Any time you are managing a large group of people (almost 600 members now) you are bound to run into a few… let’s call them personality conflicts. Since we are an advocate for our members, when one member has an issue with another member, the members are encouraged to contact the Association.
Our goal is to help people communicate better with one another. I always find it interesting when a room full of people listen to a speaker and all walk away with different experiences. The same thing happens when we are dealing with regular conversations and business dealings. We are all perceiving life through our own lens and that may or may not be what is ACTUALLY being intended for us. The meaning of things can get a little warped if we are in the wrong mental state when we experience something.
As a company, we are usually very good about helping each member see the other’s perspective, get back on the same page together, and build an even stronger relationship as a result, but sometimes the issue escalates to what we call an “incident”.
That is when one member feels another member has done something that violates their trust or confidence. We don’t have to deal with this a lot, but we do have these cases. When this happens, each party is to fill out an incident report so we have a record of both sides of the story, and there are always two sides. We will do research, investigate the claim, and when we feel we have enough information, we have a meeting to discuss with the parties. Next we create an action plan, sometimes that means a member goes on probation, sometimes that is removal from the association (we abide by a code of ethics), sometimes legal counsel is brought in, but most times it is an agreement to proceed with new boundaries and parameters set in place.
We want to protect our members and help them. That means we have to stand behind them at every chance we can and also help them develop whenever they need that. Sometimes it’s just nice for them to have a willing ear to listen to them as they sort through the experience. We all deserve to be heard.