The elevator doors opened, and Evan found himself face to face with the elevator's eight occupants, all staring straight ahead. Nobody moved. Calculating that there was enough room for him to board, Evan stepped forward, slightly jostling the tall woman directly in front of him "Excuse me," he said.
The elevator doors closed behind him, and as the elevator began to move upward, Evan scrunched his shoulders, pulled his elbows tightly into his sides, and carefully rotated himself in place to face the doors. He inevitably brushed against the tall woman again, who responded by shifting about two inches to the southwest, which movement rippled across the other four southwestern occupants of the elevator.
Evan had claimed his space.
So goes the ritual of elevator boarding. It varies from culture to culture, but that's how it's done in the U.S. It's a fairly unfriendly, mildly competitive, and ironically isolating process.
Imagine a similar scene in a parallel universe. The elevator doors open, Evan notices that the elevator is almost full, and says, "Room for one more?" The tall woman responds, "Sure, c'mon aboard." The passengers in the southwest corner of the cab move over to make room and one says, "Yeah, c'mon in. Now we have enough for volleyball!"
Life can be so different — so much more fun — and we can make it happen. Here are some of the everyday rituals we can change.
- Two groups pass each other in a narrow hallway
- One or both will form single file to make space for the other to pass without stopping. Rarely do we stop, stand aside with a smile, and generously let the other pass.
- Pouring coffee at the coffee station
- Life can be so different —
so much more fun —
and we can make it happen - Someone approaches as you're in mid pour. Do you finish pouring, and then set down the pot? Or do you interrupt your cup and offer to pour theirs?
- Entering the office or cube of another
- If the occupant is looking at the computer, or otherwise unaware of your approach, do you knock on the doorjamb? Clear your throat? Say hello? Or do you ask for directions to the Emerald City?
- Someone enters your office unexpectedly
- Do you stand? Say hello? Smile? Offer the visitor a seat? What if you've never met? Do you ask, "Am I in the right office?"
- Someone drops a book, some papers, their badge, etc.
- Do you do nothing? Do you pick up the items? Do you just point them out? Or do you make a self-effacing remark: "Hey, I thought today it was my turn to drop stuff…"
Our days are tense, but keeping them that way takes work and creativity. With about the same amount of work and creativity, we can break the tension and make Life a lot more fun. Top Next Issue
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Related articles
More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:
- Own Your Space
- Since we spend so much of our waking lives in our offices, it's surprising how few of us take control
of our immediate surroundings. If you do — if you make your space uniquely yours — you'll
feel better about the time you spend at work.
- Some Hidden Costs of Business Fads
- Adopting business fads is an expensive organizational pattern, with costs that extend beyond what can
be measured by the chart of accounts most organizations use. Here are some examples of the hidden costs
of business fads.
- How to Get Out of Firefighting Mode: II
- We know we're in firefighting mode when a new urgent problem disrupts our work on another urgent problem,
and the new problem makes it impossible to use the solution we thought we had for some third problem
we were also working on. Here's Part II of a set of suggestions for getting out of firefighting mode.
- Workplace Memes
- Some patterns of workplace society reduce organizational effectiveness in ways that often escape our
notice. Here are four examples.
- Disjoint Awareness: Bias
- Some cognitive biases can cause people in collaborations to have inaccurate understandings of what each
other is doing. Confirmation bias and self-serving bias are two examples of cognitive biases that can
contribute to disjoint awareness in some situations.
See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness and Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness for more related articles.
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- And on September 11: Beating the Layoffs: II
- If you work in an organization likely to conduct layoffs soon, keep in mind that exiting voluntarily can carry advantages. Here are some advantages that relate to collegial relationships, future interviews, health, and severance packages. Available here and by RSS on September 11.
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