Who's influencing who in the group

Baggage at work

Fri, 14 Nov 2025 08:20:57 GMT

If we really thought about the self we bring to work.....

People talk a lot about baggage in relationships. Well, they do now. When I was dating quite a few years back... it was still a dirty word - baggage! The assumption seemed to be that you shouldn't bring any baggage from a previous relationship into a new one. I wondered how that was in fact possible, as we are an amalgam of all our previous experiences. The ultimate survival skill is adaptability which implies - how well do we learn from previous experiences - thus, baggage is actually fundamental to how well we learn in life.

It got me to thinking about baggage at work. In many ways, we bring so many past experiences to our workplaces that they infect the new workplace, however hard we may try. Where we 'on the outer' of the social group at a previous workplace? Did we, instead, organise much of the activity at work and perhaps also get-togethers outside of work, so we felt always at the centre of activity, perhaps keeping busy was out thing. If our status as the 'loner' was an unwanted one we may not have been aware of how our body language encourages people to treat us in that way. If we move into a new workplace and those identities are challenged, we may feel uncomfortable and want to leave.

Now that we are talking much more about psychosocial hazards (combined impact of psychological and social factors on our behaviour and health), perhaps it's time to consider what baggage you're bringing into work everyday. Sometimes we have the sense that our full mind is taken up with worrying about what happened at home just before we got to work, or what happened in the car with the kids. And this is where the invention of the professional mask has been useful along with the idea of compartmentalising our thinking. As someone who feels that experiences permeate right throughout my mind and body (which the latest research on Polyvagel Theory endorses i.e. the ' felt' experience of the world) I have always struggled to comprehend compartmentalising. Either I'm 'all in' or ' I'm out' is part of my philosophy of life which includes the world of work and relationships. But for some people compartmentalising is part of their professional persona, and they stop themselves thinking about anything but the task at hand.

How to deal with baggage at work.

A systematic process is needed for all of us as individuals to recognise how our past work experiences influence our presence in our current workplace. Do we have a way of acknowledging this and what do we do with it? Also how much of this do we actually communicate with others. This may be part of the process of sharing the common culture of the workplace, which can often be communicated to us non verbally i.e. by tradition or unspoken expectations. I think it's important without creating a whole set of policies and procedures around this topic, for us as individual workers to start to acknowledge, yes, actually I'm superimposing my ideas about my previous boss onto this current boss and that is harming my trust in this person.

How much energy you are investing in maintaining your professional mask at work may create a lot of fatigue for you - and this is where the 'third space' discussions are proving positive for many - identifying the transition between home and work, to allow us to consciously 'drop' our work mask.

Emotional baggage is the unresolved emotional experiences and the unexamined assumptions we bring with us to a new experience. Is yours preventing you from making more sound choices at work? In fact, your whole team may be doing this and inadvertently impacting the productivity of work goals. It's a topic worth exploring to help your team start to take more emotional responsibility.

What do you do about a narcissistic boss?

Fri, 14 Nov 2025 06:47:57 GMT

The old saying; that people leave their manager, not the job may be attributable to narcissistic bosses.

'Hey I need you to stay later tonight and finish this so I can present it tomorrow morning.... What do you mean, you can't? You know your job description does say 'any other tasks as requested. It needs to happen' .

Sound like your boss...?

Narcissism is characterised by:

Grandiose sense of self-importance. This can be manifested in two ways: overestimating their capabilities or holding themselves to unreasonably high standards.
Belief in their superiority.
Need for admiration and acclaim.
Entitlement.
Willingness to exploit others.
A mask of empathy or no empathy.

We think we know the narcissistic well, because it's something that is often portrayed in films and television because it provides great drama and social media has optimised this type of behaviour or in fact 'normalised' it for some people. There is a continuum of narcissistic behaviour and there can be both the braggart and shy versions of narcissists. These people truly don't care or imagine how others might feel. Even though your boss or colleague might be chatting with you as though they care, they are very good at mimicking the behaviour as ultimately a narcissist believes they are more entitled than others and may be busy making a cutting evaluation of you. Their entitlement and sense of grandiosity ie that they deserve more than other people is profoundly implicated in everything they ask of you.

What is called narcissistic supply is something the boss is getting from their staff and they will continues to treat you in the same way to keep getting the same effect. And because they are the boss, no-one calls them on it. They crave attention and admiration. You might wonder how they got the job, but narcissists are very good at initial impressions and may have come across as likeable and charming and won out over the other perhaps more authentic candidates. And because narcissists want to be in powerful positions with people reporting to them, you will find they tend to be over-represented in leadership roles. You may go into their office wanting to discuss a particular business issue and end up listening to them talk about their latest purchase or how they became the emotional victim of someone else, because the drama of that is right up their alley.

How to recognise them?

A dead giveaway is high status objects that they surround themselves with, even though not every shopaholic is a narcissist.

Their conversation frequently includes being envious of others.

You find the conversation always reverts back to them.

They frequently over-estimate their abilities.

They seek attention through dramatic stories.

They talk about fantasies about having success.

They are very invested in looking good.

They often leave behind lots of bad feelings or wrecked jobs or relationships.

One of the major areas of difficulty if you have a narcissistic boss is that they are commonly hypersensitive to criticism and 'you are against them' if you offer a contrary view, so flattery is often used instead of robust idea exchanges. This is ultimately not great for innovation or growth in a company, and if the narcissistic boss is really holding on and denying they are doing anything to damage the brand, they might dig their heels in and blame everyone else.

What can we do?

I do wonder why people stay in jobs where their boss speaks down to them, doesn't appreciate them and manipulates them. It seems self-sacrificing for someone to stay and endure the treatment of a narcisstic boss or colleague, and of course sometimes we can't afford to leave a role. Perhaps this person - if we look underneath the behaviour - is accustomed to this behaviour from a re-run of the relationship they had with a parent. If this is the case, then understanding more about out own psychological dynamic can help us move on if that's what we want.

Being an adult

Fri, 14 Nov 2025 05:58:40 GMT

Do you internally 'avert your eyes' when someone mentions being a grownup? Does it feel like too much to always be an adult?

Being an adult seems like a difficult idea for people.

I wonder if we all succumbed at some point over the last 50 years to the Hollywood version that permanent teenage hood is synonymous with a fantastic life with its endless indulgences and lingo that keeps us 'cool' and separate from the bogeyman adult who was going to spoil our fun.

I am also reminded of those people who say 'you don't know what growing up means until you've had a child', as though they are able to take the high moral ground over others who haven't had a child . What that statement tells me is the person saying that hasn't taken up the reins of responsibility for their life and actions up until after having a child. That in fact they haven't actually spent much time thinking about others and their needs up until the point of becoming a parent, and that is the huge learning curve for them!

The book I'm reading about the 6 pillars of self esteem says more about being an adult in the first 10 pages that many things I've seen or read lately. Nathanial Branden, the 'father' of self esteem research (who started in the 1950s), says that "to feel competent to live and worthy of happiness, I need to experience a sense of control over my existence. This requires that I be willing to take responsibility for my actions and the attainment of my goals. Self responsibility is essential to self-esteem and is also a reflection of manifestation of self-esteem."

He goes on to brilliantly encapsulate responsibility for our behaviour with others including co-workers. "I am responsible for how I speak and how I listen. We evade responsibility when we try to blame others for our actions e.g. 'she's driving me crazy' or 'he pushes my buttons'... " etc. How many of us - perhaps reluctant to be the adult - acknowledge that when we say 'pushing our buttons' it's about our responsibility in choosing our response. As part of this we are responsible for the quality of our communications; "which means being as clear as I know how to be, for checking to see if the listener has understood me (i.e not just resorting to text speak 'my bad' as though that releases us from responsibility) , and for the respect of disrespect with which I convey my thoughts".

The other big factor from Branden's book is 'I am responsible for how I prioritise my time'. What would happen to you if you live the ending of this sentence in your day to day life; If I take responsibility for how I prioritise my time, I . ... ".

An 'aha' moment is the statement ' I am responsible for my personal happiness. One of the characteristics of immaturity is the belief that it is someone else's job to make me happy - much as it was once my parents' job to keep me alive. If only someone would love me, then I would love myself. If only someone would spare me the necessity of making decisions, then I would be carefree'.... I can think of numerous people I know, at work or at home, who would benefit from truly understanding that sentence and trying it out in their lives.

This gives us our power back. If this is what it truly means to be an adult, then surely that's what all the slogans are about; stand up for yourself, be yourself, protest on behalf of others - and yet so many people in daily conversations use phrases such as 'oh I'm over adulting' that have consistently bugged me and I've not been sure why exactly. Now I realise it is about that whole cultural idea of not taking responsibility and claiming a victim status of some kind or other, that has annoyed me. Not helped by the overwhelming trend for text messages where you're left 'hanging' without any closing of the loop with the other person acknowledging your message.

I'm firmly in the trying to be an adult side and taking responsibility for clearly communicating and naming how things are happening to help me understand and perhaps helping an another person as well. Of course, we can still choose occasions to be under responsible (the fun lover) and we may have a different version of where we don't take responsibility, but not taking responsibility with our choices around language seem to be the thing that 'pushes my buttons' !!!

Referenced from 6 pillars of Self Esteem by Nathan Branden, (1995)

Reflections on 4000 weeks

Thu, 13 Nov 2025 14:32:40 GMT

4000 weeks doesn't sound long does it?

It's confronting to realise that's how long most of us actually have.

This book by Oliver Burkeman is so down to earth. It is simple to read. It has a powerful message i.e. we are here for a very short time, so use it wisely. 'To see if we can't discover, or recover, some ways of thinking about time that do justice to our real situation : to the outrageous brevity and shimmering possibilities of our four thousand weeks," It is about the fact that time management techniques have failed "with the result that we live mentally in the future, waiting for when we'll finally get around to what really matters - and worrying, in the meantime, that we don't measure up, that we might lack the drive or stamina to keep pace with the speed at which life now seems to move." That aiming to be more productive is a trap. And not only that but now work can be seen not as a burden but as an exhilarating life choice - "As the gig economy has grown, busyness has been rebranded as 'hustle'" .

Burkeman starts with the astounding concept of imagining ourselves outside the boundaries of time in terms of imagining time separate from us and the world; "we proceed to measure and judge our real life against an imaginary gauge, lining up activities against the timeline in our heads" - the face of a clock, calendars, tape measures, conveyor belts, containers to 'fill up' so we are keeping on top of things.

Reflection on my 4000 weeks has profoundly impacted me, particularly the idea that we somehow can optimise our life. It is often covering up some deep emotional need - in Burkeman's case his focus on time and productivity meant he avoided the idea of meeting someone and starting a family. So many other aspects to it that made me think - like making the most of your life and the endless bucket list (which I've always resented...does it somehow imply your dreams aren't already big enough to try and achieve) that is part of modern life because of all the choices,

That fear of missing out is essentially part of life and acceptance around the finitude of life is essential to being able to prioritise what is important to us. And of course the notion of "that alarming phenomenon, familiar to anyone older than 30, whereby time seems to speed up as you age - steadily accelerating until, to judge by reports from people in their 70s and 80's, months seem to go by in what feels like minutes." And that rather than taking ownership of this idea, we distract ourself with stuff and with busyness and reading this book has helped me understand my procrastination streak.

His words that time is "like an obstreperous toddler: the more you struggle to control it, the make it confirm to your agenda, the further it slips from our control" totally rang true for me, as people are now starting to use the phrase 'time blind' for certain ADHD behaviours, which I admit I am susceptible to. To avoid facing limits, which may be due to ill health or wrong choices or somehow we believe we can achieve some nirvana balance between work commitments and everyday life. Do we then become compulsive planners or procrastinators? These are in order to avoid the painful constraints of our realities and that is something only we can come to terms with and really start to choose more consciously how to spend time.

References: 4000 weeks; time management for mortals written by Oliver Burkeman

Is there something you're afraid of?

Thu, 13 Nov 2025 14:28:04 GMT

A core idea psychologically is that fears are motivating much of our behaviour.

For some it’s spiders.

For some it’s vomiting.

Others are afraid of gelatinous substances because it feels yucky.

For others, being confined to small spaces is terrifying.

Yes... offices I’m talking about you!

A core idea psychologically is that fears are motivating much of our behaviour.

It goes back to Sigmund Freud’s defence mechanisms that we use strategies unconsciously to protect our self from anxiety. The difficulty is however, is that if it’s unconscious how do I become more aware of what I’m afraid of. Susan Jeffers famous book ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway’ exhorts us to take action because everyone feels fearful about doing new things. And if other people are out there doing new things, trying new ways of thinking, then maybe we can try it too by turning passivity into assertiveness. The fear of the fear is more incapacitating than the actual fear is what she posits.

Projection is one of the most difficult aspects of defence mechanism to get our head around.

That’s where we have a fear of a feeling and so we ‘give’ our feeling to someone else; we say ‘oh gosh, Maggie is angry today’ when that may be actually how we are feeling, but because we are such a nice person, we might struggle to admit that we can be angry. Accepting that we might be subject to doing this to others is a big step to processing more of the undercurrents at work. Again, our fear of our feeling makes our way of dealing with it, probably unproductive. Rather than naming the feeling and trying to deal with that.

The other major defence mechanism operating in many workplaces is repression.

This is where we unconsciously push threatening feelings out of our awareness and we may overcompensate (strenuous denials for instance) to ensure that those feelings are kept tucked away. This is not to say that workplaces should become more therapy orientated, but we can certainly benefit from acknowledging some more uncomfortable feelings in a structured process to help name fears about change, or fears about relevance or fears about the meaning of our work. This may help soothe our unconscious self so that we don’t get influence by these unacknowledged fears, by saying, for example as a teacher; ‘that child is impossible to deal with as they are so stubborn’ which may be more a reflection of our own internal state ‘given’ to one of our students. Particularly in situations where our job role requires us to be ‘the leader’ ie the teacher being the leader in a classroom, our actions can have a huge impact on the group dynamic.

I like to think of that group leader role as imagining their behaviour magnified by a power of 10 because of the highlight effect that is attributed to the teacher or leader’s actions or statements. Therefore it is vitally important that teachers or leaders in that role are very aware of how they are coming across. It may feel like a lot, but some of our PD can help you understand this more thoroughly.

What Happens When I Mention the Word "Retirement"?

Tue, 11 Nov 2025 01:48:34 GMT

Do you recoil because you think you will never get to retire? There are some pundits in the

UK who are stating that may happen as the retirement age is being pushed back and governments are radically reconsidering costs.

Retirement came up for me the other day watching Michael Palin standing underneath the Angel Falls in Nicaragua getting completely sodden from the hugely powerful water spray. I was sparing a thought for the safety of the cameraman but in reality, perhaps Palin at 82 was more concerning. He is definitely not looking to retire, similarly to David Attenborough, still busy filming at 97. Whether Palin should be thinking about it, is another question, when your viewer is worrying that an elderly man may well slip and fall to his death filming underneath a waterfall.

Transition to retirement is now more commonly being used, recognising that it is a process. What happens if I don't really want to retire. Ever. Like Michael Palin. Perhaps you’ve come to the conclusion that you can’t afford to retire. Are workplaces really ready for a much older generation in the office? From my experience of age-ism I would say a resounding ‘no’ to that. Australia is nowhere near Japan for example in terms of providing work appropriate to an older workforce actively utilising people’s experience and knowledge for many years post a ‘traditional’ retirement cut-off.

It may not continue to be our choice (not to work), but it is something that is not easy to simply give up. What about the trend for some to retire from their full time working role, and then go on to do something else? Is that then the thing they love? How do they know?

Firstly, we need to get a few things straight in our own head. We may have had a traditional 9-5 work environment for many years and that has been sustaining for us, financially, mentally and socially. Or we may part of the portfolio career generation with various part time roles working in synchronicity with each other, as many people in the arts sector do – some performance or writing work, some teaching work, some ‘other work’ unrelated to our original field that has grown in relevance as we’ve aged and become more important, perhaps in the not for profit or caring sector; not least because it may have paid us regular super.

We’ll leave the financial side for another day and another expert! The experience of a portfolio career is probably easier to transition to 'project lifestyle' because we are practised at integrating or slotting various roles into different parts of our life (or if you prefer ‘the hustle culture’).

Let’s look at 3 aspects of thinking about retirement; mental, emotional and psychological.

Our mental world – We are essentially losing a focus (our daily work) and gaining so much choice (sleep in, do more exercise, get another pet, meet friends for coffee, learn an instrument, go on a trip, the list is endless… which is why they call it a bucket list – it pours out!). If you stop focusing on work, you may imagine there will be lots more space in our minds for other things. However, we may simply feel like we have endless unstructured time and for some people that is very disturbing. If that’s you, then planning ahead and thinking clearly about what you want your week to focus on will be important. You may want to allocate particular tasks for particular days of week ie Monday life admin, Tuesday catch up with friends, Wednesday sporting activities, Thursday family day, Friday new projects day etc. Being the ultimately responsible person for all the choices in our life may terrify you. There is no-one else to blame, but knowing that you will probably need some type of structure to utilise instead of your work based one will help.

Our emotions – We keep hearing about people’s bucket lists and dreams for when they have all the time in the world. Our dreams may not be fulfilled. In fact, our dreams may not have been fulfilled up to the point of transitioning to retirement and we may feel like we can’t admit that to ourselves, potentially because of intense grief. Not all of us can start thinking about retiring one day and then access a great superannuation amount the next. We may have to be more ‘make do’ and be budgeting from week to week, a bit like living from pay cheque to pay cheque. We may also feel very sad if we’ve worked for an organisation for 10 years, 15 years or 20 years (either full time or part time) and we review out time there retrospectively and ask ‘did what I do, matter?’ Making meaning of our life is one of the big issues for all human beings according to psychotherapist Irvin Yalom. If that

resonates with you, finding something that really matters to you after paid work will be essential. Other existential issues or ultimate concerns like ‘freedom’ and ‘death’ are “givens of existence” or “an inescapable part” of being an alive human in our world. And talk of retirement certainly brings the idea of freedom more the forefront of our brain, which again may feel threatening, when we haven't always been able to put our choices first.

Our habits and our community contribute to our psychology. As so many motivational experts tell us, our achievement of goals is really the nub of everyday choices in how we spend our time. This is going to become much more significant if nobody else is dictating how we should now spend our days, our hours, our minutes; particularly if we had a career that involved lots of meetings and scheduling. Choosing new habits that are deliberate and contribute towards a larger picture for you is important. If we think of example of travelling; some people say ‘oh 3 weeks is long enough. I was dying to get home that trip.’ Travel involves seeing ourself differently as we see the world differently through the lens of new countries, different people. That is work for the brain and possibly, we don’t want to do that work as an older body and mind. So rather than seeing retirement as this ideal big event that is associated with travel and exposing ourself to lots of new experiences, we may learn to reconfigure life and define retirement as more in the present and choosing acts of meaning every day for ourself now we have more control over our time, rather than waiting for permission to ‘live’ life.

Four Tips for preparing for transition to retirement:

1. Self reflect. Put some pauses into your day and see where your thoughts take you. Write down your mixed feelings about retirement and help yourself start to untangle your inner world a bit. Or you may even talk to a therapist who can help you with

some gentle questions.

2. Connect with people you know who have retired already or are doing ‘transition’ to retirement and get some inspiration.

3. Set up a group. Maybe its some work colleagues you want to stay in touch with and organise a regular pattern of catchups so you feel the swirl of everyday life has not completely gone down another stream. Organise some meet ups before you leave

the workplace. Or it may even be a different group associated with your new projects.

4. Facing our fears. This may be harder to explore: what am I afraid of when I retire? It could be that sense of not being ‘of use’, or not knowing who I am because work has kept me so busy I haven’t had time to look at the fact that what I achieved in my

working life was not really my life’s dream. This is the big issue and you may need some help working through this as we hold ourselves back from facing difficult feelings.

Maybe this workshop is suitable for your workplace? Transition to retirement. how to support your staff in understanding their emotional and practical choices.

Who's influencing who in the group?

Thu, 31 Dec 2020 06:19:55 GMT

Complexities of group dynamics and how we influence each other

We believe we are singular

Because we have a belief in will and self guided choices, we are in the modern era where we struggle to see any influences from others as valid. This is part and parcel of an individualistic society says we are the product of our own efforts, and as members of the capitalistic system we have free will as to how we spend our money and our time. These factors all add up to the belief that we are self operating entities that don't need anyone else, let alone that other people are influencing our choices, unlike earlier times in human history where working together in groups or families was fundamental to our survival. This is innate stuff in our psyche so can be hard to shift.

Not wanting to feel that others can tell us what to do

The belief that we are singular creatures then morphs into the second 'rule' of how we operate in group dynamics, which is the idea that someone can't tell us what to do. If you recall being a kid, and being told once, twice, three times - how to behave, what to say in front of the relatives, what to believe about religion, shopping, movies, anything really - then it stands to reason, that once we reach adulthood, we often resent being told what to do, and tend to then 'choose' the opposite position. If we are still unconsciously reacting to being 'told' what to do, then for us, interactions in any group will feel confronting when someone says something assertively or with conviction. We may automatically believe the opposite of what they're saying, or think they are somehow lying.

If I'm overly influenced by others at work, what does that say about my expertise?

The next side of influence is being the accommodating person; simply agreeing with others, and not being assertive enough about what I believe. Have you noticed that sometimes the most assertive communicator in the group is the one that others say 'oh yeah I think that too' , or simply the one who speaks up soonest may guide the tenor of the discussion because of the 'follow the herd' mentality that sometimes occurs in groups. We ALL have a desire to be liked by others and to fit into the group. For some people, this is highly pronounced behaviour that influences them all the time in their group interactions and they are completely unable to rock the boat. Again, if we haven't examined what this means for us personally, then we will continue to simply go along with group behaviour, and wonder what went wrong. If I struggle to speak up in the group then I may question my expertise or my value in the group, even if it is fundamental to the group decision making. And if I 'cave in' to someone else's belief, there is the possibility that others see me as less worthy.

Am I leader, collaborator or follower?

Along this line of not wanting others to feel upset around us (the core of being nice) we may have found our persona in group behaviour, which may be leader, collaborator or follower. If we are a leader, then we may have a tendency to use black and white thinking - I'm right and they're wrong and I have to convince them. When I'm a collaborator I am more able to see both sides of the issue and move flexibly with my thinking from one position to another i.e I am not as wedded to feeling right about something. If I'm a follower, I may simply choose a position based on which person makes me feel more comfortable about myself, and that may be due to some basic non-verbals like smiling or inviting behaviour by them towards me. None of these positions are wrong or right, and we can shift between them depending on the culture of the group or our sense of belonging in that particular group, but being aware of your position is important and choosing your behaviour consciously.

Being influenced by others is inevitable if we are humans, interacting in our society. I like to think of it as small tendrils gaining hold inside me, of ideas, of feelings, of realities of others. Some of those tendrils grow a bit, if I water them or focus on them. Others will wither and die. But acknowledging the basic human condition that groups are fundamental to our survival, means I will feel more comfortable knowing what choices I'm making about my behaviour, depending on my role and the culture of the group.