The Oak and the Reeds

There's a famous story (from Aesop's Fables) called The Oak and the Reeds that I've been thinking about a lot lately.  The two main characters in the story are a giant oak tree and some reeds growing near a stream.  The story goes something like this:

A proud oak tree stood with its branches lifted proudly up towards the sky, while the humble reeds stood below at the river's edge crouched low in the wind.  The proud oak tree called out, "The slightest breeze that ruffles the surface of the water makes you bow your heads, while I stand upright and firm before the howling tempest."

"Do not worry about us," replied the Reeds. "The winds do not harm us. We bow before them and so we do not break. You, in all your pride and strength, have so far resisted their blows. But the end is coming."

Just then, a gale force wind rushed out from the north.  The reeds bent low and did not break, while the mighty oak tree was uprooted from the ground.  The lesson - "Better to yield when it is folly to resist, than to resist stubbornly and be destroyed."

The "bend but don't break" mentality of the reeds is a perfect illustration of what we know as resilience.  While variably defined, resilience generally means the ability to adapt or rebound from adversity, i.e. to bend without breaking.  One of the five core principles of so-called High Reliability Organizations (HROs) is a commitment to resilience.  In a recent post ("Murphy's Law, the U.S. Navy SEALS, and High Reliability Organizations") I presented the argument that most, if not all, HROs are characterized by a sixth core principle, "comfort with uncertainty and chaos."  If you think about it, one of the reasons that individuals (and organizations) are comfortable with uncertainty and chaos is the fact that they are resilient!

With this in mind, I recently found an article from the International Journal of Emergency Mental Health entitled the "Seven characteristics of highly resilient people: Insights from Navy SEALs to the 'Greatest Generation'".  The article is co-authored by a former Navy SEAL who later became a psychologist, an expert in organizational development, and an expert in the psychology of disasters and is based upon over 100 years of collective experience and research in the study of resilience.  Notably, these same three individuals later co-authored a book based upon their research, Stronger: Develop the Resilience You Need to Succeed.  They distilled the concept of resilience down to seven characteristics:

1. Présence d’esprit (a French phrase translated literally to "presence of mind"), which they describe as calm, innovative, non-dogmatic thinking (also described as "thinking out of the box"), especially during times of stress.  Individuals who exhibit this characteristic generally believe that a solution can always be found to any problem.

2. Decisive action, which I have described before (see "The seven deadly sins of leadership") as the ability to make a decision in the absence of "perfect information" and summarized by the old proverb, "He who hesitates is lost" ("Buridan's ass").  Individuals are reluctant to make decisions when they are afraid of making a mistake or failing, which is why psychological safety is so important.  The important corollary to "decisive action" is taking responsibility for one's actions.

3. Tenacity, which they describe with the popular "light bulb" story about Thomas Edison ("I didn't fail 1,000 times, I just found 1,000 ways how not to build a light bulb."), as well as the story about Abraham Lincoln's long series of repeated failures before he became President of the United States.

4. Interpersonal connectedness and support, which they claim is "the single most powerful predictor of human resilience."  They mention the community of Roseto, Pennsylvania, a community whose citizens seemed to be resistant to heart disease despite having all of the classic risk factors (hypertension, high cholesterol, obesity, smoking, etc.  The so-called "Roseto effect" was featured prominently in a book by the physician Stewart Wolf (who first described it), The Roseto Story: An Anatomy of Health and by the popular author, Malcom Gladwell in his book, Outliers.  Apparently, the citizens of Roseto were Italian immigrants who maintained the strong family-oriented social structure (multiple generations of a family lived in the same household), cohesiveness, and traditional family values brought over from Italy.  This strong sense of family and community was felt to account for the lower rates of heart disease compared to surrounding communities.  Importantly, as the community became more "Americanized" (less social cohesion, breakdown of family-oriented social structure, etc), the differences in heart disease disappeared!

5. Integrity, which they defined as "doing what is right" and "considering not only what is good for you, but what is good for others as well."  They mention Mahatma Gandhi's seven things that will destroy society ("the seven social sins"): wealth without work, pleasure without conscience, knowledge without character, religion without sacrifice, politics without principle, science without humanity, and business without ethics.  

6. Self-discipline and self-control, which they define as the ability to control impulses, to delay gratification, and to engage in a healthy lifestyle.  

7. Active optimism, which they define as "the tendency to take the most positive or hopeful view" and "expecting the best outcomes."  They emphasize the difference between passive optimism ("hoping things will turn out well") versus active optimism ("acting in a manner to increase the likelihood that things will turn out well").  

Always remember that "the oak fought the wind and was broken, while the reeds bent when they had to and survived."  What is true for individuals is also true for organizations.  There is an old Japanese proverb that I think perfectly summarizes the concept of resilience, and I will end this post with it here, "Fall seven times, rise eight."