Beware Dysfunctional Independence
First published on July 29, 2021
Independence is necessary. It is a part of the journey into becoming a human being, fulfilling our potential and actualising what is possible for each of us individually and all of us together.
We need to each understand our own unique strengths and the values that matter to us. We need to define our own way of being, our own measures of success, our own sense of what a 'good person' is. We need to do this because the old ways - trusting on the stories societies have of what a 'good person' or a 'good worker' or a 'good husband' or a 'good mother' - don't work any more. They are limited by the newly complex world, and trying to meet all of societies' definitions will drive you to stress and burnout.
Instead, then, independence is necessary. Create your own way of being. Choose how you will think and what you will do.
Independence is necessary, but it is not, of course, sufficient.
As Robert Holden says, the next level of your success will require a new level of collaboration.
The ways we hold to what Holden calls 'dysfunctional independence' are many and varied. And some of yours will be different to some of mine. Some may be the same.
I am reluctant to ask for help, I pride myself on being self-reliant (and being self-reliant means, according to some kind of internal definition, not needing help). I like learning new things, which means that one of the reasons to get help is lessened considerably.
And yet these things limit me. They limit what is possible.
My friend Regina helped me see a new one, a new way I limit my collaboration and therefore limit my success. A story of my dysfunctional independence. Here it is:
I am good at a lot of things. That isn't false pride, or at least it doesn't look like that to me, it's true. I got top grades in subjects across the arts, sciences and humanities. I even got an A in my Graphic Products GCSE, which I really didn't expect. Then I worked a broad range of muscles in my 20s: creatively in my spare time, and across business functions at work. I ran small organisations, indulging my entrepreneurialism and getting a chance to do everything: finance, sales, HR, marketing, production, customer service and more. So I am good at a lot of things and there's no problem with that. It's a good thing!
But the problem comes when I realise I have a similar attitude to Villanelle's mentor in Killing Eve: management is basically watching someone do something worse than you could do it. That's what Regina helped me see: that is my attitude to collaboration. I could do this better than that other person, so why would I ask them for help, let alone pay them to help me?!
And that, of course, is where things get tricky. Because that story is stopping me getting help, stopping me forming collaborations, stopping me having a bigger impact, stopping me doing great work.
Of course there's something sensible in saying: I want to work with people who are as good at what they do as I am at what I do. And there's something sensible in saying: I want to have a team that do their things better than I do their things.
But collaboration isn't just about the tasks. It's about what happens when two or more people work together on something. It's about how humans work, how together they make better decisions than alone, how creativity is multiplied, strengths complemented. It's about how energy is built together and about the magic that happens when people collaborate.
I should really know that, right? Coaching is essentially a collaboration: two people working together to help one of those people transform.
And yet I don't, quite. I have these stories that stop me. The stories that helped me become independent, functional, successful. Able to operate in the world. And then the stories that stop me.
Beware dysfunctional independence.