"In the end we shall have had enough of cynicism, skepticism and humbug, and we shall want to live more musically." - Vincent Van Gogh

As I sit down to write today, I find myself thinking about my longstanding practice of working to avoid cynicism. I think I was born an optimist and I had to learn to recognize cynical attitudes in others, and the hints that I might be moving towards cynicism myself. My experience is that cynicism robs me of joy and the power to take action to improve things. It does this while giving me nothing in return. There is simply no good reason to be cynical and for me it would be a weakness to surrender to this poisonous attitude. I cannot say for certain the my experience will hold true for others, but I admit that I think it will.

Just to make sure we don’t confuse cynicism with pessimism, skepticism, pragmatism, frustration, or simple realism, here are some definitions. Cynic - a person who believes that people are motivated purely by self-interest rather than acting for honorable or unselfish reasons; a disposition of disbelief in the sincerity or goodness of human motives and actions. Cynical - having or showing the attitude or temper of a cynic: as a :  contemptuously distrustful of human nature and motives b :  based on or reflecting a belief that human conduct is motivated primarily by self-interest. Cynicism - an inclination to believe that people are motivated purely by self-interest.

For me the risk of cynicism at work is that it can prevent us from engaging with each other to pursue goals that will make a difference for the organization and, in the process, help us find value and meaning in the work we do. When we look at others and question their motives, suspecting that they are acting in an inappropriately self-interested way, we discount their potential to contribute to the work we share. If, instead, we assume the best of our colleagues, I believe we have the opportunity to amplify and enhance each other's best ideas and contributions. As in my personal experience, I don’t believe cynicism has any power to add to our work together, but only to diminish our potential.

In the workplace, I have seen staff who are cynical about their leaders, and leaders who are cynical about staff. At the university, I have seen faculty who are cynical about staff, and staff who are cynical about faculty. I have never once seen these attitudes result in anything positive or useful. Especially when times were hard, and our budgets became a diminishing zero-sum game,  I could understand the temptation to question the motives of others. As salaries remained flat and layoffs threatened the security of our families, it was tempting to surrender to frustration instead of coming together to give the best we could together. Even during these trying times, I’m convinced that cynicism only made things worse by stealing our shared productivity, personal joy and hope.

As people move higher into leadership the risk of drifting out of touch can increase the risk of cynicism. With an increasingly busy schedule and a broader scope of responsibility it can be hard to maintain awareness of the challenges and issues that motivate and frustrate those we lead. The best leaders make it a priority to find ways to address this risk by making time to spend with the teams they are leading and not just their direct reports. They seek to balance their need to focus on new responsibilities with staying as close as they can to the needs and contributions of the people they are leading.

Even with the best intentions and efforts, the risk of cynicism is very real. Leaders naturally get requests to take actions that their employees believe will benefit the organization, the employee, or both. Employees volunteer to lead or participate in projects, request raises, and promotions and make their cases for these requests. We are also faced with the need to coach, or even discipline, employees whose work is not meeting expectations. Some will think we are out of touch and not listening when we have heard and either disagree with, or have been unsuccessful acting on, what we’ve heard. Even when we do our best to do what is right, employees can become cynical when their requests are not granted, or they receive coaching or discipline, and we don’t provide enough context for our decisions. Even when we do, some may suspect we are pursuing only what is best for our own career or image.

At the same time, leaders can drift toward cynicism when faced with many requests that seem to serve the employees’ best interest in favor of the organization, or when frustrated by an inability to act on justified requests due to limited budgets and other constraints. I have struggled with this myself as my responsibilities increased. I understand the political realities of needing to demonstrate that we are achieving results, providing effective leadership and strategic direction. Finding a balance between the needs of those we lead and the needs of the organizations we serve in a constant challenge. I believe we can do this while still serving the need to do what is right and without a surrender to cynicism.

As I think about this struggle, I’m reminded that our modern meaning and understanding of cynicism is very different from the philosophy advanced by ancient Greeks like Antisthenes that came to be called cynicism. According to that philosophy, our goal in life is mental clarity and the best path to this is through living in harmony with nature as defined by reason. To flourish, the ancient cynics taught that it is necessary to live with a love of humanity, and a self-sufficient indifference to the unavoidable misfortunes of life. The cynic was to live frugally to avoid the influences like power, wealth and fame. At the same time the cynic challenged social conventions and lived in full engagement with society.

The idea from this cynical philosophy that resonates most for me as I write today is that arrogance results from false judgments of value which can in turn result in a vicious character. This last notion sounds like an indictment of what we call cynicism today. By reaching the false judgement that others are motivated solely by self interest, we can adopt an attitude that is destructive to our happiness and productivity.

I want to be very clear about the difference between cynicism and the appropriate and necessary duty to consider our own interests and those of our loved ones. In writing today, I don’t mean to disrespect people's genuine and appropriate efforts to pursue what is in the best interest of themselves and their families. This is much different than the solely self-interested attitude the modern cynic sees in others.

In the end, cynicism is the opposite attitude of the one I try to bring to my work, and life in general, that is inspired by my favorite paraphrase from Kirkegaard, “Presume love in the other”. I will continue to fight against the temptation to become cynical and will continue to believe that others come to the work and life we share with the best interests of all in mind. The risk of being taken advantage of, or incorrectly perceived as naive, is small compared to the near certainty that cynicism would cost me much that makes life sweet.