I quit the first career I was in, after five years, because it was a high-people skill field, and my people skills sucked. In speaking to my boss, just before I left, and moved back to my hometown to go back to school, I mentioned that a large part of the reason I was leaving was the difficulty I had in managing people. "I never know right off how to handle things, how to phrase things. It's just *hard*. Sometimes I do it right, but only after I think about it for a bit. It's not easy."
My boss looked at me, then down at his desk. Then he asked me to sit down, and apologized for not realizing that I had thought about things like that. And proceeded to unpack for me the last five or six weeks of meetings and tasks and short-notice projects and outside agency coordinations that had gone on in the office. I had been aware of nearly all of them, and involved in a lot of them.
What my boss did, in that twenty minutes, was explain how much thought and pre-planning had gone into every meeting, every encounter, every time he had to interact with people. His word choices, the place of meeting, what he would bring up in private and what he would bring up in public meetings...and he wasn't even telling me everything.
That man, a fairly gifted manager and leader, showed me how much *work* it was to lead people, to work with people. I had thought it was something he did from the gut - and, at that point in his career, a lot of it was, because he was so used to looking for the right approach to take with different people. But most of it was brain work, and choking off emotional responses.
I was already committed to my new path - moving back to my hometown, and going back to school. But I have carried that conversation with me. And it has stood me well - I am much better with people now than I was before - for starters, I *know* I can vary my approach, and I *know* I can find better ways of saying things to different people.
(In someways, this is scary, because I'm still not very good at the people dance. But everyone who knew me back then agrees that I am much *much* better now. And it is because I finally heard someone say 'this is a skill you must practice to get right' and set down to practicing it.)
So.
I don't think I draw the same conclusions from the articles you do, or start from the same place, but I do agree that acknowledging we all react emotionally and trying to work into a place where emotions have less impact is a good thing.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2008-03-08 03:14 pm (UTC)My boss looked at me, then down at his desk. Then he asked me to sit down, and apologized for not realizing that I had thought about things like that. And proceeded to unpack for me the last five or six weeks of meetings and tasks and short-notice projects and outside agency coordinations that had gone on in the office. I had been aware of nearly all of them, and involved in a lot of them.
What my boss did, in that twenty minutes, was explain how much thought and pre-planning had gone into every meeting, every encounter, every time he had to interact with people. His word choices, the place of meeting, what he would bring up in private and what he would bring up in public meetings...and he wasn't even telling me everything.
That man, a fairly gifted manager and leader, showed me how much *work* it was to lead people, to work with people. I had thought it was something he did from the gut - and, at that point in his career, a lot of it was, because he was so used to looking for the right approach to take with different people. But most of it was brain work, and choking off emotional responses.
I was already committed to my new path - moving back to my hometown, and going back to school. But I have carried that conversation with me. And it has stood me well - I am much better with people now than I was before - for starters, I *know* I can vary my approach, and I *know* I can find better ways of saying things to different people.
(In someways, this is scary, because I'm still not very good at the people dance. But everyone who knew me back then agrees that I am much *much* better now. And it is because I finally heard someone say 'this is a skill you must practice to get right' and set down to practicing it.)
So.
I don't think I draw the same conclusions from the articles you do, or start from the same place, but I do agree that acknowledging we all react emotionally and trying to work into a place where emotions have less impact is a good thing.
- hg