The first October eTips went out last week. Subscribers received it 13 October. And it’s already been posted in blogs elsewhere. Here’s the beginning of the featured article with a link at the end to read the rest of it…

It’s better to learn than be smart

Last week in Stockholm I presented a Responsible Leadership workshop to the Statesecretaries of the Swedish Government. Near the end of the workshop one of the Statesecretaries asked me this question:

Are you saying Christopher that someone can be wicked smart, but because they don’t practice Responsibility, they don’t learn?

Precisely.

She was probably putting 2 + 2 together from a number of comments I had made including something I tell audiences about the mental position of Justify…

How Many Smart People Block Their Own Learning

One of the observations I make about the position of Justify is that being smarter, better educated, or of higher intelligence does not lend itself to seeing through one’s own justifications. Exactly the opposite is true. It seems that smarter, better educated, and more intelligent people who choose to Justify simply make up better stories! They believe them, and we believe them too!

So, while you might expect superior intelligence to somehow break free of the grip of the Responsibility Process™, our 16 years of field-testing says “no.” We find that there is no correlation between intelligence or “smarts” and Responsibility.

What’s More Dangerous, a Lack of Smarts or a Lack of Learning?

Here are some other coping mechanisms we’ve seen employed by really smart people…

Read the entire issue here.