Cde Seroke: I saw your email Saturday,l as I was working an overtime. Due to workload, I could not read nor have time to decipher its import. Suffice to say it was more of an academic discourse. My supervisor picked it up on top of the printer as I had forgotten it there when I went outside. Curiously, she asked " Mdu, what going on" putting her finger on the passage that read "and went on to say "B - Bloody, L - Lazy, A - AIDS, C - Carrying, K - Kaffirs" I urbanely responded as " no it's just an email I received from my blog group, I haven't read it " latter I went to her and explained that it was just a recounting of event that deal with emotional intelligence. Politely she said " if it were me, I would not have only retorted, instead I would have screamed if someone made such a remark on me" . you see, you are touching a very imported aspect in human existence. Mastering the art of putting emotions at bay is one of the daunting task in human species. Some years ago, browsing on an internet, I saw a book penned by Michael Muendane, which was a biography of Vusimuzi Make, who was a chairperson of the central committee after the deposal of PK Leballo. The website happened to belong to an organization which Mike was a founder. I telephoned the organization and asked his admin assistant to put me through to him. Gasping as a result his tone which exhibited some abrasion, I aid to him "Ma-africa Muendane I see you wrote an autobiography of Vusi Make" the first thing he said angrily, what do you mean I wrote an autobiography because Vusi did not write this himself. I did not even know the difference between an autobiography and a biography. He then called his admin assistant ,as I could hear from the other end of the line, and began to scold at him for putting me through to him. From then, I have been asking people that worked with him, one thing I established was that he had uncontrollable temperament. Again, I can't recall exactly, however, it must have been one of the congresses we had in post 1994. I was in a group with Bamba Ndwandwe who was a national organizer, someone ask him a question. He got irked, and said to the comrade use your p*nis. The point I am making is that, there were leaders in this organization which I had admired dearly, but when I came to the management of their emotions, I was disappointed. I slightly disagree with how you put Mbeki to the group of those that have failed to control their emotions. Admittedly, the drama of pushing Winnie Mandela attracted a lot of censure from the always outspoken media, critics and populace at large. My assessment of him is that, he does have a knack of circumscribing his emotions. Take for instance, ever since his waterloo, in what was known as Polokwane. He has suffered a lot of tirade from his ANC family detractors chiefly among them was Malema. Mbeki has elected to refrain from rebutting those attacks,(weather they were legitimate or not, that is beside the point). Today the same detractors are hailing him as a hero, albeit, they haven't, and surely will not recant their attacks. He doesn't get carried away by excitement to the media. Peter Raboroko once told me that PK Leballo would discredit Selby ngedame at meeting, because of his playboy penchant, sometimes Selby would come to the meetings accompanied by girlfriends. As Robs recounted, Selby would deal with PK appropriately. I agree, we in the PAC need to learn these things. Of course, "emotions play a major role in the process of thinking, decision-making"
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Jaki Seroke Sent: Friday, September 09, 2011 12:59 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [PAYCO] EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE - A LEADERSHIP IMPERATIVE Cde Mduduzi After a nasty experience with my work mates, a friend recommended that I read what was by then a new publication, 'Emotional Intelligence - Why it Matters More than IQ', Bloombury 1996, by Daniel Goleman, a psychiatrist who captured the issues over emotions and leadership and represented his ideas with actual cases in order to reach the lay reader. The concept of emotional intelligence is now used in university courses that deal with leadership at business schools worldwide. It is worth exploring this issue in our discussions too. I want to make two examples of my own. We were a committee tasked to deal with transformation and empowerment matters at this JSE-listed company in the defence industry. Paris Mashile, a highly qualified scientist and electronics engineer, was head of the committee and I was the only other black person in a committee of five management policy makers. Some of the white directors were not happy with the envisaged changes, and almost all the time sabotaged the process deliberately. Paris convened this crucial meeting where final recommendations were to be adopted. I later learnt this from him after the meeting was adjourned, that a few minutes prior to us sitting in the meeting one of the directors openly asked him a rhetorical question - "Do you know what BLACK stands for?" - and went on to say "B - Bloody, L - Lazy, A - AIDS, C - Carrying, K - Kaffirs", and the rest laughed uproariously. Paris was fuming and totally lost his mind in the meeting. He never handled the proposed resolutions and the objectives of the meeting well. I did not understand his behaviour - my approach with these colleagues at the time was to come to the meeting right on time, to avoid small talk. Their plan was to shake Paris Mashile emotionally in order to sabotage the crucial decision - and it worked. Mashile later resigned and joined Siemens and went on to be appointed chairperson of ICASA, the communications regulatory body. I also left the company at a later stage for entirely different reasons: in the corporate world there are invisible dog collars and chains, which come as perks, and I was not cut out for such things. As a rule, I follow the dictates of my conscience. At the CODESA forum in Kempton Park, I was once invited to a private discussion with Cyril Ramaphosa and his ANC comrades like Joe Slovo and others. Their aim was to influence the PAC delegates in a particular direction. Before the meeting Cyril told me that he couldn't help noticing that my neck tie was the same as that of the white oppressor in the NP leadership. The tie was a gift from the Sowetan newspaper and it had no exclusive choice or implied similarity of taste properties between me and the "white oppressor". This was a ploy to destabilise me emotionally so that I'd lose my train of thought before the core issues were tabled. Needless to say, we came out poles apart from the meeting. Jacob Zuma has no emotional intelligence as a leader. The blunders over SA endorsing no fly zone in Libya and therefore suppporting NATO and regime change, and the way he handled himself at a Youth League conference trying to explain his sell-out foreign policy when he berated a heckler on the matter, and, the Mogoeng choice to spite Moseneke in the appointment of Chief Justice, clearly attest to that. Thabo Mbeki also falls in this category. He slapped Winnie Mandela with a back hander at a public forum because she arrived late as a crowd favourite who stole the thunder from him. He sulked openly in the glare of the media when he lost at the infamous Polokwane electing conference. Academics and thought leaders are now saying emotions play a major role in the process of thinking, decision-making and individual success. They say emotional intelligence helps to perceive, control and evaluate emotions. It is a required package in the leadership personality and collective, and in the process of day to day decisions-making. Are we in the PAC alive to this development and can we relate to it in the past mistakes we have made? Jaki -- Sending your posting to [email protected] Unsubscribe by sending an email to [email protected] You can also visit http://groups.google.com/group/payco Visit our website at www.mayihlome.wordpress.com This email and any accompanying attachments may contain confidential and proprietary information. This information is private and protected by law and, accordingly, if you are not the intended recipient, you are requested to delete this entire communication immediately and are notified that any disclosure, copying or distribution of or taking any action based on this information is prohibited. Emails cannot be guaranteed to be secure or free of errors or viruses. The sender does not accept any liability or responsibility for any interception, corruption, destruction, loss, late arrival or incompleteness of or tampering or interference with any of the information contained in this email or for its incorrect delivery or non-delivery for whatsoever reason or for its effect on any electronic device of the recipient. Views and opinions expressed or implied in this email are those of the sender unless clearly stated as being that of Rand Water. If verification of this email or any attachment is required, please request a hard-copy version. -- Sending your posting to [email protected] Unsubscribe by sending an email to [email protected] You can also visit http://groups.google.com/group/payco Visit our website at www.mayihlome.wordpress.com
