Breakthrough

I have recently talked about business and some of the things that have been going on at ours.  I mentioned a difficult team member.  We were finally able to meet with him yesterday and it went extremely well.

I won't go in to details but the meeting was significant for a number of reasons.  First, I acted outside of my comfort zone and was very direct with the problems that I had.  This is not how I am and it is very difficult for me to be direct or confrontational.  I am the type that would rather avoid confrontation and let a problem get worse rather than tackle it head on.  In fact, I used to just stop talking to my girlfriends or become very rude to them rather than just breaking up with them.  It was my way of avoiding confrontation and making them eventually deal with the problem.  I am happy to see growth in this area within myself.

Second, our team member really opened up and we had a significant breakthrough working with him.  It's not easy to build real trust in people and especially in a work environment.  We have to be careful about what we are involved with but sometimes we need to be there for people.  We were able to talk through the problems we had at work and understand more about the team members personal situation.  You never know what a person has going on unless they allow you to know.  I have always been a very private person and never really put my emotional struggles on to anyone else, so I could relate to this person trying to handle everything on his own.

Another difficult meeting was accomplished and the result was positive.  It is exciting to see growth and development.  Just like other situations, you often get out what you put in.  Well we needed to put a little more into this team member so that we could get a little more out.  And that is exactly what happened.