#005: The hard thing about hard conversations with your boss
Crucial confrontations, remote onboarding, and what the company culture of the future looks like
Disclaimer: This edition was written by our community member, Varun Choraria.
Hi everybody,
I hope this week finds you well. With the first doses of the COVID-19 vaccines already on the way, most of the workforce is wondering how soon it might be before they’d have to fall in love with peak hour traffic and poor AQI again. Some organisations managed to go fully remote, while some are thinking hybrid. It was hence fair to spend sometime trying to understand the depths and nuances of this subject- so sit back, relax- and enjoy this edition on workplace culture.
Week in Review: Highlights of our community
As you’re aware by now, Ajay regularly has talks with community members and posts them on his YouTube Channel. This week’s conversation had Rahul Yadav going through his journey from engineering to marketing, and how that journey transformed his outlook on life, content consumption, and general habits.
In #job-board, Sandeep posted a role for an HR manager and Head of Marketing, so do reach out to him here: sandeep@securelayer7.net
Looking to supercharge your sales in 2021? In #book-shelf, Amit Kumar requested for some recommendations, and here were the responses:
Sell by Subroto Bagchi
Never Split the Difference Christopher Voss
Influence: The Power of Persuasion, Thinking Fast and Slow etc.
(Harsha G, thanks for responding with your recommendations!)
The (almost) biblical act of having water cooler conversations
Praful Tickoo posted on #general recently about a big challenge he thinks companies are increasingly going to face as remote becomes the norm. In his own words:
In the physical world, new joiners would learn a lot about company, its culture, etc. by just "bumping into" or observing people from distance. Most of this learning used to be inadvertent, or something that no training material would provide you with. While there are tools that help build "watercooler" connects, I don't think these interactions carry as much serendipitous information as the physical ones would.
What are your views on this?
Maybe it’s okay to also confront your boss?
Essentially, ‘to confront’ implies holding someone accountable, in most cases F2F. The term is often used negatively, but in reality it can open doors. the outcomes of any successful confrontations can be:
Problems are resolved
Relationships benefit
Let’s face it- confrontations, disagreements are bound to happen. But remote or not, they don’t necessarily have to be counter-productive.
Psychologist Gabriele Oettingen discovered purpose in a more constructive manner: envision the goal, envision the obstacles. This is actually called mental contrasting, and offers an interesting way to bring perspective into the most delicate situations, without really having to step on toes.
Spend the next 15 minutes reading the two part series here:
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