The “L” Word… The Ultimate Competitive Advantage
Who said love and business don’t go together? Find out just where you’re making a serious misstep.
Today’s post is by Steve Farber, author of Love is Just Damn Good Business (CLICK HERE to get your copy).
At a 2009 conference in Dubai, I was making the case that love is more than a touchy-feely emotion but actually a profitable leadership and management tool that results in good business. Following my keynote, a healthy (yet borderline contentious) debate broke out among the participants. As the discussion developed, two familiar factions emerged. One essentially said that I was selling them a bunch of American nonsense.
“Leadership is not about love,” they said, “it’s about fear.” The other, primarily younger, faction was pointing to the first and saying, “See what we have to deal with around here?”
Ten years ago, this type of debate was fairly common among my clients. The leaders in Dubai expressed their views more openly and passionately than in some other countries, but the divide on how they viewed love as a business principle reflected what I found pretty much anywhere I travelled.
Attitudes have changed markedly since then, but there’s still resistance to the idea that leaders actually can operationalize love to the benefit of their bottom line. That’s primarily due to three pervasive myths that linger in today’s workplace.
Myth One: Love has no place in the cut-throat, competitive business landscape. Leaders who buy into this myth might embrace love away from the office, and they might even put on an enlightened and progressive face for PR purposes. But their actions reveal that they view business with a survival-of-the-fittest mindset. There are winners and losers, and the competition is the enemy. You don’t win by loving your enemy, they reason, you win by crushing your enemy. And if you go easy on your employees, they will take advantage of you, lack discipline, and wilt like a flower in August when the going gets tough.
Myth Two: Love is intrinsically good for the world and should be part of business despite the reality that it doesn’t help organizations succeed. Leaders who see the world this way tend to look at love as an acceptable cost of doing business. They put everything connected to love at work into the expense column. They want to love what they do. They want to serve others with love. They want their customers and clients to love what their organization provides. But leading with love is going to cost them money and it will likely cost them business. It’s going to cut their profit margins and their top-line growth. They don’t like those losses, but they are willing to take them in the name of love.
Myth Three: Love is OK for some organizations in some countries, but it’s not a universal principle. It might work if you lead a non-profit in Oregon but it won’t last a day if you operate oil rigs in Dubai.
The truth about Myths 1 and 2 is that love actually is a competitive advantage. By doing what you love, you strengthen your resolve for working with excellence and passion. You lead with energy and neither fear nor boredom hold you back. By serving others in love, you build respect, trust, and loyalty. And by providing services or products that others love, you win clients and customers.
And here’s the thing: You don’t have to throw things like discipline, accountability, and competitive instincts out the window in the name of love. In fact, love compels you to hold people accountable and to set even higher expectations for excellence. And while you might not feel the need to cut your competition’s throat and drink their blood (figuratively speaking, of course), you do want to earn your spot as the market leader. You want to win because you love what you do, the people who work with you, and the people who benefit from what you do.
The truth about Myth 3 is that love is relevant to every organization in every country regardless of industry, culture, or political structure. In the last couple of years, I’ve spoken all over the world—to Rotary International at its conference in Germany, to BNI at its conference in Bangkok, to the Institute of Management in Singapore, to Intel’s international management meeting in San Francisco—and I’ve discovered a growing wave of appreciation and acceptance for what love actually offers to leaders and organizations.
That’s because love is a universal language. The only place it doesn’t work is where it’s not embraced. Personally, I’ve seen love operationalized in banks, health-care systems, logistics companies, online platform providers, and collections agencies, just to name a few examples.
I knew during that trip to the Middle East a decade ago, just as I know today, that love as an operating principle wasn’t some soup-of-the-day fad that had popped up overnight in the U.S. and would soon disappear from the leadership menu. Some leaders will never embrace it, but more and more are doing all they can to incorporate it into their culture, their leadership, and their strategies. Those are the organizations you love to do business with, and those are the organizations that will win over time. Because love always wins.
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Steve Farber is president of Extreme Leadership Inc., an acclaimed speaker, bestselling author, and consultant. His new book LOVE IS JUST DAMN GOOD BUSINESS (CLICK HERE to get your copy)
