Category: Corporate Games

I started my new business gig today.

My boss listed the tasks
he wishes me to accomplish
in the two short months I’m there.

Impossible under the constraints
he has given me.

When I pushed back
and told him
his expectations were unrealistic,
he didn’t budge on them.

I came close to simply walking out.
I know I won’t meet his expectations
and he’ll be unhappy with my results.
I will fail.
If failure is guaranteed,
why try?

THAT is the problem with unrealistic expectations.
High expectations challenge
and excite people.
Unrealistic expectations squish them flat.

Ensure that your expectations
are reachable.
(oh, and if an expert says they aren’t,
maybe you should listen to her)

I had a phone interview
with a prospective employer yesterday.

The executive tried to multitask
during the interview.
There were constant interruptions
which prompted abrupt changes in topic.
He drifted off in conversation
and rambled
while I heard a tapping
(likely of his fingers on a keyboard).
He’d yell things like
‘what the hell was that?’
and ‘I can’t believe it’
at random.

In other words…
he came across as a total nutbar.

I don’t know if he’s crazy.
He’s an executive
for a high profile company
so I’m guessing he’s not
but first impressions stick.
I’m seriously reconsidering my interest.

When you are involved in a phone interview
or, heck, any sort of phone conversation,
give that call your entire attention.
If you don’t,
you could end up looking insane.

Envy (or its close cousin jealousy) is bad, right?
It is one of the seven deadly sins.
We should never, ever admit to being envious.

Bull shit.

Whenever I feel envy or jealousy,
I know the feeling is about me
and about what I truly want
(which is often different
from what I think I want).

One of my writing buddies
landed a single title, New York contract.
All of her success is hinged
on this single book.
The concept stresses me out.
I didn’t feel a tinge of envy.

One of my other buddies
landed a series contract with Harlequin.
She is expected to write
several books a year for them,
gradually building her readership.
I was so envious,
I couldn’t sleep the night I heard.
(I was happy for her too,
being happy for others
and being envious isn’t mutually exclusive)

This showed me
what type of writing career I truly wanted.

Envy is a very powerful emotion.
It is true. It is strong.
Use it to show you
what you truly want.

A loved one went on vacation
with me last week.
There was free wi-fi available
with some effort
everywhere we went.

Instead of using this free wi-fi,
he told his manager
that if they wanted him
to check into work daily,
he needed the costly cruise ship package.

This wasn’t about convenience.
This was about creating friction,
about putting a value on his time.

Yesterday, I was called about a business gig.
I’m still focused on writing.
I am available at any time.
Did I tell the prospective client that?
Nope.
Because if I did,
they would assume that my time is free
and waste it with endless questions and meetings.

The inputs to what you’re doing
may be free
but your time isn’t.
It is scarce and valuable.
Adding friction can often weed out
the frivolous requests.

Jena McGregor reports that
“Researchers from Berkeley and Princeton found
that workers who know what their peers make,
especially if they earn below-median pay,
are more likely to be disgruntled
than their blissfully ignorant peers.”

My stance is that
your pay reflects your value
to the company.
That isn’t the same
as reflecting what you do.

I once worked for a company
that valued education highly.
The MBA/Designated Accountant doing my equivalent job
was paid more than BA/Designated Accountant me.
I didn’t like that
so I moved to a company with different values.

That is why paying attention
during the interview is so damn important.
If the first thing out of the interviewer’s mouth
is ‘I see you’re an MBA’
then the company puts a high value on education.
If instead the comment is
‘I see you’ve led teams on some interesting projects’
then the company could be about
leadership or accomplishment.

Align your strengths
with the company’s values
and, with negotiation,
you will do okay in the pay department.

Great Leadership has a hilarious post
on how to survive department meetings.

I especially liked
“There really are stupid questions.
The first thing you will hear
from the person in front of the room is
“We want this to be interactive
– there are no stupid questions,
so ask away”.

Don’t take the bait.
A stupid question will make you look stupid,
no matter what they tell you.
A single good question,
on the other hand,
can make a good first impression.

However, don’t overdo it.
Limit it to one
– anything more comes across as grandstanding,
or being socially clueless.”

I’ve heard some incredibly stupid questions
over my decades of attending meetings.
If you aren’t sure if your question is stupid or not,
ask a trusted coworker or manager
BEFORE you ask it in front of the room.

I am not a rule follower.
Show me a rule
and I’ve bent it.
I don’t outright break rules.
I bend them.
I have to or work doesn’t get done.

Bill Jensen and Josh Klein
talk about this bending or ‘hacking’
in their book Hacking Work.

“It’s one of the biggest workplace secrets
that most top performers
are already breaking their company’s stupid rules.
Current research shows
that about one-third of today’s workforce
use technologies not sanctioned
by their companies.
Why?
Because corporate-sanctioned tools
hold everyone back.
Those rule-breakers are
just trying to do their best.
They need the best tools available.
And if corporate won’t supply them,
they’ll hack a workaround.

Same thing with university students,
which is tomorrow’s workforce.
Studies show that almost one-third of them
have hacked around their institution’s IT structures.
When you add in non-technical hacks
—how people use their relationships
to work around processes and procedures
—between two-thirds to three-quarters
of our workforce are currently hacking their work!

So, if you’re not hacking,
you’ll be more alone.
It’s a good bet some of your best-performing buddies
are already hacking.
They just didn’t tell you about it.
We are.”

The writing world
is run almost exclusively
with virtual teams.
I’ve never met my editor
or publisher or cover designer.

With virtual teams,
more than with any other
type of team,
responsibilities have to be clear
and timelines have to be kept.

Each team member is doing
her own thing.
There is often little communication
between the team members.
All communication is flowed
through the coordinator.
So any overlap in roles
causes… well.. chaos,
duplication, angst.
The coordinator has to be clear
about who is doing what.

Timelines are also more important
because, again,
there is little communication
between team members.
Jackie doesn’t know that
the part she needs from Jill
has been delayed.
Also because Jackie has limited contact
with Jill,
any failure like missing a timeline
is magnified.
Jill is seen as unreliable and untrustworthy.

Erin Meyer points out more differences
between virtual and non-virtual teams.

I’ve been reading
many, many articles
about how the next generations
(i.e. new grads)
don’t have strong work ethics.

I don’t know where these rumors start.
A couple of weekends ago,
I was at a writers conference.
Call it the Twilight phenom
but I have never seen so many teens
in the audience.
These teens were not simply dreamers.
They’d written novels,
300 page plus novels.

I know what it takes
to write a 300 page novel
on your own.
That is darn close
to starting up a small company
or launching a new product.

THAT is the next generation.
Were you writing 300 page novels
at the age of 14?
I sure wasn’t.
So I am very, VERY optimistic
about the future.

Leslie Grossman has a great post
on lessons we can learn
from the late George Steinbrenner.

One lesson is
“Be generous.
Be willing to pay good people
what they are worth
and more to recruit them
and keep them on your team.
And get the best people you can afford.
Treat the good ones well
and get rid of the others, quickly.
Women tend to keep underperforming people
too long.”

Some people think
that keeping underperforming people
is ‘kind.’
It isn’t.
People underperform
because they don’t like what they’re doing
or
they are suited to what they are doing.
These people could, when released,
find the jobs they are truly suited for.

Keeping underperforming people
is also a downer for your performing people.
Winners want to play with winners.
Enthused people want to work with enthused people.

Cut your underperforming employees.
It is kinder to everyone.