Teaching People to Be Human

As a Trainer Coach, I sometimes start the first minute of my leadership and management training by asking my students this question: what does it take to be human? We were trained to be smart, shrewd, and even manipulative to get things done. Many were stunned by my question as they thought that being human is inconsistent with being an effective leader and manager.

Truth be told, being human has nothing to do with management and leadership but everything to do with management and leadership EFFECTIVENESS. You can't be an effective and sustainable leader and manager if you're not being human. I think being human means the following 7 things:

It has different meanings for different people
It also has different meanings for different cultures and faith. We must accept cultural diversity as the new norm
Practice what we preach
Skillfully, not unskillfully put down the thoughts and comments of others
Not engage in wars to prove that we are better than others or impose our way of life on them. Instead use persuasion, influence and negotiation to change them
Being humble enough to learn from people, especially learn from people who are not as knowledgeable, experienced or successful as us. One way to test your humility in this area is to ask yourself when was the last time you attended a management or leadership course?
Look for the Good in Others, do not always find fault. Focus on people's strengths and turn their weaknesses into a strength and use teamwork and systems to mitigate the impact of their weaknesses.

In short, being human is not about being right, but being right about your thoughts on being human. What are your thoughts on being human? Share with me in the comments here. Our courses are at here. Related articles:

Comments

The Secret Under the Mattress: Why would a 79-year Man Bet So Big on 4D?

It was 2007 when we discovered his secret. While moving my father’s mattress, we found them: heaps and heaps of Singapore Pools 4D tickets. They were stacked in layers, a paper trail of lost hopes. What shocked us most wasn’t just the volume, but the stakes. He wasn’t betting a few dollars for fun. He was punting hundreds of dollars per draw—nearly ten times a month. At the time, my siblings and I were furious. Our father was a 79-year-old retiree. We wondered, with a mix of anger and confusion, why a man at his stage of life would need to win such "big money." What was he going to do with the money? We saw it as a reckless habit, a sign of poor judgment in his final years. Some of us would say, "If I were to give him money to buy 4D, why don't I use the money and buy 4D myself? At least I have better discipline". It has taken me two decades, and the experience of raising my own three grown-up children, to finally see the truth that was hidden under that matt...

Have You Found Your Sun Yi and Teresa Teng?

I n the long, unfolding history of the Chinese-language music scene, "The Moon Represents My Heart" 月亮代表我的心 stands as an unsurpassable milestone. Yet, the journey of this globally renowned masterpiece, a song that would eventually captivate the world, was fraught with setbacks: it was once dismissed as "trash" by its own creator and tossed into a wastebasket, later suppressed by official policy as a "banned song ," and initially failed to gain any traction when performed by two different singers. The dramatic turnaround in this song’s fate is not merely a musical legend; it offers a profound life lesson: the greatest stroke of luck in life is not about how perfect you are, but about encountering the "right people", those who truly understand you, support you, and help you realize your potential, at exactly the right moment. I. The First "Right Person": A "Talent Scout" Who Recognizes Your Worth In the early 1970s, composer T...

Head Bleeding when the Chair Falls

The Weight of Silence: What Were We Really Arguing About? My earliest memories are punctuated by the sound of shouting. In 1970, when I was barely 6 years old, I stood as a small witness to the fierce quarrels between my father and my late eldest brother Kah Yang (he passed away in 1971 at the age of 17). As I grew up, these contradictions became the soundtrack of our lives, usually centered around our family's shoe shop and clothing stalls in Chinatown. In the court of family opinion, the verdict was almost always the same: my father was "wrong." He was judged as a man who didn't fulfill his role, who wasn't "burdening" enough for the family’s success. But as I look back from the vantage point of 2026, I have to ask: Was that actually true? Let me finally put to rest what my father did right: the truths that were buried under decades of criticism: Unseen Labor: He worked grueling, long hours. I remember him hauling boxes of goods and equipment to set u...

Business and Money Tips

Search This Blog