While flipping through some old notes, I was reminded of another idea that was discussed: Emotional Intelligence.
Over the course of the semester, we investigated the value of Emotional Intelligence through several exercises and were challenged to try them at work and discuss the results. I do remember one "experiment" in particular.
A Little Background
At the time, I was working on a software application which included a moving map component. The importance of this component, led our team to invest a lot of time and effort in finding the right solution. This included an inventory of similar software applications within our company and partner companies. We ended up choosing to partner with a company and integrate their map software into our application.
It worked very well. Their mapping software met most of our needs and they were willing to make changes based on our constraints, etc. In fact, we successfully performed several demonstrations of the application and developed a strong partnership with the mapping software provider.
Around the time our project started rolling along, another team within the division requested a meeting to discuss how they could leverage our new application. This sounded like a great opportunity. We could share the work we had done and allow another project to benefit.
The Cold Hard Truth
As I soon learned, they really didn't want to use our application at all. Sure, they were interested in the work we had done and what tools we had used, but they were most interested in showing off their ingenious software solution. They were most interested in trying to convince us to use their home brewed moving map application.
It was obvious that learning of similar projects and collaborating with other teams was not a priority. The effort to connect began after they had already started pouring the foundation of the project rather than before.
I was livid. This was the exact cultural behavior that our team had been trying to overturn ever since I started working there: the tendency for engineers to always start from scratch. The idea that the only way an engineer could prove themselves worthy was to re-engineer something that had already been proven successful. The mentality that if our company didn't build it, then it must be crap.
But what did I know? I was the new kid on the block.
The Experiment
As insulting as it was, and rather than draw quick conclusions, I simply soaked in all the information I could about their project and its "attractive" features. I asked lots of questions and tried to understand their perspective and their understanding of the problem. The bottom line is that instead of allowing my emotional reaction to close my reasoning I attempted to create space to respond.
This was the essence of the exercise the professor challenged us with: when you find yourself in a frustrating situation and you feel your emotions taking over reason, give yourself space. The idea wasn't that your emotional reaction is always wrong, but rather that giving yourself space enables clearer thinking.
So, I was experimenting with this Emotional Intelligence thing. I wanted to see if it had any value.
The Results
That evening, I couldn't stop thinking about the meeting. I just kept running over and over in my head how there must be an approach that would be a win win. An approach that would enable a common moving map component to be shared by both applications. An approach that, however counter-cultural, would be embraced by both teams.
The next day I had a fresh perspective and realized that I had been thinking about the problem from the wrong angle. Instead of getting so caught up in the moving map component, which my team had put so much energy into perfecting, the real focus should have been on the *integration* of the moving map into our software applications.
The reality was that our applications would be using the moving map in different ways. One was for a virtual simulation, and one was for real-time usage. This in turn, made us value features differently. For example, performance was very important for our application while map data configuration was more important for their application.
This change in perspective revealed an obvious way for our teams to work together and create synergy. Instead of allowing frustration to push us into creating yet another project island, we ended up developing a strong working relationship and continued our progress towards a more open and collaborative culture.
The Take-away
There are two simple lessons I hold onto from that experience.
- Tear down those hidden information silos.
- Give yourself the space to breathe.