I am currently very, very put off by certain things. All my life I have been abiding by the principle “Do everything yourself to get what you want, how you want it”.
Few weeks ago, I let off a bit. So I could concentrate on some other things. Big mistake. Most of the things on the side I let off, can be describe with a multitude of words, such as ‘fell apart’, ‘gross’, ‘yuck’, ‘plain stupid’.
So for everyone out there who cares to listen to this simple message:
“Do everything yourself if you want it your way” (more than a couple variations exist, but still, same meaning)
I kind of get where you’re coming from, but you have to be wary of becoming thought of as a control freak.
I often used to take extreme views on things, simply to gauge where others stood on a topic. The problem is, I seem to carry an air of authority and knowledge (no idea why) and so people didn’t like to disagree with me. The result was usually that I ended up in charge of team projects, doing it “my way” which wasn’t really my chosen way at all.
Happily in recent years I’ve managed to demonstrate my fallability and general honest-to-goodness ignorance, and now nobody would trust me to sit the right way on a lavatory.
Do everything yourself may work in your personal life, but it’s a dangerous strategy in the professional world. I never thought of mysef as a control freak - just someone who wanted to “get the job done right the first time”. I actually thought of myself as someone who delegated rather well. What I didn’t even see was a tendency toward a certain “if you want it done right, do it yourself” impatience.
If an employee asked for help with a PC app, for example, and the explanation didn’t help the first time, I had a tendency to simply say, “Here, let me at the keyboard. I’ll take care of it.”
Then one day, I darn near lost a potentially very valuable employee - one who later rose higher in the orgnization than me, for that matter. She came in and told me that she was thinking of quitting. I asked why and was told that even though she liked the job, she didn’t think it’d work because I obviously didn’t trust her. The ensuing hour convinced her to stay, and taught me more than I really wanted to know about me.
From then on, I tried to be much more diligent about the question of “How would I feel if someone dd this to me?”
I’m pretty much aware of that. But the people around me (for now) would pretty much be happy to hand me their section duties. Talk about division of work.
I also strongly believe in “do everything yourself.” Well, actually it’s not so much a matter of belief with me, more a necessity… But I am sure I’ll find a girlfriend someday.
I’ve always found if you keep hammering away at a problem like that, try to conjure up a mental picture of what you need, and eventually you’ll come up with a solution. It won’t remove stains though.
Not sure this applies to your conditions bloomy. But in larger vocational and avocational matters…
First, don’t sweat the small stuff.
For the rest, keep your hand in it, if other are involved; but, make sure to yield enough control to insure a mutually beneficial outcome. If you both don’t have that warm feeling afterwards, then even if they did it your ‘right way’, you probably have a problem with premature elation. With practice you can find the right spots to yield and the right spots to remain firm so that together both of you can come to a mutually fullfilling outcome.
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Enjoy Your Music,
Lee Marsh
[ This Message was edited by: LeeMarsh on 2002-10-15 17:09 ]
