Photo courtesy of Jeremiah Sullivan
After writing more than 50 books on topics ranging from Buddha to getting a good night's rest, Deepak Chopra recently turned his attention to leadership and entrepreneurs in "The Soul of Leadership" (Random House Harmony Books). While there's no shortage of spirituality in this book, readers -- Chopra hopes -- will get a healthy tutorial on how to practically start and build organizations and companies that thrive and possibly even inspire.
Here are his answers to a few of our burning questions:
Why write about leadership and why now?
I've written about physical well-being, emotional well-being, social well-being. And I just thought it was finally important to address business and organizational well-being because the long-term financial success of any business depends on its health and how it's functioning. Also, I feel that the time is right because many people are disappointed with the leadership on Wall Street and at many large companies. So many corporations and companies are reinventing themselves right now.
What are the keys to successful leadership?
Any entrepreneurial leader has one main goal: How to envision that future and how to create that future. So in order to be really effective, the leader needs to harness the intelligence, creativity, emotional engagement and also the emotional connection with the people that are part of his or her team in order to manifest that vision.
Can leadership be learned?
Leaders are not born that way. Circumstance, context, history, culture and precise timing bring out the leader. It's said the civil rights movement was born when Rosa Parks refused to get up from her seat. When asked why she did that, she said she was tired. It is really a mysterious phenomenon, but I believe that in any moment of crisis, there's a moment for leaders to emerge, and they usually do. Among the many, there are always one or two people who realize the opportunity and their potential. We all have the potential. We all may not have the desire. If you don't have the desire, then you're not a born leader. Inherent in the desire is the potential for leadership.
What can entrepreneurs get out of reading your book?
Entrepreneurs are risk takers in general, so they will learn to take calculated risks. They will learn to look and listen at four levels -- the level of the physical experience, or observation; the level of the mind, or analysis; the level of emotions and heart and feeling; and ultimately the level of deeper consciousness where our insight, imagination and creativity are nurtured. So it's much more holistic. For business leaders, what their followers expect most is that they have a vision, and that the vision will be actualized. But what they also want from leaders is hope, trust, values and stability.
Do you consider yourself to be an entrepreneur?
Yes, even though I didn't plan to be. I ended up becoming an entrepreneur of the abstract. I wrote books because I wanted to help my patients. As a doctor, I felt that the medical establishment wasn't doing enough. Although it was not standard medial practice, I started to write books for my patients.
What was the hardest entrepreneurial lesson you've learned?
That it's OK to make mistakes, and every time you make mistakes you learn something. The number of mistakes you make is directly proportional to the amount of success you'll have in the future -- as long as you don't repeat the mistakes.
What advice would you offer entrepreneurs on success?
Your true measure of success is your self esteem. Don't confuse your self image with self esteem. Self image is what other people think of you. Self esteem is the inner core of your being that relies on the inner sense of self. Then also realize that you'll never get anywhere unless you're independent of the good and bad opinion of others. Be fearless.
Life insurance as low as $14/mo for $250,000 or $21/mo for $500,000 of coverage. Contact MetLife®
Comments:
All contents in this post are right like be fearless, look urself from ur eyes, learn from mistakes..well said Sir
Again, i've learnt how important mistakes are. They are good because they my you realise some facts yourself. Thanks for sharing.
I've always love his many inspirational books which I would often flip to find a passage when I'm stuck in a creative rut. The challenge for leaders today is that they have a lot of options which can help them reshape the future - so, where to start? I hope I'll get some answer to this question from reading this book. Thanks for the update!
I too started to write for my patients for the exact same reason - the mainstream medical establishment - as a whole - wasn't and isn't doing enough to improve the health of the population. The focus is on disease and disease processes with little or no emphasis on Health and Well Being. And beware the physician the bucks the system. Live With Intention, DrBillToth.com/blog
Dr Chopra, Glad to see different real modern views on entrepreneurship and what a leaders main role or thinking should be, it gladdens my heart to see views that are similar to mine. I know the book would be a success, unfortunately in the part of the world where I am from it is not available, but your interviews gives deep insight into your thoughts. I wish you well.
dear mr deepak choppra you have been such an ispiration in my life from a homless man to an aurthor i am currently writting a book about my life and how drugs affected me i would like you to read 15 pages of it and tell me what you think or even write a review as this would inspire me more much love and blessings mr phira chuon
Dear Dr. Chopra, I could not agree more with your points about it being okay to make mistakes as long as you learn something from them. I don't know if you read the comments that are written here but if so I would like to tell you about what we are doing. We are taking that idea a step further. What if every time you make a mistake in a business attempt you learn from it and you allow others (who are likely to make the same mistakes) to learn from them as well. What if there was a way to avoid many common pitfalls, mistakes and obstacles when undertaking a new business venture? A place online to share stories of failed business ventures. To explore these invaluable experiences for the purpose of learning and growth. The idea being to move forward with greater knowledge, understanding and awareness. When we shift our perception of our failed business attempts away from the negative we have made a powerful decision to make positive use of yet another tool at our disposal, failure. Learn from every angle and let your ambition meet experience. I don't think its that people don't want to learn from failure, but I think there is a dichotomy between knowing that on one hand there is value in learning from these stories. On the other we do not want to allow the thought of failure to creep in because we feel that it will dissuade us from following our passion. Many see these experiences as negative, sad, depressing and lonely. This is one way of seeing these experiences but there is another way. Our most recent topic of the month addresses this very issue. Its called - Lighting Up The Darkness - The Perception Of A Business Failure It can be found at http://www.diedonthevine.com/topic-of-the-month/ We just recently launched the site and believe it will undoubtedly become an invaluable resource for the entrepreneurial community. ~ DiedOnTheVine.com Show your support of DiedOnTheVine.com by becoming a fan today! We would love to hear your thoughts, questions, comments or feedback. http://www.facebook.com/diedonthevine http://www.twitter.com/diedonthevine
Concise, insightful and something to always keep in mind for entrepreneurs during their self development. Thanks for the article.
Hearing this from Dr Chopra has now reinforced all the instinctive actions that entrepreneurs do ,as part of the entrepreneurial soul. Brilliant as usual Dr Chopra.Thanks for sharing.