Cooperation In Workplace Quotes

Among these temperamentally unhappy campers are "reactant" personalities, who focus on what they often wrongly perceive as others' attempts to control them. In one experiment, some of these touchy individuals were asked to think of two people they knew: a bossy sort who advocated hard work and a mellow type who preached la dolce vita. Then, one of the names was flashed before the subjects too briefly to register in their conscious awareness. Next, the subjects were given a task to perform. Those who had been exposed to the hard-driving name performed markedly worse than those exposed to the easygoing name. Even this weak, subliminal attention to an emotional cue that suggested control was enough to get their reactant backs up and cause them to act to their own disadvantage. All relationships involve give-and-take and cooperation, so a person who habitually attends to ordinary requests or suggestions like a bull to a red flag is in for big trouble in both home and workplace.

: larger structures in the society have inculcated behavior patterns of submission to authority, competition in the workplace, conformism, and passive atomization rather than active participation in decision-making.

The implication is that if you want to quell your inner jerk and avoid spreading (and catching) this form of asshole poisoning, use ideas and language that frame life in ways that will make you focus on cooperation.

[W]e are the ones to blame for enabling and even nourishing the toxic workplaces. In continuing to cooperate with a profoundly unhealthy and exploitative employment system, we become at once the dagger and the wound. Wounds never heal so long as they continue to cooperate with daggers. In a sense, the cure is in the disease itself. Our silence is the disease. Our serious commitment for change and for exposing power abuses and bullies is the cure.

This style of teaching reflects the business community,” one fifth-grade teacher in a Manhattan public school told me, “where people’s respect for others is based on their verbal abilities, not their originality or insight. You have to be someone who speaks well and calls attention to yourself. It’s an elitism based on something other than merit.” “Today the world of business works in groups, so now the kids do it in school,” a third-grade teacher in Decatur, Georgia, explained. “Cooperative learning enables skills in working as teams—skills that are in dire demand in the workplace,” writes the educational consultant Bruce Williams.

The truth is that modern inequality exists because democracy is excluded from the economic sphere. It needs therefore to be dealt with by an extension of democracy into the workplace. We need to experiment with every form of economic democracy – employee ownership, producer and consumer co-operatives, employee representatives on company boards and so on.

Each cooperative in Mondragon has its own workplace structure, though there are similarities and tendencies that most of them share. The firm called Irizar, which manufactures products for trans-portation, from luxury coaches to city buses, exemplifies these tendencies. To encourage innovation and the diffusion of knowledge, there are no bosses or departments in Irizar. Rather, it has a flat organizational structure based on work teams with a high degree of autonomy. (One study remarks that they “set their own targets, establish their own work schedules, [and] organize the work process as they see fit.”) The teams also work with each other, so that knowledge is transmitted efficiently. Participation occurs also in the general assembly, which meets three times a year rather than the single annual meeting common in other Mondragon firms. Its subsidiaries in other countries have at least two general assemblies a year, where they approve the company’s strategic plan, investments, etc. These participatory structures have enabled Irizar to surpass its competitors in profitability and market share.69

Every time you interact with somebody in your family, on the street, or in your workplace, make it your goal to improve the situation or the relationship. If you try to control people, you’ll be breathing down their necks. You can’t force people to do what you want in today’s society. You have to use your words strategically. Generate voluntary compliance and cooperation by directing rather than controlling.

Socialists have advocated numerous ways of democratizing the economy, from setting up worker cooperatives to nationalizing major industries... At the core of economic democracy is the notion that control should not be vested in a small group of people, but in the people who do the labor. Managers and owners shouldn't decide what the workers have to do, the workers should decide what managers have to do (or if they need managers at all). And they should own the workplaces themselves.

You can keep the harasser a certain number of feet away from the victim’s front door, order him not to enter her workplace, and demand that his calls and letters cease, but once she’s an open target walking in a public space or street or subway, the thin sheet of paper handed to her by a judge as an order of the court is as worthless as Confederate currency. The criminal justice system is far more capable of dealing with murder than with harassment, though the line that divides them is often deceptively slim.

Socially. There’s no doubt that relationships at work—be they with managers, colleagues, employees, or clients—are essential to success. Positive emotions strengthen existing relationships. For example, shared laughter—the expression of positive emotion—makes people more open and willing to cooperate.10 A number of studies show that happy employees make for a more congenial workplace. In particular, happy, friendly, and supportive co-workers tend to         •  build higher-quality relationships with others at work11         •  boost co-workers’ productivity levels12         •  increase co-workers’ feeling of social connection13         •  improve commitment to the workplace14         •  increase levels of engagement with their job15         •  provide superior customer service even if they don’t stand to benefit16

But for jobs where learning or collaboration is required for success, fear is not an effective motivator. Brain science has amply demonstrated that fear inhibits learning and cooperation.

Purpose transforms the entire basis for cooperation inside the workplace, turning the enterprise from a nexus of contracts between self-interested individuals into a nexus of commitments.

people who are typically surrounded by jerks learn intuitively to be selfish and also not to deliberate over their actions. They wind up acting selfishly even when cooperating would pay off, precisely because they don't stop to think.

All women bring with them to work their affinity for relationships. Females tend to see the workplace as a network of connections where friendships are established as people cooperate to produce work.

And 14% of southern newlyweds marry someone of another race—a larger share than in the north-east or Midwest, according to the Pew Research Centre, a think-tank. Black and white southerners vote differently (93% of blacks voted Democratic in 2012; 72% of whites, Republican). They also worship separately, for the most part. But the workplace is much more integrated. “It’s not that racism doesn’t exist, it’s just now we can discuss it,” says Aysha Cooper, who runs a day-care centre for the elderly in Snellville, Georgia. Ms Cooper finds that oldies brought up under Jim Crow now mix happily over games and meals. “There are no racial barriers in my centre,” she declares.

Father, in the name of Jesus I come to You repenting of giving in to feelings of fear, heeding the voice of fear, or otherwise cooperating with fear’s assignment against my destiny. Thank You for forgiving me and strengthening me to stand against this spirit in all truth and resisting fear’s lies. I command fear to loose my thoughts. I rebuke the spirit of fear that is working to entrap me, steal my faith, rob my peace, and otherwise riddle me with anxiety, in Christ’s name. I thank You that I have been redeemed from the curse of the law—and the curse of fear. Give me a greater revelation of Your perfect love that casts out all fear so I can withstand fear’s attacks in the evil day. Thank You that You translated me out of fear’s dark grip and into the marvelous light of Your liberty. I stake a claim on what belongs to me in the Spirit even now. I declare that You have not given me a spirit of fear but of power, love, and a sound mind. I command fear to leave my family, my home, and my workplace. I proclaim that fear runs from me. I choose faith, trust, and love. I fear and trust the Lord only, in the name of the Christ. Amen.

To be successful, cultivate positive attitudes of self-respect, pride in your contribution to your workplace, dedication to your job, cooperation with your employers and coworkers, desire to do the job right, personal integrity, responsibility, and accountability—and do it just because you value your life energy.

[Women] tend to see the workplace as a network of connections where friendships are established as people cooperate to produce work. Nothing is wrong with that viewpoint until you realize that, by and large, the work world was created by men—males who tend to see the workplace as a field for competition

Alice talked shit about people at work all the time, but she also seemed to thrive in the Hamilton Cooper male-dominated, bro-y workplace. She talked about dudes like they were himbos, which was hilarious to me. A lot of these guys hit on her when she first arrived, calling her "sexy girl" and "hot", not realizing she was Alice Lin, ballbuster and mankiller. With every jerk that winked, made kissy noises, or commented on how nice she looked, she launched into a tirade about women's rights, Asian American discrimination, and the company's harassment policies, making them shrivel up and slink away.

Toxic management style grooms you into being a cooperating subordinate.

Workplaces that devalue traits and skills like empathy, communication, and cooperation, which women are more likely to be socialized to have, almost always overvalue traits like hypercompetitiveness, aggression, and impulsiveness, which men are more likely to be socialized to have, even when those characteristics harm a work environment.

WHITE SOLIDARITY White solidarity is the unspoken agreement among whites to protect white advantage and not cause another white person to feel racial discomfort by confronting them when they say or do something racially problematic. Educational researcher Christine Sleeter describes this solidarity as white “racial bonding.” She observes that when whites interact, they affirm “a common stance on race-related issues, legitimating particular interpretations of groups of color, and drawing conspiratorial we-they boundaries.”10 White solidarity requires both silence about anything that exposes the advantages of the white position and tacit agreement to remain racially united in the protection of white supremacy. To break white solidarity is to break rank. We see white solidarity at the dinner table, at parties, and in work settings. Many of us can relate to the big family dinner at which Uncle Bob says something racially offensive. Everyone cringes but no one challenges him because nobody wants to ruin the dinner. Or the party where someone tells a racist joke but we keep silent because we don’t want to be accused of being too politically correct and be told to lighten up. In the workplace, we avoid naming racism for the same reasons, in addition to wanting to be seen as a team player and to avoid anything that may jeopardize our career advancement. All these familiar scenarios are examples of white solidarity. (Why speaking up about racism would ruin the ambiance or threaten our career advancement is something we might want to talk about.) The very real consequences of breaking white solidarity play a fundamental role in maintaining white supremacy. We do indeed risk censure and other penalties from our fellow whites. We might be accused of being politically correct or might be perceived as angry, humorless, combative, and not suited to go far in an organization. In my own life, these penalties have worked as a form of social coercion. Seeking to avoid conflict and wanting to be liked, I have chosen silence all too often. Conversely, when I kept quiet about racism, I was rewarded with social capital such as being seen as fun, cooperative, and a team player. Notice that within a white supremacist society, I am rewarded for not interrupting racism and punished in a range of ways—big and small—when I do. I can justify my silence by telling myself that at least I am not the one who made the joke and that therefore I am not at fault. But my silence is not benign because it protects and maintains the racial hierarchy and my place within it. Each uninterrupted joke furthers the circulation of racism through the culture, and the ability for the joke to circulate depends on my complicity. People of color certainly experience white solidarity as a form of racism, wherein we fail to hold each other accountable, to challenge racism when we see it, or to support people of color in the struggle for racial justice.

Competition is NOT good; cooperation is better. So much of Western thinking is based on competition. We experience it when we go through the public school system; "yay team!" And we find it when we enter the workplace. But, over time you will find that the world would be a better place if we all practiced cooperation instead.

The individual most responsible for the triumph of the documentary style was probably Roy Stryker of the government’s Farm Security Administration (FSA), who sent a platoon of famous photographers out to record the lives of impoverished farmers and thus “introduce America to Americans.” Stryker was the son of a Kansas Populist, and, according to a recent study of his work, “agrarian populism” was the “first basic assumption” of the distinctive FSA style. Other agencies pursued the same aesthetic goal from different directions. Federal workers transcribed folklore, interviewed surviving ex-slaves, and recorded the music of the common man. Federally employed artists painted murals illustrating local legends and the daily work of ordinary people on the walls of public buildings. Unknowns contributed to this work, and great artists did too—Thomas Hart Benton, for example, painted a mural that was actually titled A Social History of the State of Missouri in the capitol building in Jefferson City.16 There was a mania for documentary books, photos of ordinary people in their homes and workplaces that were collected and narrated by some renowned prose stylist. James Agee wrote the most enduring of these, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, in cooperation with photographer Walker Evans, but there were many others. The novelist Erskine Caldwell and the photographer Margaret Bourke-White published You Have Seen Their Faces in 1937, while Richard Wright, fresh from the success of his novel Native Son, published Twelve Million Black Voices in 1941, with depictions of African American life chosen from the populist photographic output of the FSA.

Although conservatives might accept violence against socialists and trade unionists, they would not tolerate it against the state. For their part, most fascist leaders have recognized that a seizure of power in the teeth of conservative and military opposition would be possible only with the help of the street, under conditions of social disorder likely to lead to wildcat assaults on private property, social hierarchy, and the state’s monopoly of armed force. A fascist resort to direct action would thus risk conceding advantages to fascism’s principal enemy, the Left, still powerful in the street and workplace in interwar Europe. Such tactics would also alienate those very elements—the army and the police—that the fascists would need later for planning and carrying out aggressive national expansion. Fascist parties, however deep their contempt for conservatives, had no plausible future aligning themselves with any groups who wanted to uproot the bases of conservative power. Since the fascist route to power has always passed through cooperation with conservative elites, at least in the cases so far known, the strength of a fascist movement in itself is only one of the determining variables in the achievement (or not) of power, though it is surely a vital one. Fascists did have numbers and muscle to offer to conservatives caught in crisis in Italy and Germany, as we have seen. Equally important, however, was the conservative elites’ willingness to work with fascism; a reciprocal flexibility on the fascist leaders’ part; and the urgency of the crisis that induced them to cooperate with each other. It is therefore essential to examine the accomplices who helped at crucial points. To watch only the fascist leader during his arrival in power is to fall under the spell of the “Führer myth” and the “Duce myth” in a way that would have given those men immense satisfaction. We must spend as much time studying their indispensable allies and accomplices as we spend studying the fascist leaders, and as much time studying the kinds of situation in which fascists were helped into power as we spend studying the movements themselves.

Production organized by workers builds new relations among producers—relations of cooperation and solidarity; it furthermore allows workers to end “the crippling of body and mind” and the loss of “every atom of freedom, both in bodily and in intellectual activity” (Marx) that comes from the separation of head and hand characteristic of capitalist production. As long as workers are prevented from developing their capacities by combining thinking and doing in the workplace, they remain alienated and fragmented human beings whose enjoyment consists in possessing and consuming things. Further, as long as this production is carried out for their private gain rather than that of society, they look upon others (and, indeed, each other) as means to their own ends and thus remain alienated, fragmented, and crippled. Social production, thus, is a condition for the full development of the producers.