How to Work with (Almost) Anyone

Your happiness and success depend on your working relationships. The people you manage. How well you work with your boss. The way collaboration happens with colleagues and peers. How you connect with important prospects and key clients. But the hard truth is this: most of us leave the health and fate of these relationships to chance. We say “Hi,” exchange pleasantries, hope for the best, and immediately get into the work. Soon (sometimes it takes weeks, sometimes minutes), the first cracks appear. A misunderstanding. An expectation not met. A low-grade irritation. A random act of weirdness. Different ways of seeing the world or getting things done. A flare-up under stress. Every relationship becomes suboptimal at some point, whether it’s a good one that goes off the rails or one that was poor from the start. When suboptimal happens, most of us don’t know what to do about it. We blame them, or ourselves, or the universe (or maybe all three). We get all the feelings: sad, let down, irritated, frustrated. But mostly we are resigned to the fact that this is what happens: relationships always get a little broken, or a little stale, or a little worse. C’est la vie, c’est la guerre. Carry on. You will leave with a renewed optimism about the quality of their working relationships, a determination to actively manage them, and a plan to get things started.