Room 602 of the Oncology Critical Care Unit

This difficult situation of a manager torn between an urgent project, an insecure boss. and a dying mother beautiful illustrates the power of synergy-of coming up with better third alternatives.

I was a single parent rearing two teenagers and professionally I was at a critical juncture in my career. I had been the project manager for a major corporate initiative for two years. The project was nearing completion, and in anticipation of its conclusion, I was beginning to assume some of the responsibilities of my new position in another area. However, the mandate was clear: complete the project as soon as possible.

At the same time, my mother, who lived sixteen hundred miles away in South Texas, was diagnosed with cancer. The prognosis was worse than any of us expected. When the surgeon finished exploratory surgery, he told us, in words that I can still remember to this day, “Resection would not be conductive to life. I can only give her two weeks to three months to live.”

Life has a way of teaching us the need for balance in our lives, for determining what is really important. Obviously, my mother’s condition was a major focus for me; so was my career. The question was truly one of balance. How could I spend every minute possible with my mother, caring for her, and still complete the project in a professional manner? Convinced that I could not do both because of the distance between the two settings, i concluded that I must turn my back on the project and request family leave to be with my mother.

Having made the private decision, I needed to apply the interpersonal habits- Habits 4,5 and 6 [Think Win-Win; Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood; Synergize] – In working with my employers. Thinking win-win was easy in this case. I really was devoted to my company; I didn’t want to leave them in the lurch on this project. I wanted to win for the company but I knew I needed to be close to my mother for those last few weeks. So I thought that turning the project over to somebody else would be in the company’s best interest.

I approached my supervisor prepared to seek first to understand. She was new in the company. Her performance was being scrutinized and she needed to make a good impression. She needed this project completed in a time and effective fashion. She also used Habit 5 to seek first to understand my needs and those of my family. I learned a key lesson that day: when two parties honestly is reward for effectively thinking win-win and seek first to understand.

For the next three months, I continued to complete my responsibilities for the project by laptop from my mother’s hospital room. When meetings were necessary, the parties from the office gathered together and I joined them via telephone from my temporary office, Room 602 of the Oncology Critical Care Unit. For the first time in her life, my mother delighted in seeing her daughter at work. She commented on my contributions to meetings and questioned aspects of the project. I provided a good diversion for what had become her routine of shots, medication, doctors, and nurses.

At the end, the project was successfully completed and on time. And I was able to spend previous hours, days and weeks with my mother.

 “The key moment in this story occurred as this woman courageously approached her supervisor and shared her dilemma. Many people hesitate to do this because they have to confront some fears-particularly the fear of not ending up with the result they desire. Someone put it beautifully; “Courage is the quality of every quality at its highest testing point.”

The key insight that the person acquired was that synergy is the fruit-that Habit 6 always follows the roots, Habit 4: Think Win-Win, and Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood. If there is a spirit of true win-win and there is an effort to achieve mutual understanding, almost inevitably new insights and alternatives are created. 

Source: Living with 7 Habits