by Rick Baker
On Feb 10, 2011
Barry talked about long-term sustainable relationships the other day.
Here are a few excerpts from Barry’s comments…
“This defines our company.”
“Sometimes you have to give 90% or 95%.”
“You can not expect it to be 50%-50% all the time.”
I know from our earlier discussions, Barry meant his comments should apply broadly: not just to Client interactions, not just to workplace interactions, but to interactions between people – to personal relationships in general.
Barry provided pieces of advice around the extremes of this interpersonal topic:
“let the little stuff go by”
&
“never burn a bridge”
I took these to mean:
- Recognize little upsets are a part of daily life. Being ‘petty’ is a route to interpersonal disaster. Pettiness annoys others. And it injects stress where stress does not need to be. If stress must exist then it should not be around the little things.
- From time to time disagreements will happen. Forceful personalities will collide from time to time. When that happens, even if it means ‘departure’ that ‘departure’ does not have to be done in a way that is stressed or permanent. Instead, it can be done in a let’s-agree-to-disagree way.
“You can choose the person you want to be.”
The bottom line:
Choose how you will handle day-to-day glitches and act in ways that bring you closer to your long-term goals…and one of those goals must be sustainable relationships.