Overwhelming Good

This week has definitely been an enlightening one for learning about how I can interact with people more effectively. On three occasions, I learned how expectations (of which I was previously unaware) could drastically influence how people view and communicate with me.

The first two occasions dealt with Probity and the Code Academy. Last week, I had selfishly suggested that our pilot test for the Code Academy be held during evenings so that I might still be able to participate while attending law school this fall. Although I later realized (with Neal’s helpful nudging in the right direction) that I was acting out of self-interest rather than considering what was best for the program. So, when a few days later, I had a couple of suggestions to make about improving Code Academy, I realized I approached them in the exact same way that I had been approaching my argument to have our courses take place during the evenings… Even though my track record says otherwise, the combination of facts that I had recently been found guilty of putting my personal desires ahead of the program needs and that I was approaching the issue with an I-know-what’s-best-we-should-do-this-immediately attitude made me come across completely selfish. My inconsistency in motives led to a mistaken notion of what to expect from me, which ended up damaging my ability to suggest new ideas.

After being repeated twice with Probity, I managed to have a much more positive (and reinforcing!) experience with expectations later this week. I was leading my last [*sniff*] SafeRide-wide quarterly meeting, and although I was running about 5 minutes late to the meeting, I made sure to open the meeting by committing to getting everyone out of the meeting within 50 minutes (SafeRide meetings have had a history of dragging on at times). I made sure to prepare the complete agenda early, and made sure to clearly drive the meeting towards its stated goals quickly, clearly, and efficiently. When we finished at 45 minutes, as people left the meeting, no fewer than four people came up to me and mentioned something along the lines of, “Wow, this was one of the best (and most efficient) SafeRide meetings yet.” (Figures that I’d just start to get good at it at the end.) I think I can attribute the positive response not only to preparedness and speed, but also to clearly announcing a high expectation, and subsequently exceeding it.

In other words, what I learned this week: By failing to be consistent, I lower expectations and thus weaken my ability to effect positive change; by setting fair expectations and meeting (or exceeding!) them, I strengthen my position and bolster the positive responses I receive from people.