Page 56 - Make Work Great

Overtness About Task

Review your workplace purpose and ask yourself where the posi-
tives lie in your own work. Then ask yourself how you might be able
to get a little more of what you like.

4. Be Overt About Your Progress
My father had a vivid expression for frustrating days in his work-
place. When asked how his day had gone, he would answer that he’d
“spent the whole day shoveling sand against the tide.” But he used
another four-letter word in place of sand.
I don’t really mind Dad’s choice of words, but for this metaphor,
I prefer “shoveling sand.” I can easily imagine myself in that scene:
showing up at the beach in the early morning, shovel in hand; work-
ing all day at full capacity, shoveling into the tide; pausing at dusk,
breathless and sweaty, and realizing as I look around that nothing
has changed. Perhaps this resonates with me a little too well! I have
had my share of those days at work, as most of us have.
If you have those days too frequently, you may be missing the
fourth kind of overtness: visibility into your progress. It’s one thing
to have a frustrating and chaotic day or week. But to work constantly
without any sense of accomplishment is bad for your morale. No
amount of incentive can make up for the hopelessness of shoveling
against the tide.
Worse yet, this pattern of work damages productivity. In the new
information age workplace, you’re surrounded by multiple distractions
and requests that divert your attention. If you’re unable to perceive
progress when you’re working toward your workplace purpose, then
productive work and distracting work all feel the same. You will lose
your ability to fi lter between what you should be doing and what you
should be ignoring, and you’ll come to see your workday as an endless
line of fi res to be put out or tasks to be performed. In a visceral sense,
it will cease to matter what you work on, as long as you’re busy. This
“walk-fast-and-look-worried” type of situation is a recipe for chaos
and overload; it’s certainly not a way to achieve maximum output with
minimum stress.

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