Careful What You Wish For
By: Chad Prevost
Tags: Life Lessons, Philosophy, Mental Health, Psychology, Self Improvement

Expectations of Others at Work

Collaboration always sounds easier than it is. While the vast majority would like to think of themselves as collaborators, and even say they “enjoy” collaboration, we are also blind to a lot about ourselves. We can expect others to be blind about themselves.

Begin by asking what others expect of you. State your own expectations to the person or people you’re working with. This adds mutual respect and a clear sense of purpose toward shared goals. Or, if there is disagreement about the goals or tension about the expectations, those can be discussed upfront, ahead of the moments when stress is involved and perhaps a deadline is going to be missed, or it becomes clear a goal is not being acted on.

No matter what kind of work your team does, there will be unforeseen issues. The monster always rears its head. Maybe something about the way the code was built in the early phases when the company had to outsource the help has led to problems about how to build on top of it. Now, an entire reframing needs to happen.

Or the marketing team isn’t going to make the deadline for delivering the new graphics package and executing on the product launch’s advertising campaign. A hard choice will have to be made. Things should have been thought through more clearly from the beginning. The CEO is looking for someone to blame.

Whatever happens, the ideal way to inculcate a culture of calm is to encourage communication. No one should have to fear delivering the news. Don’t kill the messenger if you’re in charge, and don’t live in fear of being the messenger if you’re not.

In the hypercompetitive world of late capitalism, you may have a lot of meetings, but in the end, actions are what matter. Work is a place where communication happens toward an end goal. Communication is great, but the priorities of the team aren’t just to play therapist and constantly discern the blind spots and communication styles of each individual.

There is new data that tells us we like working toward common goals, but the reality is that we don’t often actually do the work together. The paradox of working on teams is that they can be both the greatest source of connection and belonging in the workplace, and yet teamwork is some of the loneliest work we ever do. We rarely do the actual work in the presence of the other members on the team. They are busy doing the things they are good at.

Interestingly enough, for managers and leaders, for the very reason so much of our work is done alone, you might consider the power of a single word: together. Researchers have found that using this single word with some well-placed repetition gets employees to work nearly 50% longer, stick with problems longer, and focus better. It’s almost as if the intrinsic motivation felt by working together gives employees a resilient, flexible mindset. They feel a greater sense of purpose and renewed energy.

So we need a way to experience the psychological-connectedness of working as a team, even when we technically aren’t. As social researcher Heidi Grant writes:

“The word ‘together’ is a powerful social cue to the brain. In and of itself, it seems to serve as a kind of relatedness reward, signaling that you belong, that you are connected, and that there are people you can trust working with you toward the same goal.”

As people continue to migrate out to “remote” locations to work with only the occasional bobbing head on our video feeds to check in on how we’re doing, we need to recognize our need for connection as it relates to finding calm.

Emotional responses are almost inevitable under stress. Weekly expectation check-ins and adjustments may be necessary to keep unnecessary stress away. Sometimes it may take one good conversation.