Steven Hassan shares his top tips for leaders. In this series we meet leaders from around the world and learn some business English along the way. This series was made in partnership with the Open University. FIND BBC LEARNING ENGLISH HERE: Visit our website ✔️ https://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish Follow us ✔️ https://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/followus LIKE PODCASTS? Try some of our other popular podcasts including: ✔️ 6 Minute English ✔️ News Review ✔️ The English We Speak They're all available by searching in your podcast app.
Hello, I'm Pippa from BBC learning English.
And in this series we're finding out what makes a good leader and learning some useful vocabulary to use at work.
Sometimes leaders have a dark side, and today we're talking to someone who has experience of this.
Stephen Hassen is a mental health counsellor.
He also used to be part of a cult and has experienced harmful leadership.
So what makes a good leader for Stephen?
I think the most effective leaders are humble and are eager to have naysayers in their top advisory board who invite criticism and challenge.
Steven talks about good leaders who want to have naysayers on their advisory team.
A naysayer is someone who will disagree with you or tell you that you are wrong.
It comes from the old english word nay for no, which is rarely used today.
For me, that is the most interesting, unusual and true fact that the best leaders want to learn, want to grow, want to get feedback from everyone else.
So what is Stephen's advice for leaders?
I think we have to respect everybody.
I'd like to see more young leaders being taught and mentored to exert more healthy influence on the planet.
Steven's work studying cults has shown him what happens when leaders are selfish and dominant.
He thinks avoiding this selfishness is important for all leaders.
And I think a lot of leaders get into a mentality of the ends justify the means, and we need to do this x or y to make money for the shareholders instead of thinking about the long term benefit or cost to the community.
The phrase the ends justify the means is used to talk about an unpleasant action, the means which leads to a potentially positive outcome, the ends.
So if the ends justify the means, it means the unpleasant action.
The bad thing that you did was worth it.