Correction a Colleague without Coming Off as a Condescending Know-it-All
How to correct you, coworker, when he or she keeps doing the same mistake or keeps mispronouncing your name. How to make your boss understanding how a certain process works. A co-worker continually uses incorrect information. A new worker at your workplace is mispronouncing your name or any disturbing incident with coworkers.
You see wrong things done in your workplace; someone spreads wrong information on another coworker is wasting too many materials. You are the responsible guy; you need to correct these things, you do not want to be seen as an arrogant colleague or a snobbish guy. Read the following article and learn how to do it and stay alive?
Words And Phrases That Inspire, Motivate, And Persuade At Work
1. Something Positive will make it easier
No one like to be told that he or she is wrong. You do not want to be this bad guy that makes the other coworker cry when you use hard style to tell him he is wrong.
You should be looking for the attention of your colleague; an offended person will not listen to you so do not start like this “Hey do not do it this way it is wrong” you better do it more polite with softer words. The better word will be “Hey John you are doing a good job here what do you think of adding this detail? Would not it be better?
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2. Avoid Sounding Authoritative
You may be the best in the office doing your job, but you are not the perfect one, you made your mistakes too. Think about yourself before you start lecturing a fellow worker.
Having an authoritative, confrontational, and closed-minded approach will make you an image of a pretentious and condescending work mate. It will create tension and not teamwork. People will not be open to hear you and change the way they work. They will be sticking to their ideas just because they are offended by you and like to show you that they have their views and ego. Open the conversation positively and focus on their positive way of working and then mention the improvement you are looking for.
I suggest you start this way: I was reading your report on page 5 and found something not quite clear for me. Can we take a look at it together to see if you can help me clear it?
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3. Utilize Questions When Appropriate
Notice the above example where you used a question? It made the conversation much more friendly than bossy. You could feel the tension drops down and the main issue is falling on a listening hears.
Questions are softer than statements; you should make the question more like help to facilitate a conversation that ultimately makes the atmosphere peaceful and productive.
4. Provide Evidence
Small issues like the pronunciation of your name or the use of the coffeemaker that may burn down the break room do not need to provide detailed documentation to the workforce. It can be done by just saying some words with the right words and get your colleagues, to respond positively and the problem is solved.
A workplace will have more complicated issues than coffee maker to resolve. You better present evidence it will be helpful for demonstrating that you have real reasons to correct and not just shout to make your co-workers look bad and incompetent.
5. Offer Help
Stupid mistakes are not made intentionally to make your job harder or make life difficult in a workplace. People make errors and never feel good about it. Feeling embarrassed and a little overwhelmed while trying to remedy the mass.
To make things nice use this phrase. “Feel free to let me know if I can help you out” together with “Thank you for your cooperation” and concludes with “I am happy to assist”. By using this approaching you to create the atmosphere that permits to cure the wrong done by your employees without creating bad feelings and negative reaction. Everybody will be happy to help and be helped with no hard feelings.
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6. Use a Gentle Tone
Our tone makes a great difference in the way the people we talk to react to the words we say. The difference between constructive and condescending can be in the tone we use when we talk about something that needs to be replaced or repaired.
You are working together in the same workplace, all of you are employees that have a lot to do and different level of experience in different areas of the same industry. Yelling and screaming will not do any good to your workplace and co-workers. Tough talk and defensive body language will bear sour fruits not positive and constructive solutions.
The human relationship in a workplace is like walking on a thin line between productive and patronizing. Effectively correcting someone is not always an easy task
Use my recommendation, keep yourself calm when you have an issue with one of your co-workers. Keep being friendly but do not lose the goal with your colleagues.
People are sensitive when they made a mistake, do not make it become a problem, after all, you need the team to get to be a good working team.