Sticking to the goals is something that my boss taught me. He is a
teacher,
after all. Well, not taught me, exactly. I've done the 7 Habits, I know
about setting goals. I've just never been really good at sticking to it.
I get distracted. I make too many goals, or start off in a
different direction. It's hard for me to stay constant on one path.
But
every week when I meet with my boss, our top five agenda items are the
goals he set for himself this year (oops, I guess I should be doing that
with my staff too. But that would mean actually writing out the goals
that we set at our retreat, which is one of my goals, so it comes full
circle).
One day a couple months back, I was taking a long walk, and
was reflecting on my workday. I had a great day - I was working on
stuff that was totally not important for "work." I was designing
plexi-glass panels for the laser-cutter, and I realized that
when I do that - when I focus on what I like to do, even when
it's not "important" - it tends to have a positive impact and, usually, I get rewarded for it.
That's
one of the things I love about being carless. I walk. When I walk, I
think. When I actually have the time and space to think, I realize
things.
What I realized, is that maybe the "other" stuff
that I do, when I'm supposed to be working, is what I'm actually
supposed to be doing for work. Stick with me a moment. I'm supposed to
do the accounting and financial tracking for my work. But, I'm also in
charge of branding and space and design, even though they're not really
part of my job (but my boss knows I'm capable and wants that for the
department, so he asks me for it too.)
When I'm doing that
work (that's not really necessarily "necessary"), I'm energized, and it
rubs off on the rest of the team. When we're energized, we have more
ideas. When we have more ideas, things develop. It might not have been
what was on our, "to do list," but our excitement and passion and talent
makes it successful and so it is then appreciated.
What am I talking about, you ask? A room. A silly room. It's not
important to the grand scheme of things. One day, while walking around
with the boss, we decided to take a space that was being occupied by
cubicles and break down the walls and make it into a lounge space
instead.
For some reason, facilities was more on top of things than usual
and was ready to paint. We had to decide on a color. I saw great colors
in another building on campus so the whole staff got up, closed up the
office, and headed over to the other side of campus to check out Lincoln
Hall to see the "orange" I was talking about.
We stopped at the facilities office along the way and discovered
that although orange used to be one of the choices, it was no longer an
option because it was too associated with another school (that have
Beavers as a mascot). But, our student worker, Adrian, saw a deep red they had in Lincoln Hall and thought that would be good for the room. So we went with that.
I wanted to use the "whiteboard wallpaper" that we had
bought and wrap the walls. It would tone down the red and make the
space interesting. One of the researchers donated furniture. The new
staff guy mentioned having little tables mounted to the wall. One of the
other staffers then picked up little doors from IKEA to use as tables,
but we had to put in something where the recesses in were so that it was
smooth. The carpenter (who put up the whiteboard wallpaper) scored us
some "extra" plexiglass from the shop and cut it to shape for us. Our
lab manager dubbed it "20Lounge," like, "30-rock" he said, and he, being
a real-true engineer, could use the nifty laser-cutter we have to carve
drawings I make into the plexi-glass.
During our
staff meetings, we would meet in the evolving "20Lounge" and came to
realize it was becoming an awesome space. We all contributed ideas, we
all went with our instincts even if they didn't seem practical (red
walls, doors as tables, wallpaper for whiteboard), and it turned out
great.
It made me realize that's what I want to do for
work. I don't know what "that" is exactly. But, it's creative, it's
inspired, it's being goofy and instinctual and going with it, and
inspiring the rest of the team to do likewise. I'm good at that -
whatever "that" is. Now I just have to figure out what kind of job that
actually is.
As I walked and reflected on the day, I
realized I would no longer disregard "that" as unimportant. I was going
to make "that" a priority. The closest I could come to naming it was
"art and writing." From now on, my focus would be in art and writing
(with creativity and humor). Even if I had skills and interests and was
being drawn into other areas (my distractions) I would keep focus. In
the same way my boss would evaluate how to spend his time and check to
see if they were part of his "goals." I would check what I was focusing
on at work and see if it met "art and writing."
That
didn't mean I wouldn't do the "real" parts of my job. Those are
necessary and unavoidable. But, when given a choice, when given time, I
would choose to focus on creativity.
What this ended up resulting in, is me quitting my job. Not my real job, but my extra job. I wrote about it in my other blog, "
ReunionEyes"
because I discovered that I actually followed through with it. I made
writing a priority. So, unwittingly, the example my boss set in
goal-setting resulted in me stopping my work with him. At least on that
project.
I wonder where the goals will lead next.