I’ve enjoyed working with a few bosses who bring up the term “pissing contest” when people fight over silly things at work.
Workplace crisis can develop when too many “pissing contests” take place and when trust is at a low. It’s up to leaders to not focus so much energy on the “pissing” and more on developing better ways of recognizing and rewarding hard work and effort.
The oneupmanship that can occur at work often happens because not enough attention is given to the people doing the work. It’s not solved by micromanaging; instead, the good old MBWA (managing by walking around) to just make your presence felt on a regular (but non-predictable) frequency can make all of the difference.
One of my favorite tricks was to walk out for a few minutes onto a sales floor, spend about 15 minutes out there interacting with each staff member, and then heading to the back. Then, within about 5 minutes of going to the back, I’d come back out and just observe.
Think about ways you can be better at stopping the pissing contests that can happen at work. I’m looking forward to hearing some of your comments (which I will post next week).
robert@galaconcierge.com
