Articles

Right Here Right Now
by Dr. Lynne Curry

Question:
Our whole office stopped work the morning of September 11^th when we learned planes had crashed into the World Trade Center and Pentagon. I felt bad because I was supposed to oversee the office as our supervisor was out of town and I didn’t think he would like us to take too much time away from work. After everyone talked for about 45 minutes and no one had much more to say, I said, "We need to get back to work" and got attacked. An employee who always has something negative to say said "That’s crap. This is more important, going back to work is b.s."

I didn’t know what to say. A couple of employees left silently to go back to their desks and I told the rest, "Stay if you need to, I’m heading back to work." What should I have said?

Answer:
The September 11^th events changed all of our lives forever. Once we saw the telecast or heard the news, every one of us needed time to let what happened sink in. How could any one of us go back to work when the world as we knew it changed?

In some organizations, employees talked for a few minutes and then headed to their desks. In others, employees gathered around a cable television or discussed news as it came over the radio or Internet. Some companies, fearing the worst, evacuated their employees. Others organized their employees to donate blood or pool money to help stranded airport passengers.

Like you, many supervisors and employees wondered "what to do?" The answer seems to be – let’s find a way to make good come out of bad. We can’t expect to go on as usual because that would deny the reality of what happened. Nor can we, unless we directly lost someone in this tragedy, sink to the level of "let’s just get through it."We need to do more, to rise to the challenge presented us as a country.

First, we need to eliminate the we/they in our organizations and we need our supervisors to act as leaders. If we’re to fight terrorism, we can’t waste time fighting each other. Thus, when your employee attacked you, you needed to build a bridge to him and not retreat. Hard as it might have been, if you’d asked him, "how much time do you think you need?" you’d have started the dialogue.

Chances are your angry employee might have said, "As long as it takes." Then you could have said, "That may be years. I’ll give you and everyone else who wants to stay tuned to the news or who needs more time to discuss this the chance to do this for as long as you need this morning. Those of you who, like me, want to go back to work can. I’m going to suggest we gather again as a group at 4:30 and then all go home early."

By questioning your employee and taking his statement, however harsh, into account when giving your final answer, you’d have led rather than managed. That’s what our country and our organizations need now – managers who act as leaders helping us collectively decide how to act better than we ever have before. Managers can’t pretend this horror doesn’t affect employees and their work lives. September 11^th wasn’t the day to concentrate on work; it was the day to concentrate on people.

On a practical level, we need to address what terrorism means to our companies and ourselves. From every angle imaginable, we have seen the images of a smoldering Pentagon and the planes striking the World Trade center. Since the 11^th, we’ve ridden together on an emotional roller coaster.

We need to decide to face what happened and go beyond work as usual to life as unusual. When thousands of innocent people die in an instant, petty squabbles dim in importance and self-righteousness becomes ridiculous. Can we learn to treat everyone with respect and to deal with conflict in a healthy, clean way so that everyone emerges a winner? By doing so, we say that the deaths we witnessed reminded us we need to live with honor.

Employees need the chance to discuss the September 11^th events and their aftermath at work as well as at home. Through discussion, we build our sense of unity and begin to make sense of what we can do now to move past the horror. Discussion doesn’t require that everyone agree on what should be done, but that everyone feel heard and respected. When, and only when, we address what September 11th means to us individually and collectively can we move beyond it.