Misplaced stoicism

All the wonderful athletes at the recent Olympics have many qualities that lead to their success, one of which is probably stoicism. But stoicism is not always appropriate.

“I’ve been sick for two weeks. I just can’t seem to get better.” “I’ve had a cold/flu for over a week. I’ve tried everything except staying in bed.” Sound familiar?

The last few months in South Africa we have had a few nasty cold and flu bugs doing the rounds. If you are genuinely sick, stoically going to work every day is, in most cases, stupid. There are very few of us who are absolutely indispensable – despite how we like to see ourselves. If we work for a company and get run over by a bus, the company doesn’t collapse!

When we go to work sick we make other people sick.

When we go to work sick we can’t think clearly or concentrate properly, so we only get half the work done.

When we go to work sick we make mistakes.

A day or so of bed rest (with medicine if needed) allows the body to do what it is designed to do – heal itself. And quicker than it ever can whilst we are up and running around.

Even an ill performer in a world where the maxim is “the show must go on”, can rest most of the day and then go to the theatre at night. And those of us who work for ourselves need to do the maths on a couple of half days off versus a few weeks of working at half pace.

So if you have succumbed to one of the nasty bugs please don’t be a martyr. Take a couple of days to stay home and get good bed rest. Then go back to work and give it your all.

Take the pressure off yourself

“You don’t look yourself,” was the greeting from a friend on meeting me for our final committee meeting of the year. “I am tired,” I replied. “The last couple of weeks I have just been chasing my tail and barely meeting deadlines.” As I said it, it struck me that this was most unusual for me. What had gone wrong?

Into my head came a picture of Stephen Covey’s four quadrants.

Ideally we should spend most of our time doing activities that fall into Quadrant 2 – important but not yet urgent.

I had instead slipped into being in Quadrant 1 – important and urgent.

I haven’t done that for many years. I make a point of planning and prioritising, of saying No when necessary and of remaining in the moment rather than worrying about what may be coming. However somehow that went pear shaped at the beginning of December. By the time I realised what I had done I was feeling drained and dissatisfied.

I am now back in Quadrant 2 and feeling so much better.

If two weeks of that made me so tired, what do months and months of it do to us? And what’s more it is an unproductive space, so all that stress and strain is achieving even less.

Perhaps this is a good time for each of us to evaluate where we are working from and if that isn’t a productive, enjoyable space to make a plan to change it now?

(Originally written in December 2011)

Getting on with people

“Achieving success at work & in life, one conversation at a time”. This is the sub title of a book called “Fierce Conversations” that I am reading. Robust conversations are very important but I’d like to paraphrase Susan Scott and say “Achieving success at work & in life, one relationship at a time”.

I know many people who are highly successful at work or in business, essentially because they get on with pretty much everyone. When I see children at school who are at ease with their peers and with their teachers I think “they have a bright future ahead of them.” And when I meet very smart people who can’t relate to others I am sad that they may well struggle to succeed and their potential could be wasted.

One of the quadrants of the Leader Management Framework is People Connection. Without this connection a leader manager may well produce some results, but the staff will never work as effectively as they would have if the people connection was there.

There are many aspects to connecting with people. Some important ones are building trust, communicating effectively and valuing people. At a more basic level we need to understand people and that starts with understanding ourselves.

I have been working with a couple, whose already poor relationship has been severely strained by changed circumstances. They have been married for about thirty years and yet they have no understanding of each other’s different personality, different needs and different communication styles. Until they improve their understanding and acceptance of each other they can’t move forward.

Some of us are lucky and have somehow done that unconsciously. What can the rest of us do? Observe and learn, with a little help from books, talks or workshops.

Start by understanding your own behaviour, reactions and needs better. Become an observer of yourself. Notice what you do and how you feel, and ask yourself why.

And then do the same with those around you. Notice how people respond to you and to other people, and think about why. Adjust your behaviour towards them (whilst remaining authentic) and see if you get different responses.

Try to recognise their needs, and if appropriate meet that need. What response do you get?

There are many excellent, easy to read books which can increase your understanding. There is a list on my website (“Personality Plus”, in particular, is a very funny read).

Or you can learn in a much more informal environment. Watching movies or live shows, and reading novels, are great fun ways to study human dynamics - as most of them are all about people!

Being happy at work

A recent e-mail from a client ended, “I often asked myself, why can I not be satisfied with what I have achieved, or just see my job as a means to earn my living.” My immediate thought was, “because you wouldn’t be you, and you wouldn’t have achieved the success you have.” The client is a senior manager who has built up a very successful business unit within a large organisation.

Keeping that famous life / work balance is tricky and sometimes the balance comes from two equally unbalanced phases - working flat out - and then taking a complete sabbatical. The headmaster at King Edward V11 school recently did that. He has been head for eight years so took an entire term off to travel through the Kruger and other game parks. Sound inviting?

Although driven people sometimes do question themselves, they for the most part thrive on being driven - on the achievements and on creating something just a little better than last time – it makes them happy. And being driven is not stressful if it fits your personality - a laid back life would quickly become boring for them.

I am reading a book called “Happiness at Work. Maximising your psychological capital for success” by Jessica Pryce-Jones. For years I have ‘preached’ that we can create productive, effective businesses with happy, engaged, fulfilled people working in them. What is great about Jessica’s work is that she and her team have conducted really robust research that proves that people who are happy at work are more productive.

The happiest employees focus on their work 78% of the day compared to the unhappiest who focus on what they need to do for only 53% of the time. That means the happiest people put about 60 extra days of work effort into their year.

A very big, proven key to productivity at work is happiness!

She also states, if you are happy at work you get promoted faster, get more support. generate better & more creative ideas, achieve your goals faster, receive superior reviews, are healthier, and many more ...

The book explores many factors that determine how happy we are at work. I maintain that all leader-managers should be managing in such a way as to make it easier for people to enjoy their day at work (and get the job done!). However the book really focuses on what each of us as individuals can do so as to increase our own happiness at work. My work with past clients didn’t use the same structure as Jessica uses but I have seen many people who were so unhappy that they came to me to explore changing jobs and yet ended up finding themselves becoming happier and deciding to stay where they were!

As an individual are you happy in your work? And if not consider changing that. Life is too short to waste it being unhappy.

If you are a leader-manager do you know how to manage so that your team are productive and creative, and happy?

Pushing back

“Why isn’t the work we agreed on finished?” “Bess from dept A asked me to extract some data for her and Jim from Dept B needed graphs prepared”. Does this happen to you or to people you work or live with?

In 2002 I was managing a team at SARS. I found that because my staff had a reputation for being able to provide answers and deliver, they were constantly interrupted with requests. With the result that they had to work overtime to keep up with their own work, sometimes fell behind and were feeling stressed. I called a meeting and we discussed what was happening. They were all helpful people who felt guilty to say No to anyone who asked them nicely.

So we set some new rules (or boundaries). I would let the departments we supported know that we would be planning our week’s work on Monday mornings. Anything they required from us was to be communicated to me by the previous Friday (or very early on Monday morning). Anything not so requested would stand over for scheduling the following week.

My team agreed that they were answerable to our schedule before anyone else’s. If someone asked them for something during the week they learnt to say “No” in a nice way such as “I’d love to help you once I have finished all of this week’s work” or “If you give the request to Alison I am sure she will schedule it for you.”

Naturally there were emergencies and we did make adjustments to accommodate the legitimate ones, but for the most part after a few weeks everyone pretty much cooperated with us.

The result was a happier, fulfilled, engaged team delivering on time and getting through even more work than they’d ever done previously.

All of us have a need for boundaries in some aspect of our life. Without them our values, needs and priorities get subjugated by those of everyone else. We lose sight of what is important, suffer health problems, miss important events with loved ones. Some of us do too much for others. We think we are helping but we are denying them the opportunity to be strong.

Think about how you could modify what we did at SARS to help you in your own circumstances.

GM's advert sends the wrong message

The GM Red Tag advert is back on our TV screens.

Every year that it airs it annoys me. Why would I want to buy a car from a company who thinks it is impressive that their staff work extrememly long hours - hours that are so long that they forget what their daughter looks like or where things are kept in the kitchen?

Excessive working hours can lead to burn out. I have seen people who've burned out in this way. Their ability to handle work and stress after they "recover" is never what it was before.

It is also well known that working excessive hours damages home life. And people with problems at home become less productive at work.

So in the medium to long term allowing your staff to lose their work - life balance makes them far less productive and therefore possibly no longer of use to the company.

As someone who helps managers to work together with their staff to bring out the best in them, now and in the long term, it goes against the grain to buy a car from a company who sends the opposite message.

New labour laws disastrous

There are four Labour Bills currently under discussion by the South African parliament. The proposals will considerably tighten the labour market and negatively impact on business and individuals in SA.

The main concern is supposed to be to protect the employees. However we already have legislation that more than adequately protects employees who wish to contribute effectively to the economy.

No matter how much legislation you have workers can still be abused so long as they are not in high demand. To explain further. A company requires a staff member to work longer hours than those legislated. If the person has to use legal channels to complain they may be able to force the employer to shorten their hours but the relationship will probably be harmed and the employer can retaliate in many legal ways. If however there were plenty of available jobs that this person was suitable for they could leave and go elsewhere. If this kept happening the company would probably amend the working hours in order to retain staff.

The focus needs to be on education and training so as to have a well skilled work force as well as creating an environment which allows for the creation of many jobs. With both in place we would have a good supply of skilled workers able to pick and choose their jobs. Employers would then be inclined to voluntarily abide by fair legislation.

Any changes made to labour legislation need to be those that make employing people easier and more appealing. The current proposed changes do the opposite.

Our economy strengthens when businesses are profitable and growing. This requires employees to be productive and effective. Creating employment that is virtually secure no matter whether the employee works well or not encourages laziness and creates a culture of doing the minimum. This sets up a cycle of weakening rather than strengthening the economy and job opportunities.

For more discussion and useful links to the acts see www.2bbusiness.co.za/2011/01/26/llabour-bills-summary-what-this-really-means-for-your-small-business/

Let sheltered workshops help you

I visited Forest Farm around 1999 to take a batch of wooden building blocks for sanding. A few of the parents had got involved in helping our children's nursery school to spruce things up. The paint was peeling from the building blocks so I took them home with the intention of sanding and then restaining in bright colours.

I soon found out how much time sanding takes on small items. So I looked around for another solution. Forest Farm turned out to be the perfect one. It has a well run sheltered workshop where the residents work to contribute to the cost of running the centre.

I dropped the blocks off, explained to the workshop manager what I needed done and a few days later, for a very reasonable fee all was done. When I went to collect the completed job I also took my children along which gave them the opportunity to mingle with the disabled workers - helping them to be comfortable around people with disability.

The nursery school got their blocks back looking like new and the people in the workshop had another piece of work to help them feel useful.

An article on Forest Farm in our local paper recently reminded me of this experience. It said "We get contracts from companies that need services such as assembly and packaging of light components, paper folding and envelope insertions, repair and hire of wheelchairs and other assistive devices. We are looking for more of this type of contract work."

If you sub contracted some of your work out to a local sheltered workshop would it free you up to be more productive?