WorkPlace Satisfaction –
I do a lot of writing and thinking about sales training. In many ways, sales training is like hygiene. You need to do a lot of it and on a regular and repeated basis. In the sales game; this is critical. I have yet to see a sales environment in which there was too much training. I teach Shotokan karate. And there are many spill-over lessons. Lessons that I use in one that can also be used in the other. In some respects, Sales is like karate; there are exact principles of execution that help achieve maximum results. It is not just practice that makes perfect, but perfect practice that makes perfect.
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Still this BEAM is not about techniques to help you have more technical proficiency in your work or sales position. The point of this post is to help you get more gratification out of your work.
Who will really do their best job; if they do not gain satisfaction out of their work? The answer is No one!…. It is like asking someone to climb Mount Everest when they don’t like the mountains. It’s not going to work out.
So how do you get more satisfaction out of your work? – – – If you asked yourself that question with me just now; you just took the first step, to finding the answer.
Step Numero Uno; absolutely critical to enjoying your work; is to take honest steps to look at and examine the prospect of your work. And not just casual steps but efforts that you undertake, with some intensity and curiosity. An honest appraisal most often precludes work-place happiness. To be happy in your work, you need to think about it. Research it and then try to apply what you learn. Do not expect to keep doing the same thing and achieve improved results. Turn your ideas, into a proactive action plan.
Perhaps you are frustrated with your workplace. And your statement to me about now is “But you don’t know my job. It’s not possible to have a better attitude about it….” All I can say is that if you are a swimmer who is primarily mountain climbing; it wont work. If you are mountain climber who is primarily swimming; that wont work either. – – – Sometimes, what we are doing, just is not a fit for our skill-set or personality. If that is the case, quit trying to put a square peg into a round hole and find something that better “fits” your talents, abilities and interests.” Employment is not like marriage, it is seldom better to prefer fighting, to switching.
However, most times it is not a job re-positioning that we need. In most situations, we need to solve our problems right in the middle of our current cirumstance. If we do not address the difficulties that hold us back and haunt us in our current situation. We are not likely to overcome them in a new situation.
It’s a funny picture of the cow over-looking his own grassy meadow, trying to reach the single blade of grass on the other side of the fence. Still, while it may be a funny picture; it is a sad reality, all too often. People never find fulfillment, because they are always looking for it somewhere else.
Fulfillment is most often found where we are at. And then grows into something more, somewhere else because we outgrow the situation, we have mastered.
If we run from problems in our current station: We will most time find them in different faces and different places, only bigger than before. This is not the way to workplace satisfaction.
So step number one is to honestly and intently, ask the question. What can I do to find more satisfaction in my work?
Most times our answers are inside us. And our greatest solutions come from our own hunches and instincts, especially about our work.
Are you asking yourself the question? Are you writing down your ideas. Are you developing them as you work on applying them?
It’s like eating a steak. You chew up the meat and spit out the bone. What works, you keep. What does not, you discard.
Why not start a daily work journal? You can keep it online or in a notebook. — Sometimes the task of literally writing things down with a pen solidifies the concepts. In doing this in today’s world, it is best to review them and keep them permanently on a computer, so you can review them from time to time.
Start today. Ask yourself the question of how to get more satisfaction out of your work. Write down your initial thoughts. Review them briefly and daily. Do this for 90 days. You will find that your thinking develops and as you improve your thoughts about your workplace. You will find that your satisfaction with your work, also improves.
It has been said that the only bad question is one that is never asked. Yet, way too often; we do not ask ourselves enough questions.
Begin to make a serious inquiry into what satisfies you as a person? What can you appreciate more about your work by looking at it differently? What can you actively do differently in your workplace, to change the way you feel about it?
Find someone constructive to bounce these ideas off of. Don’t go to the pity party corner of the room with this workplace evaluation. Go to active people (even twitter friends) who you expect might be successful in their own appreciation and satisfaction in their work. People who will want to help you find solutions, not just sulk with you.
The hardest step in discovering happiness in your work; is most often this first step. Let your reading of this BEAM be step one: that initiates the process of attaining more meaning and fulfillment in your work. Ask yourself the question and create a 90-day log with the development of your answers. Your happiness with your work is worth it! Slam-
