Just a Job?
Written on 2 October 2007 by PaddyDo you have a job? Just a job, I mean, you do it for the money? If you won enough money, you would quit on the spot?
o you have a career? If you work hard and get your qualifications you will move a rung on the ladder. Maybe you will become a team leader or a manager. Who knows, one day you may even become the CEO.
Jobs and careers are mainly to benefit you, not the people that you serve. The focus is inward. The benefits are external – money, promotion, status. Often the expectations of a career are not met and retirement starts to look attractive. Imagine looking forward to the end of something that you have been doing for most of your life. You do feel relieved when a loud noise stops….for a short time. The people that I have met who are retired don’t seem as contented as they had planned to be.
What’s the alternative? How about a calling? A ‘calling’ or vocation is something that you believe that you are called to do. You are good at it and enjoy doing it and it helps others. You truly believe that this is THE job and that you were meant to be doing it. The money is not critical but the contribution you make IS. The person who is meant to directly benefit from your ‘calling’ is the person you are assisting. I have known taxi drivers, receptionists, sales assistants and guides at theme parks who seem to have a ‘calling’. It is easy to tell from their attitude that this is so much more than a job or a career. They want to help and obviously enjoy what they are doing. They are also good at what they do and get added enjoyment by displaying their skills.
What is your calling? What are you good at? Are you doing what you are good at as part of your working life? If a voice from the clouds told you what to do with your talents and working life, what would it say? Would it say ‘Stay in the Bank until you retire!’ or “Hang on for another ten yearsâ€.
Maybe this is the only life we get and is not a rehearsal for something else. It may seem risky to leave a perfectly secure job for a faint calling. Imagine the desperation of coming to the end and thinking ‘Why didn’t I do what I really wanted to do when I had the time?’
So get started on identifying what it is that you enjoy doing that will benefit you and others and has a sense of vocation. Of course we all need money to exist but you would do this ‘calling’ even if you were not paid because you enjoy doing it so much. Maybe the money will come if you truly identify what you are best at and do it for life.
I once sat with a man who was dying as he told me what he had not done with his life. Following your heart is not for a privileged few. Maybe it is for the courageous few.
Paddy
Are You Silly Enough?
Written on 17 September 2007 by PaddyThe original meaning for ’silly’ was more about enjoyment than looking foolish. You can imagine someone looking at a person having a wonderful time and judging that this person looked foolish or ‘silly’. Silly walks, silly hats, silly answers.
If you are having fun you will look silly to someone. Better to be having fun than being a judgmental voyeur.
Are you having enough fun in your life? What gives you enjoyment? Do you look forward to anything the way you did as a child or has life become serious and mundane?
Here are some activities that I have tried to increase my FQ (Fun quotient).
Visit a magic shop
I visited two magic shops yesterday and bought some hats, a whistle that sounds like a siren, a brick that is really a sponge and a gun that fires soap bubbles. They are all for a conference in Brisbane where I have an audience of over two hundred to educate and entertain.
Take up dancing
My wife and I are attending a dance class for Swing Dancing. It is great fun but we do increase the average age. We are attending with another couple who are close friends and it is a highlight of the week. Something to look forward to.
Develop your sense of humour
I cut out and keep unusual headlines like ‘Iraqi head seeks arms’ or ‘Prostitutes appeal to Pope’. There is enough humour in everyday life if you look closely. Just watching barristers dash around the city in their wigs is comedy enough. I also read humour books often to get new ideas for stories or humour activities. Put up a humour notice board at work and seek contributions.
Your sense of humour and fun is very much a part of who you are. Your sense of humour is your shock absorber and needs to be kept flexible with plenty of play. Watch children if you want to see a natural sense of humour and fun in action. Children laugh around three hundred times a day. Adults around thirty times.
So…find a way to let your sense of fun loose at least once a day and don’t worry about looking silly. Silly is good!
Paddy
FQ, fun quotient, silly, humour
How Your Behaviour Affects Others
Written on 4 September 2007 by PaddySome years back I remember walking along a corridor with a CEO. A member of his organization passed us and greeted him. He did not respond.
When we returned to his office I mentioned the incident and he was not pleased. I wondered what his silence has cost the organization in lost motivation. What if this person had taken offense and mentioned it to others? The negative effect could have spread to many.
Do you wonder about the effect of your behaviour on others? When you put a stop to unfounded gossip by merely speaking out you could be stopping a message that could cost the organization many thousands of dollars.
I also heard about a very highly skilled technical person who was also a manager. He was short-tempered and rude when he didn’t get what he wanted. He was also considered too technically skilled to lose so people would have to tolerate his temper tantrums. Imagine the cost in turnover.
How can you measure the effect of your behaviour? Do people copy your positive behaviour as well as the negative?
Self awareness and self assessment are truly gifts from above. As manager of a business or a home, we need to be able to read and understand our emotions and recognise their effect on others and their work performance. We also need to be able to accurately assess our own strengths and weaknesses in this area of emotional maturity.
Try this for size…Ask someone how your behaviour affects them. Listen carefully to the answer and don’t defend yourself or rationalise your behaviour. Ask the person to nominate areas that you could improve. What behaviours would you like me to change to support you more and help you to become more productive? Listen very carefully. I remember one manager being told… simply listen to me without interrupting.
Emotional skills will take time to develop so don’t promise an immediate improvement. Maybe get some help or coaching. It is a matter of trial and feedback. Keep going until you have developed the new skills. Maybe you withdraw when there is conflict. Maybe you lose your temper. It will take time to modify these responses but the benefits will be worth the effort. Remember practice makes permanent and only perfect practice makes perfect. A little practice each day will help you make progress.
There is some wonderful reading on the subject on emotional intelligence but it is the practice that will make a difference.
Paddy
behaviour, practice makes perfect, emotional intelligence, self awareness, self assessment
Laughter is Contagious!
Written on 21 August 2007 by PaddyA 1999 study conducted by Sigal Barsade at the Yale School of Management show that cheerfulness and warmth spread easily among working groups whilst irritability caught on less so. It will not surprise you to know that laughter is very contagious. When we hear laughter we find it difficult not to laugh or smile ourselves. Do you recall getting caught up in a spiral of giggles in a group? One starts and others follow. We get caught up because the brain has an open loop circuit that is designed to detect smiles and laughter and respond in kind. Scientists theorise that this dynamic was hardwired long ago because smiles and laughter had a way of cementing alliances and keeping our species alive.
I have read of many experiments to change attitudes to groups of people by forcing contact. If there is no enjoyment in the contact the attitude doesn’t change. It hardens.
The main implication here for us is that we can change the moods of others. The loop is open to outside influence. Be they customers, team members, peers, managers or family members, we can be a major influence in helping others to feel happy.
Some simple ways of doing this are:
- Greet enthusiastically. Don’t tell people how you are. Tell them how you’d like to be. Try some colourful words like: sensational, never been better, enjoying my life!
- Smile. Even if you don’t feel like smiling, others will react to your smile and smile back. You will see their returned genuine smile and react automatically with a genuine smile. Fake can become genuine.
- Shake hands warmly. Physical contact will help people feel better about themselves and about you. Match the strength of their grip and look them in the eye. Soft for soft. Hard for hard.
- Farewell warmly. People will remember the last words you say so make them memorable. ‘Hope to see you again’, ‘Great to see you’, ‘ I have enjoyed speaking to you’.
Humour and laughter spreads quickly to create an upbeat climate. Lose you sense of humour and the world becomes grey. Spread humour and colour returns. Look around you for humour and reasons to be happy. If you woke up this morning you are way ahead of those that didn’t! year.
Paddy
laughter, humour, sense of humour, attitude
Smell Your Hands
Written on 7 August 2007 by PaddyImagine if you threw rose petals at people. At the end of the day your hands would smell like rose petals. On the other hand, what if you threw elephant poo at everyone you met. The magic of positive reinforcement is not well understood. Put very simply, what you reinforce is what you get more of. If you acknowledge and reinforce behaviour it is likely to be repeated.
There are two ways of reinforcing behaviour. Oh by the way, positive reinforcement is anything you say or do that the other person takes as positive reinforcement. It needs to be as close to the performance as possible.
Back to two ways of reinforcing behaviour. Positive reinforcement follows the performance - it can be a simple ‘thank you’, a gift, a note. The person is encouraged to repeat the performance. You noticed and you showed that you noticed.
Negative reinforcement also works.The person repeats the performance to avoid getting another negative reinforcement from you.This doesn’t work as well as the positive. They may only repeat the performance when you are around and they will only do enough to stay out of your bad books.
If you ignore good behaviour and only notice poor behaviour you run the risk of seeing the good behaviour disappear because it is not being noticed and seeing the poor behaviour reduced ‘when you are present’.
Have you noticed how careful people drive when they see a speed camera? No incentive to drive well, only punishment if you don’t. Same with seat belts. There is an immediate negative reinforcement- you need to take time to settle in and your clothing gets crumpled. The positive is in the future… if you have an accident. The negative is now and certain.
So… let’s get started on using positive reinforcement. Look for opportunities to apply positive reinforcement. When people behave well, comment immediately. Make your comment positive and as close to the performance as possible. Ignore poor behaviour, if you can, and wait for any movement in the right direction. Acknowledge and reinforce any approximations towards good performance.
Do you want your hands to smell like roses or elephant poo?
If you have any stories about the effectiveness of positive reinforcement, please send them to me. My most recent example was at a hotel. As I finished signing my name, the person at the desk commented ‘ lovely handwriting’. You won’t believe the care I took when signing for my meals.
Paddy
hand smell, elephant poo, smell like roses, good behaviour, bad behaviour
