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Boundaries are designed to give organizations the ability to stay aligned with their vision, mission, and goals for conducting business. Vision, mission, and goals can be found in mission statements, annual reports, or on an organization’s website. Job descriptions also provide boundaries to employees by informing them where they need to spend their time and work efforts to meet company goals.

What are boundaries?

While the organization’s boundaries are outlined in the mission, vision, and goals, boundaries also need to be set for vendors and customers. While setting boundaries with vendors and clients can cause a lot of angst (for both parties), defining the business relationship early and clearly is necessary. Depending on the type of business, these expectations can be put into a legal document. Organizations need to know their boundaries, and employees, vendors, and customers must understand the consequences of going beyond. Communicating boundaries is difficult, especially if you’re not clear where your boundaries lie.

Why are they essential in the workplace?

Boundaries help identify what behavior is and isn’t acceptable for each employee, which helps create a standard definition of good behavior for your work environment. The world is changing, and our language, values, and behaviors within the workplace are also changing. (1)

How can leaders encourage healthy boundaries through modeling behavior?

  • Start small: If boundaries don’t exist with you as a leader within the organization, start by making those likely to be accepted. How do you minimize resistance to boundaries? Begin by asking the people who are most likely to have issues with boundaries (or who already violate them now.) It might seem counter-intuitive to ask boundary-benders or violators to be involved in developing guidelines, but this can have the opposite impact because they will feel part of the process. You may also learn why they are benders or violators in the first place. Some may never fit into a structure and may be best suited elsewhere. Others may never have had an opportunity to voice issues with people or processes that make them feel that THEIR boundaries are being violated. Fresh perspectives may provide innovative methods to enhance productivity and morale. Adjustments may need to be made in other situations, such as retraining, mentoring, shifting teams for better cohesion, better consistency in management, etc.
  • Establish a structure: Build healthy boundaries, communication, behaviors, beliefs, attitudes, etc., into corporate culture. Be diligent about protecting the corporate culture and the norms established by its structure. Everyone needs to contribute to this process, from the top-down, bottom-up, and so forth.
  • Initiate early in the relationship: Starting with the initial candidate selection and vetting process, be selective about who makes the cut. Look for candidates who share the same attitudes, respect, beliefs, and behaviors even with the little details – showing up on time, dependability, respect, etc. Identify sloppiness versus thoroughness, transparency versus half-truth, authenticity versus trying to fit in, etc. Doing this early can prevent a lot of frustration, anxiety, confusion, feelings of hurt, or not being of value to the organization or other workers.
  • Use self-reflection: Whether as a leader or any other worker, self-reflection can be powerful. It’s not always a “what could I have done better,” but it can also be “what do I do well, that I’d like to do more of…” or “what are new perspectives I learned because of this?” Self-reflection also involves introspection. Introspection is examining our own emotional and mental processes. Introspection can give us knowledge about our inner workings. Introspection is like perception, but unlike perception, it does not revolve around our five senses. We don’t touch, taste, smell, see, or hear to gain insights. Deeper or more frequent introspection can help us gain clarity that helps us move forward and live our lives more effectively. So being introspective is generally thought of as a good thing. Sometimes self-reflection can be difficult because there are parts that no one wants to look at within themselves as areas that need improvement. Still, when used effectively, self-reflection and introspection can boost confidence, build mental endurance, and challenge new thinking. (2)
  • Consistency is key: Boundaries can be hard to enforce. It is difficult for leaders to implement boundaries universally, for extended periods, and across various departments. However, it is a must. Boundaries are like promises that act as building blocks in healthy relationships. Each time they aren’t kept, a small part of trust, integrity, and respect is torn down. Reconstruction is possible, but it takes diligence to do so. Admitting mistakes and fixing them will gain back trust and integrity. When you set new expectations, offer incentives to keep them and hold everyone accountable, including leaders, to the same standards.
  • Encourage healthy communication: There are a variety of dangerous ways to communicate that lead to dysfunctional communication, so beware of communication which may feature:
    1. a loudest voice or strongest opinion which always gets the most attention,
    2. overstepping and challenging weak authority,
    3. the peppering of questions merely to control the conversation,
    4. blame shifting, gaslighting or non-productive,
    5. negative feedback -or constructive feedback that is met with extreme resistance,
    6. distractions, not keeping the conversation on-topic,
    7. excuses, high emotions, disrespectful/resentful attitudes, etc.
    8. a history of prickly responses or unwillingness to get involved
    9. continues to ask, “why am I here? Why can’t someone else do it? What is {NAME} doing?”

Great communication involves two or more people invested in a specific outcome. This investment doesn’t mean that healthy debate isn’t acceptable. It should be encouraged. It doesn’t mean that questions shouldn’t be asked and answered. It does mean that everyone should have an opportunity to respectfully and effectively communicate by both listening and speaking to allow everyone to feel heard, valued, and understood.

If you’re like most people in a meeting, you probably want to ensure that your point of view is heard. And in doing that, you may ignore the other person, pretend that you’re listening, and concentrate on only the words which are said but miss their meaning entirely. (3)

So why does this happen? A key to effective communication is to listen. Dr. Stephen R. Covey, in his book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, points out “…that most people do not listen with the intent to understand what is being said but listen with the intent to reply.” A participant, who is listening to understand, should be able to say, “Is this what you are saying? And then wait for a reply. (3) Listening is a proactive skill rather than a passive one like hearing.

  • Broaden circles: Research shows most social interactions occur within the confines of people like themselves – making them less sensitive to how people outside their ‘social bubble’ live. This segregation can lead to profound misperceptions. If everyone in your circle agrees with you or does not want to offend you by what they say, perhaps it’s time to expand your circle to include some people outside of your process who will tell you, not what you want to hear, but what they think you need to hear.

Once you’ve gained perspective by zooming out, pay attention to which details are essential to achieving your goals, and take time to make sure you have sufficient information to make a decision.

  • Minimize areas of toxic energy: Spend less time in social media or other areas where negativity prevails. Being on social media, checking notifications on Facebook, scrolling through pictures on Instagram, reading quick updates on Twitter, interacting in groups on LinkedIn or whatever, has become part of everyday life. But if you don’t control how much time your employees spend on it, the hours will fly by, and nothing will have been accomplished. So, either ban it, put a time limit on it or work on a collective policy for the company. If leadership is on social media – you can bet the employees are as well. Leadership needs to address the appropriate times (perhaps on breaks or lunch) for checking social media and get buy-in from those checking their feeds every ten minutes. Set the boundaries and enforce the boundaries for everyone.Pro-Tip: Even social media and community managers, as well as anyone who has frontline interaction with prospects, customer, and vendor partners, needs time away. This time should be designated differently than a standard break policy. Frontline workers and those who exclusively interact with people in social media for a living are subjected to many levels of toxic human responses. Complaints, service calls, online debates, etc., are just a few of hundreds to name. Whether behind a mask, phone or computer, stakeholders can treat frontend workers in a deplorable way. Be sure to give your workers not only words of appreciation but the time to take a mental health break to keep them running at their peak potential.
  • Respect the boundaries of others: Basic human needs include those of being heard and accepted. No one will ever fit into what the “perfect person” should be. Don’t force someone to make them fit your ideals. Instead, let them be themselves and show them respect, whether or not they have earned it. You’ll earn their respect by listening to them and resisting the urge to interrupt or react instead of responding. When you respond, it means you’ve taken a moment to reflect on what you heard, including the verbal cues, as well as the body language you’ve observed. Responding versus reacting means that you’re invested in the outcome of the interaction and have made a conscious attempt to “read” the boundaries that the other person is establishing. When in doubt, ask about boundaries. If someone says, “I don’t like it when you provide me timelines when you drop off projects,” that’s a pretty clear boundary. In the future, you can rectify that issue by simply including a timeline or due date for each project. Sometimes you may have to look more closely for clues. For example, if your co-worker always gets her assignments approved before yours, you could ask her the secret of getting approved despite yours being handed in earlier. It may be that she’s completed all the necessary paperwork, had preapproval or buy-in earlier in the process, or something else that can be easily modified in your work structure to reflect your boss’s preferences.
  • Appreciate/cheer others on: Remember the little details (e.g., their favorite movie or book or flower or color), be respectful of their time, listen – limit distractions and be active in the process, be available, follow-through on your promises, help them out when they need it, tell them “how” you appreciate them, tell others how much you appreciate them or how helpful they were and how, etc., celebrate successes (e.g., little notes, balloons, e-cards, cupcakes, take them out for lunch, etc.), ask them how they would like to celebrate their successes (e.g., some want to do so quietly while others enjoy the limelight)
  • Don’t forget to be your own biggest champion: Remember you have value. In the workplace, especially when morale may be low or the job demanding, it may be challenging to feel that your role, work, and efforts make a difference.
    1. Keep a journal of your accomplishments and, when possible, include metrics. For example – if you’ve reduced costs but increased customer satisfaction or shortened the sales cycle through increased efficiencies or new techniques, and so forth, include the “how much.” This journal can be referenced on days when you’re feeling discouraged and need a boost, utilized to present your rationale as to why you’ve earned a raise or promotion, and even to express the need why investments need to be made into your department (making you the go-to source for information!)
    2. Use positive self-talk. Replace negative thoughts or ideas with positive ones. For example: Instead of thinking, “I don’t have the skills to do this project,” replace with “I am intelligent and capable of learning new things. I can do this project!”
    3. Take on constructive feedback as an opportunity to improve rather than something malicious, undermining, and given with cruel intentions. Constructive feedback at its heart is beneficial. Issues that can be fixed help you excel beyond expectations.

Boundaries are designed to give organizations the ability to stay aligned with their vision, mission, and goals for conducting their business. As the world changes, our language, values, and behaviors within the workplace also change. Leadership needs to model and encourage their team members to set boundaries. Many employees mimic management, so if management models a work-life balance, it will have a much more significant impact than the “do as I say, not as I do” phrase. A lack of boundaries can contribute to workplace issues such as miscommunication, conflict, less loyalty from your employees, and a lack of respect from vendors and customers.

 

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SOURCES:

  1. https://corporatecommunicationexperts.com.au/setting-boundaries-in-the-workplace/
  2. https://www.berkeleywellbeing.com/introspection.html
  3. https://www.berkeleywellbeing.com/introspection.html
Eloisa Mendez
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