“Living in Fear” at Work? Why? | Overcoming the Killer Consequences of Suspicion

Suspicion is our enemy. It spawns defensiveness, driving our optimism, courage, and self-confidence underground. And we let it.

As a consequence, we allow it to turn us inside out, then blame it for our woes.

Avoid fabricating backstories.

There’s no getting around the inevitable, ever constant change that’s the daily bread of business:

• The CEO announces that all employees need to be more accountable for their work output and then implements a company-wide training program to launch a new accountability culture.
• A couple of popular, high-ranking managers are let go for unstated reasons and ushered out without time to pack up their things.
• Organization changes are announced and long-time gurus of the business are passed over; younger, up-and-comers are given coveted, high visibility roles.
• Your boss reconfigures your job duties unexpectedly, requiring you to develop new technical skills.

These changes produce angst. What does it mean to our careers? To our ability to keep our jobs?

Most of the time we understand little at best about the reasons that drive these changes. The less we know that more suspicious become about what’s behind it all.

In the absence of information, we fill in the blanks ourselves, creating backstories that morph into dramas we accept as reality. So we tell ourselves:

• “My department is always blamed for late reports, so this accountability training is about us. I wonder whose head they’re after. Maybe I’ll be the scapegoat.”
• “One day the CEO talks about leaders having to be more flexible and the next day those managers are gone. I could be next.”
• “If they demote the managers who are the keepers of the company’s historic knowledge, that means they can’t see much value in what I know.”
• “My boss knows that I don’t have all the skills for my new job duties. It feels like I’m being set up to fail which could get me fired or displaced.”

We think self-composed, doomsday stories will prepare us for the worst. But they only drive us into an unhealthy state of “living in fear” of the Career Grim Reaper.

Focus on facts .

The notion of “living in fear” of losing your job or workplace status is self-imposed hyperbole, a desire to create drama in your head around the unsettling aspects of change.

We all tend to fear the unknown. So the antidote is information, the factual kind.

When facing changes at work, ask yourself what you actually know. Be careful not to accept as fact what your fellow employees are telling you, since they’re prone to fabricating their own stories based on supposition and hearsay.

Focus on what you’re contributing–your work output, behavior, skills, and willingness to adapt to change:

• Listen to what the leadership wants from you and determine how you can deliver it.
• Realize that when managers are let go, their release is not about you. Stay focused on your role and performing well.
• Recognize that the repositioning of employees in an organization is how new leaders and fresh thinking are fostered.  See those changes as clues to what you need to demonstrate to move up.
• Accept that the way you do your job will continually change. Instead of dreading new requirements and technology, be prepared to accept them.
• Be ahead of the curve by continually looking for ways to improve the way work is done.

Stay focused on the actual work you’re performing and the feedback you’re receiving.

Work grounded.

You can only control your own output and behavior. Although it’s important to observe what’s going on around you, getting caught up in the intrigue will only distract you from what you’re paid to do.

It’s easy to get drawn into the paranoia, doomsday projections, and soap opera scenarios of coworkers, but that’s a trap itself.

Instead, stick to what’s real–the work in front of you. Listen to direction that comes from the leadership and do your best to ride the change train to a successful career.

Photo from Razan alhammad via Flickr

Ready to Tackle Drama, Change, Fear, and Accountability? Follow 5 Reality-Based Rules.

I love a straight-shooter, someone who cuts through the fluff and excuses to expose the unvarnished realities of the workplace. That’s what I discovered with Cy Wakeman when I was invited to blog about the insights in her new book, The Reality-Based Rules of the Workplace. We may not like to see the sides of ourselves revealed in her pages, but the insights will makes us better, happier, and more successful.

A lot goes on around us at work. It’s easy to become oblivious to much of it until we get caught in the crossfire.

Too often our own naiveté about what our companies and bosses expect of us causes us to adopt attitudes and behaviors that are detrimental. To succeed we need to understand the realities that drive business and the often unspoken  rules that, when followed, will propel us in the right direction.

Face yourself.                                    

In her new book, The Reality-Based Rules of the Workplace, business consultant and speaker, Cy Wakeman, cuts to the chase on the behaviors that will make or break your success.

She gets it about why we are lured down the paths of wrong thinking and provides clear steps to get us back on track. She never deviates from the point that success is about how you and I choose to think and act.

Wakeman reminds us that:  

When you feel vulnerable, even defensive, it’s all too easy to blame the economy, political leaders, your boss–everyone except the one person you can control: yourself.

…no one is born accountable, self-reliant, self-mastered, and resilient, yet these are the qualities that count, the ones that will fill you with confidence….

To become what she calls  ”happy high-performers,” we need to take stock of ourselves. Through her self-rating checklists and strategies to increase your rating score, you can assess:

• Your current performance
• Your future potential
• Your emotional expensiveness (the cost of being a high maintenance employee)

To assess emotional expensiveness she asks if:

• “You are dramatic….
• You come to work in a bad mood.
• You share a lot of personal information with coworkers….
• You complain a lot, or judge others.
• You have an entitled or victim mind-set….”

With your answers in mind, she adds a positive perspective:

…good things come to those who are Emotionally Inexpensive. They are magnets for jobs, promotions, raises, and opportunities of all kinds.

Wakeman makes a strong point about the importance of determining where we stand in the context of our workplace, so we can build a career sustaining strategy.

She writes:

Meeting performance expectations is now the price of keeping your job. But it isn’t enough to guarantee you anything extra–recognition, benefits, or job security.

5 reality-based rules

It’s not uncommon for us to struggle to understand what’s really going on around us at work.

It’s also not uncommon to need help understanding the reality of our own behaviors: what’s driving us, who do we let influence our thinking, how do we overcome our fears, and what are we doing to enable our own happiness.

Wakeman’s five reality-based rules help you sort through the maze. Here are the rules and a peek at Wakeman’s insights about them:

1. Accountability determines happiness

You will get results when you stop…focusing on what is happening “to” you, and focus on…what you can do …to compete, to deliver, and to succeed.

2. Ditch the drama.

Without drama weighing you down , you will be free to make accountable choices, free of your stories and excuses, free of your and other people’s drama.

3. Action adds value.

If your motive is to stop the course of action or question a decision, change your focus from why it won’t work to how you can help make it work. Get willing, buy in, and use your expertise to mitigate the risks you see.

4. See change as opportunity.

Be ready for what’s next….Don’t let fear of failure stop you from trying.

5. Face extenuating circumstances and succeed anyway.

Confront conflicts early, calmly, and in a spirit of teamwork…Ask, ‘How can I help?’ Get clear on goals, roles, and procedures.

Aha moments

The road to career success is paved with aha moments and Wakeman provides a plethora of them in her book. You will find yourself, your boss, your coworkers, and many people outside of work there.

Understanding how your attitudes, behaviors, and self-deception can create toxicity is a powerful realization. Realizing and practicing a new and more savvy perspective enables you to see things with the clarity you need

5 Supervisor Mistakes That Can Breed Employee Backlash

Supervision is a game of chance. Winning or losing often depends on how you treat your employees. Are you:

• Fair or double-dealing
• Honest or hypocritical
• Aware or clueless
• Self-serving or an advocate

Attract too many negative labels and you may breed employee backlash–often the death knell of a supervisor’s career.

Emerging signs  

Managing the range of employee expectations is a daunting challenge. Supervisors who tune out employees will soon find themselves dealing with unwanted and unexpected behavior.

Suddenly, some or all employees:

• Stop giving input at meetings
• Grumble consistently about assignments
• Become de-energized and less productive
• Challenge policies
• Complain to others about you
• Resist your direction, overtly or covertly

You know the situation is serious when you observe these signs in your best employees.

Supervisors often unknowingly generate backlash when they see their management style through their lens only. A supervisor’s job is a juggling act. Upper management, customers, and suppliers often create an engulfing noise can make a supervisor deaf to the voices and needs of their employees.

Sadly, there are also many supervisors who, for some reason, are uneasy with their own employees. When that’s the case, they tend to go into hiding, in a sense.  They may stay in their offices, quote policy instead of owning their decisions, and/or take inflexible positions on the way work is done.

Communicate without fear.

Supervisors make their own trouble with employees when they don’t communicate what they do and why.

Many feel that if they say the wrong thing, they’ll get themselves cornered with employees down the road. But saying nothing only plants the seed for future conflict and backlash.

Here are six typical mistakes that supervisors make and how to avoid them:

1. Making a knee-jerk decision. Just because an employee wants an immediate decision doesn’t mean that you must give one, especially when you have several implications to consider. Instead, say that you want to give the request more thought with a decision forthcoming at a specific time. Then make sure you deliver it.
2. Taking a defensive position when challenged. Employees who question your decisions give you an opportunity to educate them about the needs and direction of the business. Your logic and insights help to expand theirs. If their questions cause you to rethink your position, then they’ve done you a favor and have created a special professional bond.
3. Being dismissive about employee input–Your employees are your team; they make or break your ability to succeed as a supervisor. Treating their input as insignificant builds a wall that can create animosity. Employee input is gold. It helps you understand expectations that you need to manage and can provide ideas that can lead to important improvements that everyone benefits from.
4. Avoiding face-to-face conversation–There is nothing more alienating to employees than a supervisor who is invisible, distant, and unapproachable. When employees feel disconnected from their bosses, their loyalty bond is likely to be weak. Supervisors need to be real by being present, eyeball-to-eyeball–not text-to-text.
5. Continuously quoting policies and procedures–Supervisors need to own their decisions to engender respect. Too many supervisors don’t want to make decisions that they may need to defend, so they quote a policy instead Policies and procedures set foundations and parameters but they aren’t recipes. Supervisors need to apply policies in ways that meet their intent. Employees expect you to take actions that deliver the right results in ways that support them..

Be there.

Being upfront puts supervisors in a position to create respect and confidence in employees. No employee believes that their boss will be right all the time. They just need to feel connected.

Supervisors who communicate with their employees, who are honest about what they do and don’t know, and who can be trusted to do what they say, will create the kind of relationship employees need–one that will hold up in good times and rough ones.

Photo from gever tulley via Flickr

Ready to Reboot Your Career? How “Reinventing” Worked for Me, More Than Once.

Careers can get old for a lot of reasons:

• Boredom when the work gets too predictable
• Declining fulfillment from achievements
• Disenchantment with a job going no where
• Curiosity about what’s out there
• Compensation ceilings that won’t meet future needs

I’ve experienced all of these at different times. Each one caused significant stress, confusion, and frustration–sometimes all at once.

I tried to force my way through them, telling myself that they were just temporary and would pass. But, of course, they didn’t and they don’t. The only way to get beyond these bumps is to change–not our favorite thing.

It’s not about reinventing your self.

Finding your way to a different career is not about reinventing who you are. Rather, it’s about redirecting your path so you can do work that fits who you are.

In my view, unless you are severely limited by problematic behaviors, trying to remake your essential self is an exercise that keeps you from going where you need to go.

Instead, redirect yourself by aligning your capabilities, interests, and energies to a more suitable line of work.

On the surface, this may sound pretty easy, but it isn’t. Each redirection means:

• Acclimating to a different industry and/or workplace
• Forging new relationships
• Adapting to financial impacts
• Dealing with potentially negative feedback from friends and family
• Fear, self-doubt, and a new learning curve

There is, however, something exhilarating about a big change, so long as you’re ready for it. Newness, discovery, and challenge have the power to put you in high gear.

Keep options open.

This is a timely post for me since I’m getting ready to redirect my “career life” again, building on and remolding the pieces that have served me along the way.

My career unfolded like this:

Primary Career Path: Teaching ► Management  ► Consulting

I love words and how they can help us deal with life. So with an undergraduate degree in English, I became a high school teacher. Over ten years in the classroom, I learned how to instruct, manage groups, handle multiple priorities, and influence change.

Eventually, I got bored by routine, frustrated by some decisions, and curious about the world outside the classroom.

I decided to learn about big business by asking to speak to managers in HR about how public education could do a better job preparing their future employees.

Those meetings gave me a comfort level with business people and led to my first job at a large electric utility. There I learned how to manage effectively and lead when the stakes were high.

I also learned how the business worked and where its weaknesses were. After 20+ years as a senior manager there, I’d achieved my goals and realized I didn’t want to go any further.

I left and started a consulting practice, an entrepreneurial venture that would have to support me. I had done some freelance consulting that prepared me for this new venture which has been ongoing since 2002.

Corollary Career Paths: Production ► Sales

I’d always had a dream to own a horse so I started taking riding lessons when I was 30. Eventually I bought and boarded two horses. I wanted to care for them myself,  so I bought a small farm that needed plenty of work, all of which was new to me.

Before I knew it, I was breeding horses (production) for the race track and the show ring. This was an entirely new and foreign industry for me which fulfilled my curiosity, challenged me intellectually, and increased my fulfillment for almost 20 years.

Concurrently, my horse enterprise led to ownership for ten years of an equestrian art gallery, where I learned about retail sales. This rounded out my business resume.

Together, all of these efforts to redirect my career have created a range of experiences I  continue to draw on. Fortunately, careers don’t have to come to an end.

What next?

Career management is our job. It takes introspection and exploration, a good bit of courage and some luck. As our careers evolve, we evolve with them, learning what really floats our boat and what doesn’t.

I still have my original love of words, that’s why I blog. I love the quiet beauty of my farm where I can think and unearth new perspectives free from distraction. I am seeking to uncover how I will redirect again. Ideas come to mind and then fade into others. The same will happen for you until the right answer appears. Let’s continue to keep our options open. I’ll keep you posted on my progress and hope you will do the same.

What’s in your mind right now about how you might redirect your career? What challenges do you face? Sometimes writing it down makes it clearer. I’d love to hear from you.

Caught in a Mess at Work? 3 Ways to Get Untangled. | Avoiding Drama

It’s easier to complicate things than to keep them simple. That’s why most of us periodically find ourselves in a mess at work.

There comes a time when we realize that we’re:

• Too aligned with the wrong coworkers
• At odds with our boss
• Parked in the wrong job
• Part of a doomed project

Situations like these creep up on us.

Pay attention.

Each day we’re faced with decisions and options that take us down one path or another, usually believing we’re advancing our careers not putting them at risk.

I’ll write it here again: Things are rarely what they seem, and that’s especially true at work. The closer you are to where the real work gets done, the farther away you are from the decisions and decision-makers affecting the organization’s direction.

The less you really know, the more careful you need to be about your choices. This is why developing business savvy is so important.

We often make a mess our of careers by getting tangled up with the wrong people or by putting ourselves in places where we can’t meet expectations.

Here are a couple examples:

• You get hired by a boss who once worked with you as a staff professional and where you were also friends.  Now you’re expected to  support his wrong-footed policies. If you buck the boss,  you lose all around.
• You’re new on the job and the boss isn’t training you. You turn to coworkers for help which they give gladly along with their “rules” for getting along, so there are no “problems.” In time you realize that you’re in the wrong camp.
• You eagerly accepted a role on an important project team to gain some visibility for your technical talents. The forceful team leader has a predetermined result she’s promoting. You realize that her basic premise is wrong, the team is going in the wrong direction, and the result is going to be a bust with your name on it.

We get ourselves into these situations through our own naiveté. As much as we want to be optimistic about opportunities, we need to stop and weigh the potential downsides.

5 ways to disentangle

It is much easier to get situations tangled up than to untangle them. (If you’ve ever tried to get the knots out of a necklace or a fishing line, you know.)

When you need to extricate yourself from a complicated  situation at work,  consider these approaches:

1. Avoid getting in deeper: Assess the people and/or decisions that are exacerbating the problem and figure out how to start distancing yourself from them. That may mean changing the way you communicate, reducing personal (not professional) sharing, and developing relationships with others who represent your viewpoints.
2. Resist the “lures”: Step away from the temptations that may have drawn you to the situation in the first place like special access to the boss, the need to make “friends” with everyone, associations with “big” players, and egoism. Instead, refocus on doing your best work for the right reasons, even it if means accepting a short term setback.
3. Plan and activate an escape plan: When you’re in a mess, you have to get out of it, slowly and carefully in most cases. This takes careful planning and a bit of finesse. You may need to craft a special bit of face-to-face communication, build new alliances, reduce your level of involvement, and/or make a big break. It all depends on the severity of the mess and the risk it imposes on you over time.

The worst thing you can do is nothing. The longer you stay in a bad situation, the more you risk increasingly dire consequences, the worst of which is feeling trapped and helpless.

Avoid drama.

The best thing you can do for your career is to avoid pointless drama caused by unhealthy entanglements. It only adds stress and needless complexity to the work you’ve been hired to do. Each time you’re given a career opportunity, first ask yourself, “What am I really getting myself into?” That should help you take the right step and avoid troublesome drama.

Photo from framelius via Flickr

How Supervising a Small Group Prepares You for the Big Stage | Learning to Lead

Bad supervisors are everywhere. Some know they’re bad and don’t care. Some are clueless. But most desperately want to do better.

Most of us don’t want to go to work and be known for doing a poor job. Too often, new supervisors were great technical performers inexperienced in how to lead others. Once they’re in the job, they discover that their success is measured by how well others perform under their direction.

That’s when many panic and make a mess of things by:

• Micromanaging
• Holing up in their offices
• Giving orders and shunning feedback
• Withholding information
• Clinging to confidants

New supervisors often feel self-conscious, uncertain, and/or afraid because they really don’t know what to do. So they muddle along, maybe even reading a how-to-supervise book or taking a training course. But often, it may be too little too late.

Start small.

The best thing that can happen to a new supervisor is being assigned responsibility for a  small group.

It can be as small as one (although smart companies stay away from one-on-one or even two-on-one reporting). Three employees, in my view, would be the perfect start.

Why is that? Because it requires the new supervisor to deal with a triangle. (No love triangles, please.) Three employees promise enough work style, personality, and performance challenges to deal with like:

• Balancing work load
• Dealing with attitude differences
• Engaging them as a team
• Communicating clearly and effectively
• Implementing policies and procedures fairly
• Addressing unwanted behaviors
• Setting boundaries
• Evaluating and rewarding performance

In a small work group, the margin for supervisory error is small. That means if you botch a decision or an action, it quickly reverberates among all employees who will react in ways that you will have to contend with in order to restore the balance.

Lead like it’s big.

Small work groups can make a big difference no matter the size of the company.

That means you need to supervise three as though they were thirty. This isn’t a club you’re in charge of; it’s a business unit representing a significant investment in salary and benefits. The group is expected to contribute output that directly or indirectly impacts profitability.

So take charge of the expectations management has of your group. Approach your three professionally, so they see themselves as significant and you as their means to success.

Effective small group supervisors do exactly what successful corporate executives do. They lead.

As soon as you become the supervisor, assemble your group and communicate:

• What the group is there to do (what business you are all in together)
• Your style of supervision (meeting frequency, information needs, hot buttons)
• Direction for the next year plus perspectives about the future
• SMART performance goals for the group (Then set up meetings to establish their individual performance goals for the year.)
• The kind of operating culture you desire (teamwork, cross-training, informal and formal communication, integrity, general conduct)

Your small work group is your training ground. If you aren’t comfortable taking this approach with three people, imagine how overwhelming it would be with three times as many or more.

(By the way, you can also get supervisor-like experience by being a team leader too.)

Positioning yourself for more

Great supervisors get great results. When your small group produces more and better work with you at the helm, you will be noticed and so will your employees.

Great supervisors are a rarity. Employees who have them sing their praises. They want you to succeed because when you do, they do too.

Employees know that the buck stops with you and you’ll need to make decisions along the way that they won’t like. They’ll respect you for that even though they might gripe.

By learning to lead in a small group situation, you position yourself for roles with broader scope, more employees, and a position on the organizational pyramid that will make you and your early employee team very proud.

Photo from whidbychick via Flickr

Get What It Means to “Add Value”? Find Your Niche and Showcase It.

If you want to:

• get that new job, then explain how you’ll add value
• move up, then demonstrate how you’ll add value
• get a better raise, then quantify how you’ve added value
• keep your job, then showcase how you continue to add value

Sounds easy enough, right? Unless, of course, you don’t know what it means to add value where you work or how. Sadly, that’s a lot of employees.

You are money.                                                                                                

The concept of “value added” was first a business and economics term used in discussions around sale price, production cost, and profit formulas. Eventually it got defined as:

…extra feature(s) of an item of interest (product, service, person etc.) that go beyond the standard expectations and provide something ‘more’ while adding little or nothing to its cost. Value-added features give competitive edges to companies….

That’s where you, the employee, come in–adding value through talents and abilities unique to you. It’s how you demonstrate that what you do contributes to the success and profitability of the company.

Employees are a cost, often a big one, to a company. That means we need to produce work that contributes to the bottom line.

Unfortunately, we often don’t know or have a hard time seeing our connection with the company’s big picture. Our world is often just the task list and performance goals in front of us.

It doesn’t matter how far up or down you are on the company’s organization chart, you have to figure out and demonstrate what you do to add value. If you don’t, someone else may decided that you don’t add enough. The consequences follow.

It’s likely that you already add lots of value and either don’t see it or could add more.

Find your niche.

If you’re saying to yourself:

• “I don’t do anything special at work. I just do my job.”
• “I don’t have any unique talents or skills to offer.”

Please stop yourself. It’s time to adopt a new, more positive and generous self-view.

The value you add doesn’t have to  appear in lights. Small contributions can have significant impacts on the company, your work group, and your boss.

Finding your niche means looking at the skills and abilities you take pride in and then maximizing opportunities to brand yourself by them.

Your niche may be something like being known for:

• Coming up with ways to make routine tasks more efficient
• Boiling down a complicated issue into its key points
• Writing meeting minutes that keep decisions in focus
• Getting people at odds to talk with each other to resolve differences
• Injecting a light comment or bit of humor to cut tension
• Meeting deadlines, especially the tight ones
• Catching errors, written and computational, by being detail-oriented
• Defusing irate customers and preserving relationships
• Reading between the lines to uncover the real issues
• Anticipating the needs of others and preparing to meet them

It’s important to take the time to put together a 3-step value-added action plan:

1. Write a clear statement that describe your niche (This can be a challenge when what you do comes automatically, so really commit to doing this.)
2. Identify the real business value that results, creating a clear, strong context
3. Take advantage of all opportunities to put your value-added behavior to work

On the surface you may not think that what you do has business value, but it does. Think about all the time and money saved each time work is done without interruption, colleagues work together without strain, and customers remain loyal. Consider what it means when work is accurate, quality high, and communication clear.

That’s what makes organizations successful. It’s what helps your career.

Don’t  be shy.

Your value added emerges from your knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviors on the job. You want your employer to look at you and feel gratified that you work there. When you add value, employers don’t want to see you go and wish what you do would rub off on others.

Your value needs to be seen routinely to be appreciated. So please don’t be shy about showcasing it.

Photo from memories-in-motion via Flickr

Insensitive, Divisive, or Self-Serving? Taking on Problem Behaviors | “You” Power

You experience them. You may even mention them–things that are done and said at work that aren’t right.

We don’t do our jobs in a vacuum. We have to interact with others. The attitudes and behaviors of our bosses, coworkers, and customers contribute to the culture of the workplace. They make it  consistently positive, negative, or a bit of both.

So what happens when you see and hear insensitive, divisive, or self-serving words and actions that don’t sit well with you? Do you:

• Keep silent (a signal of consensus)?
• Report it to the boss or HR for action?
• Complain to coworkers who feel as you do?
• Take action in your own way?

The power to affect change comes from within you. It takes a plan and committed, sustained action. The power of “you” can be formidable.

“You” Power

We often think that only management can fix what’s wrong with a company’s culture, even  when they’re a part of the problem.

We may think that sexism, bullying, antagonism between labor and management, and an everyone-for-themselves performance mentality are behaviors we have to learn to live with.

Sadly, that’s why these behaviors continue and escalate.

We all have positive role models we try to emulate. Now it’s our turn to be that positive example at work,  one day at a time.

We can each contribute to turning negative behaviors around by:

• Becoming a conscience for what is right
• Setting an example by what we say and do

It’s not for us to get on a soapbox necessarily, but simply to intervene, one-on-one in most cases, to call attention to a more positive way to communicate and act.

Consider personal objectives like these:

1. ) Increase awareness of language and actions that have overtones

When you hear language that’s sexist or ethnically insensitive, suggest a more appropriate  choice of words to the individual speaking or writing. Suggest that certain assignments be balanced between women and men.

In the hurry of the workplace, some coworkers may not be aware of the stereotypes they are promoting through their speech and assignments. Serving as a conscience has real power.

2.) Refuse to gossip

There’s always news that spreads throughout the workplace, but much of it can be hearsay, personal, undermining, and counterproductive. When we listen to or contribute to gossip, we become its agent.

Each time we decline to participate and offer our rationale for why, we influence one or more coworkers. That may lead to some to gossip about us, but it sets the right example, furthers your cause, and may also counteract some bullying.

3.) Discourage “us” v. “them” attitudes

Blaming can become rampant in organizations. It can target employees (us) versus management (them), employees in one group versus those in another, or you versus someone who, you believe, has made you look bad. Nothing good comes from blaming.

If you  believe in personal accountability, as I do, then you can wield personal power by always owning the outcomes of your work, being unwilling to enter into the blame game, and expecting others to also own their work. When they don’t, that’s an opportunity for you to raise their awareness.

4.) Quell complaining and venting

If coworkers know you will listen to their complaints, they will continue to unload on you. If, when they start, you say you’re too pressed for time to listen or call attention to what they did to create the issue, they will likely stop.

A great many complainers fill their days dumping their load on anyone who will listen. If you reduce their audience by one, others may follow suit.

A matter of time

 Making a difference takes time. The more ingrained the insensitive, divisive, and self-serving behavior, the more difficult it is to change. You have it in your power to influence other people. Whether it’s one or many, it just matters that you do what you can to have an affect.

Every action you take has the potential to inspire someone else to follow your lead or tap into their own “you” power. What could be better?

Photo from F-2 via Flickr

 

Want to Be Taken Seriously? Make Your Mark with Care.| Personal Branding Realities

The world is watching. You may like that and invite lots of eyes. You may hate it and try to minimize your exposure. Or you may be somewhere in the middle.

Our careers depend on the perceptions of others: bosses, coworkers, and customers. By observing us, they determine whether or not we’re:

• competent and trustworthy
• cooperative and approachable
• committed and reliable

The way we come across impacts whether or not we get:

•  hired or promoted
• positive ratings and good raises
• heard and reinforced
• chosen for plush assignments

Because your personal brand identity is a priceless asset, you need to manage it with care.

Your brand tattoo

Everything we say and do that others hear and see builds our personal brand. It’s how we manufacture public perceptions.

Social media is the ink that makes your image visible and lasting, creating waves of exposure for endless audiences.

Whether we do it consciously or not, every word and picture that we post online is our effort to present the image we want others to accept. It’s how we turn ourselves into a product that we promote.

If you want to be taken seriously in your career, you need a serious brand image. When your social brand conflicts with your professional one, you may end up with a lot of explaining to do.

Social media is a strategic branding platform. The evolution of your personal brand on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and other sites becomes part of your indelible history.

You may end up having to rebrand yourself (which can be a difficult, time-consuming, and possibly unsuccessful task)  when your brand gets tarnished by:

• those beach and bar Facebook pictures that depict an appetite for partying
• harsh tweets that disparage political, business, and entertainment figures
• endless inane and trivial Twitter posts
• self-absorbed blog ramblings that lack substance

The way you present yourself online (either consciously or unconsciously) represents your brand management strategy–the way you want to be regarded by:

• friends and family
• the community and marketplace
• professional associates and employers

It’s  incumbent on you to take steps to ensure that the image you put out there is one that you are comfortable exposing to everyone.

Remember: Your life is your business. Everything you put “out there” defines you, validates you, and positions you as either someone who adds value or doesn’t.

Keep in mind too that everything you see and read from someone else is their effort to build their own personal brand. Are you buying what they’re selling?

Your brand image is a major contributing factor to getting a job and keeping it.

Serious business

Strategic use of social media gives you a career leg up by helping you  build positive perceptions among those who can help you achieve success.

Posting information, adding thoughtful comments, and blogging enable you to showcase your knowledge, insights, passions, and communication skills.

There is often real, reportable payback like:

• Visibility that differentiates you from other candidates for a job opening or promotion
• Credibility validation helpful to consultants, therapists, and advisers
• Connections with other thought leaders that can lead to professional collaborations
• Invitations by businesses, other bloggers, and book publicists to partner with them

The key to success in any field is validation for what you know and do–and how you go about it.

If you don’t take yourself seriously and if you don’t exercise care with your personal brand image,  then the likelihood of your finding and sustaining a satisfying career is in jeopardy. It’s all in your hands.

Make your mark

Social media self-discipline and self-control are your friends. When you use them to stay focused on the career that you want and resist trying to one-up or entertain your “friends,” you will give your personal brand identity the boost it needs to sustain you through a fulfilling career. I’m pulling for you!

Photo from imatvi via Flickr

Career Not Going Your Way? Try Relaxing Your Grip. | Words from the Wise

Feeling stuck? Frustrated? Just plain mad?

Choosing a career and getting the chance to pursuit it doesn’t always happen the way we’d like.

Careers are unpredictable beasts. They come with promise but no guarantees. While they seem to be about us, they’re actually more about others giving us the opportunity to make their organizations successful.

We often start out believing our careers are within our control. Then reality sets in and we hear ourselves saying:

• “I’m knocking on every door and still don’t get even an interview. Why?”
• “I’ve been performing at a high level in this job for three years and still no promotion. Why?”
• “I never thought the work I do would frustrate me like this. What can I do?”

Too often, we can’t answer these questions. They’re too big, too encompassing, and too far beyond our understanding of the conditions that drive them.

So we keep pressing, driving ourselves forward, dragging our frustrations with us. Some just curl up in a ball and do nothing. Sadly, this doesn’t fix anything.

Words from the Wise

Struggles with career choices and direction have gone on for centuries. Human beings generally want to do work that will support them and bring some satisfaction.

Especially in modern times, the hardest part is figuring out what we like and want to do, given our skills. Once that’s somewhat figured out, we set out to find the right employment.

This figuring-out process requires introspection, which many fail to do. It also requires owning what you know about yourself and the career you want, so that  you can set your direction with an uncluttered mind.

I’ve  worked for many years with job and promotion seekers who have been battered by rejection when they’ve pursued job titles, salary levels, and big name companies rather than the work they enjoy. They’ve held on so tight to their preconceived career must-haves that they have tuned out other opportunities.

I use this quote from Robin Fisher Roffer’s book, Make a Name for Yourself: 8 Steps Every Woman Needs to Create a Personal Brand Strategy for Success, to help clients (both men and women) get free of themselves:

The universe is waiting for you to say what you want…Everything that you are seeking is also seeking you.

Then I add these wise words from Henry David Thoreau in Walden:

 Men (and women, right Thoreau?) are born to succeed, not to fail.

Just think about how complex it is to get all the parts  aligned just right so that you and anyone else can intersect your objectives at the same time.

That means: The job you want has to present itself when your skills and experience are seen as the right fit for the company and when the political forces see you as having the right nature to meet expectations. Whew!

Your successful career starts with your willingness to “put out there” what you sincerely want and then to allow your conscious and subconscious thinking to work together to connect the dots. Your prospective or current employer is doing the same thing.

Relax your grip.

Lots of good things happen when you take that chokehold off your career pursuits and replace it with a realization that what you are seeking is also seeking you.

The benefits can be palpable:

• Less self-imposed pressure, negative self-talk, and energy-sapping stress
• A refreshed ability to see and hear snippets of ideas you might otherwise have missed
• An openness and excitement that blunts feelings of frustration and isolation
• A renewed belief that you will get there and commitment to the effort
• Recognition that your attitude and effort are what you control; success will follow

Your career path is a function of the work you’ve done to offer value to an employer and the initiatives you take to get hired/promoted. Your biggest challenge is to be authentic in the process and prepared to act effectively when opportunities present themselves. Taking your hand off the throttle can help you make a nice smooth turn.

Photo from ladybugrock via Flickr