The Consequences of Judging Your Co-Workers
The classic advice for solving workplace disputes is to take it to HR and let them solve it.
That’s the impulse—whether it’s a verbal altercation, loud or overbearing teammates, or irritation about people who bring their dogs to work.
Not every business is large enough to even have a human resources department, but anything bigger than a solo enterprise faces the challenge of co-workers getting along well enough to coexist in relative peace.
Ideally, workers recognize and affirm each other’s performance, knowing that the company as a whole will benefit.
Realistically, it doesn’t happen that way. People may voice their dismay or stew in silence over a colleague’s surprise promotion or new title, or mentally shut down after a co-worker’s unexpected firing. But the real turmoil—and the problem—lies in the judgments we constantly make about others who are doing, or are supposed to be doing, the same job we are.
In a May article, “Why Am I Being Judgmental?”, the editorial team of the online counseling service BetterHelp examined the prevalence of negative and overly harsh attitudes people have about their co-workers.
Unlike the hundreds of training modules designed to foster a culture of respect, unbiased thinking, elimination of stereotypes, and inclusivity in the workplace—all laudable and necessary goals—recent research examined the harm that happens to us personally when we judge superficially based on our lack of knowledge and unexamined feelings of inadequacy.
Put simply, whether that other guy (hired after you) did or did not “deserve” the promotion you weren’t offered, your negative obsession about why it happened only hurts you further.
In her book Passing Judgment, psychologist Dr. Terri Apter noted that “our compulsion to judge others, to judge ourselves, and to monitor others’ judgments of us underpin all our social [and professional] relationships. Suppressing judgments entirely is unrealistic and futile.”
But making the attempt to improve the quality of our judgments, including being able to discern those that “mislead and diminish us,” has the potential to improve our emotional health, personally and in our work life.
Connecting emotional well-being with physical health is a hot trend in the global wellness industry, currently a $5.6 trillion market, according to the Global Wellness Institute.
Oura, a rapidly expanding maker of the “smart ring” that monitors, among other things, one’s heart rate, oxygen level, stress level, body temperature, sleep patterns, and exercise level, is beta testing yet another bio-marker it calls “Reflections.”
Recent research examined the harm that happens to us personally when we judge superficially based on our lack of knowledge.
Instead of an old-fashioned handwritten journal, the company claims Reflections allows Oura ring-wearers to assess their mood, how they’re feeling, and which events and activities affected their emotional health that day. All of this appears on the Oura app courtesy of a brief AI-enhanced note you dictate, by voice or keyboard, preferably before bedtime.
The market test for Reflections is linked to whether Oura can monetize the efficacy of monitoring your mental health as effectively as your oxygen levels.
Success depends in part on users’ faith that self-knowledge and awareness will lead to healing.
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Keeping track of the kinds of judgments we make about those we work with, however, may not strike an exhausted and frustrated employee as a good use of their time after work, compared to, say, relaxing in a hot tub. And many folks disdain navel gazing, meaning excessive self-absorption, as utter selfishness.
For one philosopher without access to an app, however, close analysis of one’s thinking, including judgments about others as well as self-judgments, is the point of human existence—or, as Socrates succinctly put it, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”
For hyper-judgers feeling remorse or self-reproach about their tendency to criticize, that dictum is surely as instructive as the famous biblical warning from Matthew: “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”
