I watched my boss hurriedly hit the mute button. We were onboard a floating production storage and offloading (FPSO), floating in the Atlantic Ocean, and dialed into a large international call with operations leaders from around the world.
“Welp, I messed that one up! Yikes.” He chuckled and shook his head. I stood by his desk, transfixed, watching in awe as he let his faux pas roll right off his back.
When asked what my greatest strength is, I can answer quickly. It’s curiosity. This is also one of the core values I hold dear to my heart. As a child, my curiosity was a double-edged sword. I took apart things that couldn’t be put back together again. I found myself in trees that I couldn’t quite climb down from. I asked far more questions than my Sunday School teachers would have preferred. My bug and rock collection rivaled small museum installations. Perhaps my parents thought it would wear off with childhood, but it turns out that my curiosity was there to stay.
It’s January: The season of goal setting, good intentions and grand resolutions. It’s a fresh start to a new year and an opportunity to re-envision the future we’d like to build for ourselves. January is the month of new gym memberships, new app downloads and new habit trackers.
It makes sense that many businesses run on a calendar year and use this annual cadence to set performance targets. Yet the convention of setting personal goals at the beginning of the year introduces a host of challenges for us humans.
You may be hearing a lot these days about the importance of mentorship programs, particularly as we work to close opportunity gaps and pull-through talent representative of our communities. You may also be hearing a lot about professional coaches and perhaps have even considered working with one. Maybe you’ve been offered one through your workplace. January is National Mentoring Month, and we figured this would be a good time to provide a refresher.
It's the most wonderful time of the year! 🎶 Ehem. You know, the time when we get to have genuine and deeply insightful conversations between managers and direct reports about what went well and where we can grow next year.
Oh. Is that not how the annual performance cycle feels to you?
Well you're not alone. Plenty has been written and researched in terms of the ineffectiveness (and literal harmfulness) of year-end performance conversations. Even the Society of HR Managers gives them a failing grade.
The fourth quarter is in full swing and the end of the year is within sight. This is an excellent time to take stock of where our time and energy are currently being invested as we look ahead to 2024. In Part I, we discussed the importance of setting boundaries around our commitments to ward off burnout and, importantly, to be more present and joyful in the activities that we do take on. I introduced a basic framework:
Less adding,
More subtracting, and
Making the most of what’s retained.
In our ongoing Reclaim the Floor series, we began last week by exploring some of the context and considerations that will set the stage for how we handle interruptions. Before we tackle tools and techniques, we’re going to dive a bit deeper into what makes up an interruption.
