Page 48 - Appreciative Leadership

From Potential to Positive Power 21

• It has a lot to do with the flow of communication. If you don’t
pump positivity into the system, negativity will set in on its own.
When there is an absence of information, people begin to fear the
unknown. … Positivity has to be trained at work because outside
of work, in society, in the media, things are mostly negative.

One fi nal and important note from our interviews: Positive power
was portrayed as an antidote to criticism and a source of risk taking.
People and groups with positive power, who are grounded in their
own thinking and ideas, were described as less afraid of criticism,
more open to hearing and learning what other people think and feel,
and more likely to take risks.
The message is clear: it takes positively powerful leadership to

discover and nurture the positive power and elevated performance of
other people.

Surprising Sources of Creative Potential

Creative potential is sometimes quite apparent. It’s what you look for
when you are skimming résumés, interviewing job candidates, and
selecting team members. It’s what you hear when you ask people to
share success stories and depict best practices. It’s what you demon-
strate when you speak from your heart, give voice to your innovative
intentions, or express your commitment to positive change.
More often, however, creative potential rests quietly awaiting dis-

covery. We are often surprised when we invite people to discover their

strengths and then use their discoveries to help them create images
of their ideal future. Among the ranks of engineers, managers, phy-
sicians, executives, and social workers, for example, we have found
undiscovered visionaries, long-range planners, cheerleaders, artists,
musicians, and poets—all waiting to be seen and to be called upon to
give their best. A workshop participant summed it up this way:

Appreciative Leadership is like mining. You know the gems are
there, you just don’t know where they are. You have to dig for