I
had an incident happen at work today that I found out later was a known issue
on the team. I was furious, because it could
have been prevented if someone had just shared the knowledge after they had been
through it, instead of waiting for me to go through it myself. As I was complaining about this with HR, she
shared some insight with me. People gratefully
accept knowledge, but reluctantly give it away.
Knowledge is power, so the more you have, the more powerful you
are. But if you give it away, then it
dilutes that power, making your competition more powerful and thus leveling the
playing field.
I
was stunned by this idea, because I don’t think of people as competition,
especially within the same team. I think
of us as a family all trying to help each other be the best we can be, because
it will make the entire family better as a whole. But apparently each individual is constantly
looking at everyone else as someone that will get something they should have or
keep them from getting something that they deserve. So, they are constantly looking for ways to
make themselves more valuable and set themselves apart from this invisible
competition.
