You’ve probably heard it before. When you assume, you make an ass out of U and ME. Nowhere is this more true than in the workplace. Assumptions at work can lead to misunderstood expectations, missed deadlines, and unaddressed problems. There are all sorts of assumptions that can cause problems at work.
Assumption 1: Everyone is living in your world
I was recently listening to a friend complain about an experience they had involving room setup for an event. The room wasn’t ready, or even being worked on, an hour before the event started. The employee responsible insisted that arriving and setting up 30 minutes before the event was perfectly normal and reasonable. In the course of complaining to me about this, my friend said something interesting. She said this isn’t how things work “in my world”.
That struck me. No clear definition of “ahead of time” had been agreed upon between these two parties because they assumed they were living in the same world – one where “ahead of time” means the same thing to everyone. I think this assumption is especially dangerous when dealing with different generations. (Perhaps it is worth mentioning that the annoyed person in this story was a boomer, and the employee was not.)
Assumption 2: Everyone has the same basic capabilities
This could look like making assumptions that everyone can read and comprehend at the same speed. It could look like assuming that the calculation that you make easily in your head is equally easy for everyone. Other examples include:
- Differences in what information is easy to remember. I’m pretty good with words, but awful with numbers. They just don’t stick.
- The same background noise that is easy for one person to block out may be virtually impossible for someone else to ignore.
- Something as simple as the ability to make eye contact, especially for an extended period of time, can be extremely taxing to some people, while others think nothing of it.
Assumption 3: Everyone shares the same cultural points of reference
This can be an issue in intergenerational workplaces. It is definitely one to be aware of in multinational workplaces (and when dealing with international customers). However, even when someone seems to be about the same age and nationality, that doesn’t mean that you’ve read the same books, watched the same shows, listened to the same comedians, etc.
This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t make cultural references. It does mean that you should be aware of any implicit assumptions that everyone else has the same familiarity and relationship to whatever you are referencing. Are your assumptions implying that someone is uneducated if they haven’t read a certain author’s books? Are you using an analogy that means only people who have seen a certain movie will understand what you are explaining?
Look, everyone makes assumptions. Also, we can all afford to be a little more aware of the impact of those assumptions. What other assumptions can you think of that are a problem in the workplace? Let me know in the comments!