Are People Born Evil?

Nope. Nor are they intrinsically good. People are just people. They just want to feel good more often than they feel bad, i.e., be happy, so they’re going to maximize their happiness within the options provided by the environment they’re in.

As a business leader, why do you care? Because as Peter Drucker purportedly said, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” This is great news, because this means that you can create and enforce core values (how we do things around here) and a reward system that determines how your team performs.

One caveat. This assumes that you’ve added basically happy, honest people to your team to begin with. This is very important, because trying to teach basically unhappy people how to be happy and honest is a therapeutic issue that you aren’t equipped to address.

The main mistake leaders make is making money more important than people. Of course, profitability is essential to a successful business, but if you reward making money over caring about whether people are happy, then you’re creating a culture in which people will steal in one form or another.

If you reward making a profit at any cost, your salespeople will be dishonest with your customers, and your team members will be dishonest with each other and with you. For example, if your compensation system only rewards individual performance and not team performance, then your team members will have every incentive to be dishonest with their teammates who are competitors for making money.

As always, the good news is that, as the leader, you have control over your culture and your business success. So, hire good people, and then set up a culture and reward system that brings out the best in them rather than the worst.

No, people aren’t born evil; they’re just people, and they just want to be happy.

Don’t be a stranger. (770) 993-1129. tdockery@TheResolveFirm.com