Response to "Five Habits That Could Get You Fired"

James Caan's recent blog post Five Habits That Could Get You Fired! popped up in my LinkedIn feed and after talking about it on Facebook I decided to share my thoughts with my professional network.

I'm going to respond to each of James' five habits separately.

Lack of manners

I absolutely agree that basic etiquette should be followed in the workplace as it should in any context according to the relevant social norms from school to home to the dog park and shops.

I have never heard of anyone being fired for failing to say "please" and in my experience I've not worked with anyone where basic manners – such as saying "please" and "thanks" as James mentions – have been a problem. I've worked in some teams where people didn't bother with such niceties but you knew it was implied. I've even worked in teams where there has been extraordinary use of swear words and banter, and that was totally acceptable in that context.

What I think was a missed opportunity with James' post and his discussion on manners was an exploration of actual respect and appreciation. Saying the words is one thing, but it's quite a different matter to go to the next level of mutual respect and appropriate, authentic appreciation.

Saying "thanks" after every request is just polite, but sitting down with someone after three weeks of intense, challenging and productive work and properly thank them for their hard work is what really counts.

Over-promising and under-delivering

James says:

So many people offer false promises thinking that they will find a way to fulfil them – don’t be so na?ve

I'm all for honesty, but from a pragmatic perspective in business over-promising is just the way things are done. I think it's na?ve of James to implore people to not make promises they're not confident they can fulfill. Continually rejecting requests because they're not feasible ... that will get you fired. You are expected to aim high, to go outside your comfort zone, to push the boundaries.

That said, I do not endorse lying or deceiving clients. But over-promising is expected and I don't believe it's a habit that will get you fired.

Lack of poker face

Now this one is what really set me off. I don't mean to attack James' character, but as someone who describes themselves as an investor in "people with passion" I find his advice here to be contradictory. He asks:

Relationships at work are all about communication and if you’re not able to communicate effectively with your team, your clients or your managers then how do you expect to do your job successfully?

James is right, and in my previous blog post Time to touch base with your boss? I explored the importance of subordinate-initiated engagement to nourish and maintain that relationship.

However what I disagree with – and this is where the "investor in people with passion" bit comes in – is that people must have a poker face in order to communicate effectively.

The importance of non-verbal communication is well known. We've already talked about authenticity, honest and disclosure. So it seems contradictory to call for people to don a "poker face" and suppress their emotions and indeed their passion in order to communicate effectively or to use James' words to make people feel comfortable.

In Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High the authors talk about safety; recognising when participants feel unsafe and focusing on bringing people back into safety before continuing conversations and coming to a mutual purpose.

Having a "poker face" is not going to guarantee safety. What it implies is an unauthentic and dispassionate exchange of words.

To be fair to James he does specifically focus on conveying emotions including "I don't care" and "I don't like you". In those cases it's polite to put aside your feelings about a person's character but apart from that you should feel free to express yourself authentically with your full range of non-verbal communication.

If I see someone with a "poker face" I'll probably perceive that as them not caring or being authentic. Those are things you'll get fired for.

Anti-social behaviour

I'm sure James has a deeper understanding of organisational culture than he demonstrates in his blog post, but it saddens me that culture is equated here with social events and activities:

not making an effort to get involved with social events at work is an absolute no-no. Company culture is one of the most important components of every business

A company can have a positive and resilient organisational culture without there being any social events, and vice versa a company can cram their social calendar without people really gelling (but they'll take that free beer on a Friday afternoon).

Organisational culture underlies every aspect of how people in the organisation work together; how they talk, how they collaborate, the respect they have for each other, shared values, goals, sense of joint ownership and responsibility, passion and much more.

People can be fully immersed in that culture and an integral team member without participating in social events. No one should be fired for not playing laser tag with their work colleagues on a Sunday.

Being a glass half empty kind of person

I agree with some of James' points in this section but there's also so many related issues I want to touch on.

There is a place for pessimists in organisations - or at least someone who takes on the role and mindset of "can't do" to pick holes in plans and help predict what will happen if all the lights aren't green.

I would always prefer people raise problems sooner rather than later or wait until they've got ideas before bringing it to the team. People shouldn't be put down because they've identified a problem but haven't yet got any ideas of how to solve it. Especially in a fast-paced Agile environment there's no time to be keeping problems to yourself. If you see something, say something.

I also disagree that negativity is necessarily a character flaw. I'm not going to explore the issue of depression and mental illness here except to say that I'm currently reading an interesting book on the topic Tackling Depression at Work: A Practical Guide for Employees and Managers. But to get back to the matter of organisational culture it's often the context that shapes people's attitudes and emotions. It's not necessarily an intrinsic quality.

People rarely want to be negative, but if the organisation does not help them succeed, if it does not make them feel like a valued team member, if they have little control over their direction and contribution, their work environment and processes and their values and ethics don't align with that of the company then I can't blame them for dropping into a state of negativity and despondency.

I just want to finish off by suggesting a few books on the subject of organisational culture, context and situation, and how people cannot be reasonably evaluated as individuals in isolation from their environment:

• Situations Matter: Understanding How Context Transforms Your World
• The Field Guide to Understanding Human Error
• The Way We're Working Isn't Working: The Four Forgotten Needs That Energize Great Performance
• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
• Why Motivating People Doesn't Work . . . and What Does: The New Science of Leading, Energizing, and Engaging
• Passion Capital: The World's Most Valuable Asset

In summary, I don't completely disagree with the points James Caan raises in his article Five Habits That Could Get You Fired! and I have to point out that my objections and alternatives are relevant to my experiences in the professional and creative services industry.

I know some other industries have on average a less mature model for human resource management and a lower priority on positive, resilience work culture, expecting minimum-wage unskilled employees to just suck it up ... so in those contexts my points probably aren't as relevant.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on these points about etiquette vs authentic and deep mutual respect and gratitude, not over-promising vs doing what it takes to win new clients, authentic and impassioned communication vs the "poker face" and the discussion on organisational culture and situation.

Photo by Flickr user Brian Teutsch, licensed under CC BY