SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Leadership — tracks feedback from more than 190,000 business leaders. We run the poll question each week in our e-newsletter.
Last week, we asked: Do you find yourself to be more of a critic or a creator?
- I’m a critic — other people build things, and I give feedback and direction to them: 43.4%
- I’m a creator — I lead the building of new things in our organization: 56.6%
Creators beat critics … barely. As a leader, you must go beyond simple criticism. It’s easy to point out flaws. The real challenge is stepping up and improving them or helping people create something new. The 43% of you who are self-proclaimed critics might want to ask yourself what your contribution to the organization is because if it’s simply criticism, you’re easy to replace. Moving from critic to creator isn’t hard — you just have to change your mindset.
Mike Figliuolo is managing director of thoughtLEADERS and author of “One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership.”