Yesterday I came across Jory Des Jardins’ (of BlogHer fame) blog, Pause, and there are some gems in there. I’m of course particulary interested in her thoughts on business, and here’s a great post to start you off: What does that mean: Work smart, not just hard?
Des Jardins gives six pieces of advice here, for those of us getting overwhelmed by work — and these days, that seems to be everyone. I’m particularly fond of the first: “Understand the difference between Team Player and Team Sucker”. In part this is because in the past I have been a chronic doer — the one who carries on when the rest of the group has packed it in, doing more than my share, and then of course getting outraged when my contributions are undervalued. I’m working on overcoming that habit, and I think the phrase “Team Sucker” is going to come in handy here. (I’m a word fanatic, so I’m all about coming up with little questions and/or mantras I can bring to mind at critical moments — “Am I being a team player or a team sucker on this?” could work out nicely.)
I also appreciate Des Jardins’ thoughts on multitasking women (see her second piece of advice). She opines that it comes so naturally to us that delegating is a real challenge — but in her examples, I detect another issue at play: the “we” factor. I think this is a different, though related, phenomenon where women are more likely to consider the needs of the entire group and not just their own. So in Des Jardins’ first example —
“Do you think we should re-arrange the wording on that press release?” (Translation: Would YOU please re-arrange the wording on that press release?)
— we see that there’s an implied desire for a consensus decision about what needs to happen, where perhaps a simple directive might suffice. (Which is not to downplay the value of consensus decision-making, but it can be inefficient if used for every single decision in a day.)
One last thing I want to shout an “Amen” to here… Des Jardins also mentions Goodnight and Good Luck, and how she noticed while watching it how there were women everywhere, in secretarial roles, making the men’s jobs simpler — as Des Jardins puts it, “Men had the meetings, and their secretaries recorded everything and took care of the details that came up.” I had noticed that while watching the film as well , and like her, I thought to myself, “That’s not a bad system.” I don’t mean the gender-segregated roles, but rather the idea of having an assistant to handle administrative details. The thing I noticed in myself as I watched, was how easy it was for me to see the efficacy of it on-screen, but how hard it was to imagine applying it in my own life. And it wasn’t just the “different era” factor — it’s something inside me that deeply resists letting go of the details, even when it’s for my own good.
Many lessons here for me… and I think Pause is likely to become a regular hangout.
