I read this article in Harvard
Business Review, the other day, about points to consider for newly appointed
managers. It started with the understanding that being in a managerial role,
one is armed with a very potent weapon i.e. fire. Fire here is a metaphor for
power. The power to execute. The power to influence. How one uses that fire
will depend on success and failure. One of the points mentioned ‘taking counsel
for fears’. It is said that fear is normal and if you aren’t scared, you
shouldn’t be trusted with fire.
This line turns our usual understanding
upside-down. Logic says that if you aren’t scared, you should be the one
entrusted with fire. The new concept being explained here looks at the
practical and underlying aspect of human psychology. Not the superficial one. The
common catchphrase that when one doesn’t have anything to lose then they become
free from fear, is wrong. Rather it makes them more callous. It also makes them
think that others too aren’t fearful. The self-reference criteria sets in.
Fear of failure makes you take
calculated risks. It doesn’t make you look at the best solution but the optimum
solution. Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises shows this in an apt manner
through Batman’s prison escape sequence. The rope acted as a safety net
resulting in lack of fear. As soon as the rope was done away with, fear of
failure set in. This made his resolve even harder. There were no second chances.
Not technically alike to Goebbels
law, but a set of beliefs followed by the crowd does result in a ‘don’t-question-the-belief’
syndrome.
