Author: Amy D'Annibale

If you’re unhappy at your day job, if your ‘rock your job’ mental sound track is starting to sound like poorly recorded hold music, you might want to try these perspective-switching ideas on for size. 

Secret #1

Who You Think You Work For – is wrong.

Our cultural vernacular gives us this wonderful phrase… ‘I work for  ‘Some Company.’   We’ve all said it.  I’ll probably say it tomorrow; it doesn’t make it true.   You are the CEO of your own little employment agency and your role as CEO of  Employment You is to find a customer who will pay you for sending yourself to work with them. 

Is that confusing?  Just think of this way.  You work for you.  You sell your services to a company.  They pay you, but in the end, you report to yourself.  You get to decide if you’re doing a good job, what job you do and what you charge.  Like any business, you have to sell the services customers want to pay for, and like any business, you get to decide how much you sell and at what price.

I work for me.

I get to decide how I’m going to show up at work, what kind of results I’m going to deliver and how much I’m willing to put into my daily grind.

My customer is free to buy from me or anyone else.  They only owe me for what I’ve already delivered.

When you view it that way, it’s a lot different right?  Instead of thinking you’re at the whim of a corporation that’s out of touch and is treating you badly, suddenly, that corporation is you.  When you work for you, the motivation to get in there and provide your customer with value becomes very strong.  If you don’t deliver, they won’t buy.   But also, there’s a sense of pride and control.  This is your business. You run it and you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.

Next week – Secret #2 : The Reason You’re Working is Not What You Think 

Here’s the thing.  If you want someone else to tell you each step in a process so that you’re sure you’ll succeed – you will always be limited to predictable results.  You will still be tied to what is commonly considered a practical, realistic outcome.

Get it?  No?

If I join a weight loss plan, and eat exactly what they tell me to eat, use their metrics for measuring my food, be it a calculation that only they understand or a package that they’ve determined is a meal, then I will be limited to the results that someone else’s plan or package can deliver. Going forward, I’ll be tied to that program to maintain my weight.

If I take a position at a company and if I use their job description as the sole metric for what I’m going to do on a daily basis, then I am forever tied to that position.  I will not be demonstrating that I’m ready for another position and forever more, if I want to understand if I’m successful, I’ll be tied to that static definition of success.

So What?

Well, for starters, I’ve hemmed myself in.  In an effort to avoid disappointment, I’ve constrained my possible outcomes.  Because I’m only going to follow one path, because I’m going to measure my food against an unchanging plan, because I’m going to measure my job performance against a static scale, the number of possible acheivements has just shrunk. 

Let’s look at the opposite.

If I create my own weight loss plan, it’s possible that I’ll find a formula that creates weight loss.  In fact, as long as I never stop taking action – planning what I’m going to eat and eating exactly that – measuring results and then adjusting – I will drop weight.   I will also build internal confidence in the weight loss process because it arose from inside myself.  I’m also more likely to lose faster than my friend on a plan, because I won’t be limited to someone else’s schedule or process.    I’m also more likely to lose slower for the same reason.  The number of possible outcomes has expanded in every way.  

The same for my job.  If I believe that it’s up to me to define what my responsibilities are, I’ve just blown open the doors on possible outcomes in my career as compared to a person who is measuring themselves against a someone else’s yardstick or job description.  

It’s easy to see in the weight loss example because pounds lost per week is immutable.  When we talk about job performance, the results we measure seem murky and, we don’t get to track our progress on a weekly basis easily in one number.   However, the process is the same.   I define a set of actions that I imagine will create the job results that I want.  I take those actions consistently, then I measure where I’m at.  I tweak my actions and repeat the process.  

For instance, I might decide that I’m good at and enjoy task completion. I want my job to include completing tasks quickly and often.  So I set up a course of action.  Every Monday, I’ll consider what results I need to achieve by the end of the week – say one report created, two reviews done, five hundred lines of code or one project promoted – whatever it is, then I break that down into tasks about a half hour in length each.   I double check the tasks against my calendar,  modulate the quantity so that it’s achievable and start checking off the boxes for each task.  At the end of the week I measure my output, my job satisfaction, etc.   Did I love the feeling of completing tasks?  Did I get the result I wanted from this?   If not, I evaluate why, adjust and try again.   In time, I should be plowing through tasks and creating results efficiently.   If I’m the kind of person that loves that type of work process, my job satisfaction should go up.  If I work in an industry that appreciates that type of work process, then I should see my performance scores or salary go up.   If my industry doesn’t value high task completion, then I may see my performance scores go down or my salary stagnate.  Then I can decide what action to take next.  Either way, the possible outcomes for me at work have expanded in every way.  I am now in control of the results I get at work, I have confidence in my ability to define my job and achieve the results I want, all of which should translate into less uncertainty about my ability to keep myself employed over the long run.

Task completion is a pretty simple example. You can apply the same thinking to leadership or technical prowess. Look at your skill set and find the things you’re great at, which are likely to be the things you love to do. Then ask yourself, how can I deliver results while maximizing use of these skills? Then plan those actions into your week and measure your results.

My friend who wanders into her boss’s office each week for a list of tasks is working in a way that our society tells us is less risky.  That’s not true.  She has reduced the risk of making a mistake, but she’s increased the risk of missed opportunity.  She has less of a chance of building confidence, creating an enjoyable work experience and less chance of exemplary achievement.  There’s an argument to be made that she’s traded her potential for stability.   However, that argument is shaky given that we don’t know how well her boss assigns work and how long the job she is currently doing will remain viable.   Should she lose that job, she will most likely only feel confident in seeking the same job elsewhere.  And in knowledge work… the jobs we were doing yesterday are often obsolete today.

So What is the Take-Away? 

When you define your process, you own the results.  And that my friends, is pretty powerful mojo.

Monday Blog Redux
If you noticed, I posted the same blog content with 2 different pictures.
That, my friends is a fail, and I’m leaving them up to honor my fail.
I was running late, and uploaded the same blog, rushing, trying to keep my commitment to putting up a blog every Monday… had I put up nothing, that would be a quit.

That said, move on to the real blog – 3 secrets about work.

Our time has a way of filling up. Our lives do too. One way to find out what you really want to be doing with your time is empty it out and see what you add back. The results might surprise you.

In 2016 I quit every extra activity in my life other than one volunteer gig and my day job. I parted ways with cherished friends as I left groups and stopped participating in sports. One after another, I stopped it all.

In the space that opened up, I found time… and curiosity. In the opening that I’d created, I found dreams.

After a couple of months with nothing extra going on, I found myself exploring. My friends and I agreed to hike across Scotland. I lost forty pounds. I hired a life coach. I totally transformed my life.

Ever wonder what might be different if you weren’t doing all of what you do?

It’s your move.

We all quit on ourselves. We say we’re going to do something and we don’t do it.

Then we sort of punish ourselves for it, you know, think negative thoughts about ourselves, beat ourselves up a bit and just kinda give ourselves a hard time.

It’s almost like we think that by beating ourselves up, we’ve made up for it. Or, by making ourselves unhappy, we have an excuse to just do it again.

This cycle is just that… a circle that leads us back to the same place.

This week, try a new approach. We know that quitting is the thing that is easiest and least risky. Our brains feel better in the moment when we don’t do something new, don’t get outside our comfort zone, do the easiest thing, the comfortable thing.

The next day however, the easy thing feels terrible and the risky, taking chances, harder thing feels mind blowing good. To get to that, you have to override your mid-brain and actually do the thing.

Three ways to outsmart a quit.

I’m sure you can find more but here are three that I came up with:

1. Plan on doing the quit. — You heard me, you plan on eating five jelly donuts at lunch. Then you sit there and make yourself do it. Now what does your mid brain say? If it’s like mine, it doesn’t want to do it. It quits on the quit. Whaaaa?
2. Postpone the quit – you can skip inbox zero … tomorrow. Just clear your emails before you leave today.
3. Pomodoro through it. – Look up pomodoro method, basically work like a wild person for 25 minutes, then take a 5 minute break. I do four pomodoros and then I give my self an unstructured hour. Then I hit it again. Good times.

Be Curious, Georgina.

Let’s face it, if you don’t bother with the self flagellation, you can stop giving yourself a pass on quitting and maybe, you can just be curious about it. What can you change next time? In the end, you have to give up quitting to win. Other people have figured out how, and you can too.

They’ve been lying to you, lady.

That’s right. You’ve been striving for excellence, shooting for that 4.0 GPA, you’re in it to win it – yet all along, what you should have been doing is failing more often and more creatively. But that isn’t what they’ve been telling you, is it? They’ve been telling you that if you really want something, you can get it, do it, have it, be it. As if the wanting is the key.

The problem isn’t that you don’t want to achieve your goal. The problem is that you’re quitting when you should be failing.

There are very few champions of failure out there. But think about it. You have to be at least willing to fail in order to try anything. If you aren’t willing to fail, to mess up, to be a complete flop, you’re going to spend a lot of time avoiding the things you dream of.

So that brings us to the part of goal achievement where you have to take action and you have to be all in for some failure of heroic proportions.

Quitting is not a heroic failure. 

The difference between quitting and failing is that quitting happens early, leaves you feeling terrible and doesn’t contain the possibility of success. Failure happens after you’ve taken action, and… doesn’t have to feel all that bad.

For example, deciding not to apply for a job you want because you don’t think you’ll get it? That’s a quit. Applying for it and then not getting it? That’s a fail and it might have been a win. Quitting never gives you a chance to win. Failing contains the potential for a win and teaches you how not to do something.

So for the coming week…

Figure out what action you can take toward your goal, confront your fear of failure and just go ahead and take one big action. Then decide on your next big action.

If you’ve been playing along with this series of posts you have:

1. Set a big goal, refusing to believe that your past determines your future.
2. Figured out that your brain is going to want you to quit – and while that’s normal, it’s not helpful.
3. Started to plan ahead and focus a lot of attention on working toward your goal to build habits and synapses.
4. Scrutinized how your brain is messing with your plan and tried different ways of planning.
5. Learned that a quit is not a fail, and failure is what you want to have more of- and you’re going to plan on it.

Next week:

How to analyze your quits and trick your brain into rejecting them.

Scheduling and all the drama it brings up is a topic that comes up a lot in my coaching. I coach other coaches on their schedules… they coach me on mine and we all coach our clients on theirs.

That’s a lot of coaching for something that’s a tool you design to serve you and help you reach your goals.

3 ways your plan is messing with your mind

1. When you look at your plan… you don’t want to follow through.

As soon as you plan it… you don’t want it. You’re not alone. Pretty much everything sounds like a great idea a week before you have to actually do it. One thing you can bet your dual widescreen monitors on – is you won’t want to follow through on your plan. Especially, if what’s on the calendar for today is a little bit hard or requires getting serious and shutting off your ‘Zon playlist and focusing. It happens to all of us. That’s the voice of Mid-Brain. It’s looking for the easiest, safest thing it can find. Sticking to your new year’s resolution pretty much ain’t going to be it. So get smart y’all. Plan in a way that keeps Mid-Brain from crawling off the couch and noticing what you’re doing. Get it? If you have a game plan for getting those emails under control, add a little something to the chore… do it while listening to a great playlist. If the deal is skipping the donuts on the party table, then make sure you have a delicious alternative planned. If you’re going to read 180 mind-numbing pages on how to upgrade your ticketing system, use the Pomodoro method so your brain knows you’ll be getting regular breaks.

2. Making appointments with your own self is creeping you out.

Face it. You don’t treat you like you should, man. You won’t give yourself the time of day. Not surprising dude. We’ve got 12 years of grade school making sure that all our time is planned for someone else, right? Appointments on the calendar are all about not missing doctor visits, our driver’s test, the awesome three-day concert in the Poconos… what? That wasn’t on your calendar? The point is, there is really only one person on the planet who gives two cents for your calendar and that’s you. So make sure you’re putting your own stuff on there first. Yes. First. Give yourself credit. You’re not going to forget to go to work if you prioritize your morning run over everything else. Do you want to be home for dinner with the kids? Put it on the calendar. When they call you – and they will – and ask if you can show up for a 5:30 meeting at the last minute train yourself to answer as if that appointment was with (insert someone way important here). If you inserted your own name, you get a big ol‘ slap on the back. Good job there, dude.

3. Your schedule is packed tighter than your senior year jeans or it’s so wide open that you haven’t bothered to hang up a calendar since 2017.

Some people fill up their plan with so many “Must Do’s” that they have to sleep with their clothes on because they only have time to dress once a week. These folks – and I’m one- value productivity and spend hours shuffling their plans around as they fail to live up to their own fun-house distortion of what they think they need to do. If that’s you, I gotta thank you for finding time to read this. Think about it: if you’re not hitting your targets, then all that overload isn’t accomplishing anything. An overstuffed schedule doesn’t work. Yeah, I get it. There was that one magic day when you actually did all that stuff. That day is over. Take a deep breath. Your life is not a to-do list. Your life is a work of balance and creativity that celebrates the unique gift that is you in the world. Please, don’t miss it. It’s the party of the century. Make sure you have unstructured time and time to shower. It’s OK. And when you plan something, plan a result and walk out of that time with something to show for it.

I lost some of you there, didn’t I? You’ve never accidentally forgotten to allow time for lunch because you steadfastly refuse to plan anything. If it’s not a doctor’s appointment or a tax audit, it’s not on your calendar and it never will be. How’s that workin’ for you? Are you losing sight of all the things you thought you might want to do or be someday? A schedule is not a prison…unless you’re the person in the above paragraph – and for sure, That isn’t you. True dat. You don’t want to lose your sense of freedom and spontaneity right? Tell me, when’s the last thing you just left work mid-day and drove to the Grand Canyon to see the sunset? Right. If you wanted to be that spontaneous, you’d have to plan it. See what I did there? You gotta wonder if the reason you don’t want to put stuff on that pretty day planner is a fear of failure, the gut-deep belief that you’ll let yourself down. Cut that out! If this is you, put one little thing on the calendar for tomorrow and do it. Psst. It can be a fun thing. It can be a simple thing. It can be dancing in the kitchen for 10 minutes or watching football on Monday night. The point is you gotta be able to count on yourself. The only way to do that is to do that. So, do that.

Sure. So how come with all that, we still fail and beat ourselves up and want to quit?

Next week, how to be a grown-up.

Nah. I’ve no clue how to do that. But I do know that I need to plan today for the tomorrow I want to have, and I have to plan just a bit smarter than I did yesterday. And now? You know it too.

Next week… how to love failures and look forward to your next mistake.

See you then.

Welcome to Resolution 1.5

Look, if you’re like most of the people who bothered to make a new year’s resolution, you’ve probably failed at it by now and you probably discussed quitting – at least with yourself, kinda like mind chatter there. And if you’re normal, I use that loosely, you’re probably going to quit this week or next, if you haven’t already.

Welcome to resolution 1.5 – halfway through the first month. The key at this point is to not give up but recognize what you have tried and learn from it. Pretty obvious. So how come, if we know that, we all ordered take out this weekend and pretty much didn’t buckle down?

Well, turns out your mid-brain didn’t get the news. Our mid-brains do our driving. Literally. When we’re learning to drive, we have to focus. Nothing comes easy. We have to concentrate. All of that effort starts forging a connection between your executive function ( Frontal Cortex or Big- C) and your mid-brain. Like the bridge in the picture, information starts flowing between the two. Mid-brain starts to work on how to make all of that activity more efficient. See, it’s not just watching football in there.

Eventually, the information on the bridge is redundant. Mid-Brain has seen it all and it stops paying attention to that information flow, and Big-C stop sending so much data. After all, Mid-Brain has programmed how to turn to left, how to turn right, stop when brake lights come on and tons of other stuff. Big-C goes off to figure out how to pay for the car. Eventually, the connection between the two, degrades. The bridge isn’t maintained and soon, it’s barely usable. At this point, you sometimes arrive at your destination without remembering the drive. Oh, yeah! That!

You can feel the effect of the missing connection just by imagining going to a country that drives on the opposite side of the road. Feel the resistance? Hear that voice that says, you better plan on taking mass transit? That’s Mid-Brain telling you – safe, easy, fun while Big-C flounders around trying to find the connect between itself and Mid-Brain.

Same thing for your resolution. No bridge baby. You gotta build one and it’s going to feel a lot like learning to parallel park. It’s going to be easier if you’re not studying for your SAT’s at the same time. Get it? Constrain yourself when new synapses are required. Focus on the one thing you want, in order to get some wins under your belt at first. It should feel like learning to drive if you’re doing it right.

And here’s the thing, if you try to build the bridge on the fly while traffic is moving, you’re going to have a hard time. So the key to connecting is to plan ahead. 24 hours before you want to take the action, plan it. That means planning what you’re going to eat the day before. Going over your calendar and setting aside time for your tasks, one day ahead.

Sounds Great. How Come It Doesn’t Work?

Next Monday…. the three ways planning goes wrong. For this week, just dust off the resolution, hand your Big-C it’s hard-hat and start planning your dreams … one day ahead of time.

It’s a big deal, setting a goal. Well, kinda. After all, if you swear off food and have a pizza all on the same day, that can be the end of it, right? If you commit to inbox zero on January first and crawl out of the office on Friday the fourth with your ten most important emails still unanswered, it’s time to quit, right? Your brain thinks so. I can guarantee it.

Your brain is a brilliant thing but it’s a bit divided. It’s got a whole complex system designed and focused on doing what feels good now, will not hurt and is super easy. Right. You got it. It wants fast food, that you’ve had before, preferably delivered. It wants to answer the one hundred unimportant emails and leave those ten really intense ones for another day. Why? Because deleting an email gives you a little hit of dopamine, a little bit of “feels great”. And the easy ones, well you know, they’re easy. And the important ones… it kinda hurts just to think about focusing on reading all that and making a BIG decision. You might get your answer wrong and that could hurt you.

Get it?

So here you are, New Year’s day… setting your goal for the year. Drop some poundage, exercise more, leave work on time, empty your inbox, get that promotion. What. Ever.

See that’s the key. It absolutely does not matter what goal you set. The next thing your brain is going to do is decide your goal is the wrong goal. Bad idea. Impossible. See, you failed already. Just quit! Why? Because having a goal is the opposite of super easy.

Your brain is way smart.

Our brains got us here, as species, by conserving energy. Always on the look out for the most efficient way of getting us over the evolutionary goal line – birth, procreate, die as old as possible -the brain is always looking for the most calories for the least amount of effort, the quickest way to the water hole, the best way to stay part of the tribe, the easiest way to do the least amount of work. It’s beautiful, except if you want to do something hard. Then, your standard issue brain is a problem.

Good thing you have an executive in your head.

What? No, the VP of marketing isn’t in there with you. It’s your executive functions, cognitive processes needed for goal attainment and other stuff. That’s the part of the brain that plans, uses your working memory and basically would like to run the show. However, it’s not that simple. Your prefrontal cortex sets up plans but if you aren’t monitoring what that other section of the brain is getting up to, your mid brain is going to stage a coup.

So – If you’re having trouble with your new year’s resolution already, nothing has gone wrong. Everything is perfectly normal and your mid-brain is functioning A-OK.

OK – sure but what about that goal?

1. Recognize it’s normal for your mid-brain to bail on a goal.
2. Refuse to allow it to talk you into giving up.
3. Monitor the thoughts you are having about your goal – are these helping you?
4. Decide you are going to try again, every day if needed, until you acheive your goal.

Step 2, that’s the key right? But it’s not immediately apparent how to do it. Next Monday… how to get around your mid brain and jazz yourself up for keeping going.

See, you might make February with that goal after all.