I know I already discussed that but will need to state it again – I believe the Home Group drama caused me some type of brain damage, one where I’m unusually focused on working out what’s happening around me. That helps me understand some of the human behaviours that were puzzling me before but at a cost of feeling triggered a lot. I wonder whether that will eventually stop?

As I am trying to work out what is happening around me I am aware that quite a lot of that knowledge is rather useless, I was able to cope quite ok without it, yes, I wasn’t successful but I was doing ok. I also know some autistic people who are successful. I also know some neurotypicals who are brilliant communicators and very good at what they do, yet are struggling to get the recognition they deserve, so I would risk saying that the need to understand people to succeed in life is at least somehow overrated.

Yet, as I recently worked out some workplace tactics that I saw over the years and didn’t understand, I will write about them. I guess some people may find them useful. And could you please refrain from using the term ‘office politics’ as that implies that if one doesn’t work in the office they are not at risk, while care homes and hospitals can be full of politics too so please say ‘workplace politics’ instead.

One of the tactic that was puzzling me is when someone puts consistently enormous effort into their work, making everything over the top. I thought those people are just workaholics and need to learn to relax. Example would be: there is a new colleague in your workplace who consistently makes the same, small mistake. The easiest and quickes way to deal with it would be to have a 1-2-1 conversation with that colleague and explain what they need to be doing differently. Instead another colleague creates a sophisticated presentation for the entire team about possible mistakes in your line of work. The presentation contains loads of examples, screenshots and videos, and it’s really throughout and detailed. And you think, no one else makes any mistakes, it’s only this one colleague and this one mistake so what that was for?

You talk with the colleague who did the presentation and they tell you they didn’t want to intimidate the new one. But you think, both of them have very good people skills so it would be easy for them to talk without making anybody feel bad. And you think this doesn’t add up.

No, the colleague who prepared the presentation is not necessarily a workaholic. What he is doing, he’s communicating through his actions that he’s determined to get a promotion. He wants everyone to know they shouldn’t even try to compete.