Let me take us back to our childhood days.
When you commit an offence and you know your father would punish you for it because he even had to get a kitchen fitter to get it fixed; you can’t escape the ‘belt’ ‘koboko’ ‘pankere’ ‘ride okada’ ‘kneel and raise your hands up‘ and others you can remember.
In order to remove your mind from the pains and console yourself, you will begin to soliloquise: ‘the beating is just for 10mins or he can’t kill me’.
For some children, you ‘package yourself’ well by wearing thick shorts so as to reduce the impact of the strokes. You are smiling 🙂
Similarly, the ability to understand your boss or colleagues at work prepares and guides your relationship with them. It goes a long way in creating a healthy work relationship or environment.It prevents unnecessary and reoccurring friction .It also enhances your productivity as you have less of a bossy, saucy, arrogant, diplomatic or lazy boss or colleague to think about.
How do you create a healthy work relationship or environment?
- Understand yourself
You can’t understand the other person when you haven’t understood yourself. When you understand yourself, you know your strengths, weakness, and extremes. You know how much pressure you can stand and how fast you can adapt to changes. This helps you in getting along with your boss and colleagues. No one knows you better than yourself so the understanding of yourself makes you maximize your capabilities and enhance your self control. You know when to talk and when to keep quiet; when to react and when not to.
- Know what they want.
This is very important. Know their takes on deadlines, team works or assignments. Know if they take glory for the work of others or they cherish compliments and courtesies. Understanding these could help you avoid so many office issues. It could also affect your evaluation positively or negatively. You never can tell who is watching. You don’t have to be rude in making a hurt known to your colleague. You can politely pass the message across. You don’t have to ask ‘if he/she is blind‘ to make an omission known to him: and if your colleague does that to you, ignore. Not everything should be reacted to.
- Know them for who they are
Is your boss or colleague arrogant, rude, diplomatic, and nice or any adjective you can describe him with, don’t take them for granted. Treat everyone with respect. Do not look down on anyone. From the management to the lower cadre.This is key. Even if they work as concrete contractors, you still need to understand them.
- Leave your age at the gate of the office
One of the major issues affecting smooth operation in so many workplaces is the issue of age. You hear lines like ‘I am older than him, so he cannot talk to me that way’ ‘we are not mates if not for condition’. Please leave that condition at the gate so you don’t react at every provocation. You might be lucky to work with respectful people or unlucky to work with the opposite. Humble yourself. Even when you are related to the boss, act as if you are not even from the same tribe. Obey the rules and regulations.
In all,as a little child you understood your father’s reaction to any offence you committed and so you prepared for it. Likewise, prepare yourself for the office environment and create a healthy relationship.
