Office Rage
In the last five to ten years, the phenomenon of road-rage has been
increasing, now we learn that office-rage is on the increase too. What
is going on? What has changed? How would you react and deal with office
rage?
Today, customers are more demanding. Competition is fiercer. Deadlines
are tighter. Workload is increasing. There is less time to accommodate
less capable or less committed staff. These increased pressure and
demands, have possibly made people become less tolerant of one another,
and so office-rage is on the increase.
A 'Smiling Manager' or 'Genetic Manager' is one who tries to apply the
principles of genetics and evolution to lead their businesses. This
incredibly simple principle of natural selection or æsurvival of the
fittestÆ, now confirmed by the science of genetics, has created
powerful, elegant, awe inspiring organisms that have remained resilient
and successful for millions of years. The process of evolution, which
has constantly adapted to the ever-changing environment, is also a very
slow one, cumulatively building, in small steps, only on what has
succeeded before.
Your genes determine your traits or features and capabilities. In
business, genes can be thought of as you procedures, knowledge and
experience as well as the traits and capabilities of you and your staff.
So, what would the Smiling Manager do about office-rage? If you were a
Smiling Manager here are a few key things you might do.
First, you would understand your own personal genes, and that of your
staff. Personality differences could lead to conflict when work
pressures increase. Personalities can readily be understood by doing
simple, quick computer based personality tests. Your good intuition
about people can sometimes be fooled or misled. These objective tests,
which should indicate their reliability, the will reveal the suitability
of staff for certain jobs, how you and staff work under pressure, and
whether staff will make good team workers or managers. You would then
build and blend individuals so that everyone is working to their
strengths with minimum tension.
Secondly, peopleÆs traits and capabilities are not only derived from
their genes, but how these genes are nourished. You never put your staff
in a position where their current capability does not match the demands
placed on them. You establish systems for good recruitment, good
training, simple workable procedures, and top class supervision. You
tell your staff what is expected of them. This stops your staff, making
mistakes, becoming frustrated and so avoiding rage.
Thirdly, businesses today are encouraged by some management gurus to be
highly innovative and risk taking. They tackle bigger projects and adopt
fast quick fix solutions. All this creates a tension within the
organisation and is a possible pre-cursor to office-rage. You on the
other-hand, also want to be innovative and risk taking, but you minimise
this source of tension, by using your cunning to follow the evolutionary
principle of taking many small cumulative steps, building on success,
one small step at a time, rather than taking few large ambitious steps.
You also learn from small mistakes and make appropriate small corrective
actions.
Lastly, as a Smiling Manager you make the most of your genes by
involving everyone openly in your business to address the current
problems and future directions. This again helps pre-empt tensions and
so minimise the possibility of office rage.
Syd Stewart is the author of "Smiling Owner How to Build a Great Small
Business An Evolutionary Business E-Handbook". He has been an owner and
manager for over 30 years. He Knows What Works and What Doesn't. Visit
his site to find out how you can 'Build a Great Small Business' at
http://www.smilingowner.com
