Peter M. Rojcewicz, PhD October 20, 2014
Within Jain, Hindu, and Buddhist traditions, ahimsa is a principle of nonviolence and fundamental respect for oneself and others. How might ahimsa be realized as a leadership principle and general platform for human interactions across an organization? As a principle of organizational leadership, it is to be understood by granting it a wide berth. Ideally, nonviolent interactions give rise to relationships that do no harm to one’s mind-body-spirit. Working within such cross-functional relationships, personnel are free from intimidation, harassment, bigotry, and sexual-minority discrimination.
When leadership communicates strategies, priorities, and duties in an organization committed to ahimsa, people understand standards of performance by which they will be evaluated. When an organization is liberated from the harmful view of employers merely in terms of a “return on investment,” employees can work together guided by policies and practices of mutual respect, tolerance, ecological consciousness, and self-development – as opposed to mindless conformity to custom, procedure, or policy.
Working with others in the living system that is an organization requires respectful engagement with others as extensions of one’s own health, safety, and inter-relational being. Ahimsa requires an aspect of emotional intelligence – minimally, the capacity to delay personal gratification and fulfillment on behalf of others and the common good. It calls for leaders to embody self-mastery and mental calmness. An organization that is guided by ahimsa develops leaders in place who make decisions close to the origin of problems, rather than looking to executives as exclusive sources of knowledge or solutions .
(To Be Continued)