時尚雙語:悲觀一點 好處多多

Operations manager Diane Alter once worked for such a committed optimist that despite a litany of daily workplace crises, he'd say, 'It's all good.'

It only made Ms. Alter want to protect her momentary miseries. 'Let me enjoy my bad mood for a minute,' she felt like saying. 'Let me wallow in it.'

Faced with pressing problems, his involvement was limited to a phone call. All the while, she was huffing and puffing to resolve the problem herself. In the end, she says, 'Everything ends up OK because responsibility to fix it falls on everyone else.'

As management literature often notes, optimists drive employees to exceptional levels of achievement. But, man, those Pollyannas can be annoying, exhausting and sometimes maddening because they can get away with so much.

In offices, where blind optimism is more forgivable than even mild pessimism, staffers wait for the time when their head hopers won't know what hit them -- but it usually ends up being a promotion.

Optimists think they delegate; their staffers think they deny work's unpleasant realities. Optimists raise possibilities; staffers are told they're raising obstacles. Optimists think more can be done with less; their staffers are pretty sure less gets done with less. 'I can't think of anything that I would call a true failure,' says Jeanne Schmidt, a corporate finance consultant and black-belt optimist. 'I can't stand it,' she adds, when the why-bother pessimists take charge.

Art Armstrong, a chief executive of a manufacturing company, sees her point. 'If Henry V at Agincourt had spoken to his army about relative troop strengths, we might all be speaking French.'

'It may well be that they have been sent on a fool's errand,' he says of employees. 'But it may be that the errand is fine, the problem is that a fool was sent.'

Making matters worse (for the pessimists, naturally) is research favoring optimists. Optimists' biological stress systems aren't perpetually running at full steam, taxing immune systems and inviting chronic disease.

Pessimists like to think they're setting themselves up for pleasant surprises while optimists face heartbreak.

Not always true. 'Optimism has this way of forever sliding into the future that protects you from the disappointments of the past,' says Shelley E. Taylor, professor of psychology at University of California Los Angeles. In her research, cancer patients who suffered a recurrence would say, 'I'll beat this just like I did the last time.'

Michael Scheier, head of the psychology department at Carnegie Mellon University, says spouses of ill patients fare much better if their husbands or wives are optimistic about their future. 'It's absolutely amazing how uniformly adaptive this characteristic is in terms of health,' he says.

But pessimists aren't given the benefit of their doubts. Research shows that relative pessimists are more accurate at gauging success and failure rates at a simple laboratory task than optimists, who undercounted failures and overcounted successes, says Edward Chang, associate professor of psychology at the University of Michigan. Also, evidence shows that pessimism can be highly motivational, as what's called 'defensive pessimism' drives people to achieve their goals.

Arguably, adds Prof. Chang, investment banks suffering from the subprime-lending crisis were too optimistic while Goldman Sachs, which plotted out disaster scenarios, has thrived. 'Optimism associated with inaction is useless,' he says. 'But pessimism associated with movement, motivation and energy is exactly what people are talking about in terms of the best of optimism.'

To the blindest of optimists, even contingency planning looks like negativity. Robert McBurnett, a chief financial officer, once worked for a company where any business opportunity was circulated among department heads to weigh the upside against concerns. Then, an unbending optimist bought the company. Any concerns were met with, 'Why are you being negative?' says Mr. McBurnett. So, they found themselves forced to fix things in midproject and troubleshoot on the fly.

'They're so confident they can make chicken salad out of chicken ...' (well, you get the idea), says Mr. McBurnett. But 'it's extremely stressful on your midlevel managers. They don't last long.'

'It's a way of coping with situations where they have no answers and less knowledge,' adds Randy Johnson, a former hospital superintendent, who fielded many directives easier said than done. Because it's so easy to be branded a naysayer, Ms. Johnson figured out a way to cope with optimists -- by pinning concerns on others. Observe: 'Bill Jones may bring up objections and I really want to see this project work. What do you suggest that I tell him?' she would say.

She also hoped her supervisor's bubble would burst from its own structural weakness. With any luck, she says, 'the optimists will generate more great ideas' and forget about their first ones.

現任運營經理的戴安娜•奧特(Diane Alter)曾經在一個超級樂觀主義者手下供職。即使每天工作中危機四起，她的上司也總會說“平安無事”。

而這讓奧特只想留住自己片刻的痛苦情緒。她真想說，“讓我好好享受我的壞心情，就一分鐘也好，讓我沉浸其中吧。”

即使問題緊迫，奧特的上司也只是打通電話了事。而奧特卻從始至終都在絞盡腦汁地孤軍奮戰。她說，最後一切結果還算不錯，因爲處理問題的責任都落在別人身上了。

正如管理寶典中經常指出的那樣，樂觀主義者能推動員工實現非凡成就。但是，夥計，那些盲目樂觀的人會令人生厭，使人精疲力盡，而且有時還會把人逼瘋，因爲他們可以逃避太多的責任。

在辦公室這樣的環境下，即使是盲目的樂觀也會比輕微的悲觀更容易被接受，樂觀主義者的同事等着看他們大禍臨頭的樣子──但結果卻常常是獲得晉升。

樂觀主義者認爲自己是在把權力下放；而他們的同事則認爲這是在否認令人不快的現實。樂觀主義者提供機會；而他們的同事卻被指責是在製造麻煩。樂觀主義者認爲用很少的資源也可以成就大事；而他們的同事則肯定資源越少，成就越小。擔任公司財務顧問的珍尼•施密特(Jeanne Schmidt)是個骨灰級的樂觀主義者。她說，“我想不出有什麼事情稱得上是真正失敗的。我無法忍受讓那些不願花心思費力氣的悲觀主義者執掌大權。”

阿特•阿姆斯特丹(Art Armstrong)是一家制造公司的首席執行長，他同意施密特的看法。他說，“如果亨利五世在阿金庫爾戰役中向他的軍隊比較雙方實力的話，我們現在可能都要說法語了。”

他談到員工的時候說道，員工們很可能會被派去做些徒勞無益的工作，但這可能並不是工作的問題，而是派去的人有問題。

更糟的是（自然是對悲觀主義者而言）研究結果都支持樂觀主義者。樂觀主義者的生物應激系統不會一刻不歇地保持高度警惕狀態，所以不會破壞免疫系統，讓慢性病乘虛而入。

悲觀主義者喜歡這樣想：悲觀的基本立場可能會讓他們更容易遇到驚喜，而樂觀主義者則容易遭遇令人心碎的打擊。

事實並不總是如此。加州大學洛杉磯分校(University of California Los Angeles)心理學教授謝莉•泰勒(Shelley E. Taylor)說，樂觀使你永遠不會因過去的掃興事而感到困擾。在她的研究中，癌症復發患者會說，“我會打敗它，就象上次一樣。”

卡內基梅隆大學(Carnegie Mellon University)心理學系主任麥克爾•史西爾(Michael Scheier)說，如果患者對他們的未來比較樂觀的話，他們的配偶更容易安然處之。這種樂觀特性在健康問題上屢試不爽，絕對令人吃驚。

但人們並沒有充分認識到悲觀主義者的懷疑能帶來怎樣的好處。密歇根大學(University of Michigan)心理學副教授Edward Chang說，研究表明，在統計一項簡單實驗的成功率時，與樂觀主義者相比，相對悲觀的人能獲得更準確的數據，而樂觀主義者會少計失敗次數而多計成功次數。不僅如此，還有證據顯示悲觀可以給人以極大的動力，就象人們所說的“防衛性悲觀”能推動人們實現目標。

Edward Chang補充說，那些太過樂觀的投行在次級抵押貸款危機中遭受了重創，而高盛集團(Goldman Sachs Group)當初卻預見到了災難性的前景，最終得以全身而退。不過這種說法還值得推敲。他說，不付諸行動的盲目樂觀毫無價值；而悲觀加上行動、動力和能量卻恰恰是人們所說的樂觀主義的最高境界。

對於極度盲目樂觀的人來說，即使是偶爾進行規劃看上去也象是消極的舉動。羅伯特•麥克伯耐特 (Robert McBurnett)現任首席財務長，在他曾經供職的一家公司中，所有業務機會都要在各個部門領導之間轉來轉去，被他們反覆地衡量利弊。後來一位堅決的樂觀主義者收購了這家公司。麥克伯耐特說，所有的顧慮到了老闆那裏都會遇上這個問題而被駁回：“你爲什麼這麼消極？”以致於他們不得不在項目實施中解決出現的各種問題。

麥克伯耐特說，樂觀主義者自信滿滿地認爲有了雞肉當然就能做出雞肉沙拉。但這對中層管理者來說壓力非常大，他們通常做不長。

蘭登•約翰遜(Randy Johnson)曾任醫院主管，她巧妙地應付過很多說起來容易、做起來難的指示。她說，當他們找不到答案而又缺乏相應的知識時，這是一種處理方法。因爲很容易會被樂觀主義者貼上“愛唱反調”標籤，所以約翰遜找到一種可以和他們和平共處的方法──將關注的焦點轉移到別人身上。比如可以這樣說：我確實希望看到這個項目能做好，不過比爾•瓊斯(Bill Jones)可能會提出反對意見，你建議我該怎樣對他講？

她還希望自己老闆的那些不合實際的想法能像肥皂泡一樣自己破掉。她說，如果你運氣好的話，樂觀主義者會不斷生出更多的好主意，然後自己忘記最初的那些想法。