Growing My Performance in Collaboration

Defensive Reasoning

While people are in the process of learning many of us run into a wall. They reach a point where they think that others peoples advice is negative criticism and they think that others are judging them and this limits their ability to grow and use that information for good and become better. Having the ability to except someone else's criticism is vital to learning. Learning from others is one of the best ways to gain new knowledge and learn other consumer’s views. Many others go into defensive reason when they begin to struggle because they are not open minded to others.

 Defensive reasoning has some noticeable signs. First people will act negatively and resort to anger as they go against what others say. Next if you point out that they are defensive they will deny aggressively and/ or evade the topic. Finally they will blame their struggles on others or on the task itself. They will fall short of using high order thinking as their primary order of thought.

Defensive reasoning causes growth issues and growth is important to learning and enjoyment. Using defensive reasoning can stop this growth because it stops input from other. While input from others is one of the best ways to grow. Their knowledge can bring new insights to troubles that are at hand as well as an idea of what other people want out of your product. To get passed this one must learn to separate the perceived negative criticism as helpful and constructive advice. This is a biological process.

To overcome this problem one must first recognize the issue as a biological problem that must be overcome. They must then accept the emotions and learn to let them pass. And finally apply the SII method to improve.

 

SII Method

1.Define your strengths - define the most beneficial strengths, in order of most beneficial, be specific and  truthful

 2.Decide on improvements - Identify some areas of improvement, be thorough and specific.

 3.Look for insights on the problem - look for insights that are not know to yourself.

 

Example of SII

 1.Strengths

 •Value others input

 •I work hard on finding out what other people’s opinions are.

 •Working in a team I try to make sure everyone who has an idea is able to share and explain it before judgment.

 •I always do my part

 •I also try to make sure everyone else is doing their part and on track.

 

 2.Improvements

 •The ability to trusting others

 •I have issues with trusting others to do their part, and I try to make sure everyone gets their stuff done early so I have time to look it over and submit it myself.  I can improve this by sharing the load with others, giving them a chance to succeed, make adjustments as necessary.

 •I am also not one to take risks so I am working on being open to more ideas and to be creative while not being afraid to try; trying is part of learning and the group experience. If you do not succeed then you learn what works and what does not.

 

 3.Insights

 •There are seven deadly and seven beneficial habits to teamwork. Good (Supporting, encouraging, listening, accepting, trusting, respecting, negotiating) Bad (Criticizing, blaming complaining, nagging, threatening , punishing, bribing) Using the good techniques can improve anybody's collaborative abilities, using bad ones can hurt the teamwork experience.