In Dr. Cloud’s book Essay

In Dr. Cloud’s book, the concept of â€Å"wake† is the next in a series of important concepts in business. This concept affects how a person works within an organization, and includes everything that he does, both in business and interpersonal relationships. A person’s wake is the most important thing about him or her in terms of business, and it will determine his or her overall success. The â€Å"wake† is the legacy that a person leaves behind in a business situation (or, really, in any situation). It consists of everything a person does, both in business and interpersonally. For example, a person may help his team meet their goals quickly and efficiently, achieve high sales numbers, and further the company’s other goals and missions. These would be examples from the business side. A person may also leave his team feeling happy to have worked with him, inspired to work harder, and feeling good about meeting their goals. These are examples from the interpersonal side. However, it is also possible that someone may not do so well in one or both of these areas. Someone may be a great salesman who is achieving goals quickly and making large amounts of money for the company, but who upsets almost everyone he works with, as in Dr. Cloud’s example. This type of person’s wake must be considered from all angles. What is the person really worth to the company? If his sales numbers are great, but no one wants to work with him and people spend a lot of time complaining about him, then the lost productivity may not be worth the amount of sales he is making. His interpersonal wake is poor. Dr. Cloud emphasizes the role of character is the wake. A person must have strong character in order to have a good wake. For example, the CEO in the book was not a bad person, or a bad leader in most respects. He treated his people fairly and people were glad to work with him. He also seemed (from what information there was) to be doing good things for the company. However, he had a weak character when it came to dealing with problems. Because the CEO did not react quickly enough by either disciplining or firing the sales VP, he lost the confidence of a large portion of his team and the board members, and had to leave the company. Had he been willing to handle the problem earlier, this might not have happened. As he was leaving, the company probably did not look favorably upon his wake, no matter how many other good things he had done for the company. Dr. Cloud goes on to emphasize that character is â€Å"the ability to meet the demands of reality. † This means a number of things. When a senior staff member is hiring a new team member, especially in a higher-importance job, the staff member needs to make sure that the person can meet the demands of the company’s reality. That means that regardless of the person’s abilities, they must be a good fit for the company. What’s even more important is that the person must be a good fit for the particular job and its responsibilities. There is a good example of this, too. Dr. Cloud called some references when he was hiring a new person for an important position. The references were very pleased with the work the woman had done, and people had worked well with her. Her weaknesses were not considered to be large issues, and most importantly, they would hire her again, knowing what they knew. Dr. Cloud ensured that this person would be a good fit by checking to see what wake she had left at her previous jobs. The primary point is this: it is the personal aspects of character, and the wake, that are most important. Business issues can be overcome by someone, under some set of circumstances. But whether or not a person is equipped to deal with the stress of those situations is another matter. A person’s character and the wake they leave behind when working with others is the most important part of whether or not they will succeed.