The person who has good character can satisfactorily practice responsible freedom. Unfortunately for those who have yet to know self-discipline in body, mind, words, and deeds, they will be like untamed animals when left to do things on their own. They will most probably damage others one way or the other. We cannot say people who have the habit of fault finding are people with good characters, obviously because their view of everything is oftentimes negative. Good characters are those who can influence and inspire others to do what should be done for the good of all, and NOT those who will focus on doing nothing in order to uplift the performance of fellowmen. What is worse than doing nothing is doing negative steps that tend to belittle other people until those other people lose their self confidence and peace of mind.

As Benjamin Franklin once taught: one must first build good habits so that habits can build the person. What then can be expected of those who have not yet developed those habits ? They can only keep trying to practice responsible freedom. At the end of the day, due to no such good habits, the weak character can end up with trial and error results that have little value for a company.

How does one with good habits live productively insofar as dealing with others is concerned ? He first of all knows the weaknesses of others, without being redundantly vocal about it, and then persistently teaches whatever should be the right practices. Those who diligently teach in a positive way realize the impact of their work. Thus, they exercise responsible freedom. In contrast, those with weak characters tend to complain about every little thing, as though nothing seems right, and even magnifies problems into proportions for the purpose of giving importance to what they see is not right. Good characters solve problems or teach others how to solve problems, whereas week ones will keep on fault finding and demanding for solutions that they themselves cannot provide.

Responsible freedom should be given to those who can only build up people. For those who have not yet mastered themselves, it is not wise to give as much freedom, if the organization is to survive a healthy life. Irresponsible members have to be controlled. If and when allowed to spread their attitude or way of working, in time most of the members of the organization will become agitated to finally complain about the organization itself, until business becomes paralyzed by their unproductive ways. What will be the value of knowledge and expertise if they make irresponsible people arrogant. I have observed a lot of such people who look down on the customers they serve simply because some steps appear so simple yet customers find it difficult to follow. Instead of helping those customers understand, they start scolding them as though they had paid for nothing. That was the effect of supervisors doing the same thing to people who are serving customers. We can easily say such an organization of people must be really sick, although not all are that sick. Skills, accurate knowledge, familiarization of the system — these turn out to be nonsense in a situation wherein the spirit of service no longer prevails. Nobody in this world is perfect. We can only aim for perfection. However, everybody should always maintain the spirit of service for others, not just because the services were paid for but because it is what responsible freedom is all about.

When a weak character shows signs of even loss of patience, some organizations send them on vacation or force them to take leaves to think about the value of their work. Such a move is better than allowing them to degrade the performance of an entire organization.

Those who have learned to love to serve, love to learn, love to teach what is right, and love to solve problems rather than raise one problem after another — these are the people deserving of greater freedom, since they will most likely continue to practice responsible freedom. They enjoy life the way it should be. They appreciate whatever new problems comes along, but make sure they are resolved. It is a kind of fighting spirit for the benefit of all. This is the dream of many good organizations.