Thought 29: Pointing out mistakes

Some people are in the habit of criticizing others - even for trifling mistakes. Criticizing with a view to finding fault is not good; it hurts the self-esteem of the other person. When a person is hurt, he never learns; he gets into the defensive mode.

Pointing out mistakes with the intention of making the person improve is OK, provided of course, the other person perceives it as such – in a positive manner. However, if he views it negatively, it would only result in eroding his self-esteem.

Most people who are in the habit of criticizing even for small errors, never think of complimenting a person, even for jobs well done. If you do not compliment excellence, you should not comment on shoddiness also.

Instead of making a young person feel bad about his mistakes, make him learn from his mistakes. It is for this reason, a good corporate strategy is to encourage their young and inexperienced employees to take decisions. Since making mistakes and learning from them is important the top managements may want to catch the employees at it when they are quite young and relatively inexperienced. One reason for this is that mistakes made as a junior employee in the hierarchy will not be as costly as those made by the seniors. Michael Jordan of the Basket ball fame says that “I have failed many times and that is why I am a success”.

Never let go an opportunity to complement people for their accomplishments, however, trifling they are. There is nothing like a pat on the back to raise one’s self esteem.

The next thought is about “We all make silly mistakes”