What I've learned these past few days

My staff resigned unexpectedly during a business trip in Batam, and the trigger point was just because I asked with him about the work status in regards to his previous trip to Guang Zhou. Cutting the story short, the resignation was a result of pent-up frustation built over the time.

I've all the while been thinking that he was doing fine and happy. So the suddend and unexpected resignation prompted me to review deeply what have gone wrong all these times, without me truly aware.

I've learned many lessons in these past few days through objective self analysis, and these are the summary of things to note to prevent the same incident from happening again in the future:

1. Never again think that people could be so objectively take work arguments as simply a discussion for the sake of finding the best solutions. Especially, if that person is your subordinate or someone whom you have power/authority on. Take good care of their sensitive feelings. As much as we want to say work is just work, we are sensitive Asian, not objective American.

2. Control or manage constantly their expectations (and importantly, right from the very beginning) and let them know your expectations too. Serious communication in a RIGHT setting is crucial. Cannot depend simply on informal mode, mixing formal and informal will be best. Don't expect them to align themselves to your goals, you MUST put effort to align them to you. Well, initially they might seem to be able to align to you automatically (meaning: without you spending effort to align them), but it will be a fool to think that the auto-mode can last forever.

3. Effective communication does not mean having a good command in the language, but also right usage of tone and constantly be aware of the other party reaction and feeling.

4. Try to understand their situation, for example their work load and their mood. Help them manage their work load and motivate them when they are down (which could likely be caused by some non-office matters)

5. They won't understand whatever dilemma you are having, and they don't need to as long as you pay attention to point no.1 to no.4 above.


Bottom line is: we really need to spend time and effort on those so called non-technical stuffs to achieve the best working relationship in the hope to achieve maximum results.