Okay, while I dig deeper in Working Wounded, I just found another of Bob Rosner’s pieces called The Only Thing Worse Than Lawyers… that strongly resonated with me because a set of workplace issues that I’m currently involved in.

In particular, this is the part that spoke most clearly to me:

The adversarial system thrives because we allow it to thrive. We hire lawyers, we encourage them to go off on the “other side” and we look for opportunities to avoid real dialogue with the very people whom we’re struggling with. We have become an entire culture that looks to HR, our bosses and yes, the lawyers to be our “heavy,” to stand up for our rights. Is it any wonder then, why things have gone so horribly wrong?

These issues have actually been a rather long-standing problem for my organization. And here’s the problem: members and staff don’t get along well. Until I read Bob’s post, I hadn’t considered it an adversarial relationship, but that’s pretty much what it is. And it’s a relationship that is crippling what could be a very dynamic and successful association.

For those of you not involved in professional societies or trade associations, this problem might seem a bit foreign. I’ll try to quickly explain. In my association, we not only have to work closely with fellow employees, but volunteer members, as well. Since we are a small association, the staff relies on members to do some of the organization’s work. It is often a very different dynamic working with members than it is working with customers.

Tomorrow, I’m to be on a conference call with member-leaders and I’ve been dreading this call like nobody’s business. I have been anticipating something ugly because of this adversarial relationship. It will be like stepping into a maelstrom of long-brewing conflict and trying to find a different way out…not just for me but all the other participants. It will require me to be both engaged both inside (as a staff employee) and outside (as an objective observer) to the conflict. Scary as hell. It is perhaps the greatest challenge to my own sense of hope that I discussed in my previous entry (it might also seem somewhat contradictory, but then that’s the paradox of our own existence). When is organizational conflict too massive and intertwined in the overall culture for one or even a small group of people to effectively resolve? When is it time to just acknowledge that it’s time to move on to a different workplace where we have a better opportunity to create more soulful work?

I’m not sure why the need to share this story here. I’ve been trying to determine whether I should or not for weeks. My own hope is that it resonates with someone who is experiencing problems with interoffice or intraoffice conflict. If you’re feeling alone, you might wonder if it’s just you and that you’re possibly crazy (as in, this conflict actually doesn’t exist) or naive (as in, this conflict exists and it’s like this everywhere). Let’s see how this goes…