I find that black and white thinking sabotages our chances of success. For instance, you may have come to a decision that your boss is very strategic in his focus, so you always give big picture ideas, and never prepare for a time when he needs details. When you get scolded by your boss, rather than accept responsibility, you blame your boss for having two minds.
Blaming is easy.
Taking responsibility is hard.
It’s no wonder so few people actually succeed in real life.
It’s commonly known that the world is becoming more and more individualistic and generally, good teams are seldom seen. This is just a picture of a stadium, but it’s a representation of the playing field that a team goes on to determine whether it wins or loses.
It begins with the understanding of two different approaches. The first is the independent mindset, the second is the interdependent mindset.
In many cases, individuals who are brought up with the independent mindset think about themselves and consequences for them the majority of the time. Very often, people in this category are deemed as individualistic and uncooperative, and seldom have this intention of bringing out a win-win situation within a team.
Those who have been brought up in an interdependent environment (many Asian cultures experience this) on the other hand, experience things differently. Their decisions are often based on what the group decides to do. Hence, the amount of time spent on a collaborative effort tends to take a very long time.
It appears that people seem to prefer one over the other, when in reality, it is very difficult to justify a proper win-win for choosing one over the other. It is better to consider the benefits of flexibly being able to switch from one to the other when appropriate.
I recently encountered a trainee who had suggested in a class that training is a weapon used to control employees. He had an attitude that can be best described as “cancer” within his company. Fortunately, one of the surgeons happened to be one of his department members, who said that there’s nothing wrong with proper control, and absolute freedom is chaos. Yet another member in the audience suggested that the fact that this first trainee mentioned that “training is a weapon of control” itself is controlling. In many cases, such individualistic thinking exists and often requires a paradigm shift.
Building a solid team is not about getting people together for fun. It’s about getting people to go through difficult moments and still come out strong, if not stronger.
By learning to be independent and proactive, one can provide an interdependent arena for everyone to participate without having limiting thinking. The first participant I talked about eventually was fired for performance issues not related to the training. The second and third participant were eventually promoted – one within the company I trained, the other outside after he joined a new company.
It must mean that building a team is far more than being a body of people. It is about the maturity of thinking that an individual has to be able to command, connect and collaborate with others in a win-win fashion without having to give up individuality of choice. This wisdom can only come from post-event feedback that is received as a team. Everyone needs to take responsibility in order to move forward.
