The heartless survive
I used to admire the idea of leadership. In my youthful naivety, I thought leaders were someone you could trust, depend on, and look up to. My experience working for corporate healthcare has proven me wrong.
Ruthless leaders do what the company wants at the expense of the employees. They show a pretty face and say what you want to hear. They lie if they have to save face. They take you down in their pursuit of keeping their status.
They know how to manipulate. They focus on the bottom line. They build you up only to tear you down. They foster unhappiness in the workplace. But they don’t care. They don’t have empathy.
Empathy is something we are taught in school as healthcare practitioners. But so many lose it — it’s how they survive and the empathetic don’t.
I had a position in leadership — for 9 months. I didn’t survive because I looked out for the people, encouraged an open, transparent environment, and fostered relationships above all else. I allowed people to make mistakes and helped them learn and move forward.
I did everything I thought a leader should do.
I also did not tolerate laziness and drama. But that was the least of the administration’s worries — the ruthless leaders above me and beside me.
True leaders can’t survive under the heartlessness of a ruthless leader. They only want control. They want to be puppeteers. They don’t want problems to deal with; they keep on going, even when everything around them is crumbling, including their good people.
If the puppeteer lacks empathy for their people, the true leader suffocates. I don’t make a good puppet. I push back even when I’m the only one pushing. I fight for breath.
I speak up even when I’m the only one on my side.
It’s sad to watch organizations misunderstand how to retain good employees. They only want employees who keep their heads down. I can’t even say they only want employees to do their job well, because that doesn’t matter if you’re making any noise.
Support your leader — that’s the administration’s solution. Fixing the inadequacies of poor leadership is too much work. And they don’t care.
Stand by their side — the title is what’s important.
I can’t support decisions that go against my morals. The ruthless leader can. I can’t sit back and watch everything fall apart. The ruthless leader can.
It’s as if the ruthless leader has forgotten the empathy they learned so long ago. The people — the patients and the coworkers all suffer beneath them.
When will leadership adopt the ‘stand by me’ vision rather than the ‘stand beneath me’ approach?
How long can you breathe under a dictatorship?
It depends on how heartless you’ve become.
