Few of us realize how important and powerful a tool our self-image, what psychologists call self-concept, is in managing an organization. The self-concept is responsible for connecting, the integration of various aspects of our experience into a single system is what makes us an individual. The first-person self-concept does approximately the same thing in an organization - it integrates, through relationships with you, the experience, consciousness, ideas, values, worldview, etc. of not only the employees of your company, but also all its other stakeholders - from partners to clients .And now in more detail. Psychologists (or rather Carl Rogers) have long established that any healthy person has certain ideas about himself that organize his experience. Who am I? What am I like? Am I smart or not so smart? I am beautiful? Kind? Plump? Slender? Am I nervous or calm? Active or passive? Do I have values ​​or not? Am I greedy or generous? At a certain age, these ideas about ourselves begin to stabilize and we begin to build our own behavior in accordance with these ideas. And then, depending on feedback from the environment, we adjust our own self-image or behavioral manifestations of our self-concept. The self-concept is not only designed to save us energy due to the fact that we adhere to one line of behavior and do not come up with different ways of action, new subpersonalities and roles in typical situations. In the life of a manager, the self-concept is almost the main management tool. Because you rather interact with your subordinates from your self-concept. Based on your self-concept, you develop a certain role that you will play. Of course, it must correspond to your characteristics so that you feel comfortable in it, then you begin to play it, perform it in relationships with subordinates, adjust it so that it helps to cope with emerging problems in relationships (how should I behave in case of sabotage of my orders, For example?). And then the image that you convey to your subordinates, and which they see in your behavior, becomes a management tool. For example, subordinates perceive you as a cold and emotionally distant person, and if you are pestered with stupid questions, you become loud and dangerous. And then it’s easier for them to deal with their problems themselves than to constantly turn to you for help. Or, on the contrary, you broadcast the image of a wonderful and friendly person, so employees constantly come to you for help, they parasitize on your kindness, but you receive a lot of attention and respect and this is what you need from business and management ;) But there are also problems with I -concept. When do they happen? When you are not perceived the way you would like to be perceived. Let's say you have the idea that you are a good, sincere person, that you are screwing everyone so that they and your company move forward, but they perceive you as a greedy bourgeois cattle who profits from their work. Those. you do something from one role, but employees see it differently and you begin to suffer from it. Because you expect what your role requires - love, attention and respect, but what you get is hatred, contempt and cold indifference. And the less you are aware of the difference between how you see yourself and how you are perceived, the greater this difference, the stronger your suffering and the actions that you take to avoid experiencing this suffering (distance from employees, focusing on results and material effects of work, response irritation and anger, etc.). If you have realized that there is a difference between what you broadcast and what others see, you suffer from it and want to change, then the first step should be to find out this difference itself. Do the exercise (don’t think that the employees will make fun of you or consider it for your stupidity: firstly,