Ego, greed, fear, love and purpose.
They drive Rudy Karsan as the chairman and CEO of Kenexa. And, to varying degrees, they drive every person in the world of business.
Karsan says you need to abandon what you think you know about each of those characteristics, what society tells you each of those words mean. He says that you need to understand that, as a leader of a business and a leader of people, each of those words have both positive and negative connotations. Your job is to take the ego, greed, fear, love and purpose that exist in yourself and each of your employees and leverage it to a positive outcome.
“There is a natural perception in the minds of people that ego, greed and fear are negative, and love and purpose are positive,” says Karsan, who co-founded Kenexa, a $157 million human resources solutions company with approximately 1,500 worldwide employees. “I view all five as having positive and negative elements, depending on how you’re trying to make a decision and what you’re trying to do.”
For Karsan, the challenge starts in his own mind. He needs to balance those five drivers within himself before he can ask his leadership team to do the same, starting a cascading process that ultimately defines Kenexa’s culture and hiring practices.
“The biggest challenge I’ve had is that I’m a person of extremes,” he says. “I have to make sure that not one of those five drivers tend to dominate the others. That’s not just an issue leading Kenexa; it’s anytime I play a leadership role.
“The question is, how can I maximize the organization’s purpose, whatever it might be, while keeping my own drivers in check and in balance to achieve a maximum outcome.”
