IToldYouSoIsm

Corporate citizens know it very well and I, being part of a bigger company which used to be smaller company and also being rather naive with strong faith in humanity (despite the recent discovery of Nescafé issue by Kevlin Henney), I am only discovering this now.
Ever since I joined Y Soft, I have been wondering what makes a “corporate” and how to avoid some of the pitfalls of losing flexibility and just doing things. Recently, I have discovered one of those which I really and particularly hate: IToldYouSoIsm (“JáSemToŘikalIsmus” in Czech, feel free to substitute your own translation in your mother tongue).
IToldYouSoIsm is dangerous because it indicates that people feel powerless and unable to improve things for the better. It is a manifestation of frustration which does not help anybody and only recirculates negativity.
IToldYouSoIsm is about people who were right not being able to convince others that they were right. It does not really matter if they were right because they had better ideas or they were more experienced or they knew something the others did not. They were right and if somebody listened to them, we could have avoided mistakes which we did not avoid.
IToldYouSoIsm is equally about the fact that nobody is perfect and people make mistakes and it is normal. The fact that you were right once does not mean that you will not be wrong tomorrow. The lesson I am learning the hard way everyday.
The person who “told us so” was unable to positively influence one or more past decision which proved wrong. We need to start asking ourselves how to enable such people to be heard and their opinions accepted. Without inviting everybody to a single meeting.
The person who is being told that somebody told us so is not perfect and made a mistake. It does not mean that the person is incompetent or that they do not know their stuff. There is no need to triumph over them pointing out that I was right this time and told them so.
So in the end, I decided to strike out IToldYouSo from my vocabulary and make sure that if I feel I have something relevant to say, I say it make sure that I either convince the others I am right or accept the decision as mine as well. Life will be easier for all of us, at least it’s going to be less frustrating. Challenge is that it works best if everyone does it, i.e. it becomes part of team culture.
We all are victims and culprits at the same time here. Hence this thought post.
PS: IToldYouSoIsm / JáSemToŘikalIsmus has been invented by guys from Lumitrix. They helped me to realize how dangerous that really is. So if you are looking for a great interactive video mapping solution, pay them a visit.
