A lesson learned

In such days, you have to bow your head, think back, and reflect to what you did wrong and try to fix it for a better tomorrow.

There was a crisis at work on a project that I delegated to someone else because I had another responsibility.
The bottom line is, my client did not provide us with enough information and did not comply with my company's basic vendor procedure. For two years we had worked together and an issue had never come out.

Until yesterday.

Things that was not requested, suddenly was. Things that was not my company's responsibility, suddenly became one.
It exploded. In the middle of finishing up at the other place, I was called up to respond to this crisis. After a very long day of battle and putting out fires, everything was finally over.

Or so I thought.

I walked back to my desk and suddenly two of my team members called for a meeting. Even though the crisis was finally taken care of and we were finally off to a better ground with my selfish client; the situation is not the same with my team.
Not knowing what I had to go through on the other side battling with the client - they confronted me and letting their heart out. Fingers were being pointed, harsh words were flying all over the place. A volcano errupted.
From their perspective: I did not bother to understand how hard they had worked to help me in this project. Also that it seemed to them that I had always battled for the client and fulfilling their needs without enough consideration on the hard work that the team had to work on.
After a long conversation and heart-to-heart talk, finally we understood that both parties, myself and team members have not expressed and explained each other well enough until this time on the degree or situation of things that we do in our respective positions.

Apologies were expressed, broken hearts were mended, and off we go to a new page, a hopefully better tomorrow.

Lessons learned:
- I have to share and share and share so my team would understand that I am doing everything that I could in my power to help them and protect them. This was something that they never see directly, and thus uninformed.
- I also have to spend more time to listen to them and revisit my approach when speaking to them, so they know for sure I am with them at every step of the way.


This was a lesson that I had to learn the hard way. However it is also something I am determined to use as a stepping stone to make better decisions in the future.

Onwards, upwards!