Michael Jordan's Weblog

In the past couple days I've been involved in a couple of emotional situations that really centered around roles and responsibilities.

In the best of circumstances, assigning a task to one person when it is part of someone else's job can waste time. But I'm convinced that if you add to the mix even slight insecurities about a person's value-add to their workteam, that person's angst is magnified if/when they perceive someone else tromping on their responsibilities.

In one situation, I've been developing an employee in my group to expand her expertise into the area of change management. After trying out new skills and tools with another part of our organization for a few months, her work finally bumped into that of a guy who is more formally responsible for change management support. His initial reaction was emotional about being out of the loop.

Later the same day, a peer of mine sent out an action item that is part of my job. And in a moment of insecurity I have to admit to wondering if she was trying to elbow me out of the way. In reality, I have a high level of trust with this person and we clarified to each other who should do what (turns out she had some requirements about which I wasn't aware).

In the end, both situations actually brought us all to a new level of collaboration! The key was listening to each other and respecting each other's concerns. Everyone works so hard that it's not always easy to pause and clarify roles.

But it makes life so much easier!