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How to not get burned out

Filed Under Successful Blog, leadership | 4 Comments

by Patty Azzarello

cooltext466496263_leadership

Business is Hard

Sometimes business opportunities, challenges, activities, and responsiblities become overwhelming. You get tired.

And as your business grows, things don’t tend to get easier or less busy!

Pick your pace

It’s important to find a pace that you can maintain, so you can keep making forward progress and not get burned out.

I am a cyclist. 

There are some tough hills that can challenge a rider to the point of total system failure — you can’t breath, your heart races, your legs are on fire.  The only problem is that that happens after 10 minutes, and it may take 30-60 minutes to ride up the thing!

“I can do this all day”

So I force myself to pick a pace, one where even though it is still really hard, I can say to myself “I can do this all day”. 

When I get my thinking, my legs, and my heart rate and lungs calibrated to “all day”, when I finally reach the top I have accomplished the task, and I am still not at the absolute end of my energy. 

If you know the how long the hill is, you can push yourself to get to the top faster. But you don’t always know how long the hill is.

So you need a strategy to make sure you don’t burn out on the way.

What is your pace that you “can do all day”? 

If there is no end in sight to the craziness or turmoil, how much physical and mental energy can you invest over an indefinite amount of time so that you can make it to the top no matter how long the hill is? and still have energy to go forward after you get there?

Get ahead of the competition

When the market gets easier and there are more opportunities, you want to have the energy and the resources to use another cycling term “jump”— to go really fast, right away — while the competition has burned out, given up, or failed along the way. 

Don’t let you head give up before your legs

Part of the “I could do this all day pace” it to make sure you don’t talk yourself into stopping before you really need to.

I compare this to miserable tough jobs I have had. It is always interesting to note how much of the misery I put on myself, compared to that which was strictly imposed or required by the job. 

You can actually make a pretty big change in how you feel about your job, by deciding how YOU will manage your energy, and not letting your head give in.

Some ways to get up the hill:

It is your job to keep making forward progress in uncertain and challenging times.  Otherwise you end up just working really hard, and not really moving the business forward, or getting anywhere personally. 

—–
Patty Azzarello is an executive, best-selling author, speaker and CEO-advisor. She works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. Patty has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at Patty Azzarello’s Business Leadership Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello. Also, check out her new book Rise…

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Help, I’m a workhorse and I’m stuck…

Filed Under Successful Blog, leadership | 2 Comments

by Patty Azzarello

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help-im-a-workhorse

I recently received some input from a reader that defined the perfect storm of being stuck in the workhorse trap. Here it is…

I’m the workhorse for our volunteer emergency communicator group. There are 4 of us, but here lately I’ve been the only one answering the calls from the City for severe weather (tornadoes, severe hailstorms, etc.) even in the middle of the night. Problem is, by the time the City gets to me, they’ve already tried the other members with no luck. I’ve said something, but so far no results.

Since lives and property may be at stake, I feel it’s important to have someone doing the job. So, I do it—

But I say something to the rest of the group every time since the 5th time in a 3 day period– now, it’s been 13 times in a week that we’ve been called and I’m the only one who would answer the call. Okay one guy had surgery twice this week, first on his eye and again on his foot so he gets a pass. But the other 2? One is a definite flake and the other… well, I really don’t know.

I’m tired, and we still have more shots at being called again in the next 2 days. I feel bad saying “NO, SORRY– I can’t” when it’s the City Office of Emergency Management or the National Weather Service, but I might just have to, and tell them that I’m exhausted. After all, we’re VOLUNTEERS!

First, let’s look at the situation

1. THANK YOU. The world is a better place because of people like you that are willing to make personal sacrifice and step up when others need them.

2. Many people in their jobs feel like this. They feel they are the only one capable or available to the work. The work must get done, so they do it. Even though lives are typically not at stake, their values won’t let them drop the work.

3. In your case, lives are actually at stake! Truly, the work must get done.

4. Because you are all volunteers, there is no official way to insist that people do the work.

5. You have tried to raise the issue to get the rest of the team to step up to no avail – so you are stuck being the workhorse.
What can be done?

The first point to remember is that even if you can order people around, you are much better off if you can persuade them to be emotionally committed to doing the work. This makes everything better.

Second, it’s important to note that when I talk about getting out of workhorse mode, it is never about abandoning the work. The trick is to figure out how to get the critical work done without doing it all personally.

Sure, sometimes you need to work 24X7 when there is a crisis, a deadline, a big opportunity. The problem arises when that becomes a steady-state way of working.

If you want to get out of work-horse mode, don’t expect your manager or business partner to make it better.

YOU need to be the one to invent a new approach to make it better. Stick to your instincts that this is not right. Devise a plan to change it.

Here are some suggestions to improve the situation:

Your desired outcome:  Have other people to share the workload with.

There are two basic ways to achieve that outcome:

1. Get the people on the team to step up?
2. Get new people

Get People on the Team to Step Up

1. Record the data about what has happened. Data is not opinion or emotion. It can’t be argued with. Keep a record of all the phone calls that were made and what the response was from each team member.

Call a meeting of the whole team and share the data. Ask everyone to comment on it.

2. Discuss the team’s desired outcome. What does successful service look like? What will it require? Ask everyone to contribute to the definition of the process and the required commitment and responsibility.

Be really clear what the responsibilities are. Ask everyone on the team to talk about their ability to respond to their share of responsibilities.

3. Create an actual calendar for who is on call each day. Set an expectation that if you commit to be on call that you WILL ANSWER. Have everyone sign off on the schedule as a group commitment to one another.

4. Be super clear that there are only two choices, sign and commit or leave the group. There is no room for broken commitments when it is a matter of life or death.

If you are afraid of losing people on the team by doing this, remember that the people who are NOT answering the phone on a regular basis are not part of the team anyway. (They shouldn’t get to talk big and pretend they are a volunteer if they don’t do the work.)

They are not helping. Ask them to leave. Get new people who will be committed members of the team.

Get new people

A critical factor of getting out of workhorse mode is making sure that you have a team that is capable of doing the job.

No matter how vital the work is, staying in work-horse mode long term is the wrong answer.

You need to take it upon yourself to create a team or a process that can get the work done that really matters, without burning up your time personally.

If your current team can’t cut it, you have to change the team.

If you are an individual, you need to influence. You need re-negotiate the work to focus on the most critical outcomes, and recommend a new, better process that achieves the desired outcome in a different way.

In any organization, volunteer or business, people get burned out, leave, or have other priorities come up in life. It is important that you are always cultivating a pipeline of new people that can (and want to do) the job.

When you look at the people who are not performing, decide “Can’t or Won’t”.

Can’t you can work with, Won’t is not worth the trouble.

Cut them loose. Get people who are motivated to help. That will be your only way out of workhorse mode long term whether you are in a group of volunteers or leading a business team.

Also, there are lots more ideas about workhorse traps and escape routes in Chapter 3 of my book, Rise… They Shoot Workhorses, Don’t they?
What do you think?

IF you have any other ideas for this generous and tired emergency response volunteer, please share them in the comment box below!

When should you say ‘no’?

Filed Under Motivation/Inspiration, Successful Blog, leadership | 5 Comments

Learn to say ‘no.’ It will be of more use to you than to be able to read Latin.-Charles H. Spurgeon

Take a quick inventory of the time you spend each week doing something for someone else. While you’re at it, think also of the choices you make that are not in line with your values or your goals. How much of your time is spent pursuing someone else’s perception of what you should do or can be?

Most of us hate to say ‘no.’

Whether it’s because we want to be liked or because we fear that we’ll appear weak, many of us struggle with speaking that small, but significant syllable. Some of us have deep, systemic ‘people pleaser’ issues that are borne of low self esteem. When we say ‘yes’ to projects or volunteer opportunities, it’s usually because we seek approval or want recognition.

Some of us want to appear as though we are super-human, efficient ‘go-getters.’ If we say ‘no,’ we fear being passed over when promotion time rolls around. Or we’re letting someone down. Especially in the age of social media, iPads and smartphones, people are expected to be accessible all of the time.

But what happens when we dilute ourselves to the point of being unrecognizable and inefficient?

Until you value yourself, you will not value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it. – M. Scott Peck

Take another look back at that week. How much of it can you actually remember?  Was most of it spent in a flurry of busy-work that seemed to blur into one big To Do List? Did you feel as though you were a hamster in a wheel?

Did you set conscious, measurable goals and jettison anything that didn’t align with your intention? No week is perfect, and there will always be unforeseen obstacles that present themselves. That said, if we hope to become independent, we must discipline ourselves to set and stick to an overriding set of goals: immediate, intermediate and ultimate. When faced with a request from someone that doesn’t dovetail with what we’ve determined to be our goal, we must summon the courage to say ‘no.’

The cost of a thing is the amount of what I call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run. – Henry David Thoreau

The day I internalized this quote was the day that my schedule magically opened up.  After I read a book called Your Money or Your Life , it was literally as if the biblical ‘scales fell from my eyes.’ My choices and time commitments stood out in stark relief.

Once you reconcile the fact that every choice you make costs energy (time, money, effort), you start to view your commitments and investments with an entirely new set of eyes. “How much of my life am I willing to pay for this choice?” If I say ‘yes,’ to the PTA meeting, I’m saying ‘no’ to playing catch with my daughter. If I say ‘yes,’ to buying this $50K car, I’m saying ‘no’ to a good chunk of my retirement planning.

Furthermore, every commitment or ‘yes’ that takes you farther from your presumed goals also keeps you from independence. You are ultimately beholden by the choices you make.

Review our priorities, ask the question; What’s the best use of our time right now?-Alan Lakein

Again, none of us are perfect and there are going to be days where you have the ambition of a slug. However, this must be the exception and not the rule if you wish to be free. Discipline creates the paradox of freedom. Create habits and touchstones in your day to keep yourself on course for the times when you’re experiencing free fall:

  1. Before you leave your office/end your work day, write down three things that you need to (MUST) tackle first thing the next day.
  2. Block off one hour per day to take stock, realign your choices or perform course correction.
  3. Exercise. This must become a non-negotiable. In addition to multiple physical benefits, exercise is a commitment to yourself that pays mental dividends.
  4. Practice mindfulness. When you’re juggling three things at once, become aware of what you are doing. Ask yourself, “What’s the best use of my time right now?” Delegate or stop doing the unnecessary.
  5. Follow through with your decisions.

Time is the most valuable coin in your life. You and you alone will determine how that coin will be spent. Be careful that you don’t let other people spend it for you.-John Dryden

When we find ourselves mindlessly saying ‘yes’ to everyone else, we are saying ‘no’ to ourselves. Our hopes. Our goals. Our dreams. There’s a difference between self-care and selfish. Saying ‘no’ doesn’t mean that we are selfish.

If you’ve seen the movie Bruce Almighty, you’ll remember what happens when Bruce (as God) wills everyone to win the lottery. Everyone wins a few cents. The same thing happens when saying ‘yes’ to everyone at the expense of what you really desire. It’s an underwhelming, diffuse sort of effort/payoff. Just think of how much more you can help people when you say ‘no’ when necessary so that you can spend your time on that which truly fulfills you.

Your effectiveness increases. You live a more abundant life. You’re able to truly give from a place of security and sanity. Give yourself permission to say ‘no.’

When was a time that you said, ‘no,’ and lived to tell the tale? How did your decision affect you? the folks around you?

——-
Molly Cantrell-Kraig is a woman with drive. Possessing an innate sense of purpose and a pragmatic, solution-based approach to empowering people, she fused these two traits in order to establish Women With Drive Foundation. Based upon its founder’s personal history, Women With Drive Foundation is a means through which Cantrell-Kraig may effect change on both a micro and macro level. By providing women with something as essential as personal transportation in order to transition them from poverty to prosperity, she, through Women With Drive Foundation, seeks to empower women to help them help themselves. Through this action, the individual applicant benefits, as does society as a whole. Follow Molly on twitter as @mckra1g or @WWDr1ve (Women With Drive Foundation)

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Delegate…and relax

Filed Under Successful Blog, leadership | 1 Comment

by Patty Azzarello

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delegate-relax

How well do you delegate?

Most people inherently know that they should delegate more, and delegate better, but one big obstacle keeps them from doing it…

It will be better if I do it myself.

Who’s at fault?

It it doesn’t come out right, the uncomfortable question this raises is – did this person fail to do a good job because:

1. They are not good enough at the job or
2. I am not good enough at delegating?

You don’t need to get comfortable with worry!

The real secret of successful delegating is not to learn how to deal with the emotional discomfort of letting go, and learning to live with being worried about the outcome, or accepting bad outcomes…

It’s about preventing reasons to worry

Your job is to delegate, let go, NOT micromanage… AND create structure, support and processes so you ensure that it is going to get done right.
You don’t deal with the worrying, you ensure it’s not necessary.

Ways to build comfort and insurance into the project

(without micro-managing)

1. Let the person create the timeline, define the deliverables and how you will measure them.  The encouragement and trust goes a long way, and you either get the pleasant surprise of a better plan than you would have come up with, or you get an early warning that this person needs more support.

2. Tighten the Outcomes.  If you are concerned that the person is not capable enough to run with the project, Instead of a 6 month outcome, discuss outcomes that occur every two weeks.

3. Focus on the outcome, not the activity. No two humans will do a task exactly the same way.  If they deliver the outcome, it shouldn’t matter how they do it.  Let them worry about how and what.  You worry about WHY, and what needs to be true when it is done.

4. Create an actual process and tracking system for long term or repetitive tasks – a software development lifecycle with checkpoints is a good example.  But why not define a project lifecycle with checkpoints for a quarterly analyst presentation, a press release, or a marketing campaign?

5. Third party reviews. Get yourself out of the position of always being the one to judge whether a deliverable is good enough or not.  Get the actual consumers of the deliverable to review and provide feedback.  Your employees will learn far more this way.

6. Don’t forget to inspect and measure things along the way.  If you set up a timeline with review steps along the way, you must follow up.  A great deal of your comfort comes from the fact that people take you seriously and actually do the committed work.  A long time mentor of mine always put it “You get what you INspect, not what you EXpect”.

7. Teach. When you are delegating things you are personally good at, always think of delegating as a teaching opportunity. If you need to sometimes jump down and do the work yourself, make sure someone is watching and learning.

Bottom line…

You need to delegate effectively if you want to get anything significant done, get anywhere in your career, and save yourself from an un-doable workload.

If you are either doing the work yourself, or worried about the work not getting done, you need to change your strategy.

You can delegate and feel comfortable that the work is getting done as long as you do the higher level work of setting up the systems, processes and measures that ensure the right things are happening along the way.

What has worked for you?

Please share your ideas about how you got better (and more comfortable) with delegating. Let’s discuss in the comment box below!
—–
Patty Azzarello is an executive, author, speaker and CEO-advior. She works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. Patty has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at Patty Azzarello’s Business Leadership Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello

WHEN do you think?

Filed Under leadership | 6 Comments

by Patty Azzarello

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time-to-think

The big idea…

If I could offer one idea that will have a huge impact on your success and your satisfaction with work, it would be that you give yourself time to think on purpose.

(you can stop reading here if you accept that point!)

Time to think

I work with so many executives that tell me they would be so much better at their job if they had more time to think.

Think about a typical day, week or month in your work.  How much time to you spend in uninterrupted, quality thinking time?

I know when I was a corporate executive I had the same problem.  My calendar was fully booked.

If I tried to schedule time for myself it would get over-ridden with urgent customer problems, staff crises, or emergencies from my boss to deliver something to his boss.

My personal, thinking time got wiped out.

So I needed to work differently.  I have written much on the topics of defending your time and energy, making more time, delegating better, and many other topics which help you use your time more strategically.

But today I just want to focus on this one idea:

Give yourself time to think.  Schedule it.  Protect it.

This will have a bigger impact on your success than almost anything you can do.  If you are giving yourself this time, don’t ever feel guilty about it.  If you are not, start taking it.

Key point: Remember, your job as a leader is to build capability underneath you, so your team can handle more work, and so you can apply yourself to solving higher order problems.

Enable your team to do the work

You will never do any of this if you don’t give yourself time to think.  You will get caught up in a sea of activity and reacting.
Think about it this way:  If you stay overwhelmed with activity you are not doing a good job.

Schedule time to think and HIDE

Try it for 2 hours.  Tell everyone you are at the dentist.  The world will not come to an end.  Hide. The hiding part is important. The activity knows where to find you.

Think about how you can improve all of this chaotic, reactive, repetitive activity and do something better.
Then give yourself 2 hours a week to think.

Don’t feel guilty

I can’t tell you how many teams I work with where they all live in fear of their instant message window saying “unavailable” for a second.  It’s fascinating that no one holds it against anyone else, but each person feels this huge pressure to always be available.

I know people who work at home who are afraid to go to the bathroom because they think their company will think they are not working if they don’t answer IM’s instantly.  This is crazy.

Why not put your IM status for an hour or two as “working on a deadline” or “on a call” or “be back at 2pm”?

If you tell people to expect that you will be away from IM working on strategic projects a few times a week, no one will hold it against you.

Being over-available can backfire

If instead you stay infinitely available, but never do anything strategic, you will fail to do your job well.

I hear upper managers talking about their workhorses… “Oh yeah, we can throw anything at him,  he’ll work round the clock, he’ll travel anywhere, we can always count on him… “

Notice they are not saying, “he is someone we should promote.”

If you work tirelessly 24×7 to accomplish a goal or meet a deadline once in awhile that is OK, and sometimes necessary.  But if you work tireless 24×7 for 5 years you will be stuck.

If you never give yourself time to think about how to work better or more strategically, and just keep doing all the work as it comes at you, you will never be as successful as if you figure out how to rise above it.

How do you defend your time to think?

Tell us how you’ve been successful in the comment box below.

—–
Patty Azzarello works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. She has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at Patty Azzarello’s Business Leadership Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello

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