Are you living your Plan A?

The other night, a client asked me if I was in my “Plan A” job. Loosely interpreted, his question meant, is my current work experience the vision of what I really want to do? My answer required thought and a much longer answer than “yes” or “no.”

The first point I want to make is that I don’t have a “job.” I do “work.” My work can be very rewarding and satisfying. I am able to have relatively flexible hours, and I work out of my home, which is ideal for a workaholic who also wants to enjoy life. Omitting commuting time and working around traditional office hours, I am able to get work done during hours that don’t get interrupted by traffic and office politics.

The real beauty, though, is in my entire work scenario. There are many things I am able to do that are not possible through a j-o-b. Probably the most important thing is that if I find the work I am doing or the people I am working with are wearing me down or draining me of energy, I am able to do something else with someone else almost immediately. I can also implement a new process without having to go through layers of bureaucracy. Sometimes the path for acknowledging that something is draining me takes longer than it should, and the solutions are not always immediately clear, but as I go into my 19^th year, I can easily say it is getting easier and easier to simply say “no” and move on to anything else that is more enjoyable. I’d like to think that my days of suffering to make a buck are behind me.

it’s never a simple decision to walk away from bad business or complex, toxic relationships

That said, it’s never a simple decision to walk away from bad business or complex, toxic relationships that may have developed. It’s not quite as bad as getting a divorce (I’ve had experience with that, too), but it sometimes can cause many of the same conflicted feelings. Did I do enough? Have I tried everything to make this work? Do I deserve to be treated this way? Do I have unrealistic expectations? Do I have to settle? Owning a business may end up creating different handcuffs than an employment scenario, but it feels like I have more options. In most cases, it is only a segment of business or a person that needs to be left behind, or a new system needs to be developed to make some part of the work easier or more palatable.

There was a time when I was questioning what I was doing. After the first ten years, I was finding I had gotten into a routine I didn’t like. I recognized that something had to change, and unlike the many jobs I had easily quit, that wasn’t the solution. It required my identifying exactly what was at the root of my zapped energy.

Working as a subcontractor for another company had produced a regular paycheck, but it sucked up considerable time in the middle of the week, and it was difficult to schedule other work around it. The work itself was somewhat satisfying, and the actual end users really seemed to appreciate my efforts, but the company I worked for was unappreciative and continued to make more demands without an increase in compensation or any recognition of the added deliverables. Walking away from this extremely draining, time-consuming contract (that paid little) was my first step. I finally let it go and just had to trust that I could continue doing similar work for people who cared. Almost immediately, my business doubled.

At 15 years, I had stopped bouncing out of bed in the morning looking forward to tackling the next thing. As I examined what really drove my decreased enthusiasm (it felt like depression at the time), I found some pretty clear culprits. I hate the ridiculous amount of detail involved with operations. Data entry, marketing, tracking dates and invoicing are some examples of the tasks that involve managing endless minutiae. Other issues, such as constantly having to nag people to remember commitments and working with people who showed little respect or appreciation for my time, really brought me down. Although these points were easy to identify, the process for changing things took a while.

It finally became clear that for me to focus on the fun stuff, I needed help. So my next step was hiring an assistant to take on the truly annoying administrative tasks I face each day so I could invest energy in what I enjoy most. It wasn’t a magic fix, and it took time to learn which things were easy to turn over and which things I might as well do because it took far less time to do them than explain each. Anything with nuances that could change from time to time were better left on my plate. The more static processes or marketing that was separate from my work have been off-loaded. Not everything that supports my work has been turned over, but I have definitely been able to free up enough time to dedicate to the fun stuff. The changes have been gradual. As I see more ways to off-load things, I am also able see a ray of hope and a light at the end of the tunnel. My work energizes me once again.

The message I want to send out to the universe is: if you are doing work you don’t like, figure out why. Finding a new job may not be the answer. Finding new/different work or changing how you do the work you are currently doing could be the change that saves you from a fruitless job search. You may find that you can build on a foundation you have already laid and move forward outside of your current role. The clues to what will make you happy will transcend employers, jobs and venues. Take the time to think bigger and further into the future. And of course, I can help you with that.