{"id":107,"date":"2016-02-08T13:49:05","date_gmt":"2016-02-08T18:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/?p=107"},"modified":"2018-02-15T13:49:41","modified_gmt":"2018-02-15T18:49:41","slug":"good-culture-is-high-quality-connections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/2016\/02\/08\/good-culture-is-high-quality-connections\/","title":{"rendered":"Good Culture is High-Quality Connections"},"content":{"rendered":"

For as critical to our happiness as workplace culture can be, I think it\u2019s a concept that\u2019s difficult to define.\u00a0When\u00a0the culture isn\u2019t\u00a0right, we know it, but it can be challenging to know\u00a0what\u00a0exactly<\/i>\u00a0isn\u2019t working or what would be better instead.\u00a0These two paragraphs from the recent HBR article, \u201cWe Learn More When We Learn Together<\/span><\/a>\u201d\u00a0by\u00a0Jane E. Dutton<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Emily Heaphy<\/span><\/a>, help to put some structure around the idea for me, and ring true as I consider the times in my career when I\u2019ve been happy at work, and times when I\u2019ve felt less than fulfilled.<\/p>\n

What are high-quality connections? They\u2019re\u00a0the connections with other people in which we feel positive regard, mutuality, and vitality. Positive regard is the sense that someone sees the best in us, even if we are only connected for a short time. Mutuality means we feel a sense of responsiveness and openness from another person. Finally, vitality captures the heightened sense of energy we feel when deeply connected to someone else \u2014 as if we are more alive in the moment.<\/p>\n

High-quality connections are what Barbara Fredrickson calls micro moments of love. Don\u2019t let the word \u201clove\u201d scare you. These moments of aliveness in connection with others create a sense of safety and enhanced capability that become a powerful platform for development. We grow in high-quality connections because our thinking is broadened, we absorb knowledge more quickly, our action repertoire is expanded, and we are more engaged, playful, open, and resilient in the face of setbacks. High-quality connections stand in stark contrast to low-quality connections, in which feelings of inadequacy, defensiveness, and lack of safety undercut growth possibilities.<\/p>\n

Lots of things matter in the making of a fulfilling\u00a0career, and different things to different people at different times in life. But I think, universally, it\u2019s the connections we have with others that matter most. It\u2019s not the money, or promotion, or the big office. It\u2019s not the flexible schedule or reasonable hours or sweet break room snacks. And yet, I think relationships are\u00a0the element in most working environments that we leave the most to chance. We try to hire the right people and build skillful teams, but we rarely work deliberately at fostering these high-quality connections, and we never talk about it overtly.<\/p>\n

From my perpetual seat\u00a0in the middle of the org chart, I\u2019ve seen a lot of missed opportunity from leaders. Organizational leadership doesn\u2019t determine the culture entirely, but I think the influence they\u00a0carry is worth real consideration\u2013for the tone they set, the style they model and the parameters they define. How are decisions made, for example? Whose voices matter? What information is shared openly, and what is kept to only the highest ranked? These are the elements of culture that reflect the values we hold about relationships.\u00a0Leaders who don\u2019t model that relationships matter set a a value chain in motion that is difficult for others to break.<\/p>\n

And yet chronically, we don\u2019t train our leaders with these skills and awareness. Instead, we promote people into leadership roles who were successful in their functional roles previously. We assume that, by some magical transition, these people will become leaders or figure it out as they go. I\u2019m not sold on the idea that leadership should be a trial-and-error endeavor by design. Can\u2019t we better prepare our leaders for success, for their own sake and the sake of their teams?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m curious about the deliberate steps we can take as individuals and organizations to build high-quality connections. I think it would be too easy to assume that these kinds of relationships come about only serendipitously, though I think that sometimes they do.\u00a0What personal attributes can I cultivate to make these connections more likely? What organizational dynamics help support cultures of connection? How can we lead from the middle by modeling the kind of leadership we want to see?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For as critical to our happiness as workplace culture can be, I think it\u2019s a concept that\u2019s difficult to define.\u00a0When\u00a0the culture isn\u2019t\u00a0right, we know it, but it can be challenging to know\u00a0what\u00a0exactly\u00a0isn\u2019t working or what would be better instead.\u00a0These two paragraphs from the recent HBR article, \u201cWe Learn More When We Learn Together\u201d\u00a0by\u00a0Jane E. Dutton\u00a0and\u00a0Emily Heaphy, help to put some structure around the idea for me, and ring true as I consider the times in my career when I\u2019ve been happy at work, and times when I\u2019ve felt less than fulfilled. What are high-quality connections? They\u2019re\u00a0the connections with other people in which we feel positive regard, mutuality, and vitality. Positive regard is the sense that someone sees the best in us, even if we are only connected for a short time. Mutuality means we feel a sense of responsiveness and openness from another person. Finally, vitality captures the heightened sense of energy we feel when deeply connected to someone else \u2014 as if we are more alive in the moment. High-quality connections are what Barbara Fredrickson calls micro moments of love. Don\u2019t let the word \u201clove\u201d scare you. These moments of aliveness in connection with others create a sense of safety and enhanced capability that become a powerful platform for development. We grow in high-quality connections because our thinking is broadened, we absorb knowledge more quickly, our action repertoire is expanded, and we are more engaged, playful, open, and resilient in the face of setbacks. High-quality connections stand in stark contrast to low-quality connections, in which feelings of inadequacy, defensiveness, and lack of safety undercut growth possibilities. Lots of things matter in the making of a fulfilling\u00a0career, and different things to different people at different times in life. But I think, universally, it\u2019s the connections we have with others that matter most. It\u2019s not the money, or promotion, or the big office. It\u2019s not the flexible schedule or reasonable hours or sweet break room snacks. And yet, I think relationships are\u00a0the element in most working environments that we leave the most to chance. We try to hire the right people and build skillful teams, but we rarely work deliberately at fostering these high-quality connections, and we never talk about it overtly. From my perpetual seat\u00a0in the middle of the org chart, I\u2019ve seen a lot of missed opportunity from leaders. Organizational leadership doesn\u2019t determine the culture entirely, but I think the influence they\u00a0carry is worth real consideration\u2013for the tone they set, the style they model and the parameters they define. How are decisions made, for example? Whose voices matter? What information is shared openly, and what is kept to only the highest ranked? These are the elements of culture that reflect the values we hold about relationships.\u00a0Leaders who don\u2019t model that relationships matter set a a value chain in motion that is difficult for others to break. And yet chronically, we don\u2019t train our leaders with these skills and awareness. Instead, we promote people into leadership roles who were successful in their functional roles previously. We assume that, by some magical transition, these people will become leaders or figure it out as they go. I\u2019m not sold on the idea that leadership should be a trial-and-error endeavor by design. Can\u2019t we better prepare our leaders for success, for their own sake and the sake of their teams? I\u2019m curious about the deliberate steps we can take as individuals and organizations to build high-quality connections. I think it would be too easy to assume that these kinds of relationships come about only serendipitously, though I think that sometimes they do.\u00a0What personal attributes can I cultivate to make these connections more likely? What organizational dynamics help support cultures of connection? How can we lead from the middle by modeling the kind of leadership we want to see?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108,"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107\/revisions\/108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elligoudzwaard.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}