Book Review: Moid Siddiqui,Leading from the Heart: Sufi Principles at Work

The author of this book is a well-known name in the corporate world in India and popularly known as management monk. His previous spiritual works concentrate on management themes, including Corporate Soul, namely, Who Will Bell the Cat?—which also found a place in the famous Chicken Soup Series.

The present book Leading from the Heart emphasizes secularism and Sufi wisdom in leadership. The book is written in 18 chapters. The author strived to explain the spiritual and complex concepts of life in a simple way by giving examples and relating with day-to-day life.

The author consistently focused on human aspects in management. He emphasized leadership with secular approach. He indicated changing focus of leadership from spirituality to materialism. He compared leadership style of today with the style followed at the time of Indian independence and he noticed a vast difference between the two. He commented that today’s leadership has lost its soul, and Sufi sagacity is missing in leadership. He has given examples of great Sufi philosopher Al-Ghazani of the twelfth century, Kung Fu Tzu, Lao Tzu and Mulla Nasrudin of the thirteenth century, and many others who followed truthfulness as an essential feature of leadership with both courage and gut. Further he gives examples of several leaders who followed secular approach.

Siddiqui explained that an understanding of ‘thyself’ is very important before managing others (human capital in the context of an enterprise). He emphasized that leaders who do not understand themselves, operate from the level of contracted consciousness. According to him, there are four constitutes for a wholesome discovery: (a) Knowledge of Self, (b) the Knowledge of the Almighty God, (c) the Knowledge of this Temporal World, and (d) the Knowledge of the next Eternal World.

After emphasizing the need to understand thyself in the next chapter, the author focused on two different roles that are played by human (mind and heart). Mind gets you the riches of the world; the heart gives you the heavenly blessings. The journey from heart to mind is considered most difficult, tedious and longest. It is always advisable to trust one’s inner self as many a times logic is crude, and often fails in understanding the finer aspects of life.

Leading to achieve a purpose is leading-in, which is possible when the leader has illuminated his heart and recognized his powerful inner-self. According to the author, one should not choose the defined patterns of leadership, rather it should be a reflection of one’s inner self.

Next, the importance of necessity of healing touch is defined, and it is advised that a leader should have a healing touch. As Mr Siddiqui had written, those who perform Dil Se (from the heart) are capable of healing the bleeding heart. Leading with high touch is possible only when one develops a Sufi Heart in one’s leadership by moving from lower levels to the higher levels on consciousness.

Further the author elaborated that everyone seems be in a mad rat race. He suggested that one should understand that winner in the rat race remains a rat. One should have the clarification as where one wants to go in life, else will be directionless and cannot reach to the destination. He summarized that heedlessness along with greed is causing incalculable damage to the society as well as the corporate world.

Further, the author tried to identify great values of leaders and human dignity by giving simple examples. A true leader is a ‘giver’ not the ‘taker’. The true examples of leader given by the author are Gandhi and Kabir.

Giving is gaining: A heart that does not beat for others is not a heart. It is always better to give a needy who comes to you. Khalil Gibram, the great Sufi, says when giver’s hand touches the taker’s hand, it touches the heart of the God.

‘Give with love, never with pride’ and also do not give or help someone with some expectations, suggested by the author. Although the author advocated that one should not expect anything in return, he believes that law of energy responds, and it gives back the due returns. Giving never goes waste. The real art of giving is that you give with right hand and your left hand must not know.

Change of heart in leadership can change the world. Understanding the holistic patterns with great significance is must in management. Lack of holistic understanding can cause problems in management of people. Leaders who understand their presence and can foresee the futuristic trends or patterns become visionaries. Most of the problems in any society arise because of difference in perception. The author suggested that there are different techniques that can be followed to build common grounds of understanding.

Later, the author explains that leadership is all about trust and credibility. Great leaders are trustworthy they trust their people and have faith in their competencies and capabilities. In the next chapter, the author talks about humility as the sign of greatness. He explained humility is a great gift of God, and leaders with humility scale greater heights. They speak less and act more. One quality of humble leaders is that they never raise their voice, yet their words carry force.

Next, the author tried to reflect the belief of Osho. According to him as you sow, so will you reap. He further explained that laws of consequences are so perfect that we can see the future by understanding the past. Further, the author emphasized on the importance of relationship in one’s life and quoted that relations are delicate, they need to be handled with utmost care. One more enlightening thought that one must see the dreams while one is awake. Dreams seen in waking hours are the goals and inspirations to work on for fulfilling them.

According to the author, a leader must know how to create melody that comforts the heart and soothes the soul. The attitude plays a vital role in creating music in one’s life. One cannot be optimistic about life through pessimistic eyes. Likewise one cannot hear the melody of life through pessimistic ears.

No doubt, the book is interesting and a fine comprehension of Sufi principles and wisdom gained out of it. A direct link is established between leadership and Sufi principles. In sum, the book presents how great leaders perform their duties, and the emphasis is on secular approach that leaders follow with great values and trust. The interesting features that make the book unique are: it is logically written and adequately illustrated with examples and day-to-day events. Overall, this is a brilliant attempt to accentuate on true principles of Sufi philosophy at work.