Work
As talked about in the lesson on dealing successfully with Others, being able to keep clarity about the roles of your various co-workers is essential to interacting with them well. Recognize the purpose of each person that you work with every day and don’t cast them in roles that they do not play. Also realize that from their perspective, you are filling a role, and expectations of you and your behavior go along with that.
Many of those expectations will be based in the “bottom-line”. The bottom-line from the perspective of a business is money. Co-workers such as your superiors will evaluate if you are earning the money that they pay you and also if you are helping the business make a profit. Although some businesses claim differently, and although you might want it to be different, in most cases the bottom-line is the most important evaluation you will face at work. You might wish that your personal qualities were a larger part of how you are looked at but in a real-world working environment it is rarely that way. You do not have a personal relationship with a business.
Businesses, first and foremost, have to survive, and if you don’t hold up your end financially then you put the survival of the business on the line. Employers would rather have someone who can be occasionally difficult on a personal level but who does the required job well than they would want to have someone easy going and friendly who doesn’t do what needs to be done every day. You can be well-liked, but when you cost the business money then you are bringing the kind of attention to yourself that can cost you your job.
On the other end of the scale, there is nothing wrong with being ambitious. Of course you will want to make sure that you don’t sacrifice your Integrity for that ambition, but as talked about in the lesson on Goals, it is important for the structure of your life to be moving in a positive direction at all times. Wanting to improve your status, your income, your resources, your inner self or your outside world are all valid reasons to have ambition.
Be aware that most of the people around you also have ambition of one form or another. As discussed in the lesson on interacting well with Others, you want to behave in such a way that you don’t create unnecessary friction. Competition could turn out to be an inevitable part of your work path, but you have the power to keep it always a friendly competition.
And it is also true that ultimate success can take many forms. Most of the great or wealthy or powerful people on the planet had failures and changes of direction before they succeeded. Winning every competition may not be to your benefit, and again from the lesson on Goals you will need to first make certain that you actually want to win any battles that you ultimately engage in.
The long-term view is the one you want to hold in regards to your ambitions. Ask yourself what you want your life to be like in a year or three years or five years and then make your evaluations and your decisions based on that broader perspective. Asking others about their ambitions in the same way will help you to understand both them and yourself. You may have very different life goals and that information should certainly have an effect on the choices you make. You may even wind up deciding that you don’t want what you thought you wanted and that is perfectly all right, in fact it is one of the important lessons to learn about life in general. Having clarity about what you really want will save you from going in the wrong direction more often than not.
Stay aware of the difference between personal trust and working trust. Trust happens on many different levels and do to well in the adult work environment you will need to keep a clear eye on the boundaries. Not everyone has integrity and sometimes people will try to take advantage of your good nature. Don’t be lazy, don’t assume there is any easier path than working yourself and don’t assume that everyone has your best interest in their heart. Remember that they live with their own needs and ambitions and always take responsibility for yourself and your world as covered in the lesson on Self.
Have boundaries also on how much you trust your company. Promises for the future are great, but conditions change in the business world all the time. The company’s sales may fall, the company can change owners, the people who made you promises can get fired or transferred. All of those things can create major changes in the company overall and in your own world within that company. Events like this, and others, happen all the time.
Your employer will have no problem firing you if conditions have changed enough to warrant it and you would not want to make the mistake of thinking that the company has any personal loyalty to you. The bottom-line will always come first for a business no matter what they may tell you when they hire you or as you work. Morals, as in keeping personal promises made, do not exist in the business world. You will always want to have your work conditions and rewards specified in writing and you want to make sure that the company holds up its end as you hold up yours by doing the work they expect you to be doing. Be professional with your work and your efforts and always Do Your Best but don’t over-trust and careful about making too many sacrifices with your time or energy for the company based on future promises. Always take the time to sit back and see how much extra time and effort is going into doing your job and take an honest look at how much you actually get paid when all of those hours are calculated into the formula. Do not be afraid to change if you feel your current situation is taking advantage of you.
From the other side, don’t take advantage of the company. There is a tremendous difference between activity and action, between smoke and fire. Don’t attempt to fool others or yourself that you are truly engaged in your job with your best effort when you aren’t. Your own personal Integrity should always prevent you from doing so. If you observe yourself making less than your best effort, ask yourself why. There are usually many reasons for that kind of behavior that originate on many different inner levels. Take an honest look at yourself and your life and see if perhaps a change, large or small, might be in your best interest.
|
Questions?
At the bottom of the page are links about
Work
|