What do you bring to the table?

09 Apr

One of the most important things you can do is work out what you contribute to the organisation through your job.   What do you bring and deliver that adds value to your colleagues, team, department, division and company?  

Having a clear understanding of this helps you in the following ways:

• Gives you a clear focus to continue doing what you are doing
• Tells you what not to do
• Gives you an understanding of where to improve in order to increase your value.
• Helps you enjoy what you are doing much more.
• More likely to be validated by your colleagues because you become reliable and can deliver
• You become more content, less stressed, with yourself because of what you bring
• Your demeanour will be one of relaxed confidence and you will be seen as being an easy person to deal with
• You will demonstrate leadership in your area and validation will be reinforced

We would all love to be in this zone of relaxed confidence knowing that we are providing a superior outcome but most of us still have a long way to go.  

In many ways I believe that we ultimately strive to be in that space.  Just imagine if we all felt that way.  What would life be like?  I think people would respect each other more.  They would be more cooperative.  Teamwork would be better as a result.  It would be easier to focus on issues without egos getting in the way,after all, demonstrating a strong ego could be argued as nothing more than trying to seek external validation of the unfulfilled self. 

Another important outcome would be that you would enjoy working more and you would be more content at home and in your private life.
Just think that this all started from having a clear view of what you bring and how it helps the organisation to succeed.

My good friend Don has this mantra when faced with a problem - Clarity, Simplicity and Focus.
This seems to be a good basis for starting the process of adding value to anything that you endeavour and in particular what you do and what you bring.

According to studies in psychology one of the most rewarding feelings we have as individuals is when we are giving.  So powerful is that feeling that our body releases all manner of good chemicals which assists our own health.  I equate the power of giving to the feeling of delivering meaningful value in your endeavours which naturally includes work.

Knowing that you provide important output that adds value and is valued overrides many of the day to day annoyances and issues that confront us.  We become internally strong and confident and we have clarity and focus when issues arise.  It allows us to filter the important from the unimportant.  It allows us to deflect the distractions and the detractors.  We make better decisions simply because we have clarity and focus.

With all these benefits why is it then that we are not working better?  Why is it then according to the Gallup research that between 60 to 70% of the workforce is not engaged in their work?  Why are 18% of people actively disengaged at work?
I would suggest that we are disengaged because we don’t feel valued or feel that the work is meaningful.  When this happens we actively seek some form of external validation for why we do what we do. 

That same study stated that having a good supervisor or immediate boss was the most important reason for being more engaged at work.  Alternatively more than 70% of the reason for leaving an organisation was because of the poor view of the boss.

Given then that most people are disengaged and that your boss has a strong bearing on how you feel at work there is even more reason to clarify your role and what you need to bring to add value.  Taking the initiative with the boss to define and quantify your role in a tangible way is the first step to leadership self-mastery.  Having a discussion about defining the tangible requirements, what excellence is and how it specifically adds value to the organisation sets the tone and the framework for the relationship. 
It becomes much easier to have dialogue and make decisions in the context of the agreed framework.

Most of us don’t have these detailed discussions and often only have a vague idea what we should be doing.  It often starts at the hiring process where much of the work is worded in generalities and most of the discussion is around what the person’s skills are and their level of experience. These types of discussions don’t help you or the organisation.  What you need, as my friend Don says, is to have clarity, strive for simplicity and remain focused.