But maturity also means being aware of how fragile true maturity will always be – and therefore what a bizarre brew of neuroses, excitements and troubles a typical day at the office will generate.

What we don’t see on every CV is the litany of psychological entanglements we bring along, uninvited, to the workstation and the meeting room.

These histories interfere with our ability to respond with lucidity, courage and soberness to the present. We interpret reality with a bias that twists the available evidence according to narratives that feel familiar but may be untrue and unhelpful to who and what is actually before us.

A lot of our difficulties at work stem from these unknown psychological legacies. What we don’t see on every CV, alongside qualifications and technical experience, is the litany of psychological entanglements we bring along, uninvited, to the workstation and the meeting room. Ten people around a table means ten different early households, at least

problem. For most of the time that human beings have existed, it may have been sufficient – for individual and group survival – to operate with very limited interest in how other people’s minds work.

The central problem of colleagues is that they are not you.

at all times ‘professional’ – that is, logical, efficient, straightforward, insensitive to mild insult, responsive to brute command and uninclined to mental breakdown. We are under pressure to forget the difficult truth that we know from personal life: that humans are exhaustingly complex, unpredictable and fragile.

The quality of our efforts has grown reliant on tricky, elusive fare: a sense of meaning, respect, inner fulfilment, encouragement and a spirit close to friendship.

Profitability has grown reliant on feelings.