Office Rage

by Syd Stewart

Published on this site: February 10th, 2004

In the last five to ten years, the phenomenon of road-rage has been increasing, now we learn that office-rage is on the increase too. What is going on? What has changed? How would you react and deal with office rage?

Today, customers are more demanding. Competition is fiercer. Deadlines are tighter. Workload is increasing. There is less time to accommodate less capable or less committed staff. These increased pressure and demands, have possibly made people become less tolerant of one another, and so office-rage is on the increase.

A 'Smiling Manager' or 'Genetic Manager' is one who tries to apply the principles of genetics and evolution to lead their businesses. This incredibly simple principle of natural selection or ‘survival of the fittest’, now confirmed by the science of genetics, has created powerful, elegant, awe inspiring organisms that have remained resilient and successful for millions of years. The process of evolution, which has constantly adapted to the ever-changing environment, is also a very slow one, cumulatively building, in small steps, only on what has succeeded before.

Your genes determine your traits or features and capabilities. In business, genes can be thought of as you procedures, knowledge and experience as well as the traits and capabilities of you and your staff.

So, what would the Smiling Manager do about office-rage? If you were a Smiling Manager here are a few key things you might do.

First, you would understand your own personal genes, and that of your staff. Personality differences could lead to conflict when work pressures increase. Personalities can readily be understood by doing simple, quick computer based personality tests. Your good intuition about people can sometimes be fooled or misled. These objective tests, which should indicate their reliability, the will reveal the suitability of staff for certain jobs, how you and staff work under pressure, and whether staff will make good team workers or managers. You would then build and blend individuals so that everyone is working to their strengths with minimum tension.

Secondly, people’s traits and capabilities are not only derived from their genes, but how these genes are nourished. You never put your staff in a position where their current capability does not match the demands placed on them. You establish systems for good recruitment, good training, simple workable procedures, and top class supervision. You tell your staff what is expected of them. This stops your staff, making mistakes, becoming frustrated and so avoiding rage.

Thirdly, businesses today are encouraged by some management gurus to be highly innovative and risk taking. They tackle bigger projects and adopt fast quick fix solutions. All this creates a tension within the organisation and is a possible pre-cursor to office-rage. You on the other-hand, also want to be innovative and risk taking, but you minimise this source of tension, by using your cunning to follow the evolutionary principle of taking many small cumulative steps, building on success, one small step at a time, rather than taking few large ambitious steps. You also learn from small mistakes and make appropriate small corrective actions.

Lastly, as a Smiling Manager you make the most of your genes by involving everyone openly in your business to address the current problems and future directions. This again helps pre-empt tensions and so minimise the possibility of office rage.

Syd Stewart is the author of "Smiling Owner How to Build a Great Small Business An Evolutionary Business E-Handbook". He has been an owner and manager for over 30 years. He Knows What Works and What Doesn't. Visit his site to find out how you can 'Build a Great Small Business' at http://www.smilingowner.com.