Hold guard against grudges.

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    I am writing this post to quote from my own experiences the views I expressed in my previous post. Just like smoke or fog affects your visibility, any grudge will affect your thinking. I will not use the words such as hatred or prejudice because I believe no one deserves it.

In a workplace, you may have come across someone who tried to block your entry at the time of the interview itself or tried to throw you out soon after you joined the company. Understand that it is just a part of the survival game. Guard and defend yourself but be empathetic to the other persons' point of view.

In one of my experiences, someone vehemently opposed my entry into the company, and they still hired me. That, someone, was required to train me on the project and do knowledge transfer after my joining. The gentleman worked for the company for about ten years. He had reached a career plateau and suspected the possibility of being asked to leave. I had to work closely with him to get knowledge transfer for the project.

It is easy to reason with the reaction. It is a conflict arising out of insecurity and not because of any ill will. It is no surprise if I say that I faced escalations and complaints. Sometimes it is better not to react even when we feel provoked, and this is when we need to try our best to give the benefit of the doubt to the other person.

He was involved with several projects at different times and managed to impress most of the time. The company recognizes it. Almost every one of us certainly will slow down at some point. The career will need a reboot which might not happen without facing new challenges. We may develop complacency being too familiar with projects and people. Finally, we can grow clueless about how to make things better. A change can be in everyone's interest at this point, and still, it could be hard to embrace change willingly as this brings uncertainty. Change is difficult for everyone. Our insecurities do not easily let us embrace the change.

I can't say we did not have a difficult start. At one point, the gentleman wrote a big escalation mail with some trivial complaints. It took a couple of months for us to settle down, and we finally arrived at some common ground and completed our knowledge transfer and training. He finally found another job. I was genuinely happy for him. We greeted each other warmly while parting.

Title image source - the internet

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The ability to learn is the key to survival. We can learn faster by learning from each other.

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