CONCERN WITH APPROVAL
In the corporate world, approval of others can be important. But that approval will come if you act authentically and honestly and work hard. You need to be independent of the good opinion of others, doing what you feel is right. Your ego, in that situation, is not craving recognition and thus not likely to carry you astray.
FEAR OF SEEKING HELP
If you are afraid to ask for help or don't want to ask for help because you want all the credit, then it's likely your ego is driving you. Mr. Rao recalls a project where he tried to go it alone and flopped, his ego leading to the failure and the loss of friendships with colleagues he had spurned.
COMPARING AND COMPETING
Continually comparing yourself with others - and having to achieve superiority - is not only a sign of ego issues but also a losing battle since there is always somebody better. "If you keep seeing your life as a competition with those around you, then you will continually be dissatisfied and the ego will drive your life."
GREED
The constant need for more is another expression of ego. It's also a waste, if it's simply for the sake of always having more to satisfy that ego lust.
LACK OF PRESENCE
Ego-driven people continually live in the past and plot their future, rather than living in - and dealing with - the moment. If you're always thinking about the next great phase of life or celebrating past victories, you are succumbing to ego and not gaining as much as you can from the present.
NEED TO BE RIGHT
Beware if you need to win every argument and prove you are always right. "Leaders with this attitude ultimately alienate all those who work for them, and eventually stop receiving the kind of input that can propel them forward because they are so adamant about being right," he warns.
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MENTORING: CORRECTING NEGATIVES
There's a tendency for mentors to always be positive and supportive. But in The Elements of Mentoring, psychology professors W. Brad Johnson and Charles Ridley stress that no one is perfect and even the sharpest protégé can benefit from constructive criticism. "Failing to offer correction when it is needed is a disservice to the protégé," they note.
So address subpar performance, failure to be attentive to details, ethical lapses, and even bad work habits that threaten health.
But the authors urge you to vary your style according to the length of time of the relationship. Early in the mentorship, precede a correction with a healthy dose of encouragement and affirmation. Later on, the advice can be more direct and the protégé won't feel as threatened.
"Confronting a protégé may surface some pain, but it shows caring. On the other hand, avoiding a confrontation may spare the protégé some pain but cause greater vulnerability to costly errors and unchecked dysfunction. Mentors who really care confront problem behaviour," they conclude.
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SELF-MANAGEMENT: GAUGING YOUR CONCENTRATION SPAN
Productivity expert Julie Morgenstern has focused attention on something she calls the concentration threshold, which is essentially the period of time in which you can be attentive to a task.
On the Tools For Thought blog, technology writer Andre Kibbe explains that it ties into procrastination, because if we know there is a task on which we can effectively concentrate for only 20 minutes before being tired or bored and there is an hour at hand, we'll procrastinate for 40 minutes before starting.
This will vary with different tasks, so he advises you not to see yourself as a procrastinator in general but as a person who procrastinates on certain tasks where this concentration threshold is asserting itself.
