Organisational insecurity
View(s):It was with much enthusiasm and expectations that Chanaka walked into the first day of his new job at the company he had always aspired to join. This was his second job, and he hoped that given his can-do attitude and openness to learning, he would be a valuable resource. In the first few weeks, Chanaka started to get highlighted for the quality of his work; however with time, he was also highlighted as ‘over-enthusiastic’ and ‘impatient’ thereby creating frustration in the team.
The team had been one infested with a sense of complacency for quite some time. Chanaka was seen by his boss as the one to upset the apple cart, for his entry shifted the dynamics of the team – a loud wakeup call to everyone to step up. His boss was ambivalent about Chanaka, and jokingly started calling him “the black sheep” and sometimes “Zika Virus” (after the Z generation Chanaka belongs to). The boss recognized Chanaka’s potential, and realized that this was someone he either needed to groom or get rid of.
Unfortunately, the boss didn’t know how to groom his team and he himself was never empowered to utilise his full potential. He didn’t see it as a part of his job. He was used to simply presenting his team’s work to his managers – a system which had worked for him up until then. But now, with Chanaka’s presence in the team and the clear signs of his competence, he felt somewhat incompetent.
Choice
With a good understanding of his capacity to either support the growth of or to completely crush the potential, the manager first made a choice; a choice that is very common in our society – labelling. Seemingly innocuous as it can be justified as a part of someone’s sense of humour, labeling can have lasting effects on the victim when its roots are derogatory. Jokingly, the manager started calling Chanaka “Blacky” or “Zika”, and regularly passed sarcastic comments about how it is only the “one who respects culture” (without the use of the word ‘conformist’) that survives. Secondly, the manager started to complain about Chanaka to the top management saying that Chanaka tries to be too smart or too eager about new ideas. Thirdly, he removed most of the work allocated for him and delegated it to others till Chanaka felt he didn’t have much to do in his role.
Why is it that Chanaka’s manager chose to follow this line of action? Why was his go-to strategy labeling, complaining and then isolating? These are common strategies of survival in the workplace.
Insecurity is a state of feeling unsafe when one feels that his/her own survival is at stake. This self-preservative behaviour occurs when one feels less than the comparison point, when one’s own self concept is challenged unconsciously questioning ‘I am not good enough?’ This happens mostly when one is not sure of one’s identity as an employee/manager or as an individual as a whole.
Insecurity can have great ramifications on the entire team. When everyone is similar, it is easy to manage them; when everyone is below the line of power, it is easier to protect one’s seat. However, if continued over a period of time, without one’s knowledge one might be promoting a culture of compliance which destroys inventiveness, innovation, and growth of the team.
Being insecure
Some of the commonest qualities of an insecure leader are as follows:
An insecure person makes you feel insecure about yourself and feels the need to boast and showcase his/her accomplishments. He/she would often disguise something desirable they do as something negative (complaining about all the supposedly tiring (yet exotic) travel they have to do in their position in their company (yes, those way too many pictures on FB/Instagram), and too frequently complain that things are not good enough, and why things are not happening is always someone else’s fault.
They may have the need to overly justify their actions and may treat others with jealousy. Even though they may say they want change, they are probably happy to be where they are provided that it ensures their safety, and finally they may hate competition and may use tactics such as complaining, bad-mouthing and back-stabbing to crush perceived and actual competition.
The good news is that ‘awareness’ of these seeds of insecurity, the roots of our weaknesses, can shed light on how we can address it and respond to threat differently.
And awareness can come from within and from people who care about us – our team, friends and family. However, awareness alone is not enough; it has to translate to action. Helping people find their identity to know themselves, their strengths and limitations can boost their personal confidence that acts as an antidote for insecurity.
Helping people to be anchored to a larger purpose within and outside the organisation can also widen the window through which people view the world.
Unfortunately for Chanaka, his manager’s decisions resulted in him surviving in the department for only four months, after which he was transferred to another department where he had little expertise in. We complain about not having the right talent and this could be true. But do we stop to ponder on how many of our potential top performers are stuck in toxic sub- cultures of insecurity, dissatisfied, misunderstood, stagnated, ignored or used as scapegoats?
(The writer is an Organisational Psychologist, the Founder of Forté Consultancy and the author of ‘From Crisis to Character and a co-author for the upcoming book ‘Rockstars-Creating Stellar Performers in Organisations’. She can be contacted on rozaine@forte.lk)