Have you ever noticed that some people seem to be one person at work and another in their social life? I found it odd until I started reflecting on my behavior. I discovered you are only one person.

How I behave at work, on my team, should be no different than when I’m at home with family and friends. I did some research on this and found a term to describe the behavior.

The behavior is called “cognitive dissonance.” Feel free to read the article at your leisure.

The “mind friction” between the differing behaviors leads to challenges that impact relationships.

Teams are affected by the members’ interactions. As a performance indicator, it is worth looking at social and work behavior. There might be a weak signal that points to a degree of “mind friction”.

One person, many adaptations

It’s worth noting that team members do adapt their behavior to the support team’s performance. I don’t consider this a concern unless someone is miserable working on the team.

Adaptation helps us to survive and thrive in our environment. We see it in nature with camouflage patterns. The tricky part is when the adaptation is a move to an extreme.

Extreme adaptations can lead to “mind friction”. As a result, the team can help its members self-adjust if awareness is increased around behavior indicators.

No one wants to be miserable on a team. It’s up to the team to look out for its members.

Consider this, I’m not a carpenter. And yet, I wanted to work with my daughters to create something.

I didn’t disagree with their ideas about how we would build a “rock box”. Instead, I accepted whatever came of the project.

I avoided trying to be something I am not. We owe it to our teams to do the same.

Let’s not force them into changing against their will. Instead, help them adapt their abilities and skills to support team outcomes.