Common Courtesy Conducive to Collaboration

 

I have often wondered, over the last thirty or so years of my career, why it seems that crude confrontation seems to often trump courtesy within organizations.  I tend to agree with Emerson when he wrote, "There is always a best way of doing everything, if it be only to boil an egg.  Manners are the happy ways of doing things."

In organizations where effective collaboration is critical to project success, how well we interact with our peers, superiors, and subordinates is important—which is why I believe cordial communication is so important to project management success.

In May of 1940, Neville Chamberlain was removed as Great Britain's Prime Minister for failure to respond to the threat of war from Germany.  As the newly appointed Prime Minister, his first address before Parliament is where Winston Churchill famously said, "I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat."

However, my point in bringing up Winston Churchill is not to discuss his ability to rally England to repel a potential German invasion, but to acknowledge his graciousness and generosity of spirit to a former rival at his passing.  I believe it would have been easy to bash and otherwise castigate Chamberlain for his inaction, however Churchill realized that doing so would do nothing to advance the cause of freedom and would only tarnish the name of the former Prime Minister and cheapen his own. 

Instead, this is a snippet of what Churchill had to say at Chamberlain's funeral, "It fell to Neville Chamberlain in one of the supreme crises of the world to be contradicted by events, to be disappointed in his hopes, and to be deceived and cheated by a wicked man.  But what were these hopes in which he was disappointed? ... They were surely among the most noble and benevolent instincts of the human heart—the love of peace ... Whatever else history may or may not say about these terrible, tremendous years, we can be sure that Neville Chamberlain acted with perfect sincerity according to the lights and strove to the utmost of his capacity and authority ... to save the world from the awful, devastating struggle in which we are now engaged."

We work in an age of instant messaging, email, and other almost-instantaneous communication.  We should not let the immediacy of the medium allow us to become callous and casual in how we approach our co-workers, even when problems arise and mistakes are made.  Even in today's workplace, there is a place for common courtesy.

1. Take time to make communication thoughtful and cordial: When time-lines are truncated and project teams are asked to do more and more, take an extra few seconds when writing an email or other communique to consider that your communication is going to a person.  I like to begin every email with a salutation, which reminds me that I am writing to someone.  The extra two or three seconds it takes me to address the person I'm writing to doesn't negatively impact my productivity, but it does help me foster a productive and cordial working relationship.
2. Take time to be polite: Within the imperfect world of project-based work, sometimes difficult decisions take place—but that doesn't mean that we can throw civility out the window.  In the thirty plus years of my professional career I have watched what used to be considered common courtesy among superiors, subordinates, and coworkers become "quaint" and considered "unnecessary."  There is nothing wrong with considering the feelings of someone needing correcting, regardless of how stupid you think they are or how big a mistake you think they made.  Being polite and considerate of each other is the very least we should be able to expect from our "professional" colleagues.  Anything less is unproductive and immature.
3. Remove the criticism from "constructive" criticism: I was taught early in my career, by friends and colleagues much wiser than myself, that "criticism" was never "constructive."  I don't think I have every worked with a project team that agreed all the time.  Project management involves a lot of creative problem solving, which means that it is seldom done right the first time.  Fostering a creative environment where team members are creatively solving problems and pushing for excellence requires collaboration, not criticism.  Where disagreements arise or a course change is required, "I don't like this," should be followed by, "Here's why, and here's a suggestion as to how you might proceed."

Effective communication doesn't rely on tricks or gimmicks.  In my opinion, it's important to remember that effective communication is personal.  It doesn't matter if it's face-to-face, via email, or even in a blog, it's one person interacting with another.  Project management tools can help facilitate communication and collaboration, but the type of communication is up to you.

American author and playwright Jean Kerr said, "Man is the only animal that learns by being hypocritical.  He pretends to be polite and then, eventually, he becomes polite."

What are you doing in your organization to encourage considerate and courteous interaction among your colleagues?