Getting along at work would appear to be just basic common sense. Alas, our experience regularly shows that workteams can have real trouble working out together what ‘good workplace manners’ are!! We recommend that teams develop their own set of agreements about what they expect of each other. For such agreements to work, they must be developed collaboratively! What follows is some ‘snippets’ from the list of behavioural expectations we have developed. It may seem expedient to start with such a list – but resist the temptation, and start with your own. This builds ownership!
- Allow yourself and others to make mistakes, acknowledge yours quickly, apologise and forgive others when they apologise.
- Maintain an awareness of how others in your team are travelling. Check out assumptions or concerns you may have, offer support and work collaboratively to alleviate work pressure.
- When there is misunderstanding, or tension building – check it out with the person before making assumptions.
- Listen without interruption to understand a person’s views and feelings before arguing back.
- Prepare ourselves to engage in challenging encounters. Take time to centre yourself, deal with unhelpful emotions and consider your best approach.
- Refrain from speaking negatively about people to others. Do not engage with others who do so, but stand by the person being spoken about!
- Observe common politeness rituals of the workplace – eg. greetings and farewells to all, thanking people, letting others know where you are.
- If you want to talk to someone about an issue, or ask them some questions about a topic - check out with them if this is an okay time.
- When making a phone call to someone about a topic that is lengthy or tricky – ask them if this is an okay time to talk.
- If unexpectedly confronted by a request or a difficult issue – buy time to think about your response, rather than simply reacting.
- Immediately an email exchange becomes tricky, and strong opinions are expressed – abandon email contact in favour of face to face, or phone contact.
- Remember – it is often not what we say, but how we say it! When you have strong feelings about a topic, and are communicating about it to others – watch the tone and volume of your expression.