Friday, June 14, 2013

Optimists and Pessimists

Amy Gallo wrote the article "How to Handle the Pessimist on Your Team" in the Harvard Business Review Blog back in 2009, but it's still a valuable article today.  I've seen many times how a single vocal pessimist can pull all of the energy out of a team, bringing creative thoughts to an abrupt end.  Gallo provides three strategies:
  1. Create awareness
  2. Reposition negative statements
  3. Involve the whole team
Please read the article for her thoughtful ideas behind each of these steps.

I am normally quite optimistic, so when confronted with a pessimist, I often find myself getting frustrated.  While I want to make progress, the pessimist wants to hold me back.  When I want to solve a problem, the pessimist tells me my strategy won't work.  When I look on the bright side, the pessimist reminds me of the dark side.

The skeptic is a slight twist on the pessimist.  The skeptic has the "prove it to me" attitude.  Not only do I have to put energy into generating and fleshing out a new idea, I have to convince the skeptic, dragging me down.

Despite my frustration with the pessimists and skeptics in my life, I have learned to value some of what they bring to the table.  They force me to think through my proposals and to not jump to a solution too quickly.  They make me look at facets of a problem that I might not have considered.  They help me slow down and be more thoughtful.

So, to all of those pessimists and skeptics out there, and there are many of them in IT, I ask for a little balance.  I'll try harder to slow down, to listen to your concerns, and to craft better solutions to problems.  In return, I ask that you try to control the cynicism, help me use my creative energy well, and let in a few rays of sunshine.

Friday, June 7, 2013

The Value of Focus

It is so easy to lose focus in this age of multitasking.  The article, Train Your Brain to Focus, by Paul Hammerness, M.D., and Margaret Moore, appeared in the Harvard Business Review Blog Network in 2012.  I encourage you to read their article to find out more about the three techniques they recommend:
  • Tame your frenzy.
  • Apply the brakes.
  • Shift sets.
I had an interesting experience this week regarding my own attempt to multitask.  While listening to a very long vendor demonstration, I thought I could do a fairly mindless job of cleaning up my email labels.  However, it appeared that I may have deleted some important folders in the process.   Panic ensued, or frenzy, to use the authors' terminology.  After hunting a bit more, I find that I didn't actually delete them, but I did rename them in an odd way that made them hard to find.  So, I will recover, but my attempt to multitask was a bit of a failure.  And I confess that I didn't do as good a job evaluating the vendor demonstration as I should have done, either.

I am reminded of the old mantra to "be in the moment."  It's really not possible to focus on more than one thing at a time, so when I try to multitask, I miss things.  I am resolved to be more focused in the future.