As you first look at this poster, you’ll notice that one of the boxes is a solid line. The other is a dotted line.
I happen to have the woman inside the dotted line boundaries since that is most frequently how I see this play out in the work place. However, it might just as easily be that the man is in the dotted line boundaries with another man in the other boundaries or even a woman in the other boundaries.
What it means is that someone doesn’t have their boundaries clearly defined, and consequently it’s easy for the other party to violate those boundaries and step in where they are not wanted. This causes the other person to lose respect for the person who allows their boundaries to be violated.
In the case that you see in this poster, a woman, who typically values relationships more than the man, allows her boundaries to be a dotted line for the sake of keeping the relationship. She compromises more; she accommodates more than the man does. Consequently, the man ultimately loses respect for her.
I believe she does this because of some very understandable reasons. The physicality of a woman is not as strong as that of a man and consequently she uses relationships oftentimes to achieve what she wants. Whereas a man believes he can just very often punch his way to what he wants; a woman depends on relationships in order to achieve that which she desires. In most cases she values relationships more than men do, and consequently allows her boundaries to be violated more than men.
Let’s put it in a physical context. If somebody came by and kicked the back of your chair every morning as they came to work, how long would it take you to say, “That’s not acceptable.”? Twice? Three times? One time? How long will it take you to say, “That’s not acceptable,” when passed over for another promotion? How long will it take you to say, “That’s not acceptable,” when you’re called out in an insulting way in a public meeting?
These are all boundary issues.
My encouragement to you is to go to http://davearch.com/boundaries/, where part of a wonderful book on the subject of boundaries has been dictated as an audio book. You can download that as a podcast if this is an area in which you believe you could stand strengthening.
A leader knows where his or her boundaries are and doesn’t allow people to violate them – realizing that sometimes it will put the relationship at risk. S/he encourages his/her followers to do the same.
Categories: Assertiveness, Sociability
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