Michelle: When you walked past I thought you said "I wish my cluck".
Catherine: What did I say?
Michelle: "I wish Mike luck"
Catherine: Oh yeh; I have a mint in my mouth. That and really bad.."
Mike: Breath?
Rose; thorn; banana.
Today a woman at work asked me how I was.
Not in a "Man you look tired/sick/strange; how *are* you??" concerned kind of way but in a greeting/social-situation kind of way. Trouble was, I had my bad attitude on - not because of her and not because of the meeting we'd just arrived at - but because of a conversation that had happened before I'd got there. It was a pretty typical conversation in my work-life that never failed to put me in a poor frame-of-mind.
I kind of sighed and grunted and slouched as an answer to this perfectly friendly question.
She chuckled and said, "You know, if you had a Rose; a Thorn; and a Banana you could've answered that question."
I showed her my "please explain" eyebrows and she proceeded to tell me that in her team they had this habit of thinking about:
- One good thing (the rose)
- One challenging thing (the thorn)
- One thing they're looking forward to (the banana)
Had I been forearmed with this technique I might have answered her question with "I'm excited that Project X has finally kicked off although I'm hearing some resistance due to lack of resources, I'm really looking forward to getting the stocktake underway." Or something except who the hell ever looks forward to a stocktake?
"I'm so happy it's Winter - it's my favourite time of the year even though it's getting colder I really am looking forward to our first proper frosty morning!"
Rose; thorn; banana - a little social lubrication that potentially camouflages the truth of the situation you might not want to share because all you really want to do is sag and sigh and no one really wants to know how you really are anyway.
Tomorrow: pack away one good thing; one challenging thing; and a banana into a sentence so you're ready to be the social lubricator not the party pooper.
The little post of Calm Down!
It may still be three weeks until Christmas, but it seems the crazy has come early this year - well at least to my nook of the woods - how about yours?
We got the inkling last week when people started popping out of the woodwork suddenly wanting things done in a hurry. Non-urgent things that were seen as urgent and pushed through with urgency, urgently.
So what's that all about? Is it suddenly realising the end (of the working year) is nigh?
Note to anyone who is suffering from a sense of urgency because of the date on the calendar: that's okay. Focus your urgency to laser precision. Work steadily, constantly, resolutely, until you get done what needs to get done.
Just don't panic.
That's not going to help anyone and you're going to look like you're not managing. In fact, the higher up in the organisation you are the *more* incompetent you're going to look if you're flapping and squawking about as the problem persists.
What I'd also like to know is that if you panic at work over a typo or a lost file, what the heck are you going to do when a saber-toothed tiger jumps out of the filing cabinet and wants to eat you?
“Panic is a natural response to a life threatening situation. It’s a primal emotion that has helped us adapt, overcome and survive life threatening situations. It’s only logical that panic would carry on to modern humans because our ancestors used it to survive.
Nowadays, we don’t really face any life threatening situations where panic is warranted. Even during real life threatening situations, panic will most likely make the situation worse.”
Don't waste your fight/flight response on shit that doesn't require it.
This useful Christmas Work Tip (CWT) has been brought to you today by Thursday, the whackiest day that could have been avoided with a cool, calm head.