The Uncommon Sense - Common Sense

Ever been asked, 'Don't you have any common sense?' Well, you're in for an interesting read!"

Key Learnings from this Article

·???????? The Importance of Common Sense in Work

·???????? The Role of Gender and Challenges in Common Sense

·???????? Building a Culture of Common Sense

First Line of Engagement

As humans engage in work-related duties, they are bound by a code of conduct that applies common sense as the first line of engagement. To channel common sense to ensure the best possible outcomes can involve a sharp learning curve to master this instinctive factor and life skill.

Common sense in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is defined as “sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts”. The sound and prudent judgment requires us to be a tad like Artificial Intelligence, apply learning through experience to ensure that the best outcomes materialize. That doesn’t mean learning from scratch is omitted. Simple perception means that it is not a profound sense of intelligence and intellect that goes into common sense only that it is an educated gut feeling that this is the best solution as to go ahead, or avoid. For example, you have a cup of tea when it is still fresh and warm, but you don’t drink ice cold beverages with sensitive teeth or after a trip to the dentist. Both practices are examples of common sense.

Basically common sense is using a helping of conventional wisdom. So as a rule of thumb, common sense goes beyond pure guesswork since it is a trained reflex that supports thought-work, acting as a bridge between perception and judgment.

A Collaborative Work Etiquette

Let’s take for example a key task in any office “how to write an email to a colleague”. The etiquette tells you to start with a greeting that is at an elbow’s length but still warm and cordial (Hello, Dear or Hi), a simple query on his/her work life, and then the business end of a communication, how to best tally the words to give the reader the best understanding of the topic in the economy of words. That is common sense that goes into writing a work email.

In addition, a commonplace greeting such as “Good Morning” can also be a builder of relationships in the corridors, but it is also common sense as a wider public relations exercise – news does travel fast. Basically, a timely greeting – the timing - too requires an infusion of “common sense”. Etiquette and common sense are a match made in heaven. Etiquette is required to furnish a sense of due practices to an event that can be subjective (perceived differently by human senses and based on personal tastes) but is a point of convergence; in other words common sense is largely an objective reasoning to a timely query, and even in simpler words, it is proving that your judgment is accurate to popular wisdom.

Shortcomings that go a long way

So why do we forget to practice “Common Sense” in the workplace? It is because humans can be too human in making a mess out of simple applications of intellect and practice. We forget that the “first come solution” to instant brainstorming is most likely to be the best answer to the question at hand. Instinct is a powerful weapon, since it is an intrinsic decision making process, overlapping with common sense.

Our failure to use common sense is due to our existing workloads, multiple work stresses, pressure, hurrying up, wishing to belong into a work place, ease and many more unqualified factors. Sometimes, shortcomings in common sense provide a secondary and often imprudent solution to an important task, or in simple terms, being fallible in weighing out one’s options.

Not always right but rarely wrong

Common sense still can be wrong on occasion, like when you would stake a claim to be popular – herd behavior -, sacrificing sensible options. In this day and age, a presentation or an article can go viral with the press of a button, and to get our common sense right can be a survival instinct and a catalyst for self-preservation. Basically common sense should be our DNA, a nuclear foundation for work life.?

Gender is a vital factor, as women are known to be reservoirs of common sense, perhaps due to maternal ways, intuition, protective instinct, empathy, compassion, tolerance and perhaps due to the dearth of testosterone. To expand, intuition is a higher faculty, common sense is a form of wisdom, and instinct is an inborn trait (unlearned) shared by all members of a species – us humans.

To “get it right in the first attempt” is important now, since public relations exercises are no longer tailor-made answers in front of a recording camera, only real-time gaffes that can hurt you – or even triumph - in the long run. The good news is common sense has a low error rate, and so most of us are unguarded in our verbal flows. Still, it is better to listen first and then speak; and that in itself is a cardinal practice of modern life.

Thinking outside the Box: The Uncommon Sense

Thinking outside the box or not seeing a box can be stewardship of a rare form of “lateral thinking” that can be useful in the chemistry between the first line of perception and a winning brainwave. Does uncommon sense not work? Archimedes, Einstein and Elon Musk would disagree. That is the challenge of common sense – it makes us conform to traditional thinking. Of note, Albert Einstein went from a patent clerk to being a Nobel laureate - while also being named as the Time magazine’s man of the century due to his original theories in physics.

Setting a Culture of Common Sense

When stocked with common sense we become walking smarty-pants in our shirts & trousers and pencil skirts & blouses – our office attire. Street smartness is not made in a day, only a lifetime. So let’s do everything in our power to bolster our common sense IQs by quiet reasoning, so that we are better armed for tomorrow’s challenges.

Building a culture of common sense in our own Menlo Parks (offices) is a must. Common sense is a great builder – also a strong leveler - of street smart relationships at the workplace. So let us capitalize on common sense, to infect each other with reliability. Moving away from complacency to a commonwealth of hearts practicing the feeling gut, shows our readymade will to unearth optimal outcomes, those ever-present and fashionable serendipities.

Off the air conditioner leaving the office, lend an ear to your co-workers, Listerine your gums after lunch, segregate the many types of waste, use Grammarly, are all about employing common sense in the office. Common sense helps us avoid potholes in the fast lane.

Lessons learned are tact, sound reasoning and sensibility go a long way to determine the best outcomes in the face of soft conflict. Common sense when deliberated and unhurried is a powerful weapon to a cooperative, team-first and productive work culture.