‘The Development of Personality’ (Jung, 1954)
In 1954 Jung wrote an article on the education of educators. This work was initially designed to explore the qualities that might be hoped for in teachers of children, but grew into a essay on the importance of personality development, in its own self, and particularly in those who lead others. In it, Jung contrasts those who become ‘walking personifications of method’, by unconscious or conscious copying of conventions as if a series of rules, and those who truly develop as integrated personalities, enduring the struggle of following a path of ‘fidelity to the law of one’s own being’, and enabling themselves to be refined into a true self through that process.
This essay is one of the most important for leaders and those who develop people. In the light of Jung’s careful explanations, what is apparent from even the slightest glance at many business and people development publications today is that what is often sold is method. ‘Models’ are regularly held up as short-cuts to simplicity and ease. Yet those on the inside of the human organisations on which such models are too rigidly imposed tell the stories of human sacrifice, voice-silencing and emotional and mental anguish.
There is no simplistic model to reduce human complexity to controllable order without splitting off some of the most tender and precious qualities human beings possess. We are not comfortable pretending that there is, and so our work with people allows plenty of space for uncontrollable factors, disruption, needing more time than anticipated, dealing with unexpected emotions, and places of celebration, restoration and connection. We try to honour humanity as it really is and not as a model tells us it could be on a good day if x, y and z were optimised and the human being was totally isolated from any factors that might indicate an actual life. We assume learning is a relational, socially-contextualised process, and that to actually learn and implement new leadership capacities beyond ‘tips and tricks’ and ‘techniques’ takes all of us working deeply together, experimenting, getting feedback, realising some of that feedback had more to do with the other person, realising that some of our discomfort is because something true has landed in a tender place, asking for help, taking some time to calm down, chatting in a cosy group for reassurance and strength, looking for progress, small and big, to celebrate and relentlessly encouraging all attempts to do pretty much anything.
(And if by chance we have some uncannily useful tips, of course we share those too.)