Frankly, it’s personal.
"We have now committed the Golden Rule to memory; let us now commit it to life." —Edwin Markham
This past week, I read two LinkedIn posts I’m still struggling to comprehend. They were gut-wrenching stories quickly resulting in lost faith for Corporate America.
These stories took me back to an experience early in my career when the tech bubble busted.
I was working for a startup backed by a large financial services company. They relocated my family to Denver, as well as 15 other employees and their families from around the country. I was so excited to be in the tech startup world and was willing to do whatever it took to succeed.
After a few months in our new surroundings, hell broke loose in the stock market. We all lost our jobs.
HR people from the parent company made an unplanned visit and gave us pink slips on February 14th. Not exactly what I’d call a happy Valentine's Day!
As my teammates and I tried to make sense of the timing and deal with the shock of what transpired, one of the HR managers unemotionally stated, "Don't take it personally."
She delivered this message with about as much sensitivity as a toll collector telling me I owed fifty cents on the turnpike.
Later in my career, I’m embarrassed to say I leveraged a similar tactic. Just as we repeat behaviors of our parents and teachers, I was "corporately raised" to believe this: when the going gets tough, tell employees to not take it personally.
Occasionally, I would even double-down with a remark like, "Now, don't be so emotional." Pathetic, I know.
Thankfully, it didn't take long to realize how utterly ridiculous it was to use such language or have such a belief. I know how I felt on that fateful day, when I lost my job. I was devastated and demoralized.
So, how could I expect my team members to separate their personal and professional feelings, when I couldn't do it myself? The answer was easy. I couldn’t.
As I've shared before: when employees love their brand, they attract customers and new employees who love the brand. If they only like a brand, they attract customers and new employees who only like the brand. And I believe when team members hate a brand, they repel customers and colleagues who grow to hate it, too.
Not to be Captain Obvious: the actions of leaders influence how employees feel about a brand.
Leadership requires an expression of care and concern for people's feelings. Frankly, it is personal. As humans, we have one mind; one heart—and they process professional emotions, as well as personal emotions.
I know of no biological ability which compartmentalizes a boss' insensitivity from other negative experiences happening outside the workplace. Negativity hurts the same.
When we're no longer on this planet, people won't remember us for the things we did; they'll remember us for how we treated people.
What are you doing to build and nurture the relationships you have with your teammates and peers? Do you find yourself suggesting people shouldn't take things personally at work?
What do you think it would do for your career and performance if everyone realized, it is personal?
Make it a great day!
Chris
