The First Paradoxical Commandment

February 29, 2008

The Mentorship Approach With Teams & Groups

People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered. Love them anyway.

© Copyright Kent M. Keith 1968, renewed 2001

Words like these sound wonderful in an inspirational speech or a sermon. I close my eyes and smile and think, “What a wonderful world.” Then reality walks in wearing flesh and bones and a rude attitude!

Now don’t get me wrong. I actually have the capacity for a lot of empathy and compassion. I can forgive a bad attitude and some harsh comments if I know someone is having a hard time. I start “listening” with my intuition if someone is quiet or seems shut down.

But my capacity for kindness was overwhelmed by some situations. Sometimes an employee would come in on a Friday morning and say, “I need to be off next week.” Rarely was it a life crisis, like a parent’s or child’s illness. It was usually something like, “My mother’s taking her vacation time and driving to visit family and she wants me to go with her.” Or it might have been something like, “My husband’s work is closing down for a week and he wants to use the time to get things done around the house.”

I was a business owner responsible for scheduling well-trained, nurturing people to care for children on a stable and consistent basis. I couldn’t tell if that employee didn’t value her importance to the children in her group, or if she felt she was compelled to put her family’s wants (not needs) before her work responsibilities.

Either way, I thought my head would explode!

I had to back away from the situation and get some perspective. A lot of times it would come down to a family member having unreasonable expectations of my employee, and me having to deal with the unreasonable person indirectly. As the employer, I could act professionally and maturely and enforce rules and clarify boundaries and make my expectations obvious. But I would likely lose up against the coercion of the family member.

What worked? If I calmed down and talked to my employee we could usually resolves those crises. I would hear her point of view on the pressure from the family member. Did she want to do this or did she feel obligated? Then I would remind her of the children’s needs for continuity and the pressure her sudden absence would put on co-workers.

The employee would share her view and I would understand more. I would share my view and my employee would understand more. Then we would come up with a plan that respected each other’s needs and included reasonable compromises. We would even discuss ways for the employee to talk with mom or the husband to explain why a week off wouldn’t work.

Sometimes it seemed I had to compromise a lot, giving a couple of days off or shortening the schedule for a week. Some of the women working for us loved their jobs and loved working with the children, but they were just learning to value themselves.

Their job was where they were developing independence and self-esteem. They needed that, and I knew long-term they would become even better employees. So I was inclined to figure out what was in their long-term best interest and try to make that happen if I could.

This is a hard commandment. It demands a lot and it costs a lot of time and emotional energy.

Do it anyway.

Posted in The Mentorship Approach With Teams & Groups, Zine 5: February 2008