When my daughter and I made her chore chart she asked me to include a chore that states “help someone out” It is by far her favorite chore and if I’m being honest, I love hearing about her good deed at the end of the day. For a few weeks she would come home from school and proudly proclaim that she helped her friend with reading, science, math or whatever it is they were working on that day.
So, one day I asked her why she is helping her friends with their schoolwork instead of the teacher. She simply said, ‘Because I know how’. My daughter new how to do the assigned schoolwork and when she noticed her classmates were struggling, she readily stepped in to catch them up. This got me thinking, why don’t we all do this? Why is it that when we see a person in our workplace struggling, we don’t help them if we can? We are all on the same team, we all have a common goal. If we wish to succeed, then why not equip each other with the proper tools for success? Below are a few reasons why I believe that information and resources are not freely shared.
Knowledge is Power
When considering reasons why people don’t freely share resources I kept going back to the phrase ‘knowledge is power’ I’m sure that it is something that we have all heard at some point. Everybody wants to be the go-to guy, and when you have all the information regarding a certain subject, but doesn’t that just intensify your workload? Now, you not only have to work on your current projects/duties, but you have extra stuff to do because you’re the only person that knows how to do it. I get it though, being the go-to guy has its advantages and can easily make you visible to leadership but maybe leading a training session on the subject could get you that visibility as well.
Maybe I’m Wrong
Another reason could be that people are not confident in their knowledge. They don’t want to share it because they fear their suggestions are faulty and will not truly help another person but instead hinder them. Or they might have made plenty of mistakes to find the answer and they don’t want to be embarrassed by sharing them. The self-doubt these workers have is real and they need a confidence boost. As a co-worker accepting information from them, if it doesn’t work out for you in the intended way you don’t need to lash out at them. There are not one size fits all solutions for work problems. Appreciate the fact that your coworker made the effort to help, learn from it and I encourage you to go back and thank that co-worker regardless of the outcome.
Encouraging a Knowledge Sharing Work Environment
As leaders, supervisors, or managers we all play big roles in how our team operates. Creating an environment with a knowledge sharing culture requires leaders to support and recognize employees helping each other out not just the top performers or that go-to person. As a leader you should also be an example of knowledge sharing. You gained your position through time and experience, so step in and help a fellow colleague out. Become a mentor to your employees or even better, setup mentorship program within your workplace, this is surely to encourage more open communication.
In conclusion
Let’s all strive to do plenty of good deeds by helping each other out. Let’s develop that mindset where there is open communication and information is flowing freely. Save your co-worker a couple hours of debugging/problem solving by sharing your experiences and how you resolved them. Do this simply because you know how.
