Everyone Has Something to Teach You

A note to young leaders.

Lessons from my father.

When I was in my mid-twenties, my father overheard me complaining about a colleague who greatly annoyed me.

Dad, waiting for my rant to come to a cathartic end, looked me in the eye and said: “Everyone has something valuable to teach you.”

“Even people I dislike?”

“Especially them.”

Pause.

“It’s the ego in you that sees the ego in me”, dad continued. “Is it possible that what annoys you about this person is pointing at something you’re refusing to see?”

Then came my father’s familiar chuckle.