreinourmemoryandhoweventstriggerthemintonewperspectives.
This is the case of the OTHER Loop in which I wrote few posts about previously. Rod King,
Ph.D. is the initiator of this loop. As a reminder the components of the acronym OTHER,
below is an image reminder.

15
This loop has resonated strongly with me because it provides a simple; yet very effective
approach to a wide range of applications. Just think of its use in writing this post. I have an
Observation of something that I want to write about. I start Thinking about the idea. I start
Hypothesizing different scenarios and I start Experimenting the validity of what I decide to
write before Reflecting on it in a post that would be of value to the reader.
Being so useful, the idea that struck my mind was how to stretch the value of this loop? My
first Observation is that OTHER is a -5words acronym. WOW as this is a Fibonacci number. I
am strongly supportive of the idea to work with nature and not against it. Natural growth
shows often Fibonacci-based growth patterns. These patterns are spiral in shape. I Think I
have an idea on how to stretch the value of OTHER. Put it on a Fibonacci-based rectangles
as I show in the figure below.
The OTHER group is now fractal in nature. I Hypothesize this is an idea worthy of exploring
and the OTHER Fibonacci-based loop is of a greater value than before. It shows a natural
growth pattern.
One Hypothesis may lead to another, or OTHER leading to an-OTHER. To make this loop
more natural I needed it to follow a Fibonacci time pattern. My idea here is to build the
Other-Clock. Googled for the search term Fibonacci clock. To my surprise I found a very
interesting application of the Fibonacci clock. I am too late for this idea to claim it.You want
to see a lovely video on Fibonacci clock, here it is below.
I still find the idea of the OTHER-clock feasible and emulating the OTHER spiral loop.
Ingenuity of combining the Fibonacci clock and the Other clock would be a useful time
management tool on how much time one needs to spend on each letter of the five letters
of the OTHER loop.

16
Working Against Our Comfort Zone
Comfortably
We tend to work against natural laws and expect us to succeed. Is this possible? Is it a
winning strategy? If not, what to do about them?
Let me start with few and simple examples. Take a limestone (it is dense) and put it in a
vessel filled with water. The limestone shall sink immediately. It is working with gravity and
not against it. There is no effort on the limestone to sink. How may we then change this
behavior and stop limestone from sinking? How can we then extrapolate what we find to
the management of people?
You may stop limestone from sinking by using a simple trick. We coat its surface with a
fatty material. This coating strengthens the surface tension force so that it overweighs the
opposing gravity force. Now you have a floating limestone on water without any effort. We
made a natural force offset another natural force. That is the trick.
Humans behave similarly in that they have natural tendencies to gravitate to their comfort
zone.Thetendencyofsomemanagerstomovepeopleoutofitforcefullyisasureprescription
for failure. There are two reasons for that and both work against nature. Working against
the nature of the gravity of comfort zone and against the fact that all people were born

17
free. Managers who do that are short-sighted and look for the immediate «profits» with
disregard to the energy expensed in working against natural tendencies and that the stress
imposed on employees will sooner or later spring back on them.
We have tendencies to select the beautiful and strong. We have tendencies to make
assumptions. We have tendencies to reject concepts that violate our assumptions. We have
tendencies to socialize. We feel secure as well when we socialize as we don›t want to go
naked in this world. Fish schools and flock of birds are examples of which patterns emerge
because of socializing and make it work for the individuals› need to safe.Why don›t we then
see constantly similar patterns?
Ibelieveitistheactionofmanagersthatinterferewithnaturaltendenciesinawrongway-by
imposing orders and not by creating an opposing NATURAL TENDENCY so that employees
don›t feel oppressed. This reminds me of the billiard balls as we hit them with a lubricated
stick. A billiard ball is a small, hard ball used in cue sports, such as carom billiards, pool, and
snooker. The number, type, diameter, color, and pattern of the balls differ depending upon
the specific game being played. Various particular ball properties such as hardness, friction
coefficient and resilience are important to accuracy. The balls are in harmony with their
intended use. Billiard balls have a minimum of friction. A billiard ball struck by a cue travels
in the same direction as the cue unless the ball is struck toward one side in order to impart
sidespin. In that case the ball deflects or“squirts”away from the line of approach of the cue,
typically by a few degrees. Do employees work on the side of the leaders› cue or are they
hit by the other employees to sidespin? Do leaders think of the possibility that employees
because of their tendency to assemble in like-minded groups would take paths similar to
billiard balls in which they find «new comfort zones»?

18
http://www.slideshare.net/FNian/fractals-and-chaos-theory-presentation
When relationships between employees freeze we tend to heat up the relationships to
make them warmer. We hold meeting between the antagonists and thee managers will be
happy to «force» them to cooperate. May be a safer approach would be to work with nature
in a different manner. If we add salt to ice the freezing degree of ice shall drop to below zero.
This is not a way of disturbing ice; it is a way of finding new natural behavior. This is also a
PRVENTION APPROACH; rather than wait for the ice to freeze we make it more difficult for
ice to freeze. What «salt» a manager may add to the ice relationship among employees to
delay freezing and make it virtually impossible to happen?
Working with habits is the natural tendency. People with similar habits group together.
Opposing habits segregate the groups. This is much like organic mixes with organic. If not,
segregation happens like the stripping of aggregate (inorganic) from asphalt (organic).You
want the «paths» of work not get stripped by differing habits of your employees as some
prefer early hours and others midday hours) then segregate them or force them to accept? A
better solution is to try to make them more compatible. We coat limestone with an organic
material so that it becomes more in terms with the organic asphalt and this way stripping
problem is greatly reduced. A manager may seek to find a way to change preferably ONE
GROUP so that it may become compatible with the other groups.
It amazes me to what degree we have been successful in finding
solutions to work with nature in many applications, but failed
miserably in extrapolating the concept to the management
domain.
We may create new paths of minimum resistance; frequently
managers intensify the resistance of this path by trying to work
against nature. Attracting people to something different from
what they are attracted to may be accomplished by finding
a stronger attraction. A bee is attracted to a flower, but if a
more attracting flower becomes available the bee changes to
sucking this flower. Who plants the more attractive flowers for
employees?

19
LeadersareSymmetrical,Managers
Are Not
Thingslookmoreattractivelybeautifulwhentheyaresymmetrical.Theoppositeofsymmetry
is asymmetry, which is the absence of, or a violation of, symmetry (the property of an object
being invariant to a transformation, such as reflection). Symmetry is an important property
of both physical and abstract systems and it may be displayed in precise terms or in more
aesthetic terms. The absence of violation of symmetry that are either expected or desired
can have important consequences for a system.
Look at the two leaves below and ask yourself which is more attractive to the eye.

20
Symmetry adds beauty and balance. It adds economic balance as well. The bilateral
symmetry also called mirror symmetry) of most humans and animals helps in balancing
movements. We tend to neglect this fact by our behaviors. I quote «Our body is designed
for symmetrical movements. Performing repetitive one sided movement or sitting in a
skewed posture increases the risk of injury. Alternate your movement patterns or rearrange
your workstation so that there is SYMMETRY IN MOVEMENT».
And this brings the idea of what some managers do: when they move people around they
tend to imbalance the movements of their teams. They distort the balanced movement
of the teams. These imbalances are expensive in energy and performance. Soccer teams
realize this fact and they move players around, but without affecting the symmetry of their
movement. Team managers who fail to keep the team balance end up as losers.
A good leader observes symmetry even when sitting on his chair as he tends to some right
and left. Turn the chair right and left. They use the right ear and then the left ear. They
maintain the balance. This offers a new differentiator between a manager and a leader:
A leader has symmetry in what he does and works on keeping the team symmetrical as
well. A manager doesn›t keep the symmetry of his movements or the team either. Leaders
look for employees with symmetrical behaviors. This is a natural tendency among animals.
Female swallows, for example, prefer males with longer and more symmetric tails, while
female zebra finches mate with males with symmetrically colored leg bands.
The tendency of leaders to have symmetry engulf their emotional symmetry as well. As
I am in the process of writing this paragraph dear Dr. Edward Lewellen responded to a
comment that I wrote by saying « life is imagination. I worked with a person yesterday who
has problems interacting with their family. They used the words «I don›t respect (name)»
many times. I said, «You›re holding on to the memory of each time they did something that
caused you to feel disrespect, aren›t you?» They said «Yes». I told them that emotions are a
funny thing.Take «Love» as an example.We create love in our imagination; all the thoughts,
feelings, and emotions are driven by how we choose to imagine another person. Because
emotions exist in our imagination, they can quickly be changed through an event that
disrupts our «dream» we›ve created around this person. I then asked, «When do you last
remember really loving your family?» The person had an epiphany and cried! As your post
above shows, many times we just need to refocus...».This is a great example of asymmetrical
emotions in which we move our emotions in one direction and that disturbs our lives.

21
Leaders know that going in a focused direction is important.
However; they don›t forget that they need to keep the symmetry
of their movement by looking to the opposite direction. Those
leaders know that they must test their assumptions and that their
direction is the right one.
And here comes an important issue: it is about using the right and left brains. To use one is
wrong. It is asymmetry. We need to train people to use both. Maxwell demonstrated that
electricity and magnetism are actually two complementary aspects of a more fundamental
force, called electromagnetism. The Mind Force is best viewed similarly.
Do you agree with this post? To keep symmetry I expect some commenters not to.

22
Designing for Chaos
Accepting that things may go wrong is a sign of maturity. Ioana Elena David published
today a lovely post titled «Open [chaotic:-)] letter»in which she imagined how chaos may
initiate when things go wrong. This post aroused my interest because at the same time I
was exchanging a dialogue on designing for catastrophe with the beautiful mind of Joanne
Swecker -PBP Building Companies For Social Change.These synchronized events prompted
me to write this post on Designing for Chaos.
Weknowthatwhenchangefallswithinanarrowbandofrateitformschaos.Oursocietiesare
facing rapid changes in social structure, in technology, in communication, in entanglement
of interest, in effects migrating rapidly from one place to another, in information and many
more such that we are bound to fall in the zone rate in which chaos is very likely to occur.
Just take the Twitter Curve as one example and see how the rate of interruption is nearing
zero.Twitter is a global community of friends and strangers answering one simple question:
What are you doing now?With such rate coming from only one social media platform- then
what would happen with interruptions coming from other social media platforms such as
this one LinkedIn?

23
http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/12/2006/httpwww37signal.
html
We know that we experience rapid interruptions and these interruptions may cause our
lives to become chaotic. Then what to do? The catastrophes of disruption are similar to
catastrophes that we face from nature such as volcanoes. As we design for catastrophes can
we design from chaos as catastrophes are chaotic anyway?
One idea is in catastrophe management Risk Spreading is a way of alleviating the risk by
spreading it instead of localizing it on «one shoulder». Distribution of load is similar to
the distribution of risk. This is a form of putting some order into chaos and increasing our
resilience to catastrophes.This is a topic that is tackled so brilliantly by dear Dr. Vincenzo de
Florio, who is the real authority on this topic.
All societies need to increase their resilience to chaos. We have three options to do that.
One option is the prevention or prediction of catastrophe and this is beyond what control
till this moment. We are trying to understand if truly some animals can sense earthquakes
before they happen and how they do it. These efforts are still in their infancy.
A second option is minimizing the effects of catastrophic chaos through different
approaches. We have good experiences in designing systems to lessen the harm of fires.
Conflicts between employers and employees with customers are like fire that may escalate
rapidly. Can we design systems to reduce the «fire of conflicts», in emulation of real fires?
Or, can we wake up from our drunken feelings of being successful and design for the
catastrophe of rapid failing and unpredictably? There is an example here- that of Chelsea
Football Club falling down from being the football league champion to becoming to the
zone of relegation very rapidly. The swing from success to failure is chaotic and we must be

24
ready in advance to either lessen the rate of deterioration so that chaos doesn›t happen or
have built-in resilience to lessen its effects. Otherwise; chaos shall make our thinking and
reactions chaotic as well and this will compound the effect of chaos.
Increasing preparedness is a way to combat chaos. Like some animals which increase the
thickness of their fur in autumn in preparation for the forthcoming winter we need to
make preparations for the «winter of markets» when selling goes down and rapidly in a
catastrophic way. Other animals store fat in their bodies to warm up in the winter. We can›t
predict weather and its occasional catastrophes, but we may take precautions to alleviate
the chaos resulting from such catastrophes. Cold weather adaptations and cold markets
adaptations share many commonalities and we could transfer our knowledge from one
field to another to lessen the turbulences of chaos.
A different way of increasing our resilience is by finding creative ways of minimizing the
impact of chaos. The best example I find is the wood frogs in North America in which they
may experience very cold weathers. These frogs have a unique way of lessening combating
the cold weather by producing an antifreeze from the sugar in their bodies, urea from their
urineandstillunknownchemical.Thiswaythesefrogsdon›tfreeze.Whenrelationsbetween
nations become very «cold», when social interruptions are freezing our minds on focusing
at what we do- wouldn›t it be a great idea if we could build an antifreeze structure? Like a
frog using its waste urine to do that how can we use our wasted times and chaotic efforts
purposefully?
A third optional strategy of combating catastrophes is by linking networks. I discussed that
in a previous post titled « Network Sharing Based Marketing». I just want to add one more
example here. Marketing networks may exchange information so that one company may
know in advance where to migrate when experiencing very «cold markets»?
The risks we encounter are too many in our lives and business lives alike. For a great study
on these possible risks and their networks (yes, risks have networks that we may turn into
benefits), I strongly recommend reading this document by the world Economic Forum titled
«Global Risks 2015
10th Edition». It has wealth of information on 28 risks that we are facing.
We may design models and our thinking to deal with catastrophic chaos before we fall
victims for it.

25
The Fire to Fire
What makes successful people successful? This is a question that has been addressed
abundantly, but I have few thoughts on this topic.
You have probably heard of the Spontaneous human combustion (SHC) is a term
encompassing reported cases of the combustion of a living (or very recently deceased)
human body without an apparent external source of ignition. It is still a misery how this
process takes place. One general observation is almost all cases of SHC involve persons
with low mobility, due to advanced age or obesity.Victims show a high likelihood of having
died in their sleep, or of being unable to move once they had caught fire.
Slow moving companies may suffer from SHC as well.We are living in the age of fast-movers
emerging as winners.They know they have to move faster than a bee to have a place in this
world. Slow-moving companies may burn because they mobility is limited. A small burning
candle might initiate a fire that burns a slow-moving business. Slow is a virtue sometimes,
but not when fire is around. These companies need to fire their slowness before they may
not be «eaten up» by the fire of competitors. Lean companies have no fat, but slow-moving
companies are fatty. Once the fire starts their fat becomes the source material for fire to
continue burning them.

26
Self-burning has been attributed in part to Larry E. Arnold in his 1995 book Ablaze! In
which Arnold wrote that the flammability of a human body could be increased by certain
circumstances, like increased alcohol in the blood. He also wrote that extreme stress could
be the trigger that starts many combustions. This hypothesis resonates with me in view of
recent scientific findings. Nasa geophysicist Friedemann Freund showed that, when rocks
were under very high levels of just before an earthquake, they release charged particles.
These charged particles can flow out into the surrounding rocks.
I wonder if highly stressed companies behave similarly and if that extreme stress reaches a
level whereby these companies send «charged signals» that an earthquake is to follow. Is
that the explanation for «Burned-out» companies?
Instead of building mounting stress, real management would turn this self-burning
destruction into a useful purpose. Individuals as well as companies must have a purpose in
life. They have the fuel of desire to achieve their purpose. They have two options: either to
succeed or if not to end their efforts with no harm to others. They realize life can be similar
to a farmer who did everything possible to grow the almond trees. As the tree started to
flower, a strong wind blew the flowers away. They accept that success may not come, but
that efforts and learned lessons may benefit other people. They are like the self-burning
campfire furnace- it burns itself once it has accomplished its purpose. The embed video
below shows how this wooden furnace works.
To have the opportunity to succeed a business must act rapidly like a rapid fire. It has a
fuel of positive emotions of high octane number. These businesses know how to keep the
fire ablaze. They know how to enrich the Oxygen needed for burning with positive ideas,
surroundings, thoughts with supportive management and business climate. They know
their desires to achieve shall make obstacles the burning wood for fire to continue and
lighten their way.

27
Managementmaydecideiffireisto«fire»peopleoutoftheorganization,or
fire people to burn their stress before stress may burn them and meanwhile
burnallobstaclesfastenoughtostayoncoursetowardsabetterfuture.
Management may kindle a fire, but what kind of fire that is the issue.

28
We Need New Appraisal Criteria
My mind is occupied with answering the question on why international efforts to correct
the global debt problem have failed and even deteriorated the problem. A question proved
to me could be the input for another question. How do we evaluate «experts» when in
fact their expertise make bad worse? Again, this question serves as an input to two more
question: are our appraisal systems of employees wrong and why? Worse even, if these
experts appraise other employees and most likely they shall downgrade employees who
don›t see eye-to-eye with them. This is a cascading issue and may lead organizations to
bankruptcy.
For businesses to continue what they are doing means simply that they are on their least
resistance path. Nobody is challenging the path or, if somebody dares to he/she shall be
silenced. We penalize staff who dare to ask questions that would correct the failing path
their perspective businesses are following.
I believe that the cost of not asking is like a coast- both have indefinite length. The coast of
questions means we should be asking fractal questions with the output of one question is
the input for another. We know nothing for sure, but as we know more the beauty of the
questions fractal emerges.
The longer we stick to a theory or a practice, the more we feel we own it. It is like somebody
renting a house for many years. The renter feels he/she owns the house the longer the

29
renter stays in the house. Look at the time span it took us to show that air isn›t just one
component. Phillips Curve and its modification because we had later to consider human
behavior and expectations is another example. Even gravity, space-time curve and almost
all long-approved scientific theories need revision in view of the new advancement of
technology, which allow us to visualize changes almost as they happen. Changes in the
mind of researchers prompted by asking themselves the challenging questions that shall
lead our journey to discovery.
Here is the dilemma. We appraise employees by their output. To have above-the -average
output they are encouraged to continue with what they are doing. Teachers are another
example. They have curriculum to cover and there output is defined by what percentage
they covered. We are not appraising those people who make us realize that the input is
wrong and therefore the output is of no value. We teach Newton›s discovery of gravity, but
we don›t teach how to challenge this discovery. We are still working like machines and we
are therefore measuring the output of machines more than the output of humans.
We aren›t walking the talk in our appraisal systems. We want people to adapt while asking
them to conform to rusty machine-like systems.We are investing billions of dollars globally
on teaching and training of human forces, but only to do what they were accustomed to-
same old habits. We need do disrupt current thinking and habits vigorously.
What is the way out?
OnesolutionIproposeisrethinkingourappraisalsystems.Weneedmindsthataskquestions
all the time. A good question leads to other good questions. We need disruptive questions
that lead to new thinking. A major appraisal criteria of employees should be based on how
many question each employee asked and how many others generated more questions
from this question. We need to appraise employees on the degree they shakeup the input
as much as we welcome the output.
A tilted rod shall give a tilted shadow. A distorted appraisal system shall give distorted
appraisals. To straighten the system we must straighten our appraisals.

30
Love and Hate- Which Is Stronger?
Global hate is surrounding us everywhere. The deplorable bloodshed in Paris is just one
example of what is going in many parts in our world. We live the horrible consequences
of hatred and the evil actions it provokes. What planted the seeds of hatred to such a high
level so that taking the lives of others even on the expense of losing one›s life is a concern
for all.
Hatred and all negative feelings have their negative energies and these may lead to horrible
consequences. There is a lovely video which shows same rice divided into two jars. One
jar has a label which says love; the other jar has the word hate. Upon placing the two jars
under similar conditions over thirteen days and talking to each jar for moments daily in
accordance with its label. I love you or I hate you and the amazing thing was the rice in the
love bottle almost was still good to eat, while the one labeled with hate had disgusting
mold growing into it.
Please watch this video to see what negative feelings can do.

31
We are all parts of our emotions.We plant seed of love or hate in our hearts, which represent
the jars in the above experiment.The seeds shall grow and depending on what feelings we
give those seeds, shall determine the end result. Imagine if we keep feeding those seeds
with hatred what would we house in our hearts? Hearts filled with horrible molds and the
consequences shall me even more horrible. It is bad for the hating person as well as for the
society.
Justin A. Bertini shared a beautiful post last week in which he stated «Love is the most
powerful force in this universe...I shared this post by commenting «If water molecules didn›t
«love» each other and therefore are weakly bonded, then what would happen to us? Love
while keeping your «mobility». We need to love each other, to bond to each other, but at
the same time while maintaining our authenticity and mobility. Looking at the video again
and that the rice jar with the label love kept going healthy and this truly shows the power
of love as not only the most powerful force in the universe, but also it is the only power that
would keep our universe healthy and worthy of living in.
Those ideas crossed my minds when reading about the concerted efforts Brad Fergusson -
PBP Building Companies For Social Change and Joanne Swecker -PBP Building Companies
For Social Change are doing to build up globally the concept of People-Before-Profits. This
is a noble one and they try plants the seeds of love in the global citizen. They deserve our
support because they are trying to fill our world with love, care, attention and respect. Just
name all the positive emotions. It is by doing that their efforts shall not only expose the
«seeds of love» to a loving atmosphere, but they shall also plant the feeling the every global
citizen is equal. That shall lessen the hatred and all its terrible effects.
Let us all be powerful, healthy by loving each other.

32
Our Heads Are Reaction Vessels
We have been given the gift of the bond of friendship, I celebrate us. That is what Joanne
Swecker -PBP Building Companies wrote in one of her posts. I responded by saying «I feel
this applies to purposeful people…they have no boundaries, no limitations and no rules.
They have the determination to achieve their purpose passionately and with love».
I wanted to check this idea and if this is a way of life. I was pleased to read a great post in
which it states that «if a dog wants to bury its bone, it locks on the idea of burying it, and
then it is very difficult to distract it once the idea is there». Eagles aren›t different as they
When an eagle sites his prey, he narrows his focus on it and sets out to get it. No matter the
obstacle, the eagle will not move his focus from the prey until he grabs it.
Focus is power and the mind that focus have the power necessary to drive them to finishing
what they have to do. And equally important is the realization that power is inversely
proportional to time. Sleeping on tasks means losing the power to accomplish them. This
is a terrible impact of the distractions that we experience today from tempting activities on
social networks. Too many things happen at the same time that we may easily be tempted
to postpone NOW to a future date.

33
Can we help avoiding that? Even though I try, I fail occasionally. Social media it a source of
rapid feedback and this feedback might be the distracting factor. I am thinking of social
media as a container for reacting different ideas together, the same way we react chemicals
together. In a classical chemical reaction we known the reactants and reaction conditions
and we may predict the product(s). Same with reacting two ideas together, where the
reaction vessels are our minds. For example, I might combine a wall and camera to have a
wall with a hidden camera for my protection. I focus on the job and get the camera in the
wall. No distraction and focus on completing the job.
But the reaction vessel of social media is different. If I start with an idea and cook it in the
vessel of my mind and publish I get a feedback. This feedback will depend on whether
the commenter agrees with me or not and the sentiment by which opinion differences
are expressed. Being a feedback, this becomes an input in the reaction vessel. In other
words, the reaction vessel has new a reactant now.The more feedback I get and their timely
coincidence means adding many more reactants to the reaction vessel and expecting me
to know what the reaction vessel shall produce! Are our societies running into impossible
dreams?
The social feedback is serving two opposing directions: it enriches our ideas and open new
horizons for them with the simultaneity of producing so many emotions and ideas that we
may lose focus.We are no more the people who have a goal to achieve- and where shall led
us to?

34
LetmereiterateoneofmymetaphorsinwhichIdescribedcomplexissuesashavingbundles
of keys and locks and you find no clear way of which key goes to which lock. By adding ideas
to the reaction vessel we are constantly adding keys that serve only in increasing our loss to
which locks these keys fit. I know that some keys will have a built-in instinct to find their lock
and that «similar ideas flock together», but only to a limit. Sooner or later, the discussions
shall heat up, the reaction medium shall get less viscous leading to even more interactions
of ideas and newly-generated ideas shall feedback into the reaction vessel and more ideas
shall evolve. Where to stop this rapidly process that would lead to an exponential growth
of ideas?
Sometimes I feel it is a blessing that %20 of people on the internet generate %80 of new
ideas; otherwise the growth of ideas might reach extremely high levels that break out of
the capacity of the reaction vessel (our brain) and the inner pressure may explode it. Who
knows how volatile are the newly-produced ideas. What is their pressing need ?
Our heads are becoming a reaction vessel for so many ideas that keep new ideas flooding
in, colliding, producing new ideas that feedback to the reaction vessel and who knows
what shall come next?
We are compounding uncertainty even to what we think we know well. We feel sometimes
the urge to escape from this trap by seeking break-away times. Is there such a thing now
with the mobile putting the world in your palm?
I dedicate this post to dear friend Joanne Swecker -PBP Building Companies for inspiring
the idea of this post.

35
The One Certain Direction
It is rainy outside. Have a look at the sky. It is cloudy. There is no rain without clouds. This is
a certain direction. You can›t be equally sure to say it is cloudy outside and so it must be
raining.
Rainy then sure it is cloudy. Cloudy but there is no assurance it is raining or going to rain.
There is only one certain direction and the reverse direction is uncertain. But why A mi
saying this? Profits-Before-People and People-Before-Profits- are the directions equal? Or,
are both uncertain? Or, are they are like clouds and rain with only one direction is certain?

36
Some businesses opt for profits before people?They want to be cash cow businesses?They
sell low quality products, they wrap their offers with honey, while the inside is molded
bread? They may opt to play with the standards and specifications to make higher profits.
They may produce toxic products that are bad for health and they create great packages to
make the products more appealing for the consumer. And the list goes on.These businesses
know they are not genuine in serving people and sooner or later they shall be found out.
They do their best to collect the maximum profits before their clouds become too cloudy
with suspicion and the rain of profits come to long dry periods.When the focus is on making
profits attention to the source of profit- the customer- is of second importance. Some
businesses try to cover up by donating to charity and serving the community; however
fooling people shall not be possible forever. Worse is that those businesses work under
stress for fear of being uncovered , the cost of which shall be very high. This is a direction
that has one certainty- failure.
Making People-Before-Profits as the landmark of a business means care for the people,
their environment and to the best of the people interest. This doesn›t mean that profit
isn›t desired; in fact profits might double. When people feel the sincerity of a business they
become its loyal customers, advocates and promoters because they feel they have a stake
in this business staying alive. This is a sure direction as much as there are clouds if it is
raining. People buy delight and not pain. People hate to be cheated. People don›t want to
feel they trusted an undeserving business. People hate to buy a product that is wrapped
in an expensive package to find out they bought a low-quality product. Their expectation
drop sharply and feelings of being cheated aren›t easy to forgive.
When businesses work for people they have nothing to hide. They become transparent.
People trust them more because people like transparency.
Sometimes we forget simple facts by trying to be clever enough to go around them. As
simple as the concept of People-Before-Profits is simple and direct; still many businesses
disobey it. Here I welcome the pioneering work of dear Brad Fergusson - PBP Building
Companies For Social Change for starting a campaign to pool top names in their fields to
serve and promote this concept. In few months he has succeeded to get great names to
join and is proceeding ahead with holding an international conference May, 2016 to ….I
leave this part for Brad Fergusson - PBP Building Companies For Social Change to fill.
We need to go back to the basics and propel the efforts of serious people who work to
serve people knowing that profits shall come anyway.

37
Resonating Hearts
Isitourheartsthattalkorourmouths?HeartMathInstitutehasdevelopedacommunication
technique called Intuitive Listening, which“involves focusing on the heart and maintaining
a neutral or appreciative attitude while listening to another person” (McCraty, Atkinson, &
Tiller, 1999). More research is even more fascinating as it showed that each human heart
emits an electromagnetic field, the largest generated by any part of the human body, which
extends up to several feet away from the body in a -360degree radius. Researchers were
able to show that the mother’s brainwaves synchronized to that of her baby’s heartbeat.
In this experiment, the baby was laying in the mother’s lap with a blanket placed in
between mother and baby. In the summary of their findings, the study’s authors wrote,
“This preliminary data elucidates the intriguing finding that the electromagnetic signals
generated by the heart have the capacity to affect others around us. … It appears that
when the mother placed her attention on the baby that she became more sensitive to the
subtle electromagnetic signals generated by the infant’s heart.
Is it the heart only that is responsible for motions being the organ with the strongest
electromagnetic field? Again, recent research shows that The science behind all this is
fascinating, and the conclusions are staggering. It turns out that biochemical reactions to
mental and emotional stimuli – your everyday thoughts and feelings – occur not just in the
brain but also, often simultaneously, in virtually every system of your body. all these systems
are inextricably linked in a sort of secondary, chemically based nervous system, one that is
intimately connected with (but not exclusively controlled by) the electrically based central

38
nervous system with which most people are more familiar. Thoughts and emotions cause
distinct neuron-firing patterns within various parts of the brain. They can also observe how
these patterns coincide with chemical releases and reactions throughout the body.
Are we having fractal electromagnetic fields within our bodies? By the same token are we
having fractal emotions pattern in our bodies? I mean not a single emotion at one time =,
but a basket of emotions in certain fractal patterns? That we have mixed emotions at one
time has been proven by solid research. This research findings are worthy of revisiting, but
is of concern now is that each emotion has other emotions with it, but it is the pattern of
distribution that varies for each prime emotion. You have sort of finger prints for emotions.
WhatstandsoutfromotherresearchesisthatofLOVE.Morethan700participantsinFinland,
Sweden and Taiwan participated in experiments aimed at mapping their bodily sensations
in connection with specific emotions. Love is the only emotion (other than happiness) that
includes a warm glow between the legs. Love has a unique location as it has a unique value
in our lives. It is love admixed with other emotions that a mother has towards its baby that
makes the mind, heart and the whole bodies resonate between a mother and her baby.
Manufactured love isn›t true love and shall send a different coding signals than those codes
generated from purity of love.
Working for people with love shall create the signal patterns that makes customer oscillate
with them like a baby responding to his mother. Customers shall respond to businesses who
care for them and who send the codes that customers resonate with. When people believe
that you love them and care for their interests your customers become like your «baby»
responding to your field of business. As the whole human body responds to emotions, the
whole body of your organization must respond to signals coming from your customers. And
remember that customers have coded emotional signals and shall respond to your signal
as they feel them. Love between you and your customers is an amazing thing. It is the real
bonding between you and your customers. As a baby is loyal to his mother, your customers
will be loyal to the degree you send them the loving signals of love and care.
The more the light of discovery intensifies, the more the darkness of unknowing becomes
darker.Morelightexposesdeeperdarkness.Itistheco-existenceofopposites.Butonething
I claim I know- it is People-Before-Profit first or nothing. You can›t beat the electromagnetic
signal pattern of your customers with false love.
When I mention People-Before-Profit, the name of Brad Fergusson comes to my mind.

39
The Selected and Happy Few
There are many products in the market. Some niche products low volume of sales, but they
generate fatty profits. Most products enjoy high volume of sales, but they generate few
profits. In between some products medium volume of sales at modest profit.
Ideas react in a similar way to chemical reactions. In the latter, molecules that collide, but
the number of collisions that produce the desired product are few. This is due to many
factors, and prominent among them are the orientation of colliding molecules may be
incorrect and the colliding molecules may not have the necessary energy for them to pass
the transition barrier to products.
Are ideas different Apparently not because when we group people to brainstorm and
generate ideas they do that and the greater the number of ideas generated the greater are
the chances they would collide. However; these collisions fail to produce new products. Are
causes relevant to those colliding molecules which fail to produce the desired products?
Apparently, there are many similarities. Groupthink tends to produce similar ideas if
done improperly. It is like a molecule reacting with itself. It is a waste of time to have a
brainstorming session in which the participants just follow the opinion of one person.
When people go to a brainstorming session with a negative attitude or being disengaged

40
means that they are unlikely to produce «warm» ideas and their main concern would be for
the session to close. Even if they produce ideas they shall be cold and their collisions shall
not have enough energy to pass the activation (transition state» barrier.
It is not an accident that Oxygen, without which our existence would be jeopardized, is
about %20 of the composition of air. In contrast, Nitrogen which is almost inert, constitutes
around %80 of air. This is in accordance with Pareto Rule that %20 of employees do %80
of the work. In brainstorming sessions I shall not be surprised if only %20 of the attendees
produce %80 of the ideas and that %20 of those ideas are worthy. If we go deeper we may
find that %20 of the useful ones are really good enough to follow. Those remaining ideas
become very diluted with the presence of irrelevant ones and their collisions are mostly
going to end up without enough activation to produce new products ideas. Exactly like
molecules in a chemical reaction are mostly unable to provide enough collision energy to
complete the reaction.
What adds to these difficulties is having the talents to manage brainstorming sessions.
Talents may find that their ideas collide mostly with low energy people who are deprived of
a genuine desire to make change and therefore act as a barrier to really good ideas to have
the right orientation to collide fruitfully.
I find the same concept applies to social media platforms in which authors take time to
produce posts. Not all posts are of equal «energy». If we check the engagements that may
lead to hot discussions are few in percentage. As molecules mostly collide more efficiently
at higher temperatures so are ideas. If the medium of reaction is cold we shouldn›t expect
many fruitful collisions. How many posts produce the product of a post that the author
wishes? Very few and this is apparently the law of nature.
Ideas are the moon in a dark night. One moon to shine> Is this our destiny? For those
organizationsthataresearchingfortalents-beawarethattalentsneedtherightenvironment
to have their ideas to results. Having a talent is one thing; actualization of their ideas is a
different story all together.

41
Character Quotient- it is more than
IQ and EQ
Human intelligence quotient (IQ) and emotional quotient (EQ) are well-known and are
being used as a way of evaluating job candidates. Initially, An intelligence quotient (IQ)
is best defined as a measurement of cognitive capacity--one›s ability to think and reason.
Experiences showed that IQ is not as reliable measure of performance. People who do
well at schools may not do well in life. Figuring out a better measure for work performance
resulted in developing the EQ. People with outstanding academic achievement, but
with low emotional quotient may perform poorly at work. For this reason, international
companies started to look for candidates with an EQ of 110 and above. This is on the high
end of the EQ curve.
A post which Brad Fergusson shared on LinkedIn aroused my interest. The post read
«Character is higher than intellect. A great soul will be strong to live as well as think. Ralph
Waldo Emerson. So, character is higher than intellect and the EQ falls short of predicting
performance to the highest level. Are we then in search for a new quotient and in need of
developing a Character Quotient (CQ)?
We are pursuing this idea. With this I mean this a joint effort between People-Before-Profits

42
Group and myself (I am a great supporter of this Group and its objectives). The issue here
is complex because of the definition of character has many facets to cater for. However;
thus isn›t disturbing. If you think about it all complex systems have one up to three simple
measures to gauge their behavior. The human body, in spite of its complexity we may
measure its healthiness by measuring the body temperature and pulsing rate. The Brix
Number, is a measure of the quality of fruits. As complex as character is; still it may yield to
simple measures accordingly.
Having a quotient for characters will serve in many domains such as in storytelling, in hiring
and measuring the performance of employees. It should also be of help in assigning jobs to
staff in accordance with their Character Quotient (CQ).
There is a proverb in Arabic that translates to everybody acts like a mineral. For, example
some minerals cleave easily in one or more planes. Some characters cleave upon exposure
to pressure. Most minerals don›t show their real color till we grind them and then determine
their streak characteristics. Pyrite mineral shows brassy yellow color, but its streak color is
green-black. That is why it is called fools› gold. We may find the true color of a candidate
quite different from his/her streak color. We need to see how a candidate behaves «under
grinding». You don›t want human characters that prove to be «fools› gold».
Minerals when exposed to light show different reflection colors (luster), depending on their
structure. Humans may behave similarly when exposed to the lights of fame. They reflect
their internal colors. Some minerals show dull or chalky luster whereas others show metallic
and bright luster. We have experiences with this test. Some people when became famous
and were brought in the spotlight behaved showed a luster of false pride and chalky
attitudes to others. Beware of «opaque humans» who show no transparency when exposed
to light by reflecting almost nothing of it.
Tenacity of minerals suggest another way of extrapolating tests on minerals, to find out their
real character, to humans. How well a mineral resists breakage is known as tenacity. Some
minerals are brittle, others are malleable, flexible or elastic. What is the «Human Tenacity»?
And how may we measure it?
Twosimpleteststhatweborrowfrommineralstoapplyonhumanstorevealtheircharacters.
This is a crucial area because character tells us a lot about why a human does what he does
and why they do the actions they do.
I invite the readers of this post to give their feedback in our effort to generate CQ. I am
expecting some lustrous feedback, even throw they might deceptively show they aren›t.
This work shall be my gift to the People-Before-Profit as a symbolic way of walking the talk.
It shall be of value to all people and organizations as well for they shall know where they
stand to know where they are going.

43
The Hidden Characters of Great
Leaders
First, I tell a real story, which has far reaching- effects. People nicknamed a lady by «The lady
of the ring».The lady was presented with a ring that had a precious stone.The ring captured
the heart of the lady, but not of the people in tow. As soon as old ladies saw her wearing
the ring they almost her to remove it «no lady, you are still too young to wear this ring».
Later, people started to avoid the lady because they thought she symbolized bad omens.
It turned out ladies in that town used to love the ring. However; most of them became
widows following their husbands battling in a ferocious war. For one reason or the other,
the killed husbands› wives wore the ring and those who survived their wives didn›t even
own the same type of ring. Women developed the belief that the ring brings bad luck and
death as well. I call this phenomenon «Experience love-leaving».
This experience is the opposite of another experience commonly known as «Experience
taking». In Experience-love-taking, you get immersed in what you do so that you might feel
you are the person you love. When you read a book and a character absorbs your attention
and captures your heart you feel you are this character. You take the character into heart
and you dissolve yourself into it. There is polarity in your heart as you become positively
and strongly attracted to this character.
A leader is like a character in a book- either h/s develops experience love-taking or

44
experience love-leaving. When the «followers» feel the leader is the character they love
they have polarity in their hearts to be in the leaders› heart and be genuinely immersed.
When people have the attitude to a leader based on experience love-leave they are not
going to deal with this leader. They have negative polarity to the leader. Lovability of the
leader is a critical factor. The negative relationship characteristics Insecure styles include:
anxious-preoccupied, dismissive-avoidant, or fearful-avoidant. Leaders may create the
image of a character that absorbs people; the opposite is finding a way to resolve the
styles of h/s repulsion by people and how to resolve them. It is energy consuming. A leader
knows well that by removing anxiety, by not being dismissive and not scary to people h/s
is removing the causes of alienating with people. But, capturing their heart as a hero in a
movie captures our hearts because he immerses himself in their interests is a sure way of
building lasting relationship with the people.
In understanding the hidden characters of great leaders I shared a post on LinkedIn, which
drew thais very thoughtful comment from Sara Jacobovici « I so much appreciate the
connections you make between nature and business. I agree wholeheartedly that humans
are organic, biological beings and «nature› bound.The human paradox is that we are unique
individuals dependent on community. What you are reminding us is that this dependence
strengthens us individually as we grow in our community. There is often a fear (for lack of
a better word) that the self will be lost in the collective. I think it is the opposite: working
in a supportive group environment has the potential to bring out the uniqueness of the
individual and in this way allow the group to grow a stronger support base».
I responded by saying « I highly appreciate your comment dear Sara Jacobovici. I agree fully
with you. I say all leaves look similar, but none is an exact copy of another. Each has its «Self
Print». It is the whole as one, while the one personality is preserved to some extent. Let me
put it another way, we want the individuals to dissolve in the whole, like sugar dissolves
in water. However; once water evaporates the sugar molecules crystallize in better shapes
and quality». Sara Jacobovici responded by saying «What a powerful example Ali Anani,
PhD. What yourare showing me is that in nature, the sugar can dissolve because it «trusts»
the outcome. In human nature, we are taking a risk by «letting go», or dissolving because
we don›t naturally trust the «system».
Trust and love make great characteristics of great leaders. They make people enjoy their
«experience-taking» with their leaders.

45
Ali Anani, PhD

Complexity has its shadow

More Related Content

Viewers also liked (7)

Similar to Complexity has its shadow (18)

More from Ali Anani, PhD (20)

Recently uploaded (20)

Complexity has its shadow