Keep Humility in Success and Failure

To young leaders.

A lesson from my father, who was once asked by an acquaintance how his business was going, having earlier that day completed the biggest acquisition of his career.

Dad simply said: “Thank goodness, all is well. And how are you doing?”

Later, I asked Dad why he was so understated in his reply.

“As far as the rest of the world is concerned, your business should never be doing great or doing terribly. It’s always just doing well. If you beat on your chest in victory or defeat, all you do is risk waking the two black dogs.”

He spoke here of the two black dogs of envy and schadenfreude.