When we spoke, she was exasperated. I asked a few questions to better understand why she was so out of sorts, and she wouldn’t answer me and kept saying, “It’s our equipment and our process, they suck!” My first thought is we have a “plumbing problem” (equipment and process), not a people problem, so why did she call me, the head of human resources. So, I took a deep breath and plunged further into the conversation with her to unravel what was at the heart of it. I guess instinctively she knew she wanted to speak with me, the problems that were frustrating her were the people that used the equipment and were supposed to follow the process. She had a “people problem”.

I’ve found that most of the problems I’ve watched organizations face aren’t about plumbing, they are always about people and most of us don’t understand people. Why, because people are all different. People are not the same. We’re unique and that’s what makes each person special.

A bit of quick research will tell you we are made up of 3 billion base pairs of DNA and between 99.1 – 99.5% are the same (even AI can’t completely agree what’s the same). What makes us different is between .001% and .005%, which seems like a small difference. But it really means between 3,000,000 and 15,000,000 pairs are different. That to me seems like a big number.

While it may never have happened to you, here are a few of the ways I’ve found those differences have shown up in the workplaces I’ve been associated with.

• Some people follow directions well, others you must repeat them over and over.
• A few will receive constructive feedback from you well and most will want to debate you.
• The mistakes you make in hiring never leave you, your successes are usually scooped up by someone else.
• Some people are accident prone or constantly ill, while others rarely if ever miss a day of work.
• Many are happy people, who love their job, and are fun to be around every day, but a few are like Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh – every day, spoiling it for the happy people.
• A few are good at critical thinking, others can’t solve any problem they face, they want you to do it for them.
• Common sense isn’t very common, it’s rare.

What does that mean for you? You will experience people problems in your career. You can’t avoid them, you can’t hide from them, they’re still with you even if you work from home. You must become good at addressing and dealing with people problems. And there is no perfect recipe because everyone is different, but I’ll give you three that will help you.

1. Hire well – People hate interviewing and hiring, but it’s your best chance to make your life better.
2. Confront the problem – Everyone “hopes” things will get better or will “solve themselves” if we just leave it alone. Tell me when have you ever seen it work in a people problem? It doesn’t. Confront it and deal with it.
3. Be willing to leave – Yes, if the problem is your boss or a toxic team, accept that you can’t fix them. All you can do is help yourself by leaving. That could mean transferring to a different department, or leaving the organization, but the status quo with people will never get better. And if you must do this frequently, you might need to look inward at yourself.

When you’re stuck, reach out to your human resources professional for some wisdom, or give me a call.  Good luck!

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33