What can the classics say to the modern manager and executive? What can he or she gain from reading Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar? One lesson that immediately springs to mind is, does unfettered ambition naturally lead to a selective listening process? Gaius Julius Caesar’s unrestrained ambition to match or outperform the achievements of Alexander the Great eventually led him into the selective listening syndrome trap: a syndrome whereby a leader only hears what he or she wants to hear and ignores the other advices. Caesar’s blatant ambition eventually resulted in outright arrogance, which blinded him to reality and ultimately cost him his life.
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