The Wild Freedom of Managing Yourself

What's *just absolutely wild* about the work we do every day is that we get to wake up and answer the question: What should my contribution be? Think about that. Whether you choose to answer that question in the moment, or on an assignment, or in a job, or over an entire career ... you (we) get to make that choice! Every day!

Yeah, what's possible is bounded by the situation (the circumstances of the job, the organization, the problems, the projects, etc.) ... but inside of that there is an awesome opportunity to decide what your contribution is going to be.

And! If you don't like what's on offer, or it isn't a match for you, very little is holding you back from a different situation that is offering the contribution you're seeking. There are many, many, many situations out there. Find the right one for you. Better yet: create the right one for you.

And! This situation, the work you're doing right now, regardless of what it is, offers the best opportunity to develop your skills so that you provide yourself the opportunity to decide what your contribution is going to be tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that. And the day after that.

Peter Drucker called this Managing Oneself.

To manage oneself is to put yourself in the best possible situation to make a contribution. That's where we find professional success—and frankly, it's where professional satisfaction hides, too.

To do that, Pete the Great says, we need to know our strengths, how we work best, and our values. And take responsibility for relationships. So let's get to it.

What are your strengths? Identify strengths; use strengths; improve strengths. 

In other words, work and grow from strengths. "Most people think they know what they are good at," Drucker writes, "They are usually wrong.” I share Pete’s negativity only to encourage you to reflect.

Bad habits can get in the way. So we must remedy those. And—this bit is also not so good—each of us tends to develop an intellectual arrogance in our subjects of specialty ... because we're human. Something to be aware of. And something to overcome when present.

“Think strengths, not weaknesses,” as Dan Pink writes and captures what has become common advice. That’s because it works. Doing (more of) what you do consistently well is energizing, rather than the opposite which can become an on-ramp to burnout.

How do you prefer to work? Or: How do you do your work? Or: How do you get things done? Or: How do you perform best?

Our work methods are often just inherited from former jobs, colleagues, organization norms, bosses, or even default settings in our digital tools ... and sometimes (often?) they are not all that effective. One of the great mysteries of the modern workplace (to me, anyway) is just how little attention is given to *how* we perform our work tasks.

Rarely has anyone used a process of deliberate discovery to find what work methods "work" best for them—how we focus, how we set objectives, how we learn, how we decide, how we think, how we collaborate, work environment, etc. etc. etc. 

We all perform work in different ways. Something that works for you can be a non-starter for someone else. So ensure the conditions that put you at your best are present as often as possible. It will help you to make the contribution you desire … while understanding flexibility is required, whether because a situation requires a different approach or colleagues have different performance needs. 

‍What are your values? When it comes to doing the work you do, and how work fits in with the rest of your life, what do you value? What’s important to you?

"Personal values are the measuring sticks by which we determine what is a successful and meaningful life," writes Mark Manson, author of "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck.” 

Our values are often obvious upon reflection. Because values are right there in our day-to-day behavior and the choices we make each day. We very literally do what we value. And there's friction when your values are in conflict with the what a job requires—responsibilities, expectations, or otherwise.

Finding the best opportunity to make the contribution we desire requires finding a workplace culture that jives with what’s important to us. As in, very truly and actually grooves with what's important to us. We all know the values posted on the website aren’t necessarily representative (nor comprehensive) of what the people in charge (whether of a team or at the tippity top) actually value.

Taking responsibility for relationships—we never work alone, even when completing "independent" work there are always other people involved, and so the professional takes responsibility for relationships, which has two parts in Drucker’s view:

"The first is to accept the fact that other people are as much individuals as you yourself are. They perversely insist on behaving like human beings. This means that they too have their strengths; they too have their ways of getting things done; they too have their values. To be effective, therefore, you have to know the strengths, the performance modes, and the values of your coworkers." (Bosses included.)

The second part is taking responsibility for communication. This means sharing how you work, what you're working on, what others can expect from you, how others can be helpful to you … And it means asking others the same to establish working expectations. Most people never ask. Huh.

So let’s summarize and multiply. Managing oneself—the practice of putting your answers to these questions to work—helps you to take control of your work and career by: 

• Identifying the contribution you seek to make—either right now, and/or as far as into the future as you desire; and the results you expect to deliver

• Positioning yourself in the best work situations to make those contributions, and exiting those that appear to be contribution-limiting 

• Establishing a point-of-view and direction for your personal talent development efforts (aligned with your sought-after contributions, strengths to build on, values to stay true to, and desired work situations)

• Becoming more intentional and deliberate about *how* you work—as in actually how you carry out the tasks that comprise “work", and the methods, tools, conditions, etc. that help you to do your best work

• Accepting responsibility for communication (collaboration and cooperation) with co-workers through a) the knowledge that each person has their own answers to these questions and b) sharing your answers with each other to establish understanding and improve trust 

Here it is. Managing oneself gives us the power to make a subtle flip: rather than merely accepting (or not) the conditions of the job (or project, relationship, etc.) as it exists, we can move ahead with creating the conditions (for us and those we work with) to do our best work.

These questions (nor the advice) are not Earth shattering in any way. It is, in fact, exactly what you might expect the output to be if a random group of workers were tasked with identifying the best questions to find purposeful work. 

What’s important about that, in my view, is this: 1) it’s good advice and 2) the challenge is in operationalizing the insights. How active are you in applying your strengths, your values, and preferred work methods? 

The answer for most of us: not very. So there’s the opportunity: putting the advice into practice ... and seeing what happens as a result.

Around The Water Cooler ⛲

Not this week, I’m OOO—see you here in a fortnight.

Thanks for reading. Hit reply and let me know your thoughts.

How To Work is healthcare-focused work design inspiration (from the experts!) to nudge your perspectives and practices into better alignment with the world of work as it is, and away from what it was. Here’s my take on what we’re working through.