Lessons in upper management

By Jane Hickson

First appeared as a web original on November 21, 2011

Years ago I had an experience that proved to me that God is equal to every situation. I had accepted a position as head of operations at a company after the owner of the company accepted a public service position.

Since I was young, the only female manager, and had the least experience in management, this appointment appeared unfair to other managers, many of whom had eight to ten years experience and more achievements. However, the owner was firm in his decision, pointing out that I had proven my ability by unifying the other managers in establishing an education department in the company. Furthermore, I was the only manager who had built an office from scratch, and my office had been for some time the most profitable in the company. The owner felt these achievements would be helpful to all the managers.

Shortly before I was to take the reins, the owner briefed me on a particular situation that had arisen in the company and was highly confidential. It appeared to me that if the particulars of this situation became widely known, they would have a detrimental effect on the company and on those who worked there.

A few days after this briefing one of the managers approached me about this same situation. He seemed to know all about it, and since he had much more experience than I had, I felt it might be helpful to hear his point of view. Just minutes after our lengthy conversation, I realized that he had not known much at all about the situation. I felt I had been lured into the conversation and, as a result, I’d exposed valuable information that wasn’t appropriate to share.

I was devastated. I realized I had broken confidentiality and trust with the owner and put the company in possible jeopardy. With this information, the other manager could cause harm to me, the company, and all those working there. In fact, he had already talked about his new information to my secretary, who immediately related it to me. She described his actions as manipulative and self-seeking.

I immediately contacted a Christian Science practitioner for prayerful help. Her words to me were “My God hath shut the lions’ mouths” (see Daniel 6:22). As I considered this statement, I realized that malice, envy, jealousy, and self-seeking had no authority, no place to operate in God’s creation, no justification, no cause or effect. I thought about Mary Baker Eddy’s statement in Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896: “The pent-up elements of mortal mind need no terrible detonation to free them. Envy, rivalry, hate need no temporary indulgence that they be destroyed through suffering; they should be stifled from lack of air and freedom” (p. 356). I understood that in the all-presence of divine Love pride, carelessness, envy, rivalry, malice, could not exist, much less operate.

I saw I must “. . . love more for every hate, and fear / No ill,—since God is good . . .” (Mary Baker Eddy, Christian Science Hymnal, No. 207). I could cherish man’s true nature as good, as related in the first chapter of Genesis. And I knew that as I embodied that true nature in my daily living (refusing pride, carelessness, envy, rivalry, or hate in my own actions) I would be proving it as the only nature of man—not just for myself, but for all. There was also a lesson for me in Mrs. Eddy’s poem, “Love” (Poems, p. 6).

As I prayed, I found an immediate sense of peace about the situation. I leaned on divine wisdom for direction and determined to greet all with brotherly love, and within about a day or two the sense of tension was replaced with confidence in God’s control. I recognized that I didn’t have to give power to the suggestion that malicious motives would try to harm me or the company, and as I continued to pray over the next few weeks, the tension that had seemed to exist between the other managers and me totally dissolved. The previous situation, about which I had been briefed, was corrected smoothly, and the company went forward successfully.

The manager I had been suspicious about became a trusted friend. At one point, he even recognized that my position on an issue would be detrimental to me—and he came to me and helped me get a better sense of the issue. Quite an about face for one who I’d previously considered untrustworthy.

The real healing for me was the proof that God, divine Love, controls all. It’s important to understand in the face of news such as volcanoes, earthquakes, floods, oil spills, hurricanes, that evil is not erupting, tragedy is not pouring forth unrestrained. “My God hath shut the lions’ mouths”—hath capped the evil, given it no authority, no place to operate. Only human misconceptions can suggest anything different.

The proof that God is in control lies within each of us. We express Him as we replace carelessness, envy, self-seeking, or hate in our thought and action with wisdom, unselfishness, kindness, generosity. We are the evidence that God has authorized brotherly love to reign!

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