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March 18, 2022

Leadership Lessons From Holi

Holi and Leadership

Holi - regarded as the festival of colours is celebrated today.. The festival also marks the onset of spring, which, once again, denotes colours with the blooming of a range of flowers. People celebrate Holi by applying powdered colours on each other’s faces, and some choose to celebrate with water-filled balloons and guns called pichkaris. Additionally, with the burning of negative spirits, Holi also, like many Indian festivals, highlights the importance of good over evil.

Let’s take a look at what leaders and managers can learn from this uplifting festival:

Erase Negativity / Avoid Self-Centred Thinking:

A ritual during Holi celebrates the prevalence of good over evil by burning Holika who tried to kill Lord Vishnu worshipper baby Prahlad. It is believed that with Holika’s death, all negativity also burns in the bonfire.

Managers can also resolve to choose a positive over negative mind set and symbolically “burn” negative emotions and inner demons such as arrogance, jealousy, anger etc.

Some examples of negative attributes among managers may be:

  1. Displaying unfounded bias towards one or more team members
  2. Lack of communication of objectives and expectations to employees
  3. Setting unrealistic deadlines for team members
  4. Lack of accountability for projects and tasks
  5. Not being receptive to constructive feedback and its application

Leaders must consciously identify and curtail such behaviour as it can negatively impact team spirit, productivity and professional relationships.

As Holi also teaches us, the festival can be celebrated in multiple ways - some like an extremely immersive Holi, which may turn rowdy as well. Others like to celebrate by simply applying a coloured tikka on their friends’ and colleagues’ foreheads. What’s important in this though is to respect the choices of how those around you want to be treated. Similarly, leaders must steer away from one dimensional or self-centred thinking and make a conscious effort to respect their team members’ preferences when working together.

Add Colour and Celebration to Life:

The biggest and most significant lesson leaders can take away from Holi is the importance of colours in life. This doesn’t need to be followed literally but colour in terms of diversity of opinions, perspectives, thoughts. This can help a leader become more open-minded, flexible, adaptable towards ideas different from one’s own. This type of a growth mind set as opposed to a fixed mind set is the hallmark of an authentic leader.

Another way of adding “colours” is to celebrate the small wins in a team. These mini celebrations bring joy to the environment as well as help team members feel valued.

Conclusion:The festival of Holi is symbolic of a fresh start. It is an ideal opportunity to rethink existing behaviours, to discard unfavourable mindsets, and to tread towards a positive, considerate, and colourful path. Today, our minds are shrouded by an overload of information and require a reboot every now and then. This festival is a chance for that reboot so let’s try to wipe the slate, fill it with positivity and empathy as well as a splash of colour.

Wishing you all a Very Happy Holi.

Please comment on how you celebrate wins or small achievements at your work?