People are often uncomfortable with differences and try to prove that we are all the same. They ask me questions like:
Aren’t we all just humans after all?
Nope! They may look the part, but no way are we all human. Some “people” are not people at all! They may speak human languages and walk upright, but many human types are not really human. We see them on the nightly news. They show up in political debates. They often manifest themselves in the forms of bosses, consultants, pundits, commentators, and so on, but nah, not all are humans.
Where am I going with this?
We are not all the same, even if we have some things in common, but that’s really okay! In fact, it can be very good! Because differences can be uncomfortable for us, we often tend to marginalize and mitigate them, but differences can be as good as similarities. I mean it.
Me running sprints well, and you running distances well makes a better track team. We have differences: different gifts, different talents, different muscle composition, different lung capacity, different fast-twitch muscle fiber, different event times, different training, different diet, different exercise, different gear, different preferences, different backgrounds, different experience, different shapes, sizes, and colors, but on the same team, our differences are a good thing. Your talent coupled with mine help both of us more than we could help ourselves on our own. To borrow a line from a previous post of mine: Some call it synergy.
Don’t oversimplify. Yes, there are commonalities, but there are also differences. Don’t pretend that the differences are unimportant. They are valuable.
Worse, don’t pretend that they aren’t there. They are there and should be recognized…just don’t denigrate others because they’re not the same as you.
Rue Dooley, SHRM-SCP has been an HR Knowledge Advisor for SHRM for over 20 years and has plenty of HR experience as a practitioner and consultant. Rue has daily direct contact with HR professionals around the world, helping them to create solutions, to improve systems, and to find and use resources that improve the delivery of the HR function. Rue has authored and co-authored numerous articles on a variety of subjects; conducted webcasts and podcasts; created videos, and has been quoted in various media outlets.
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