11
Chapter 2
Golden Nuggets
After answering a few e-mails and phone calls, Eliza
went down the hall to Dave’s ofce to check on him.
He was still fuming as she sat down across from him.
“I just got off the phone with their CEO again. They
are denitely rattled, but I told them Claire just didn’t
know what she was talking about.”
“Do you want me to call him myself?” Eliza asked.
“No, I think I walked him back from the cliff. But
what the hell, Eliza? If you had learned on Friday that
the client thought the entire order was wrong, wouldn’t
you have called me? Wouldn’t you have called some-
one? I mean, tell me if it’s just me, but knowing how
important these guys are to our product line expansion,
I’m just stunned that Claire didn’t at least shoot me an
e-mail or something! She let it fester for the whole week-
end! Seriously, sometimes I think Claire can only stare
12 ◾ Transforming Teams
at the trees and is totally clueless that she’s standing in
the middle of a big, fat, freaking forest!
“And Kirby should have known!” he thundered. “He
was with me for all of the calls. Did he think that I was
requiring these specications for my own amusement?
“Honestly, Eliza, you have no idea how frustrating it
is to work with Claire and her team. Sure, managing all
of the incoming orders is hard to do, but if the orders
aren’t coming in, they have no jobs, right? Don’t they
see that? Can’t they connect the dots between what we
in sales do and their own jobs? But when I approach
them with a new order, all I get from them is ‘that can’t
be done,’ or ‘we can’t satisfy that time frame,’ or ‘that
has to go at the bottom of the list while we work on all
of these other orders.’ They have no sense of urgency.
They have no concept of prioritization. Let them walk a
day in my shoes and see how they like it!”
Eliza thought it best not to aggravate him further—
not for the time being, but she did need to address one
item with him immediately.
“Listen, I can certainly understand your frustration.
I know that sometimes there is a lack of appreciation
for what you and your team does day in and day out.
But I also think that goes both ways. And I’m not sure
telling the client that it was all Claire’s fault was a good
approach. I don’t like the idea of airing dirty laundry in
front of clients, and I don’t think it helps.
“In fact, I know you don’t want to hear this, but
I think you could probably have kept Claire better
informed about the systems conversion. You knew
that conversion would be a big priority for the client.
Golden Nuggets ◾ 13
And if it affects the client, it will denitely affect Claire
and her team. That said, I think you are right to be
concerned.
“Dave, do me a favor. For now, let’s just focus on
making this right. Let’s get it resolved to the client’s sat-
isfaction. We’ll address what went wrong once we pull
this one out of the re,” Eliza stated.
* * *
Alone in her ofce and with the door shut, Eliza
reected on the dramatic events of the morning.
Serious damage had been made to a key, high-prole
client, one that is critical to the rollout of the company’s
new modular product line. But even more ominously,
Dave and Claire seemed to be in an all-out war with
each other.
Once the dust settled, she knew she would need to
address this conict. It was almost as if the two were
absolutely incapable of seeing eye to eye. Eliza was so
rattled by what had transpired that she had failed to
notice how tense she herself had become. She paused
to take stock of how she was feeling. Her brow was
tight and she felt edgy and uneasy.
Earlier in her career, Eliza had always embraced the
stress that came with her job. She thought that thriv-
ing on adrenaline was part of what it takes to be suc-
cessful, and that the more passionate she was about
a situation, the better she would be at managing it.
She believed this even after she began to suffer some
side effects from living with constant stress—elevated
14 ◾ Transforming Teams
blood pressure, an occasional ulcer, skin disorders, and
insomnia.
It wasn’t until her boss at the time took her aside
and told her that she was not performing well that she
gured out the truth. In reality, under all the stress, she
was not making clear choices, she was less creative,
and she was more likely to exaggerate the negative
attributes of a situation, all of which were affecting her
performance at work.
Her boss recommended that she get a professional
coach, which she did. Her coach introduced her to the
concept of Emotional Intelligence, also known as EQ—
the practice of applying control over one’s emotions to
facilitate higher levels of collaboration and productiv-
ity. What she learned as a result of this coaching was
that she was poor at recognizing the signs that she was
in an emotional state. She was not aware of her own
moods, and she lacked the necessary skills to redirect
her stress-induced impulses. She lacked self-regulation.
By working with her coach to recognize her moods
and emotions as she was experiencing them, she
learned that the goal wasn’t to avoid emotions, for that
would be impossible. Instead, the goal was to use the
techniques necessary to redirect her emotions to enable
her to perform at a higher level during times of stress.
And this was one of those times.
With the door shut, she practiced the techniques
that her coach had taught her so that she could become
aware of her emotional and physical state and regulate
her stress. Eliza closed her eyes and made a mental scan
of her body. She was tense: her hands were in a st; her
Golden Nuggets ◾ 15
neck and shoulders were tight; and her stomach was in
knots. She opened her hands and placed them on her
lap, palm side up. She relaxed her neck and shoulders,
and she took a number of deep, calming breaths.
As she was breathing, she pictured a photograph
taken a few years ago of her daughters as babies play-
ing on the beach at a summer cottage they had rented.
As she focused on the mental image of that picture,
she could almost taste the saltwater in the air and hear
the waves lapping against the shore. Slowly, the tension
in her body released. Her sense of fear and concern
ebbed as well. She became very calm. Once relaxed,
she sat back in her chair and opened her eyes.
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