One day I serendipitously made a revealing discovery with respect to whether our experiences growing up affect work place team dynamics. In an open feedback session with my team members, one of my colleagues intoned that they perceived my intermittent presence in the office as being akin to that of an absentee dad. To say that I was astounded and thoroughly intrigued is an understatement.  I took the time to reflect on this amazing feedback to my leadership. Surprisingly I saw a striking similarity between marriage dynamics and team dynamics that I hadn’t reckoned with before. You see, in a marriage relationship, two individuals bring their past experiences to bear in a way that perpetually and significantly affects the dynamics of the duo. In our experience facilitating couples through our chanda na pete programs, we think upwards of 70% of marriage issues stem from upbringing.  At work though, our view of leadership and team culture as a function of our experiences growing up may not be thought to matter much. Perhaps it’s because, workplaces by design are still reeling from the cold, mechanical, industrial age, cog within a system type performance approach. Seemingly the softer side of the organization, that is the culture of the people working may be ignored … but then I digress. The statement, ‘you are like an absentee dad’ was curiously a mirror reflection of my colleague’s experience with their dad growing up. My colleague’s view of my leadership therefore was hued with emotions, reactions and attitudes that stemmed from this unlikely source that they were not aware of either. In a highly relational culture such as that bequeathed to us by our ancestors in this part of the world, it is worth noting that past experiences influence our attitudes and behavior in a team all the time. Team dynamics and culture is affected by other factors such as one’s sibling placing, personality, beliefs, interests, likes and dislikes and so on. That we don’t pay serious attention in examining these components of culture in driving team performance in our teams is regrettable. Peter Druker, a deep thinker on management was quoted as saying  organizational culture eats strategy for breakfast? If you are a dad reading this, know that as dads we have a powerful role of shaping attitudes, behavior and therefore the culture of our children and society more than we think. Nelson Mandela’s dad died when he was 9 years old. In his autobiography Long walk to freedom, he was quoted saying, “although my mother was the center of my existence, I defined myself through my father…”. Our role therefore as authority figures inadvertently shapes the destiny of those who look up to us for guidance. I suppose this applies to any other authority figure. It is worth doing a self audit to see what role the influence of our primary authority figures plays in our everyday life attitudes. Equally, it may help to invest time to understand what our team members bring from their experiences growing up. Even more important is the role we currently play as parents in shaping future adults who will in turn shape others in different spheres in life. The author is the Team Leader at Badili Experience facilitating change experiences that last for Organisations, Couples, Parents and Individuals navigating a transition.

kiteto@badiliexperience.com +254721217777