Cathy's blog

If you were the CEO of your life - who would you fire?

I'm sure you have a list.

We all have to deal with people we like less. Especially in business. 

You can't choose & select every single person that you work with on likeability.

But you still have to work with them.

In a previous life, I had to work with a boss that I didn't like. No matter what we did, we'd rub each other the wrong way. I even started planning my day in such a way that we would have as little contact as possible.

But after a while, I realized just how much energy I was putting in avoiding the relationship. And asked myself what would happen if instead, I decided to invest in the relationship?

At first, I so didn't want to. It felt that by investing in the relationship, I was saying she was right. And I was wrong.

Until I realized that the person suffering most from me wanting to be right, was me.

The first step was the most difficult one. If I wanted to invest in the relationship, I had to connect with her.

And as I had been vilifying her for so long, I couldn't find anything to connect to.

My coach gave me a life-changing exercise: list 10 qualities.

It seemed impossible. Where to start?

Well - anywhere really.

The first quality I found was: I genuinely believed that she was a great mom. The way she talked about her kids was warm & caring.

When I connected with that quality, I realized that she actually had some good friends at work as well. So I could see that side of her.

It took me a while to get to the list of 10 qualities that I really believed were qualities.

And as I continued working on the list, I came up with more relevant, work-related qualities - like she was really dedicated to find the best solutions for our internal clients.

Making this list of 10 qualities helped me:

• see her as an actual, complete person - not just *a bad manager*

• realize that I had been attributing blame and negative intentions

As soon as I started looking at her differently, I started behaving differently as well. More balanced, more interested, more compassionate.

And this in turn made her behave differently as well.

The harsh judgemental attitude I'd had towards her, had not been helping me.

It had only invited her worst version - because she constantly felt attacked by me.

As soon as she started feeling safer, and more relaxed, our relationship became a good professional partnership.

Every day we have the choice:

To be right & judgemental & invite other people's worst version.

Or to invest in all relationships & invite their best version.

What will you choose today?