Tag: HR Blogs

We know how lucky we are

There is no doubt about it – 2020 has been a challenge.

And it started before COVID hit.

We sailed into January believing the worst was behind us. Our dog, Boo, had survived emergency surgery in December, emerging from a twisted stomach without her spleen but with all stomach tissue intact. It was pretty much a best case scenario. We celebrated Christmas and the New Year, certain we had more time with our older, but still puppy-like, dog. 

Then less than two months later, the rug was pulled out from under us and Boo threw a blood clot and despite emergency care, we lost her 24 hours later. After 10 years, we were suddenly coming home to an empty house. It was terrible. 

And then the world started shutting down.

Our last personal trip was the day after we lost Boo (planned trip to Chicago for the Hustle), and my last business trip was early March. Shortly after that, my choir concert was cancelled, and eventually, the rest of the season. We watched and waited to see what would happen with jobs, with family, with health. We hoped things would improve by August so we could take a planned trip to California, but soon realized there was no way. Our annual pre-holiday trip didn’t even get to the planning stages, knowing we were in this for the long haul.

Yet through it all, we know we are lucky. 

Neither of us lost our jobs and the work we do is easily done remotely. We have good health insurance. We have a house large enough to accommodate both of us working from home for the foreseeable future. We have the means and the know-how to order what we need online. We have remained healthy. Our extended family has remained healthy. The money we had set aside for our California trip was repurposed into long-overdue home improvements (along with everyone else in our neighborhood, apparently). We already had a home gym set up, for goodness’ sake. Overall, we are doing okay.

Every once in a while, one of us will comment on a story we’ve read or a segment on television we just saw, saying, “We have been really fortunate through all of this.” 

That doesn’t mean we don’t have bad days. We get frustrated, depressed, annoyed, and bored – just like everyone else. But we haven’t had to say good-bye to a loved one via Facetime, which puts it all in sharp perspective. 

For all of this, we are grateful. I won’t say we’re “blessed,” because to me that infers we are somehow special or ordained. No – we are flat out lucky. Yes, we follow health guidelines (masks and sanitizer on hand at all times), but lots of people who do that have gotten sick. Yes, we try to be thoughtful about our careers, but lots of people who do that were laid off through no fault of their own. We are simply benefitting from some cosmic lottery that allows us to weather this particular storm in relative security. And so, we are grateful.

There is no motive behind sharing this, other than to say – beware of attribution bias. Yes, we might try to make our own luck, but that saying, “Man plans and God laughs,” exists for a reason. People can do everything right and still struggle. And people can do everything wrong and succeed. You can be proud of your accomplishments AND acknowledge the element of chance that ensured the cards fell in your favor.

Final proof of our luck? We had been following an Akita breeder on Instagram for future consideration. Their dogs had similar personalities to Boo and we thought someday, they might be an option when the time came to consider a new dog. The day we lost Boo, a litter of puppies was born. We were able to put a deposit down, got our first pick of the puppies, and welcomed Baloo to our home the week before my birthday. He’s a doofus of a dog who tries our patience like only a 10-month-old puppy can. 

And we are so lucky to have him. 

Pro Tips from a Terrible Job-Seeker

Recently, a friend of mine asked if I had any tips as she thought about her next role. She knew that I had been through a similar situation about a year ago and wanted to know what wisdom I had learned from the experience.

I also laugh a little to myself when I get these requests. I think it’s fun that people think I know what I’m doing as a job-seeker. As a recruiter, not a problem – I can give advice and suggestions all day long about how to recruit, as well as share what recruiters and hiring managers are thinking. It’s different when it’s personal. I often describe my career as “Forrest Gump-ing my way through life” because I wasn’t always the most thoughtful in my approach. I would work somewhere for awhile, decide it was time to leave, then find something else without a lot of planning. It typically worked out, but not always. And while I learned something from every job, I feel like I could have avoided some of the pain along the way if I had been smarter about it.

Thankfully, I was a LOT more thoughtful about my last move. As a result, I’m in a job I love doing incredibly interesting work with incredibly smart people. Finally.

So, to help you NOT be me, here are some of the tips I shared with my friend:

  1. Don’t search scared: If you still have a job while you’re searching, this is a little easier. If you don’t have a job, it can be hard to be patient and not panic about money. Hopefully you have a nice buffer and can feel okay taking the right amount of time to find what you want. This isn’t always possible, so if you need to take a contract position while you look for your permanent home, that’s okay.
  2. Know (generally) what you want: Just blindly looking for something that looks interesting is exhausting and makes it harder for people to help you network. There are some good free tools out there to help you narrow your focus. Or splurge for a session with a coach or super smart friend. Whatever you do, narrowing down your want list is necessary.
  3. Find like-minded people: I’m not talking culture fit. Find people who will appreciate you for YOU. I’m at the point in my career where I will not suffer fools for immediate coworkers, so I consider long and hard who I will be interacting with, whether I’ll learn anything from them, and whether they will get my sense of humor (and that list is shorter than you think).
  4. Don’t be afraid to ask for help: As shared earlier, I suck at finding jobs for myself, but I love helping other people find jobs (I’m so weird like that). Chances are, you have an AMAZING network of people who love you and want to help you find your dream job. Use it.
  5. Treat Yo’Self!: Yes, you’ll want to be smart about money until you’ve got your next gig figured out, but don’t begrudge yourself a pedicure. Or a trip, if it’s booked. Or a hair appointment. Or that damn cup of fancy coffee. You still need to love you.

So there you have it. Hopefully this helps you as you contemplate that next job search. It’s not an exact science. Everyone’s search is a little different, so grant yourself a little grace along the way.

If you have any advice to share, please do! And good luck to those who are looking for their next job. We’ve got your back.

The step teams forget

Anyone who knows me (or at least reads this blog) knows that group work is something that can destroy my soul. Part of that is due to my introverted tendencies, part of is it my control issues (self-awareness will set you free), but I think a big part of it is how ridiculously ineffective it can be. I mean…picking a team name alone takes a good 20 minutes of ideas and recriminations.

Collaboration is good. Hopelessly stumbling through a forced group activity is excruciating – and is not very good business.

The reality is, teamwork IS a vital component of work. None of us can be successful by ourselves. We rely on the expertise, time and effort of those around us. Different tasks and different projects require teams to come together and break apart all the time. Remember Tuckman’s stages of group development?  With the pace some businesses run, there often isn’t even time to name all four, let alone move through them. And it’s exactly this frenetic pace that can sabotage the success of teams.

You’ve probably noticed that some teams are remarkably successful and others are a trainwreck from the first meeting. And while there are many variables that factor into the success or failure of a group, there is one thing teams can do shift the odds in their favor:

Talk about how the team will work with each other.

Im-not-bossy

Think of it as establishing the rules of engagement – how you’ll communicate, how you’ll make decisions, how you’ll disagree with each other, how you’ll resolve conflict. Everytime I see a team take as little as 5 or 10 minutes to have a quick conversation about this, I have seen that team do well.

My belief in the importance of this step  is solidified whenever I see teams go head-to-head in some way. What follows are two examples – one from real life, and another from “reality” TV:

Real Life: I’ve facilitated a team-building/communication exercise a number of times that involves the recreation of a Tinker Toys sculpture. Each member on the team is only allowed to do a specific thing in this exercise and talk to only certain people. It’s quite convoluted feeling and teams get frustrated because the person who can see EVERYTHING is not allowed to share anything – they can only answer yes or no questions. The twist is that anyone on the team at any time can call a team meeting so they can talk about HOW the team is working together. Every single time I’ve facilitated this exercise, the team who takes the time to establish – and review – how they will work together successfully completes the sculpture. The team that does not do this descends into frustration and passive-aggressive sabotage.

Reality TV: I absolutely adore Face Off, a special effects makeup competition show that is now, sadly, ended. Depending on the season, the challenges change week to week in being either individual or team competitions. Sometimes the teams are chosen, but more often than not, they are randomly assigned. Time and again, the teams that take a few minutes at the beginning to establish how they’ll make decisions and are intentional about sharing their thought process out loud so the others understand it win the challenge. It shows in the final product.

While both of these examples are from an artificial environment, I have seen this play out in business projects time and time again. Think about the BEST project you’ve ever been a part of. chances are you had clarity in communication cadence, clearly defined decision-making authority, and the understanding that disagreements could be aired in team meetings without people taking it personally.

 

So the next time you find yourself on a team – ad hoc or otherwise – focus on the step that will make the biggest difference.

And no…picking a team name doesn’t fit that bill.