The Value of Considerate Conduct

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I remember getting my first full-time job after college, and I of course considered it below my skills and qualifications. However, I was young and had much to learn about careers and workplaces and the habits and experiences of others. As I was describing my job to my father, he proceeded to ask me several questions, a practice he used often and effectively. I will never forget the question, “What is the most important thing to do in your job?” Of course, I proceeded to rattle off what the job entailed. He said “Fine, sure, ok,” but “what is the most important thing?.” With a bit of exasperation, I began to name many important job-related skills such as being on time, working hard, doing quality work, and so on—all of which he readily admitted were important and necessary, but maybe not sufficient. So, after a frustrating pause in the conversation, when his overarching answer eluded me, he shared his belief that “your number one job is ‘to get along’ with other people.” He did not use sociological terms about group behavior or concepts from human relations and communication theory. In straightforward terms, he elaborated on the importance of building good relationships with other people and how these efforts support quality work, job longevity, and satisfaction in the workplace. He opined that no one wants to hire (or keep!) a problem person, a disgruntled and complaining person who sees the “speck in another’s eye, but cannot see the log in his or her own” (New Testament, Matthew 7). My father genuinely liked people, and this number one task was not so hard for him; but he must have seen many people fail because fundamentally they failed in the interpersonal dimension of work, not in ability to do the job. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Play fair. Say you are sorry when you hurt someone. Look and listen. This advice was captured in a best-selling book some years ago, All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten (Fulghum 1989). Over the years in the academy I have observed some who obviously had not learned those lessons, and their behavior and the responses of others created dysfunctional departments and toxic cultures. From my perspective, a successful career calls for the alignment of two paths: productivity and excellence in job performance and good colleagueship. In my experience, poor performance in the latter makes success in the former an even stiffer uphill climb. Now, I know that Innov High Educ (2009) 34:201–202 DOI 10.1007/s10755-009-9120-5