Wednesday, July 28, 2004
Giving Advice
As part of the work of our division, we provide advice to people drafting documents. This is one way of ensuring that documents produced by the various divisions are consistent to the policies and objectives of the organization. However, one flaw is that we are not doing the enforcement duty to see that advice given out are adopted and implemented.
As you may expect, for half the time, people ignored our advices and went on their ways doing what ever they like. This is human nature and I have long accepted that it is next to impossible to change people’s behaviour, especially those exhibited by the stubborn ones. After all, the golden rule of on advice giving is to be indifferent whether the advice is taken up or not and never persist in trying to set people right. Ultimately, people are responsible for what they do.
The only problem is that under the principle of shared responsibility, those who landed themselves in trouble by going against good advice would inadvertently claimed that they followed our advices and adopted decision of the group. After all, this is the real world and back stabbing in office is not uncommon.
My strategy of distancing myself from such claims is my paperwork. Apart form my work focus of providing guidance and advice, I placed great importance on keeping proper record of the advice given and to inform the relevant managers that such advice had been given. It would be up to the relevant section managers to deal with consequence arising from non-adoption of good advice.
In today’s complex office environment, it is not just output that is required of a conscientious worker. While office politics may not be our cup of tea, it pays to devote attention in keeping proper records of what we have done.
As you may expect, for half the time, people ignored our advices and went on their ways doing what ever they like. This is human nature and I have long accepted that it is next to impossible to change people’s behaviour, especially those exhibited by the stubborn ones. After all, the golden rule of on advice giving is to be indifferent whether the advice is taken up or not and never persist in trying to set people right. Ultimately, people are responsible for what they do.
The only problem is that under the principle of shared responsibility, those who landed themselves in trouble by going against good advice would inadvertently claimed that they followed our advices and adopted decision of the group. After all, this is the real world and back stabbing in office is not uncommon.
My strategy of distancing myself from such claims is my paperwork. Apart form my work focus of providing guidance and advice, I placed great importance on keeping proper record of the advice given and to inform the relevant managers that such advice had been given. It would be up to the relevant section managers to deal with consequence arising from non-adoption of good advice.
In today’s complex office environment, it is not just output that is required of a conscientious worker. While office politics may not be our cup of tea, it pays to devote attention in keeping proper records of what we have done.
