Didn’t you want to learn how to bartend like the guys in Cocktail? You don’t know that movie. *GASP*
Tom Cruise flipping bottles in the air while mixing up the most incredible party-time drinks for throngs of patrons made a splash in 1988. The Beach Boys had a new hit and newcomer Gina Gershon hit the big screen as the love interest for the pretty bartender. What most of us didn’t know until recently was how dangerous that steamy love-making scene was for Mr. Cruise. Gina had let Tom know that she was very ticklish and that he needed to be careful. When action was called, Cruise grabbed Gershon’s stomach to pull her close and her knee flew straight up…into his nose. Her reflexes just kicked (knee-ed) in.
And while the production had to take a minute to attend to Mr. Cruise’s nose (yes, she almost broke it), to his credit, he kept telling the move crew that the incident was completely his fault. He had been advised and he didn’t treat the warning as seriously as he should have.
In our work world, we see reflexive action happen daily. The “wrong” thing is said, and an employee instinctively claps back, for instance. We have watched the figurative knee pop up and clock a person in the face. And while we’re not talking about a physical altercation (I hope not), we do have reflexive responses pepper daily interactions causing the deepening of misunderstandings and mistrust.
The remedy is not popular - personal responsibility. To be clear, you are not responsible for the actions of another. If your boss is a jerk and does jerky things, that is not on you. That person needs to be held accountable and take personal responsibility for the actions/words offered. You did not make the person do those things.
What is on us is to lean into an understanding of our reflexive behavior. “He made me do it” is not a defense most of us can stand behind. Yes, there are VERY few limited exceptions to this, but in the workplace, many of those circumstances do not exist. Because your boss is a jerk does not mean you can punch him in the face instinctively and then suffer no consequence. I have been in workplaces where the authorities were called following this exact type of exchange. And while the employee tried to plead his case based on the rudeness of his boss, the police arrested that employee for a filed claim of assault. It was a mess.
If you read these blogs regularly, you know that extreme examples are often used to quickly highlight the concepts and content presented. Assault at the workplace is not the norm (goodness, I hope not), but reflexive behaviors around disparagement, for instance, might be more the norm. Feeling validated to tear a co-worker down instinctively and immediately after a tense team meeting is a behavior that can be changed. We don’t have to give into whatever reflexes that rise up.
This isn’t about being ticklish (by the way, no one should be putting their hands on you at work to do so), but it is about behavior. What reflexes have you allowed to be definitional in your actions? Maybe biting language and outbursts, or storming out of rooms, or…You know what you need to address.
Knee-jerk reactions are not called that so you have a right to knee every jerk you run into. Even if you really want to…