Coporate Culture or Tradition?

The internet was at it again, the story about UBA Chairman and whether or not our ‘elder’ colleagues should be addressed by first names.

It brought back memories of my experience about twenty years ago, when I returned to Lagos from the UK to commence work at a multinational organisation. One where company culture allowed us call each other by first name. Well, that was a practice I was already used to, coming from UK corporate life.

I was excited, hopeful and eager to get right into work. One day, a few weeks into my resumption, I was asked to get some important information from ‘Becky’.

I hadn’t met Becky, and when I enquired, was simply asked to call her on the office intercom. So I proceeded to look up her number, dial and responded to her ‘Hello’ with ‘Good afternoon, is that Becky?’

The pause on her end should have signaled an issue but I naively repeated ‘Is that Becky?’

‘Who is this?’ she sounded irritated. ‘Oh, my name is Mini, I’m new here. Just need some information about ….’

‘Tell your supervisor to call me.’ she cut in.

My supervisor rushed to me after she had seen Becky. ‘Mini!! You can’t address her by first name!!!’ She’s not your mate!’

‘Oh!’ I would have gone red had I been light skinned.

If the office culture was ‘first name basis’, then why wasn’t I informed about the exceptions?

Because in this part of the world, office culture does not always trump traditional culture. And so young eager colleagues who arrive ready to jump in and embrace work should not be left to ‘figure out’ what the exceptions to office culture are. It should form part of their orientation and be explicitly spelled out. Address your seniors (by rank or age) by last name (Mr or Mrs….), by title (Manager, CEO) or a simple Ma’am or Sir.

So, how did it all end? Well, I had to take a trip to Madam’s (my new way of referring to anyone old enough to be my mama) office and apologize for my ‘bad’ manners.

And after seeing all the bruhaha about first name saga, I pulled my teens aside and lectured them about striking the balance between office culture and tradition. Never too early as they say.

Would love to hear your stories and thoughts about addressing senior colleagues by first names… do share!