While I’m still playing with the idea of ridding myself of my automobile, more angst is coming from wrestling with whether I need to leave my job, or how I can change it so that I can stay.
It’s funny. I have been reading Go Put Your Strengths to Work, and after the exercises in which the reader diagnoses what is and isn’t working in a week’s worth of work activities, Marcus Buckingham includes a long section counseling the reader not to dump her/his job and rush off in search of the next one. He writes that while the “eject” button is the dramatic solution (a leap into the dark to the next situation, which may or may not be a better fit), we can iteratively move our current job closer to our perfect job through attention and goal-setting. Certainly I have the most negotiating power with the folks who already respect me and depend on me (that is, my current team and employer). It’s annoying to be right where Marcus Buckingham predicts I would be. I’d prefer to be unique.
So, it is listmaking time for me, figuring out what it is I can’t do without, what I can trade for other things, what it is I can no longer do, what I have to ask others for…
Things I need: team, writing, collaboration, clients, change, variety, action. I want to have different problems than we did last year, than we did last quarter. I want to be making different mistakes.
Things that concern me: I don’t want to be the single point of failure or hero. I want to build or participate in a system where I and our clients are supported by a team with overlapping interests and responsibilities. I’d like to be replaceable. I’d like a little slack in the system, a little redundancy. I don’t know how to do that in a small team. I think we simply need to be bigger.
But, there is an upside. I have shed some tasks and responsibilities that were mine that weren’t right. I removed myself from some email lists (like Perry Marshall’s), re-examined some of my work habits (yes, there are ways I have participated in creating my own angst), and essentially spring cleaned my office and my job description. Yes, whether I’m happy at work really is up to me. Whatever the outcome, this realization is a good, if painful, thing.
Comments
2 responses to “Letting go II”
This is a very interesting post. Not what I expected. I’m glad to see that you’re doing everything you can in order to improve your work situation. Not easy.
My questions for you:
On a percentage basis (per week), how much of the following are you getting?
Writing
Team/Collaboration
Clients
Change/Variety
Action
Challenge
It sounds like you’re under a lot of pressure. What happens when you aren’t available for a “you only” issue? Can somebody else deal with it? Are you truly irreplaceable, or has your experience at work made you feel that way? I’m wondering how much of this pressure you’re putting on yourself.
It sounds to me like what you really need is a “partner” — someone who you can work with in tandem and divvy up responsibilites so that not everything rests on your shoulders. Someone who can take over what you’re working on at a moment’s notice. A “team” of these people would be ideal, but I think that starting with just one person would be more realistic. Is there anybody currently at your job who you can partner with?
Resk,
Interesting questions and feedback.
In a small place, each of us is a singleton of our type. So while we can brainstorm together and we do want to help each other, we’re each heroes of our own domain. In a small place, we’re all individually irreplaceable, and we’re all bottlenecks if we get swamped.
Your idea of a partner is a good one, I did enjoy the pairing I did at Menlo, it made the end product better and the process feel less like trapeze gymnastics without a net. The partner provided me a net and sounding board.
It is worth considering whether there may be more potential for task-sharing or collaboration across roles that we’re currently doing.
Percentages? Weeks are so variable, but here’s a guess:
Through conversations, I’m definitely wondering whether “project manager” is actually the name of what I do, or just a tool I use in my work life. Similarly, at one point, “writer” was my title, but then writing became part of my toolset rather than the main thing that I do. Another discovery is that I am more interested in proposals than I am in implementation details, so scoping and shaping projects rather than administering them is my interest.
So, I’m iterating towards my ideal job description. There’s hope!