"You can take a horse to the water. You can give it enough water to drink. You can tell the horse that drinking is good for its health. But the choice to drink or not to drink lies with the horse."
I believed in this statement for quite sometime. But over the last year or so, i am not so sure whether these statements should reflect reality.
What does a superior do when a reportee does not take interest in his own development, or resists all efforts by the superior to plan for the reportee's development?
Should the superior give up or should he keep on trying ?
The other day i heard someone say that when a reportee resists my efforts to develop him, i feel "rejected". Consequently i reject him back, and give up on him. Yesterday, i heard someone else say "I feel inadequate in such a situation. I subsequently keep on trying."
I am not sure what's the correct response. But i realize that when our efforts get resisted, it arouses strong emotions/feelings in us. This makes us behave the way we do.
Being cued on to how i am feeling would be the first step in dealing with the problem . The second step would be to understand how i am behaving consequently or how i might behave. Subsequently one must be genuine - if there is energy to try again, do go ahead and try. If there is a lack of energy to try, one might want to be genuine in sharing this feedback with the other person. "How the resistance is making me feel and consequently how i might possibly react?"
But then the discussion should not be close ended. It should give the other person a chance to respond. A statement like "I feel ............because of whatever has been happening. I am not going to try till the time you feel it's important for you. Whenever you feel you would want to work on your development areas and might need my support, do come back to me. I am always open to discuss."
In this way we would be true to our feelings and would have kept the door open too.
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Sourav
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