Overcoming Resistance

Do you have ever joined a new team and want to communicate effectively with your colleagues? What do you think about your teammates? Do you feel any resistance regarding your ideas or opinions?

Sometimes you may encounter miscommunication and resistance for change in several cases in your workplace. When you ask for a change or even stating your opinion, you may see this disagreement paradigm showing up. You may get angry and your reaction may cause opposite effects.

Someday I was helping some teammate in doing a project task. The task was to enhance the functionality of some module I have already made before in the project. During this task implementation, he start to ask for something. I give him solution. He didn't like it. This situation happen several times. He seems to me as if he is refusing whatever I suggest. Actually, I got nervous from his attitude. The concern was that he put himself in a defending area as if I am attacking him!

I also had similar situation in my old company. I tried to convince someone inside the team that the team was doing something in a wrong way during the last period. The resistance show up again, the resistance to change. He looks like he's saying: "You have just joined recently. You should follow what we used to do."

From a while, one of my friends joined a new company and he had the same issue with his team. He asked for a change in some development techniques applied in the company and he face this kind of resistance. "I don't want to continue. I feel not good and I can't communicate with them anymore.", my friend said.

I tried to search about this resistance issue. I found a book summary called: Overcoming Resistance. The book is talking about the reasons behind this resistance paradigms you may find in your workplace and how to deal with it.

One of the book advices is to "BEND and SNAP-BACK!". BEND! by ACKNOWLEDGING your subordinate's or team member's response to your request for a change. THEN, SNAP BACK! by restating your request. It is that SIMPLE! BEND and SNAP BACK!. The book author see that these two simple steps are so dramatically effective, it let the resistance blow up leaving your "change consistency" - as he called it - in place and unaltered.

Another note concluded from the book, is to try to be specific about the reason behind the resistance. The resistance can be because different reasons and it's not always the fear of change. It can take several shapes: Procrastination, No follow-through, Insensitivity, Chauvinism, Unprofessional behavior, Low productivity, Lack of initiative or Resistance to change. Avoiding generalities and being specific will block resisters from using some of their favorite escape routes!

I still believe we have a lot to do to enhance the team mentality here in Egypt. There is a lot more than the technicality to care about. The mentality of team work, coordination, respect, ethics and values should be considered and learned.

Don't Hurry Up For Quick Results

I was reading the famous book "7 Habits of Highly Effective People" by Stephen Covey. The following paragraph take my attention:

"In all the life, there are sequential stages of growth and development. A child learns to turn over, to setup, to crewel, and then to walk and run. Each step is important. No step can be skipped. This is applied for all areas of development. Even in emotional areas, human relations and personal character. We always try to find shortcuts skip some vital steps to save time and effort and still reap the desired results!

What if you lead you friend to believe that you can play piano at concert hall level however you skills still that beginner? This will only results to disappointment and frustration."

I have seen many cases when a person try to skip a step to get a better position, better state or more money. Just take the time for each step. Enjoy it and don't be hurry in getting quick results. It never work like that.

Got Working Ethics?

Today, I had several orientation sessions at work. One of the sessions was about about the working ethics inside the company. One of the points which take my attention is the general guidelines to consider when you deal and interact with the company clients.

The speaker mentioned a real and interesting story happened inside the company. The company hired a very talented UI designer and there was a negotiation with one of the company clients regarding some deal. Unfortunately, the company didn't close the deal for some reason. The designer explicitly contacted the client and took the deal for himself as a private work. As a reaction from the company, the designer was fired!

It seems a very aggressive reaction. From the first impression, the person has the rights to make the work if the company is not interested in it. However, the speaker think that the employee with this action affected the company image in the market in a way or another. He believes that the employee cause a damage for the company relationships, integrity and profit which may affect the company progress in the future.

After thinking, I believe this is somehow correct. Try to put yourself in the company shoe. You will see that the company need to increase its market share not only for this employee but for hundreds of employees. When you have taken this deal for yourself - and specially this deal which was supposed to be taken by the company - the company has lost a lot of potential to take another deal from this client. I think when you work for corporate or company you became part of it. The company expects some kind of integrity in the employees interactions and dealing with the clients.

Destorting Your Image

One of our colleagues applied for a position in some company. He claimed in his resume that he has some position inside the company he hasn't got yet. The company he applied to asked a reference inside our comapny regarding this guy position. The reference denied. "No, he didn't get the position yet!", the reference person said.

The reference person discussed the issue with the claiming one to understand the reason behinds this attitude. I was astonished. The claiming guy believes he didn't do anything wrong. He said that doing so will give him a special image in the interview and so he can easily get the job.

Weired! If we allow anyone to claim whatever he want and assume it as a normal behavior, we open the door for many to do so. It will be a mess. Even for the person himself, he has started his career with a lie losing the trust of his colleagues even before starting.

Small Things Always Matter!

Small things always matter. Neglecting small things can lead to unexpected disasters. This because neglecting it sometimes not only affecting you, but others as well. This happen especially when you're at the center of the others worlds wither a parent, manager or a leader. If you are in a position of responsibility, your reactions definitely will affect others no matter how massive this action is.

Suppose you are a parent raising your son. You give him apparently a large amount of money every couple of days. Your son tend to spend all his money at once. He always follow his desire whatever it's on the right place or not. You didn't bother yourself to teach him to save, to think before spendin. As a result, your son won't appreciate the value of the money when he grow up. He will not do hard to get it. You have killed the value of "doing" in your son. He won't see any problem to find any illegal way to get it. That is it. Small thing here matters.

You're a manager not caring about your employees morals and passion. You think as long as they get their salaries in time, they reach their maximum productivity. In the long term, people will get bored. This won't affect only your employees but it will affect "their" output, subsequently "your" profit, "your" life and "your" business future.

As a technical person, I see many colleagues don't care about small requirement, design consideration or even customer feedback. I am dealing with testers and designers where their output are mostly affecting the customer satisfaction in a way or another. I always hear: "No this is small .. Not important .. the customer won't care about it." You may delay the issue but don't ignore it. The result of ignoring will come someday wither as a customer lose or decreasing in market share.

Knowledge is not the only incremental characteristic in humans. Feelings, appreciation, personal values are all a result of long experience you gain along time. In your social life, if you don't show any appreciation to your parents, friends, partner and family, they will value you the same in a long term. You can't blame them as they lose your value in their life.

If you don't care about your health, body and fitness when you're young, don't expect much when you get old. It's all a matter of time and your body won't show any appreciation. As you give you will gain.

"Balance is the key to success in all things. Do not neglect your mind,
body, or spirit. Invest time and energy in all of them equally - it will be the
best investment you ever make, not just for your life but for whatever is to
follow." --Tanya Wheway

Small things matter because it's the building blocks of the larger ones. The final result of the equation always depends on its parameters. Small changes in the equation lead to different result. Make sure you're not missing any in your life!