The Task Of Defining Our Work
More and more these days I find that among people in my seminars the importance of defining our work is a topic that truly resonates. The challenge many of us face is to not only track, but accurately label all of our projects, and hang on to those "stakes in the ground" while the rest of the world seems to want to blow us away from them like we're in a hurricane.
How many of you don't have time to do your work, because you have so much work to do??!!
How many of you, in your jobs, are only doing what you were hired to do? (I never get one affirmative response in any group I query!)
I credit Peter Drucker for framing this issue better than anyone, from the macro perspective. He indicates that whereas forty years ago 80% of our work force made its living by making or moving things, that number is now less than 20%. And that "knowledge work" demands a completely different paradigm of focus than we have been trained in as a professional culture. (See Drucker's terrific book Post-Capitalist Society.)
The good news about making or moving something is that when you come to work, un-made and un-moved things make it very easy to know how to spend your day. You do not need "personal organization" other than the work that is obviously and visibly at hand. The bad news is that these days only a small percentage of us get to work and know exactly what to do. The rest of us have to make it up! And after we courageously apply our prodigious creativity to making up an agenda, very few (if any) of the people we interact with seem to be supporting our agenda.
So, it becomes critical for each of us to maintain a complete and accurately defined list of Projects, and to ensure that we review these at least weekly with real sincerity of focus, creating and capturing all the, "Oh yeah, that reminds me, I need to . . . " kind of next actions that need to happen to make our self-defined "work" happen.
That list needs to include all the professional and personal projects about which you would like -- ideally -- for something to be happening during the course of an operational week. For example:
- Research new digital camera
- Finalize budget
- Refinance house
- Reorganize office
In our culture, we were only trained and equipped to show up and deal with the work at hand. We now have to train and equip ourselves, create our own targets and goal-lines, and tie safety ropes onto those outcomes to keep steady in our course against the winds of the world.
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Welcome to the new indentured servitude....
Work longer hours for less money, pay out of pocket for your own health care benefits and pay into your own 401k instead of getting a pension, get less time off, and don't ever try to take all your vacation days (and don;t ask to get reimbursed for the unused ones either)....
and better save up - because you're getting laid off at 50 and will never work again at the salary you left behind.... you'll be lucky to work at ANY job to make it until you hit 65 and can finally find out that government benefits aren't what you expected and your 401k evaporated in the stock market downturn....
Where can I aquire one of those "I love my job" buttons?
People work longer hours for less pay and little to no benefits, save NEGATIVE money and live in mortal terror of losing their homes.
Can serfdom be far off, or has it arrived?
Randy
We have nothing to lose but our chains.
The I approach this problem is to have a set of 5" x 8" index cards for each project. They range from optimizing my taxes as a freelancer to finding a new adventure to pursue during vacation or whenever.
When you review this stack a couple times, you can prioritize your actions, better define your goals, track your progress, realize when you're being sidetracked, concentrate on your areas of expertise, and tackle problems that you'd rather avoid.
If you review this stack right before bed, you can flag the cards you want to work on when you wake up.
HTH
The drive of the modern day workload is a product of the culmination of peoples desire for more and and ever increasing standard of cutting edge technology.
Its true to say, less physical attributes at work and more virtual workload, its almost intangible nowadays as technology replaces staff at some level throughout almost every industry. Technology produces quicker ways of doing things and this in turn creates a need for businesses to streamline their operations and practises ultimately placing more of a demand on existing employees to perform and maintain performance levels, so the monster has been created.
In the age of the New Business Flexibility, where employees are commodities to be discarded at a company's convenience, tell me again why I should do anything beyond the bare minimum to keep a paycheck (keeping up a good facade and talking the talk, of course. In this, Republicans were way ahead of the rest of us)?
"Threat of Layoff" is no longer something to be feared, in an age where that is applicable no matter how an employee performs.
"Earning more through Merit" is no longer an inducement, since hard renumeration (e.g., salary, benefits, etc.) is no longer really tied to performance. "Your reward for good work is more work."
Why kill yourself for such a small delta in actual compensation? We've been suckered into identifying with our jobs, thus we sacrifice our lives to pursue "advancement" in that area.
Every hour of unpaid overtime is one hour less of Life.
Shouldn't those buttons say "I loved my job why did the Republicans take it away?"
If we were less inclined to let our jobs define us , this would all be far less problematic. Here's one take on that theme: http://memestreamblog.wordpress.com/2007/09/13/what-do-you-do/
Any tips on time management when your organization is understaffed due to cutbacks and you are doing the work of 2 or 3 people for one salary? I am hearing that this is becoming the standard operating procedure. The clock may say 5:00 PM, but this is meaningless.
I am all for organization and setting one's own goals. I tried to employ this method of having a loose list of tasks for the week which I knew I needed to accomplish by Friday. And it did get challenging when co-workers would shake up my schedule with additional issues and needs to be addressed. However, I found this manageable.
I was lucky enough to have a realistic workload (albeit a modest salary). My husband is in another situation. He can set all the goals he wants, but people keep coming into his office and dumping more work on him. This work cannot be finished in a 40 or 50 hour work week and his organization won't hire anyone else with the technical skills to assist him...so he is the lone ranger.
It is hard to "heart" your job when it begins to encroach onto your entire life and eat up every spare minute of the day and late into the night. And, I don't think he is alone in today's "lean and mean" screw the employee world.
I had a previous boss who could be heard muttering every once in a while
"I Love My Job and All the Challenges It Presents" over and over again- her Mantra. I've used it myself many times since.
Now I use it to remind myself that I love My country- just hate those who have Hi Jacked it an dheld US hostages for the last 40 yrs.
What did we unintentionally unleash on the res tof the World, mankind & nature.
Corporationists (facists, Impealialists, Dictatorships, no matter the term it is still the real plague of humnaity and all we are responsible for the care of).
They are only men, only brick & mortar and scapes of paper they tell US are valueable.
End the Federal Reserve Private Banking System, Dismantle the World Bank and dispense their assests to those they have stolen them from.
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