Several years ago, I was invited to be a member of a team for a competition. I agreed to participate but there were issues, primary among them, a complete lack of external ownership or leadership of the team. In the absence of external leadership, we tried to establish some internal direction of our own. Unfortunately, one member of the team (the person who had been called first and presumably saw himself as the leader) flatly refused participate in any preparatory work with the rest of us. We tried several times to encourage him to join us in prep meetings, but he was always too busy.
The young gentleman never met with us. When the rest of the team met, we determined that he couldn't be part of the A team. Given that he had never met with us and got a sense of how we worked, we felt it in the best interests of the team that he serve in a minor role. Once we got to the competition venue, we tried to tell him this gently but he didn't take it well. We made the tactical error of delivering this information in a public place (a very bad idea) and he had a royal meltdown. The wine he had had at dinner probably didn't help his reaction, but let's just say that the way he carried on was quite embarrassing. He was so pissed, he changed his flight arrangments and returned home the next morning. Apparently, if he wasn't to be on the A team, he wouldn't play at all.
Now, this is where the story got interesting because he ran home and reported us. I have no idea what details he might have reported, but when we got back, we were called in to be upbraided. The Director advised me that she was extremely disturbed at our treatment of him. I, being genetically opposed to being upbraided unfairly (an ailment from which I am slowly recovering), asked her whether in his reporting he had advised her of our repeated attempts to have him join us to prepare (and his repeated refusals). Pause, "Uh, no." I asked whether he had, in his reportings, advised her of his behavior in the public space of the hotel, when we tried to explain why he would need to serve as alternate as a consequence of his refusal to prepare jointly. "Uh, no." she replied. So he had shared only the version of the story that made him look like the wronged party and she, instead of getting the other side, had leapt to a conclusion and doled out punishment without first doing any independent research.
What I learned that day was simply this: first come, first served; first spoke is first believed. Moreover, having spoken first, you must have been telling the truth. Why would you hustle to report a lie? In fact though, it is the liars who have the most to gain by reporting first and inferring truth from eagerness to report is a most unwise approach to management. The job of management is to troubleshoot interpersonal conflicts that affect team dynamics. Instead of doing that, what I've found (and this has happened to me more than once now), is that rather than troubleshoot, managers sometimes just take the path of least resistance.
'First spoke, first believed' is rubbish. It's a lazy way of dealing with the inevitable conflicts and challenges that will arise on any team. To presume that the first to speak is telling the truth is to forget human nature. Children who tell tales usually do so in an effort to protect themselves from the consequences of their own malfeasance. We should assume that the same is true of adult employees who have not only face to save, but jobs and lifestyles to preserve. Managers would also do well to consider that he/she who does not report, may have much to report as well, but (s)he chooses to handle conflict by using his/her words, not by running to the teacher.
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