(originally published April 5th, 2005)

What would you rather be, right, liked, or respected? If you’re like me, you probably want to be all of these. We can be all of these, if we work at it. But I would bet we all know more people who seem to act as though they want to be one more definitely over all the others.

I know many people who love being right; heck, I love being right all the time. But I’ve been right at times when I hoped I was going to be wrong. There’s never pleasure when you predict something bad will happen, and it does.

There are people who love being loved, or at least liked. We all want to be liked, but sometimes it’s to our detriment to want to be liked, especially when a particular job has to be done, or a particular action must take place, and you’re the one who has to make it happen. It’s at those times when you might find that being liked doesn’t work to your advantage, and if you decide to change up you might have already ruined any chance you have to immediately get the results you need.

There are people who want to be respected, and in my opinion, this is the better way to go. If you’re respected, people will give you what they have to give. If you’re respected, people trust you. If you give others a chance to participate in the planning of whatever needs to get done, they’ll work even harder towards its success.

Being respected will make people think you’re often right; being respected will make people like you. Being respected,… wow, what a high!