Manage Yourself, Before Others Do! E-Book

Dan Wiener

• Herausgeber: Panta Rhei PR AG
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 162

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

Individual responsibility is the basis of a successful and fulfilled life. It is considered a matter of course in today’s professional world. But not everyone is able to cope with the freedom that comes with it. We are too used to placing responsibility on each other. We feel that we are limited by others’ opinions, adverse circumstances, or even destiny. The key to freeing ourselves from this plethora of limitations lies in a successful management of oneself. In this book, Dan Wiener succeeds in making us face issues we like to avoid. He patiently guides us step-by-step from the vision through the planning to the achievement of our goal. As an artist, author and management trainer the author knows all too well the pitfalls, stumbling blocks and inner temptations on a path to self-determination. As a seminar instructor and consultant he has found time and again that he is not alone in this. The tools and tips that he provides, supported by numerous examples, are also very practical. Manage Yourself, Before Others Do is a valuable guide for how to approach your daily professional tasks in a more self-determined, dynamic and satisfied manner.

Leseprobe

Manage

Yourself,

Before

Others Do!

DAN WIENER

ManageYourself,

BeforeOthers Do!

A Guide to Self-Determined Actions

A book by Edition Panta Rhei – On Demand

www.pantarhei.ch

© 2020 Dan Wiener. All rights reserved.

Project coordination, proofreading and editing: Pantarhei PR

Cover design: fraufederer.ch

Layout and typesetting: fraufederer.ch

Printing: www.cpi-print.de

Photograph on p. 114: Alexander Preobrajenskij

Translation: Alisa Blokhina Alvares, Eloquent Words LLC

ISBN 978-3-9525354-4-8

Author’s website: www.c-culture.com

Contents

Foreword

1.Before We Get Started

1.1.Between Individual Responsibility and Constraints

1.2.Buzzword: “Work–Life Balance”

1.3. Seven Steps to Self-Determined Actions

1.4.The Aims of this Guide

2.Quality and Effect

2.1.Personal Goals and Subjective Quality

2.2.Defining Goals: What? When? How Much?

2.3.Values and Company Culture as Quality Guarantors

2.4.Developing the Vision, Mission, Values, and Principles

2.5.Mistakes, Disappointments, and Failures

2.6.A Final Word About Quality

3.Time and Priorities

3.1.Reconciling Everything

3.2.The To-do List

3.3.Selection and Prioritisation

3.4.Time Management and Schedule Planner

3.5.A Final Word About Time

4.Focus, Concentrating on What’s Important

4.1.Concentration Ability

4.2.Prevent Disruptions, Eliminate Time Sinks

4.3.Personal Daily Rhythm

4.4.Being Able to Say “No”

4.5.Being Able to Say “Yes”

4.6.A Final Word About Focus

5.Creativity and Solutions

5.1.Why Do We Need Creativity

5.2.Can Creativity Be Learned?

5.3.Conditions for Creativity

5.4.Creativity Catalysts and Methods

5.5.Processing After the Creative Phase

5.6.A Final Word About Creativity

6.Decision and Selection

6.1.Making Decisions

6.2.The Decision as Part of the Five-Phase Cycle

6.3.How Does a Decision Occur?

6.4.A Final Word About Decisions

7.Lasting Change

7.1.Willingness to Change

7.2.Six Factors for Change Success

7.3.The Power of Habit

7.4.Lasting Implementation of Changes

7.5.A Final Word About Change

8.Mind–Body Balance

8.1.Why Balance Is So Important

8.2.No Rhythm Without Breaks

8.3.Energy for Mind and Body

8.4.Mind–Body Balance

8.5.A Final Word About Mind–Body Balance

9.Conclusion

About the author

FOREWORD

Much too rare are the occasions when I take the time to pause and calmly think about what is actually important to me, what I am all about, and what I would like to achieve. My daily life is dictated by all the urgent things that must be done, that are imposed on me, that land on my desk, or things I have brought upon myself in a moment of weakness.

In 2020, I created a theatre project with the subtitle: “In search of free will”. In the run-up to it, I asked the following questions in interviews:

What do I want? What can I do? What am I allowed to do? What should I do? What must I do?

The fundamental question was to find out what I determine consciously and where I follow internal or external pressures. I noticed two things: the external and internal pressures are often much greater than we would want to admit. Consequently, most people would like to shape their lives themselves to a larger extent and more consciously. The only question is: How do we accomplish this?

I know many people who are industrious workers, perform well, and create added value for the company and customers. Whether they lead a company or organisation, or, as employees, do everything in their job description, fulfilling the tasks and responsibilities assigned to them and following the target agreements they have signed, if they do a good job, they get a feeling of satisfaction and often an appropriate salary to go with it.

In theory, everyone understands that the result quality is heavily influenced not only by “what” you do, but by “how” you do it. That means, both what you can do and the satisfaction from this work have a lot to do with the culture and atmosphere of the work environment and your ability to actively determine it.

This insight is often missing in concrete implementation. It is lost in day-to-day stress, the usual bottlenecks, and adverse external circumstances. In my consulting work, I keep encountering people who complain that their personal well-being and motivation are adversely affected by the company’s needs. And I see these challenges on all hierarchy levels.

Let’s be clear about one thing: These people are by no means unsuccessful slackers, nor do they have more personal problems than anyone else. These are people with a positive attitude who love their profession and their responsibility and want to achieve many things. But even these people are not immune to a loss of motivation or excessive professional stress that negatively affects not just their work but their private life.

Some bemoan that shareholder value takes precedence over human values in company decisions or that often only short-term, “hard” results are measured in large corporations. This happens, even though in these circles people are also aware of the aforesaid insight that an important role is played not only by the tasks themselves but by how they are carried out. Faced with such mechanisms, people dream of working for themselves or in another setting, for example, an NGO, a smaller company, or a governmental agency. But if their dream materialises, they often realise that the constraints there could be just as strong.

Why is that? In my view, people often lack the courage to stand up for their convictions and to question the status quo, because this courage can entail discomfort and conflicts. In my experience, however, this path is more satisfying and productive in the long term. It is the only way for me to regularly check whether what I am doing is consistent with my quality standards and higher goals.

This does not mean that I do not support the group. But I should participate proactively instead of always just reacting or allowing someone else to drive my actions, just so I realise, albeit too late, that this is not how I wanted things to be. This is why the call to action in the title of this book is: “Manage yourself, before others do.”

Tips on the topic of self-determined actions are often limited to just one area, be it better time management or prioritisation. Or they make do with the recommendation of addressing your physical and mental well-being, and rest and relaxation. Sometimes, they advise structuring the change processes more deliberately.

Over the years, and in my efforts to offer practical tools in my consulting work, I have discovered that only a combination of all the relevant factors is what really works. For this reason, seven areas are interwoven in this guide on self-management: quality, time, focus, creativity, decision-making, change, as well as mind–body balance.

I have written the book intentionally as a practical manual. So, even if you may be tempted to skip a chapter or two because they may contain information you already know, do not forget that the desired effect is achieved only by combining all the elements

Dan Wiener, 27 October 2020

1Before WeGet Started

1.1.Between Individual Responsibility and Constraints

Individual responsibility is required and encouraged in today’s working life. Innovation and creativity are sought after, while the work environment is organised more openly and the workplace is not always a fixed location anymore. Moreover, professional performance with increasing management responsibility is measured less and less in hours. Agreements on working hours are replaced by performance agreements and job profiles that define the scope of the tasks and the competences. Those on the top level are also responsible for strategy.

These prerequisites alone do not result in self-determined work, though. External pressure is rather increasing because the service can now be obtained in a “free market”. In addition, there is competition with other – real or potential – providers of the same services. In this process, employers and shareholders are not usually guided by the feasibility of a task but by their own needs and external constraints. For skilled professionals, this does not only mean that they frequently have to worry about securing their resources, but the boundary between working time and leisure time is becoming more and more blurred.

Especially in an age when work from home is becoming more common, employees are increasingly facing the challenge of self-management. The managers’ job is even more challenging. In addition to bearing the responsibility for the organisation’s overall strategy, they have to lead their employees in a more strategic and goal-oriented way.

But employees hardly receive any support in coping with the challenges of this new autonomy. The tasks associated with the increasing individual responsibility and self-management are not defined in the performance agreements and job profiles either, and are left up to the employee. In consideration of the quality of your work and your long-term well-being, it is essential to think about where and how you yourself can influence your work and your environment, because if you do not ask yourself this, nobody will.

The following questions can help reinforce individual responsibility:

•What are my personal goals and how do I make my professional life worth living?

•How do I plan my commitments in the long term so that I do not experience physical and mental bottlenecks?

•How can I continue to keep up my performance and motivation and how do I deal with being unsuccessful at times?

•How do I reconcile my work and my personal life so that the different areas of life benefit, and not suffer, from one another?

By trying to find answers to these questions, you do not only determine what you do but, most importantly, how you do it. This, in turn, is a first deliberate step that does not only have a positive impact on your performance. You will also be more satisfied and healthier in the long run.

External influencing factors and constraints

If you do not ask yourself these questions, you will fully submit to the external influencing factors and constraints – not that they necessarily have to contradict your own wishes.

But the above questions will help you coordinate your personal goals with the professional demands and the organisation’s goals. External influencing factors cannot and should not just be suppressed. On the contrary, it is about matching your personal style to the style of those around you to enable the best possible result for all.

We, with our responsibility, our competences, skills, and our resources, come under the influence of different factors in every decision. The following diagram illustrates the overall structure we find ourselves in every time we make a decision. The influencing factors outside work, such as society and personal life, are intentionally listed in the lower section.

As this overview shows, everything we do is always related to other external influencing factors and therefore impacts different areas of our life. Consequently, it is important that we do not lose sight of the influencing factors outside of work as well as the broader professional context when we make our professional decisions. For example, each company also has social responsibility, and, if it inadvertently makes the headlines, the employees may be asked about it in their personal life or have to answer uncomfortable questions. Or, if you make a career move, this will not only affect your relationship with customers and other professional contacts but likely also impact your personal life.

1.2.Buzzword: “Work–Life Balance”

Work–life balance is frequently talked about in courses, discussions, and relevant literature on the topic of self-management. The term is often used to address the difficulties of separating working life from personal life or the negative impact of excessive work on personal life.

But the term “work–life balance” is questionable in itself because it suggests that people either live or work. The fact that many people spend a considerable part of their time working suggests that they also “live” while working. And, conversely, for many people their work is a significant factor in their self-image and self-worth in their personal life.

This does not mean that there are no problems separating the two or that problems and pressure at work do not influence one’s personal life, and vice versa. Many people actually suffer from being unable to reconcile their work and their personal life. It is not uncommon for disrupted family relationships, failed marriages, heart attacks, chronic illnesses, and even suicides to be caused, at least in part, by difficulties with reconciling these two areas.

Instead of forging ahead with the seemingly endless fight between work and personal life, I will suggest a system that comprises both aspects: in everything we do and in all the different areas of our life we should be guided by the same values and know what we are living and working for.

In order to discover this balance, it may be worth asking yourself a few fundamental questions:

•What is important in my life? What am I passionate about? What fascinates me?

•What can my work contribute to this, apart from the financial and material basics?

•How does my work benefit my personal life?

•How does my personal life benefit my work?

•How can I organise my life so that the things that are important to me continue to develop positively and sustainably?

We should not forget that for many people around the world work is a question of mere survival. So, it is a privilege to be able to ask yourself such questions about purpose and meaning. Unfortunately, there are too many people who could enjoy this privilege but consider their work just a necessary evil, nevertheless. Many are trapped in a loop of dissatisfaction that they cannot break out of for material reasons, for example, out of fear that they will have to give up some of their material comfort.

It is especially important in these situations to ask yourself the above questions about purpose and meaning, reinforcing your personal motivation in this way. However, the path to self-determined actions is not only about reconciling your personal life with your professional life. Your personal style is also a separate factor that should be considered in this context.

Personal style at work

It is completely normal for different aspects of our personality to come out to a stronger or lesser extent in our personal and professional daily life. It gets hard when the two areas are too far apart or when a change process needs to be initiated every time we cross from our personal life into our professional life, or vice versa, and this begins with our clothing but also includes our language and behaviour.

There are also individual aspects of behaviour that we cannot just set aside and that are – and should be – a big part of our day-to-day professional life! For example, different tasks are done differently by different people depending on their working style. Some people like to work on a problem independently and on their own; others prefer to exchange their ideas and experiences with their co-workers from the start. Yet others can see a solution very quickly, while those around them are still trying to understand what the problem is all about.

Personal style can be seen, for example, in a classic office building with standard single offices. If the employees have the opportunity to occupy “their” office for a longer period of time, sooner or later they will add personal touches to their standardised office. So, there may be creative chaos in one office, while another one looks hardly occupied, very functional, and has no superfluous bells and whistles. Other offices are decorated with children’s drawings, personal photos and other “relationship substitutes”.

Just as people have different styles of communication, thinking, or decision-making, there are also individual recipes for how people work successfully. That is why there is not always necessarily a better or worse approach. In most cases, there are simply different ways that lead to the same goal. But this also means that the application of the methods provided in the subsequent chapters can differ greatly depending on the individual.

As previously mentioned, personal style is reflected, for example, in the way a person approaches a task, how they communicate with others, or in their leadership behaviour. The 3D-Behaviour-Method1, among others, is used in seminars and coaching on this topic to understand and illustrate these individual behaviours and to be able to use them optimally in day-to-day professional life.

This method is used to reflect on both one’s own behaviour and the behaviour of others, but without judging it. A better understanding of the different behaviours allows us, on the one hand, to adequately react to the advantages and disadvantages of each personal style. On the other hand, it provides important clues to the aspects of our behaviour that we can still learn something about.

Whereas the personal elements and insights of the 3D-Behaviour-Method could be a bigger part of targeted seminar and coaching work, this short description should suffice for this guide.

1.3.Seven Steps to Self-Determined Actions

The following chapters of this guide are dedicated to the seven areas that you need to have an influence over if you want to shape your development and your daily life. In combination, these areas form a consistent system that produces its full effect only in the sum of its individual parts. In other words: each area enhances the positive effect of the other areas, contributing to the success of the system as a whole.

How the areas are connected

The questions below form the common thread that runs through this guide. They will be explained in detail in the following chapters and serve, individually and together, as practical signposts on the way to self-determined actions. The above-mentioned connection between the areas is one of the important foundations of success in implementing the methods and suggestions provided throughout the guide.

1.What quality would you like to achieve and what are your personal and professional goals?

If you have defined the desired quality, then you need to think about how to integrate these quality goals in your plans: what priority and how much room will you give them in your schedule?

2.How do I turn the set goals into concrete tasks, where are my priorities, and how do I create a reasonable timeline?

Even the best plan will not help, if you do not stick to it. Focus has to do with discipline, but also with mental strength: where do you say yes and where do you say no?

3.How do I plan and set my defined goals and priorities better and how can I train my focus?

Just because you undertake to do something does not mean that is how it will work. Sometimes we encounter limitations and it seems as if the task cannot be completed: what creative solutions can help you move forward?

4.Where is creativity needed and which spaces, friction, and tools do I need to find creative second-order solutions – outside the box?

We could focus on being creative and constantly working on new possibilities for a long time if we do not consistently test the solutions for plausibility: why are you deciding in favour of each particular solution?

5.How can I deliberately and systematically make decisions that take both logic, intuition, as well as instinct into account?

How do you implement your decisions in a structured way, so that they result in the desired change in a lasting manner?

6.How do I implement the decisions I have made in a well-structured and sustainable change process?

Although purposefully made changes bring improvements in the long term, they often cause uncertainty at first and it takes time to find a new balance.

7.How can I keep my mind and body