Quite often, rivalry arises between colleagues, and it is not always manifested openly. The job search site Login Casino Work knows how to find out competitors and how to benefit from such a situation.
We suggest that you read the recommendations of Hillary Enger Elfenbein, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis, and try to determine if you have a professional competitor, why there is rivalry in the team, and how to stop the competition without loss.
It is worth noting that most people do not notice the rivalry, continue to openly communicate with colleagues and, as a result, make mistakes that competitors immediately use. As a result of unfair competition, a stressful situation may arise that affects productivity and motivation. Let's see why there is rivalry at work and what to do if the confrontation between colleagues is growing day by day.
The main reason for competition is the limited resources in the workplace. Everyone wants to achieve a salary increase and career advancement. But from the whole team, only one employee can become a leader. The desire of a few of them to take a leadership position can move from the category of rivalry to the stage of militant confrontation, which quite often happens between people inclined to leadership. When professional rivalry reaches this level, the situation can get out of control and harm all parties, including the company.
Hillary Anger Elfenbein has studied the problem of unhealthy competition and rivalry in the workplace. The study involved students working on a single project and car dealership sales managers. The vast majority of the subjects could quite clearly identify those who disliked them but had absolutely no idea who their secret rivals were. The thing is that people are used to expressing their sympathy openly, and they prefer to hide rivalry.
Hillary believes that the concepts of competition and rivalry should be separated. While professional competition is commonplace and can be motivating, rivalry becomes personal and can be a nightmare to work on. When thinking about how to win the rivalry at work, the employee becomes anxious, detectable, and unsure of their strengths and capabilities. Due to limited timeframes, high emotional stress, and a healthy communication environment, problems arose out of the blue. People make irrational decisions based on hasty conclusions and misinterpret the behavior of a work colleague. This is how unhealthy competition and open war are born.
To understand who is the secret rival, you should take a closer look at your colleagues. Ignoring your opinion - you should be wary and think about how dangerous rivalry can be. It is better to act ahead of schedule than to eliminate the consequences. Unhealthy competition can make working conditions unbearable and a person may not be given any other choice but to find a job at another company.
Stopping competition can be very difficult. In some companies, management deliberately creates such situations, believing that this increases motivation and productivity. This is especially true for financial institutions and commercial enterprises. Professor Elfenbein believes that only a manager can cope with such a situation if they treat all employees equally, fairly celebrating their achievements and not comparing them with others.
The experts themselves can be advised not to constantly expect a dirty trick from colleagues. Rivalry can pass rather quickly, especially after a change in the career of an employee. Quite often, former enemies become allies, finding themselves in different life circumstances. For example, if one of them goes to work in another department.
Constant competition and the stress associated with it can be very debilitating. Some people subconsciously begin to compete with more successful colleagues. The last ones become for them a model, a standard to strive for. On the one hand, this is not bad, since the specialist has an incentive for his own development. But this is only if a person is not focused on the opponent, but devotes more time to their achievements. First of all, you need to admit to yourself that you have an opponent. And then to improve their professional qualities.
If this article was useful to you, do not forget to share it with your friends so that they also learn more about the rivalry in the team and can determine the presence of an opponent in time.
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