i have this working theory (which probably already exists because i'm not that original a thinker that the thousands/millions before me havent already come up with a version) that where you work depends on a triangle of salary, meaningful work, workfriends/good management. Most people can tolerate missing one point of the triangle as long as the other two are there and then there is serious risk of leaving when there is only one left (if you hit all three you are living the dream). My main worry about it is that i have been stuck in so many conferences and powerpoint presentations that i am at risk of having been accepted into the corporate presentation cult of basic but meaningless pseudo information. Welcome to my TED talk.
I had a Senior Chief Engineman at one point in my Navy career who described a job as a four sided polygon, the sides being Responsibility, Accountability, Authority, and Power. In a well-balanced job, the four sides are equal. If this square becomes a rectangle or trapezoid, or Heaven forbid, a skewed open-ended box, the person trying to do the job will be very dissatisfied. On this scale, I’ve had good jobs, poor jobs, and one extremely poorly-defined job. That ENCS was a really smart guy.
As someone who gets very little feedback on the quality of my work, unless it's-touch wood-one of the biggest cockups in the history of cockups, or so good it has just killed off all the hopes and dreams of our (prospective) client, that's where all my work based meaning comes from, the crushing of dreams. It's wonderful. You get no meaning from just going through the motions.
The meaning of work is so often overlooked in a leadership context in the workplace. People are unable to connect their effort to the overall goal, if they even understand what the overall goal is. The biggest issue is sometimes there is no connection between the task and the overall goal.
Just the other day I pointed at some KPIs we were tracking that I was arguing were contradicting each other. When I asked "what specific behaviours were we trying to drive when we created these KPIs", no-one had an answer.
In a team environment, if you can give people purpose it is amazing what they can achieve and the satisfaction they can gain from it. People will also put up with tremendous inconvenience if they are working towards a better situation in the future.
You are selling your earlier work short John. I distinctly recall an excellent piece about the rabble pirates in Timor running into an Aussie Army checkpoint.
You are seelling your earlier work short John. I distinctly recall an excellent piece about the rabble pirates in Timor running into an Aussie Army checkpoint.
Bravo. I think one of the issues with an activist bent is that there’s an idea that minds can be changed. More often it mostly gets lost in our ever growing echo chambers. What you do is unique . Keep punching JB . It’s important . Nothing like opening a book that you know will end to soon.
Work is one of those interesting words that is both in common use and has a very specific meaning in the world of physics. The fact that the two meanings align is endlessly fascinating to me. In physics work is measured as the rate of expenditure of energy. In thermodynamics it is the rate of reduction of chaos or disorder (within the local environment: at larger scales chaos always increases). The fact that chaos is (or can be) measured in bits, and is intrinsically a consequence of information content is the direct link between your labours (work) and your entertaining stories.
i have this working theory (which probably already exists because i'm not that original a thinker that the thousands/millions before me havent already come up with a version) that where you work depends on a triangle of salary, meaningful work, workfriends/good management. Most people can tolerate missing one point of the triangle as long as the other two are there and then there is serious risk of leaving when there is only one left (if you hit all three you are living the dream). My main worry about it is that i have been stuck in so many conferences and powerpoint presentations that i am at risk of having been accepted into the corporate presentation cult of basic but meaningless pseudo information. Welcome to my TED talk.
I had a Senior Chief Engineman at one point in my Navy career who described a job as a four sided polygon, the sides being Responsibility, Accountability, Authority, and Power. In a well-balanced job, the four sides are equal. If this square becomes a rectangle or trapezoid, or Heaven forbid, a skewed open-ended box, the person trying to do the job will be very dissatisfied. On this scale, I’ve had good jobs, poor jobs, and one extremely poorly-defined job. That ENCS was a really smart guy.
Whoa. That sounds like something you could spin off into a whole best selling self-help book!
Feel free. You’re a much better writer than I am. A note about me in the Acknowledgements would suffice. ;-)
As someone who gets very little feedback on the quality of my work, unless it's-touch wood-one of the biggest cockups in the history of cockups, or so good it has just killed off all the hopes and dreams of our (prospective) client, that's where all my work based meaning comes from, the crushing of dreams. It's wonderful. You get no meaning from just going through the motions.
"But giving people something they want to read in the age of Tik Tok? That’s the Lord’s work right there, I reckon."
amen brother
The meaning of work is so often overlooked in a leadership context in the workplace. People are unable to connect their effort to the overall goal, if they even understand what the overall goal is. The biggest issue is sometimes there is no connection between the task and the overall goal.
Just the other day I pointed at some KPIs we were tracking that I was arguing were contradicting each other. When I asked "what specific behaviours were we trying to drive when we created these KPIs", no-one had an answer.
In a team environment, if you can give people purpose it is amazing what they can achieve and the satisfaction they can gain from it. People will also put up with tremendous inconvenience if they are working towards a better situation in the future.
Without purpose, what is the point?
Working with people would be very strange.
I talk of "what fills my bucket". The trick is to find a way to make some coin out of the activity that fills your bucket.
You are selling your earlier work short John. I distinctly recall an excellent piece about the rabble pirates in Timor running into an Aussie Army checkpoint.
You are seelling your earlier work short John. I distinctly recall an excellent piece about the rabble pirates in Timor running into an Aussie Army checkpoint.
Bravo. I think one of the issues with an activist bent is that there’s an idea that minds can be changed. More often it mostly gets lost in our ever growing echo chambers. What you do is unique . Keep punching JB . It’s important . Nothing like opening a book that you know will end to soon.
Work is one of those interesting words that is both in common use and has a very specific meaning in the world of physics. The fact that the two meanings align is endlessly fascinating to me. In physics work is measured as the rate of expenditure of energy. In thermodynamics it is the rate of reduction of chaos or disorder (within the local environment: at larger scales chaos always increases). The fact that chaos is (or can be) measured in bits, and is intrinsically a consequence of information content is the direct link between your labours (work) and your entertaining stories.