There is always some element of competition in most workplaces, but often your over-competitive colleagues, make your life feel rather tough. Worst case scenarios include your best ideas are stolen or people attempting to upstage you publicly or in meetings. But such competitive work-mates may actually help improve your career if handled correctly. Here are some smart tips on harnessing the competitive potentials:
Becoming Allies
The best ways to harness competitive energies of work-colleagues is to be friendly with them. Observe how they work and whether you could form a good team together. An excellent way to get the ball rolling is to complement their ideas and mention some similar action lines that you could potentially work on together. This may not always the best possible action in all situations, but it’s an excellent technique for softening animosities. It is at times somewhat tricky to do at times, especially when dealing with persons with whom you had issues at some time in the past. Finding yourself a workplace ally can be a great strategy, in the long run, if you are able to develop the right attitude and find a connection between both of you.
Channel Competition into Motivation
A little competition can possibly lead to better things, by helping and motivating you to improve work norms and channel it correctly, without frustrating you. If someone makes life difficult for you, take an opportunity to improve your skills. You may take a class, learning from people who are experts or just by taking more risks. To be able to get ahead, one needs to grow and improve so that others will also notice your improvements. Focus on improving yourself and grow in your career, so that no matter what the outcome with your competitive co-worker is, you will be more employable with better skills than before.
Maintain your Integrity
Your managers and bosses should essentially see you as a person who is professional, maintains a good work attitude and very important, do it with absolute integrity. If your competitive colleagues act in ways that are not moral in order to get ahead in the competitive game, chances are that it could lead to their eventual downfall. You can boost your prospects by concentrating on working hard, keep your head down and not engage in petty competitive behaviour with others.
Don’t let it get under your skin
Some co-workers maybe particularly competitive towards you; try not to take it personally. It can be rather frustrating, but think of it like this: they must perceive you as a worthy opponent to want to compete against you, and that must be taken as a compliment. However, if the high stakes involved do really become an issue and interferes with your daily work, the best thing to do is have a heart-to- heart chat with the other persons. If you don’t feel comfortable doing this, you may possibly consider explaining the situation to your HR representatives to resolve outstanding issues involved.
Competitive co-workers boost your career
As with all things in life, competitive co-workers can be seen as a negative, or used as a way to further improve your career; it all boils down to your attitude and how to ensure using these negative trends for positive gains.
