The car in front of me was not moving fast enough. I kept muttering under my breath, "Move, move..", but only I seemed to be hearing these words. Similarly, in life, we find that we move at different speeds to each other. Every day we see a little child scurrying to keep pace with the parent, the man/woman struggling to keep up with the dog that s/he is taking out for a walk, the elderly man tyring to keep pace with the teenager and so on....some are faster than others and we all know that the pace at which someone moves, either physically or mentally, differs from person to person.
As I listened to the person in the meeting, I knew that he had not got the point I was making. My first thought was, "Gosh, this person has just not got it!" I reacted by cutting him off in the meeting and carrying on the discussion from where I left off as the others had understood what I had to say. How many times have each of us done this in our lives? I am pretty sure all of us do this in our daily lives, not just at work.
When we are slower than others, we always want the others to wait for us. However, when we are faster, we seldom wait for others. I struggle with this and am trying my best to slow down for those who need me to and catch up fervently with those who do not wait for me....I must admit that this has been a struggle for me all through my life. This impacts us significantly in our daily lives.
As I listened to the person in the meeting, I knew that he had not got the point I was making. My first thought was, "Gosh, this person has just not got it!" I reacted by cutting him off in the meeting and carrying on the discussion from where I left off as the others had understood what I had to say. How many times have each of us done this in our lives? I am pretty sure all of us do this in our daily lives, not just at work.
When we are slower than others, we always want the others to wait for us. However, when we are faster, we seldom wait for others. I struggle with this and am trying my best to slow down for those who need me to and catch up fervently with those who do not wait for me....I must admit that this has been a struggle for me all through my life. This impacts us significantly in our daily lives.
At work and at our home, we seem to get upset with each other when speeds differ. This causes tremendous stress in our lives and seldom do we realise that if we are able to adjust speeds, we will do ourselves a lot of good. At work, I have seen some of the best leaders fail because of this. They run at a speed that others are left gasping. Further, they have little tolerance for those who are not able to run at their speed. They show this by rewarding only those who run at their speed or just ignoring few in conversations. While it causes stress to those who are slower, these leaders also suffer from stress at the time when organizations collect feedback from employees on how satisfied they are with their leaders. Typically, we would see the Employee Engagement Scores not being very good where, as individuals, we are not able to strike a balance between speed, agility and the emotional aspects of working.
This is so true at home too where our elders are not as fast as us. More so if they are really old. They want to be involved in conversations, hear only a part of a statement and ask questions. This really irritates us and we end up saying something harsh that can upset them. This not only upsets them but they feel cut off and lonely after that. There is, therefore, a real need to stop, think and act in such situations - easier said, than done.
How do we then get around this? I have, over the years, come to realise that we get better at managing speed differences as the Emotional Quotient (EQ) in each of us increases. While, I believe, that most of us know this, we do not consciously try to train ourselves to see how to get more of EQ. We tend to be happy with the IQ bit. Not that IQ is not important. A good balance really helps. As we grow as leaders, EQ is a must and without that, individuals and, the corporations in which they work, will struggle in the long run. Most companies have realised this and are trying to get this woven in to their leadership skills matrix, training, work practices and rewards and recognition structures.
John Kotter of Harvard Business School: “Because of the furious pace of change in business today, difficult to manage relationships sabotage more business than anything else - it is not a question of strategy that gets us into trouble; it is a question of emotions.” This is so true in our personal lives too.
Dear Ravi, thanks for this great piece! Though I cannot put into words more succinctly that you did, I'll share my first hand experience on this. I had recruited ten freshers and there were a couple of slow movers in the team. While the rest of the team went ahead in knowledge and understanding pretty fast, these two were left behind, their productivity and enthusiasm going down.
ReplyDeleteI realised this, though after sometime, and I had to slow down my pace and involve the slow learners more thoroughly in what the rest were doing. After this, there was no looking back. Their enthusiasm grew into zeal and they did things that some of the fast learners couldn't think of!
It was an important lesson for me, not just for the well-being of the team members, but also as a great boost to the team's overall productivity.
Nilesh, thank you for sharing this experience..most of our own learnings are experential and that is why you are able to relate to this article...
ReplyDeleteDear Ravi, Thank you for one more excellent article.
ReplyDeleteEach of us varry in our speed of thinking and execution. While I understand, speed is one of the key factors for success, it is not the only thing required for a human being to succeed. i have seen many team members in my life, who are not too good at speed like others, they have their own unique other key strengths, which have made them succeed well in their professional and personal life. when I look back some of those people decisions and actions, those are solid long term and they had balanced many aspects of life.
It is quite obvious from Gallup strength finder, out of 34 strengths for each human being, each one has their first strength and 34th strength. while we work in a team, it is upto us to identify and leverage the strengths of each individuals without hurting them by pointing out their weakness (34th strength).
Crisply written. Everyone forgets they're on a unique journey and try to draw comparisons with each other which is the prime most cause for misery. Only if the full essence of life is realized, will the mankind flourish...)
ReplyDeleteVery well put Ravi - I came across a simple framework to strike the right balance - LEAP - Listen, Empathize, Acknowledge, and Propose - every time I do these 4 steps in a conversation, I find people reciprocate much better...anurag chaturvedi
ReplyDeleteConsciousness is the answer! No need to balance the speed. Speed exist with mind and not with consciousness. Consciousness is always being here and not being there, and speed is always being there and not here.It is always now here! If you are fast, you are fast. If you are slow, you are slow. But you are always here with cosciousness. You are nowheree with speed.
ReplyDeleteTaming speed with emotions is always difficult as there is something above emotions and that is consciousness. The hierarchy should be: Body-mind-heart-soul. Manage speed with emotions and emotions with consciousness.
ReplyDeleteTaming speed with emotions is always difficult as there is something above emotions and that is consciousness. Emotion is class 2. The hierarchy should be: Body-mind-heart-soul. Manage speed with emotions and emotions with consciousness.
ReplyDeleteGood way of looking at it Vijay...thank you.
ReplyDeleteHi Ravi,
ReplyDeleteBut the thing is that when you become conscious you will get out of the business most of the times. The very desire to make profit will melt down. And business is all about making profit.
To be in business you need to be in mind and touch emotions sometimes. Good at intellect- businessman, good at emotions- poet and good at consciousness- none. Only none can know life. Others think they know it but it is their projection. Life will remain survival unless we touch consciousness. Living without consciousness is not knowing the life you live. What matters if have a thing and you don’t know about it? It is as good as you don’t have it.