-
Brilliant Jerks Cost More Than They Are Worth, WebArchive Mirror - by Retrospective.co/Anonymous. Takeaway: "Brilliant jerks harm team morale and productivity. They don’t have to worry about being nice, because they are the top dog, and people need their natural talent. They have no incentive to try to improve, because they can simply go somewhere else. If you look carefully, you’ll notice that they often bounce around from place to place. They know they can get away with it." You must apply a "no jerks" policy.
-
Brilliant Jerks in Engineering - by Brendan Gregg. Takeaway: Identifies selfless (cares about the company) and selfish (cares primarily about themselves) brilliant jerks. "Companies can adopt a 'no asshole rule,' or more politely, a 'no brilliant jerks' policy. Colleagues may be genuinely conflicted about how to deal with [the selfish type of "brilliant jerk"]: on the one hand, he is a real jerk, but on the other he is a 'high performer,' so isn't it in the company's best interest to tolerate his behavior? A policy helps you decide, and it can be as simple as three words: no brilliant jerks."
-
A Guide to Building Trust in Teams and Organizations - by Ron McFarland. McFarland's wide-ranging piece outlines various meanings of the term "trust," organizational factors that can influence it, and organizational dynamics that it, in turn, affects. The piece also includes descriptions of ways trust can operate at several interlocking "levels": personal, relational, organizational, and market.
-
The Hidden Toll of Workplace Incivility - by McKinsey. Takeaway: "[D]e-energizing relationships—those that are negative or draining—have a 4 to 7 times stronger negative impact on performance than the positive effects of relationships that are energizing (defined as leaving employees feeling enthused or upbeat)."
-
A Highly Effective Leadership Habit for Building Relationships - by Douglas R. Conant. Takeaway: Conant avoids expectation mismanagement based upon hoped-for mind reading and confusion by spending one hour "declaring himself" in a conversation. He covers what is important to him, what kind of leader he's trying to become, what he values in an organization, what he seeks in direct reports, how he believes the industry operates, his planning philosophy, his operating background and background, and his favorite quotes.
-
How to Listen - by Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman. Takeaway: Balance between being silent and asking questions that promote discovery and insight. Build the speaker’s self-esteem, make them feel supported. Challenge assumptions and disagree—but try to help, not win an argument. Make suggestions, but don’t just jump in and try to solve everyone’s problems. Clear away distractions (phone/laptop), focus attention on the speaker, make eye contact.
-
Kill The Elephants in The Room Before They Kill You. - by Scott Belsky. Takeaway: "A common mistake I observe in leaders of teams big and small is to aspire for peace as a default. You should be challenging peace as a default. Create an environment where people can withstand a fight and engage in friction as it arises. Rather than passively surf the whims of peoples’ hesitations to take action, bring the conflict to the surface[.]"
-
Learning to Embrace Conflict as a Part of Startup Culture - by Eric Paley. Takeaway: "Ego makes conflict painful because we try to avoid hurting others’ feelings, while protecting our own. But for many, winning the argument becomes more important than the company making the right decision. Therefore, when we engage conflict, we become emotional and want to win for ourselves, confusing this emotion with our desire to win collectively. While each of us struggles with this tension, the problem is exacerbated by the fact that everyone in the debate naturally is subjective on the superior value of their perspective. This tendency can often lead to anger, insecurity, and unnecessary emotion that makes conflict painful, relationship threatening and unproductive. Unfortunately, ego frightens many team members to shift into conflict avoidance."
-
Personal User Manual Template - by Yan-David Erlich. Takeaway: Modeled on Urs Hölzle's Personal User Manual, this template enables people to design their relationships by mapping out communication style particulars and pet peeves/preferences.
-
A Taxonomy of Troublemakers for Those Navigating Difficult Colleagues - by First Round. Takeaway: "a behavior often isn’t good or bad in and of itself — it’s the application of that behavior to a given context that’s good or bad...Research shows that, in about 70% of cases, difficult people will be shocked about how their behavior is being received and will simply self-correct. They didn’t know, and just stop." Includes eight archetypes: Narcissus, Bean Counter, Venus Flytrap, Swindler, Distracted, Robotic, Eccentric and Suspicious.
-
Team Leader Venn Diagram - by Lara Hogan. Takeaway: How to differentiate between product managers, engineering managers and engineering leads. This eliminates confusion and conflict down the road.
-
These 13 Exercises Will Prepare You for Work's Toughest Situations - by First Round. Takeaway: A profile of Maggie Leung, who uses the term “dynamic empathy” to describe "quickly gaining an understanding of how a colleague feels and figuring out how to act on it in a swiftly changing environment."
-
Three Ways to Cool the Conflict - by Daniel Goleman. Takeaway: Manage self by noticing feelings and reframing situationss, manage conversations by reflecting and pausing, and manage relationships.
-
Want to Be a Great Leader? Assume Positive Intent - by Jim Whitehurst. The Red Hat CEO explains a key lesson he's learned from watching open source communities work together: Assume positive intent. In this article, he explains how that lesson impacts the way he views leadership and organizational culture.
-
Why Is It So Hard to Listen - by Happy Melly. Takeaway: "Not only is listening a key factor in being an effective communicator and a strong leader, it’s also one of the basic necessities when it comes to enhancing our emotional intelligence and living in the moment — which ultimately contributes to our overall happiness at work and in life." Includes listening challenges to help you improve.
-
How to Communicate with People Who Disagree with You - by Michael Grothaus. Takeaway: Work backwards from a person’s known belief; opt for in-person communication if possible, because it’s easier for people to dehumanize you via text communication; and use video conferencing instead of email.
-
Overcome the 5 Dysfunctions of a Team : by The Mission. Takeaway: 1. It takes time to build trust in a team. 2. Never fear conflict, as "the only purpose of productive conflict is to produce the best solution in the shortest period of time." 3. Commitment is a function of two things: clarity and buy-in. Great teams move forward with complete buy-in, including members who voted against the decision. Therefore, leaders must be comfortable with the prospect of making a decision that turns out to be wrong. 4. Leaders must create a culture of accountability in/to the team by encouraging and allowing the team to serve as the first and primary accountability mechanism. 5. Leaders must set the tone for the team to focus on results. If the team members sense that the leader values anything other than results, they will take that as permission to do the same.
-
Power up Your Team with Nonviolent Communication Principles - by First Round. An enlightened interview with executive coaches Ann Mehl and Jerry Colonna, who teach major tech companies about nonviolent communication principles through emphasizing awareness, responsibility and empathy.
-
A Psychologist Studied 6,000 People for 40 Years and Found This 1 Super Effective Conflict Resolution Tactic - by Brenda Barbosa. Takeaway: Taking some cues from psychologist and couples researcher John Gottman, avoid conflict by lightening up; showing empathy; calming yourself down; and showing appreciation for the other person.
-
These 13 Exercises Will Prepare You for Work's Toughest Situations - by First Round Review. By identifying and understanding people's motivations you can take a difficult conversation and turn it into a dialog that is constructive. The initial goal is to find common ground, and by asking questions around motivations before tough situations, you can review your own feelings and be overall better prepared.
-
Why We Should Be Disagreeing More at Work - by Amy Gallo. Takeaway: "[M]ost people don’t want to disagree or know how to do it. In fact, we’ve come to equate saying “I see it differently” or “I don’t agree” with being angry, rude, or unkind, so it makes most people horribly uncomfortable...Disagreements are an inevitable, normal, and healthy part of relating to other people. There is no such thing as a conflict-free work environment. You might dream of working in a peaceful utopia, but it wouldn’t be good for your company, your work, or you. In fact, disagreements — when managed well — have lots of positive outcomes."