Key Messages
How To Build Better Relationships At Work – A Toolbox Of Tips And Ideas
Strong work relationships are essential for success, no matter the field of work.
Thankfully, when it comes to optimizing interpersonal connections in a professional setting, Get Better provides a invaluable resource of advice and actionable information that can help anyone start to build healthier and robust relationships at the workplace.
This book offers an assortment of constructive tips such as establishing trust and respect between colleagues and learning how to open your own “emotional bank account”.
One key takeaway is learning how to be an attentive listener in order to foster communication within the team.
Plus, it helps managers learn how to provide helpful feedback that employees won’t dread.
All in all, this books gives readers a powerful set of tools they need to create strong teams with respectful work environments–whether you’re an manager or employee!
How You Can Overcome Narrow-Minded Perceptions By Embracing Openness And Staying Open To Others’ Perspectives
Todd Davis encourages us to be open to other perspectives when it comes to how we view ourselves, others and the world.
When Jon came to Davis with his concerns about their coworker Isabel, Davis realized that Jon was stuck in a narrow perspective and had labeled Isabel as slow and lazy without taking the time to get to know her.
Davis reminded Jon that he could use his strong interpersonal skills as a husband and father, combined with staying open to the perspective of others, in order to understand different points of views rather than quickly making assumptions or passing judgement.
By being open minded, having conversations and truly listening to our coworkers, friends and family, we can foster more meaningful relationships as well as break down stereotypes instead of perpetuating them.
Pausing: The Key To Staying In Control Of Your Reactions And Responses
One regretful reaction that many people unfortunately make when faced with a difficult situation is to act out of anger.
Todd Davis knew what this was like when his new colleague negotiated a salary that was far higher than his own.
His initial feeling was one of rage and he complained to friends and family, feeling unmotivated and sad.
However, by taking the time to calmly pause and think things through, Davis realized that a better solution existed.
This idea is something we should all remember: if an outside event or circumstance is causing you to feel angry or upset, take a moment to pause and reflect on it before jumping into action.
Focusing on your feelings can help you develop an understanding of why you might be tempted to respond in an emotional way, which can lead you towards more positive solutions than letting yourself get cast as the victim.
In Davis’ case, he decided to ask for a raise from his boss – something which wasn’t even on his radar until he took pause and reflected on the situation in greater detail.
So next time you’re faced with an unpleasant experience, remember: it’s always best avoid a regretful reaction by pausing first in order to think things over.
Demonstrating Credibility In Your Relationships: Character, Competence, Long-Term Perspective And Adaptability
Having a successful relationship requires trust, and having trust, in turn, means having credibility.
You can demonstrate you are credible by having character and showing competence in what you’re doing.
Moreover, displaying your capacity to think long-term and adjust to changing situations can go a long way in making others respect and trust you.
It’s all about balance though: don’t focus too much on one side to make up for the other.
For instance, when skydiving, it is important your parachute is packed by someone competent but also displays good character – no one wants to take that risk with an arrogant or emotionally unstable person.
To highlight your reliability, try showcasing your long-term perspective – it’s important for colleagues to know that you’re reliable and can see out projects until the end.
Likewise being adaptable shows real credibility as you could have chosen to complain when given new tasks instead of adapting like most savvy people do.
It is clear then that great relationships are built on credibility earned through having admirable characteristics – competence, character and the ability to be flexible and think long-term.
Finding Balance To Juggle Multiple Roles In Life
Relationships thrive when we find the right balance and pay attention to all the roles we play.
This is something that Ruben, an executive, parent and husband, learned first-hand after missing an important family photo portrait.
After this event, Ruben realized he was placing too much importance on his executive role and decided to never let something like this happen again.
Finding a balanced approach starts with first figuring out what your roles are.
This includes both professional roles such as graphic artist or tax advisor, as well as personal roles such as girlfriend, sister or animal-shelter volunteer.
It’s important to remember that the most important of these are those that resonate with your core values and fulfill personal goals—not those you do to please others.
Once you have identified your roles, it’s time to consider how much time and energy each one requires.
You can do this by creating a contribution statement for each one which states your intention in playing the role—such as providing your children “unconditional love, support and safety so they can reach their goals in life” for the role of mother.
With all this considered and accounted for, you’ll be able to maintain relationships more harmoniously by exercising control over how you spread yourself between multiple responsibilities —all while achieving an optimal level of harmony in your life.
Seeing Beyond The Present: Why We Should All Appreciate The Potential In Others And Ourselves
Todd Davis, a recruitment manager, learned an important lesson from his boss: despite the limited experience and accomplishments he had at the time, his boss saw immense potential in him and believed in him more than he believed in himself.
As Davis’ boss listed out his accomplishments so far, it gave him a much-needed boost of confidence that propelled him to continue doing great work.
Davis’ story is a perfect example of how we should recognize potential within people and look beyond what they are right now.
Instead of seeing them as scrawny seedlings, appreciate their potential to become tall and strong trees.
It is also essential to avoid unimportant distractions along this journey.
Simple tasks like responding to a text message or email can quickly seem pressing even though they don’t bring you closer to achieving your goals.
We need to create daily or weekly goals that focus on the important stuff like our relationships with colleagues, friends and loved ones instead of succumbing to these mundane tasks that have no real impact in the long run.
Stop Thinking In Terms Of Zero-Sum Games: Embrace Interdependent Collaboration For Career Success
When it comes to getting better in life and work, we should strive to focus on collaboration rather than competition.
In a competitive environment, there’s the mistaken perception that if someone succeeds then they are taking something away from you.
But this zero-sum philosophy is wrong and won’t get you far in life.
At work or even in our private lives, we should adopt a “we” frame of mind and create an interdependent relationship with others.
Instead of feeling envious or threatened by someone’s strengths, this will allow us to think about how to best combine our talents with theirs.
Collaboration offers a great way to gain new skills as well as pass on knowledge, so working together can benefit both parties involved.
It’s not always easy and takes courage to respectfully express our own opinions while considering those of others.
This balance between courage and consideration will ensure an end outcome where everyone can benefit from the collaboration, creating a true win-win situation that enables all involved parties to share and learn from each other.
How To Maintain A Healthy Emotional Bank Account In The Workplace
If you want your work relationships to stay in good standing, you need to pay attention to your emotional bank account and make sure your motives are honorable.
It can be tempting to think of these relationships like a bank account where we deposit and withdraw things such as trust and encouragement, but this isn’t a healthy approach.
Instead, strive to keep your emotional bank account (or EBA) high, with plenty of trust and engagement.
Don’t only dispense trust or encouragement when you expect that they’ll soon be returned.
This opens up the opportunity for manipulative and insincere interactions that will damage relationships rather than build them.
When it comes to motives, make sure they stay honest.
Taking credit for someone else’s work or belittling another’s effort just to get on your boss’ good side is not acceptable behavior.
Focus on improving everyone’s position—not just yours—and that will be reflected in a healthy balance of honorable actions in your EBA.
The Benefits Of Active Listening: Learn From Gary’S Mistake And Get Better At Communicating
The importance of listening cannot be overstated; it has many great advantages, including deeper connections with others and better understanding.
When we actively listen to someone, we show that the other person’s story and opinion matters to us – and this is something that can be easily missed by just speaking without taking in what the other person has said.
Not only does active listening during conversations show that you’re paying attention but it also encourages understanding, encourages connecting on a deeper level, and confirms that their opinion, perspective and feelings are registered and thus valid.
As demonstrated by Gary’s lost business opportunity, not listening can have serious consequences such as damage to relationships.
In summary: Listening cannot only improve a conversation but also guarantee that each party in the discussion really feels heard.
Therefore it is important to make sure that if we start talking about our own needs or ideas, then we should try to switch back and focus on the other person’s concerns as well.
The Power Of Trust In Building Working Relationships
As much as you may want to use your strengths to help others, it can be damaging to push them on those around you.
Too much focus on personal abilities can impede progress and negatively affect working relationships.
It’s not that your talents shouldn’t be used, but rather, don’t do so to the detriment of the team and collaboration.
The concept of trust should also never be overlooked.
Building effective working relationships requires a steady trust between employees and managers alike.
People need to feel their boss trusts them enough to complete the task without constantly checking up on them.
If people have that trust, they’ll be more confident in themselves and eager to get the work done properly without letting their boss down.
But trust isn’t automatically given out; it must be earned by assessing each situation separately and evaluating both risk and anyone’s credibility.
When trusting someone with important tasks, ruling out bad experiences is just as important as knowing when to believe in a potential individual.
We Should Welcome Feedback As A Chance To Grow And Improve
If you want to achieve greater personal and professional success, being receptive to feedback is key.
Feedback not only helps you identify areas of improvement, but it also helps create a safe and respectful work environment.
Take cautionary tale of Carsten for instance.
He was a senior manager at a medical-equipment factory but refused to listen when the failure rate began rising.
His attitude of believing that he was immune from criticism and showing vulnerability made it difficult for anyone to reach him.
That’s why it’s so important to develop an environment in which honest feedback is seen as constructive and helpful, with good intentions.
This sense of support will make it easier for employees to embrace suggestions on how they can grow and improve while feeling supported by their peers.
Feedback can be hard to accept sometimes but when received with the right intention, it’s very beneficial in helping us better ourselves both personally and professionally.
By creating an open dialogue where everyone feels heard and respected, our workplace becomes a positive space that encourages growth and development for everyone involved.
Wrap Up
In Get Better Book by A.J.
Jacobs, the key message is that we must strive to build relationships with our colleagues if we want to accomplish great things in the workplace.
To do this, it’s important to embrace different methods of working and listen to the ideas of others without overreacting.
We should also create an environment where feedback can be comfortably shared, inspire collaboration among co-workers, and ask for feedback directly when needed.
Overall, Jacobs emphasizes that strong work relationships are essential for achieving success: by cultivating open communication between team members and allowing people room to do their jobs as they see fit, any workplace—no matter how small or large—can become a place of positive growth and progress.
