There are no winners and losers in the blame game. There are only losers. People who invest in blaming others cannot learn from mistakes. Blaming leads to win-lose thinking, defensiveness, wasted energy, increased the animosity between departments, all the while, no one learns from the situation, nor do they figure out how to prevent it from happening again.
Welcome to the eleventh episode of By Your Life. Thank you for joining me. If you haven’t already, please subscribe at the bottom of the page so I can send you notifications when each new episode is posted.
My goal is to inspire, empower, support, challenge, and encourage you to connect Sunday, with Monday-Friday, in a secular, business world. It is my desire to help you live our Catholic faith in the marketplace, and to trust that it is good for business. I hope to offer you practical ways to go forth and glorify the Lord by your life.
In this edition, we will reflect on the readings for the Tenth Sunday of Ordinary Time.
Look for solutions instead of making excuses
The first reading from the Book of Genesis has always fascinated me. Adam blames Eve, but first, he blames God for putting Eve in the garden. Eve blames the serpent. This story so aptly captures our human nature. We are just like our first parents. We get defensive and make excuses for ourselves. We blame others, so we can feel better about ourselves. We see this in the workplace all the time.
I can’t tell you how often I am working one-on-one with someone and they spend most of the time directing our conversation to what other people do wrong and how others are to blame for their issues. A lot of the time these people are not wrong in their assessment of the other person’s faults and failings. The problem is that when they focus on blaming the other person, they are not able to recognize how they contributed to the problem (or failed to contribute to the solution).
Recently, a client told me a story about a situation where their customer received the wrong product. The customer service rep was upset because the warehouse employee received the box from the manufacturer, saw that it was intended for a specific customer, and passed it along for delivery without checking the contents for accuracy. The warehouse employee didn’t think there was a need to open and repack the box because it was marked for a specific customer and doing so would have delayed delivery to the customer. The customer service rep blamed the warehouse guy for the problem. The warehouse guy blamed the customer service rep.
Neither employee took the time to find out why the product was wrong. Did the customer service rep make a mistake and order the wrong item? Did the manufacturer make a mistake and ship the wrong item? Did the customer make a mistake when they placed the order? Instead, both employees got defensive, wasted energy blaming each other, increased the animosity between the two departments, all the while, no one learned from the situation, nor did they figure out how to prevent it from happening again.
There are no winners and losers in the blame game. There are only losers.
There are no winners and losers in the blame game. There are only losers.I have to give Adam and Eve credit. In spite of playing the blame game, they didn’t lie about their actions. Ultimately, they owned up to eating the forbidden fruit. But then again, they were confessing to the All-knowing Almighty. There were consequences for their offenses. There always are. But, not everyone learns from their failures. People who invest in blaming others cannot learn from mistakes.
Not everyone learns from their failures. People who invest in blaming others cannot learn from mistakes.Breaking down barriers
This example from my client is just one of many where the blame game creates or increases hostility between departments. Their customer didn’t really care which department was responsible. They blamed the company. I frequently find myself reminding my clients that the competition is outside the walls of their building, so stop should pointing their arrows at each other.
In the Gospel reading, Jesus said, “if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.” The same is true of companies. Conflict between departments is natural, but the conflict should be constructive, not destructive. Different functional groups will naturally have a perspective that favors the needs of their department. Sales wants flexibility on pricing and delivery. Operations wants to follow processes to assure quality. Finance wants the highest price and lowest cost. They are all right to want these things and everyone wins when they work together to meet the needs of the customer and the company. This is a win-win perspective, not an “I win and I don’t care about you” way of thought.
This win-win perspective is highlighted at the end of the Gospel. Jesus is told that his mother and his brothers were asking for him. He said to them in reply, “Who are my mother and [my] brothers?”And looking around at those seated in the circle he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers.”
I used to think that Jesus was being disrespectful to his mother. But knowing that isn’t possible for God to violate his own commandment and dishonor his mother, I had to rethink what He telling me – telling us. Jesus has an abundance perspective. There is plenty of him to go around for everyone. By including those seated in the circle in his love, he wasn’t excluding his mother and brothers, rather he was extending his love for his human family to all of humanity.
Think win-win
How would your relationships benefit from an abundance mentality? Where can shifting from “either/or” thinking to “yes/and” approaches benefit you and your workplace? Who do you find yourself in conflict with most often and how can looking at things from their perspective help create a win-win?
A house divided against itself will not be able to stand. What can you do this week to take down the walls that are dividing your work groups?
A company divided against itself will not be able to stand.Let us invoke the Holy Spirit to help us be abundance-thinkers so we can break down walls and find win-win solutions.
May God bless you abundantly, so you may go forth and glorify the Lord by your life. Amen
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Many thanks to Fr. Stan Fortuna for his musical gifts, especially the traditional and contemporary versions of Come Holy Ghost (Come Holy Spirit) that you hear in this podcast. You can find more from Fr. Stan at http://www.francescoproductions.com/ or on Facebo21ok.
