How to Teach the Twelve Cognitive Processes 133
may not work for another. A leader learns to figure out who is who and what works for each member of the team. The conscious part of this is about learning who needs what from the leader in order for the leader to get the most out of each individual so that the team’s goals are achieved. The subconscious part is about interacting with others, which is rarely conscious behavior. We get smarter through experience. If our team wins because we functioned well as a team, we learn to repeat the behaviors that worked. If we win because our team was simply much bigger than the other team, then we probably won't learn much about teamwork.
Teamwork can be taught only by examining how a team functions and attempting to make conscious the subconscious behavior that is not working. Thinking about what we have done that may not have been helpful to the team, and making sure that team members’ goals are aligned, is pretty much the only way we can learn to improve our behavior.
HOW TO TEACH NEGOTIATION
My daughter was a little over 2 when we moved back to the United States from Switzerland. The enormity of U.S. toy stores overwhelmed her and it seemed that she wound up crying every time we entered one. She wanted everything. So I had what I thought was a clever idea. I told her that she could have two toys of her choice but that if she cried she couldn't get any at all. We talked about it and it was clear that she had understood what I said. She ran around the toy store and end- ed up selecting three toys. I told her one would have to go back—that our agreement was two. She started crying hysterically. I then said she had to put them all back as she had violated our no crying agreement. All of sudden, she sucked up all her tears and said in a breathless voice: I’m not crying now. I said that we would compromise on one toy. That was possibly her first lesson in negotiating. I say possibly because kids and parents negotiate all the time. She and J are still ne- gotiating. Now it is about when she will come to visit or when she will send her son down to visit or a range of other family issues. Negotiation is so important that it is nearly absurd to ask how we teach negotiation. We can learn it by copying, of course, which I did when I watched my father get a good price on a used car I was buying that I was ready to pay much more for. But really we negotiate with
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