Relating In The Workplace - Part 1

As a college graduate who immediately started my professional career two weeks after graduation, adjusting to interacting with only people my age and professors to working with people in a spectrum of age groups was a new and untold challenge for me. University prepared me to give presentations and work in groups that I haven’t chosen, and those groups were diverse concerning individuals cultural background, not age.

My first day I spoke with my boss, a woman in her mid-forties, with five kids, the financial supplier for her family, and a global lead of financial transactions at the company we worked at. All of my team members were Indian men in their mid-thirties or American women in their mid-forties. I share their nationalities because it’s an important detail in terms of how to communicate with these individuals.

I quickly realized that there was a huge communication and general understanding gap between me and all of them. The way I spoke and presented my ideas and understanding of concepts rarely made sense to my team members, even though I typically understood what they would share with me. My playback wasn’t working for them, which I could tell, caused frustration for them which caused me to be more defensive because no one understood me!

I thought that asking questions, such as “why do we do X happen when someone does Y?” would help clear up some of the misunderstandings but that actually lead to even worse interactions. Why? Well I think as a young person asking “Why?” to an adult with many years of experience, they found it threatening. They received my questioning as “Why would you do it like this, are you an idiot?” which is the exact opposite of what I was trying to do. I am curious and want to understand things.

Sometimes “Why?” is perceived as threatening because the person I asked it to didn’t know the answer and this lack of not knowing something immediately put them on the defensive. People hate to not know things, and when there is someone they don’t know that well but are supposed to be the figurative “source of knowledge” for them, that threat gets exacerbated. In college whenever I would ask “Why?” it was always received with open arms, either the professor knew or would conduct research, or state that I should conduct research, to answer my own question.

Now, I’m not saying don't ask “Why?” since it is the most important question you can ask if you are truly curious and want/need to understand something. This blog topic is a series that will show you how to get answers to your “Why?” questions without coming off as threatening if you ever find yourself in the environment I was in (I guarantee that you will at some point if you haven’t already!).

Knowing how I’m communicating isn’t working for anyone on the team, I changed up my approach. Rather than giving verbal or written playback, I would create visual diagrams showing my understanding. This not only worked amazingly, but it became the new standard for me to show a visual with my verbal playback. Everyone loves pictures, regardless of age. More on this and more in the next post on this topic!