I Was Lost at Work So I Asked a Simple Question

 

Ask A Question | Pexels

Early in my career I held jobs that were very straightforward.  When I shagged balls at the golf course it was simple. You walk around the driving range and pick up the golf balls, wash them and put them back in the ball dispenser. When I worked at the pizza parlor as a dishwasher it was very logical. You take the dirty dishes from the busboy scrub, them, wash them and sanitize them and put them back on the shelf. I worked at the hardware store as a stocker when I was older and it was still a simple job. You take the pallets of nails and screws and put the boxes on the shelf.  None of these jobs took a lot of skill and I didn't have any confusion about what I was doing and never needed to ask. 

As I got older and my experience in different jobs grew, I was able to get jobs with more responsibility.I eventually became a shift supervisor for a popular fast food chain. The job was still pretty straight forward and didn't take much training. Here is the process for opening the registers and closing them. Here are the receipts for the food. Here's how you ring out on the register. Everything else complicated was really handled by the store manager. My job was simply to keep my hand on the wheel to make sure we didn't drive off the road. It was again, a little more complicated, but still very straight forward.

Eventually I started to get jobs where I had to make decisions that could be more complicated. I was running my own team without having my manager in the same box. I had the value of having worked in this environment for sometime at multiple levels. I had seen the assistants and how they did their job before I got that job and then worked directly with the manager before I was promoted into hat role. I would occasionally get complex problems, but I had enough experience and the problems were simple enough to solve on my own. I didn't need any help, I just needed to do the logical thing and almost everything would work out fine.

I've been lucky in my career. I've been lucky to hire good teams. I've been lucky to land good roles. I've been lucky to have such good results. Having good teams and choosing good gigs have allowed me to learn on the job and minimize my risk while I did. I was able to produce good results through my teams and get recognition for it. This allowed me some free time to expand my skill set and become more valuable at work. Eventually I applied for and got an office role that was much more complicated than any I had had before.

A Change of Pace

I remember on my first day of work in my new role, I asked my new manager what I should be doing on a daily basis. I will never forget what happened next. They laughed. They looked right into my eyes and laughed at the question. I was concerned and confused but in a moment It would get worse. My new manager looked at me and said, I can't answer that question for you. This job is always something different and I can't predict what you're going to be doing. You have to figure that out. Imagine taking a chance on getting promoted to a totally different job and then having your boss tell you that they couldn't tell you what your job would be.  Turns out, they were totally right about that.

The job that I had taken was an office job supporting our field sales teams. This role required a totally different skill set than what I had used in the field. In the field I had a team of people that worked for me and clearly defined goals that were set by the organization. I knew exactly what I had to do every single day and how to go do it. I used the strengths of my team to achieve the goals through their actions. We all won together. After doing it for a while, it even became easy. The new job was the opposite. I didn't have a team at all, it was just me. I didn't have clearly defined goals or outcomes. In my new role, tasks would be assigned based on what other people couldn't figure out how to do. Sometimes these were things that I learned how to do in old roles and were easy. Other times these tasks were brand new to me and I had to learn how to do them on the job. Sometimes they turned out to be easy and sometimes they turned out to be complex.

Over time the tasks became easier, but I also found myself becoming overwhelmed from time to time. I would get so much work that I didn't always know how to complete it all. I was starting work at 7 in the morning with email and working until 9 or 10 at night most days. It was exhausting and I felt like I wasn't getting anywhere. Worse, my family was feeling the brunt of this work as well. I felt like I was struggling at work and at home. I was right on both fronts. Worse, I would take projects in and just agree to do them without understanding the big picture. I didn't know what they were trying to achieve other than they needed me to X or Y for them as soon as possible. I just said yes and got to work.

I Struggled With a Complex Project

That strategy of just saying yes and getting to work eventually became a problem. Not only was I burning the candle at both ends by working early in the morning and then very late at night, but I was taking on projects without understanding the full scope of what was being done. I remember when I got the project that really changed my perspective. It was early in the year and my boss was out of their role on a stretch assignment. My director asked me to put together a year end presentation for his boss the VP to present their business performance to their Senior VP and their peers. I had helped on putting these together before as part of a team. My boss had typically managed these projects and I just contributed my part, but I always saw the outcome so I figured I could easily do this. 

I got to work right away, by grabbing an old presentation and changing the dates. I worked with my peers to get the different parts of the presentation assigned and they began to work. Over the next two weeks the bulk of the presentation was put together. I was working late and early to make adjustments, ensure the data was correct and that the presentation looked good. My director asked me to meet with them and update them on my progress. It didn't go well. They were not happy with the direction of the presentation. They said it didn't meet their expectations and gave me a few things to do differently. I took this back and started working on the changes. At our next meeting it turned out that those updates weren't what they had in mind and they had additional feedback about the overall flow of the presentation.

This back and forth occurred several times and with increasing frequency. It was exceptionally stressful. I would do the work, they would tear it apart and tell me to do better. I'd go back, try to figure out a new way to do things and go back for another round of finding out what they didn't like. After enough of this back and forth we finally got to a product that worked for them. They were confident in providing this presentation to their boss the VP to present during their business review. They thanked me and I went back to my desk and sat there with mixed feelings. I was glad to have finally gotten the project across the finish line. I felt relieved that I wasn't on the hook for any more updates. I felt defeated that I had to repeatedly hear how the work wasn't good enough. 

What had I done wrong? I had never had this much criticism and push back on my work before in my career. I had always known what to do and was easily able to put things together quickly and effectively. In this role I had taken every project that had come my way and was able to eventually figure out a good solution and get it back into the hands of those that needed it. However, on this particular task I was constantly doing work and then having to redo that work. Not once, but over and over. It was mentally and emotionally exhausting. As I looked at how the final project turned out and what I had initially turned in I started to understand that I had missed something important. I missed the whole vision of what the project should be. Worse, I realized that it wasn't my boss's fault I didn't do the presentation the way they wanted at first, I realized it was mine.

The One Question I hadn't Asked

I realized I needed to ask one question. There was one question I never asked. I asked what we needed and when they wanted it. Those are good questions to ask. It's very important to understand the task and when it's going to be due. What I didn't ask though, what they were trying to achieve. There's a subtle difference. If someone comes to me and says, hey can you put together a presentation on the performance of the sales team for the last 6 months, I can easily grab sales numbers and put them on a series of slides and call it a day. If I ask another question though I can really help set the direction and tone of the presentation. Instead of "Sure, let me get on that.", I learned to ask, "Sure, I can help with that. What are we ultimately trying to achieve with this?". That one additional question gives me insight into not only the task at hand, but the ultimate goals of what is being asked of me. Instead of just a presentation about the sales performance, I might learn that they think the team has been struggling in a specific part of the business and want to understand from a sales and behaviors aspect what opportunities might exist and how to best set a new direction for the team.

My Work Completely Changed

By asking one more question to understand the ultimate motivation and desired outcome I learned to more effectively manage my own work. Tasks became easier and work was less likely to be returned. There was another advantage as well. As I progressed in my career and became more experienced, I learned better ways to do things. Sometimes tasks made obvious sense when they came across my desk, but sometimes they didn't, so I'd ask my question. You know what? A lot of the time, I learned that the task wasn't really going to achieve what the requester thought it was. In the past, I would have happily done the task and handed back the work. Now I knew enough to find out what they were really trying to achieve. I could now advise people from going down the wrong path, or redirect their work all together. Sometimes that meant I would do a different task or sometimes I would send them to the right person or team to get what they wanted.

I went from being a doer to being an adviser or a trusted consultant. Instead of just blindly taking in project after project my role evolved into one where I would ask pointed questions and give advice on what steps should occur next. Instead of just being a tool to be used I became a resource to be valued. My career and work radically changed during this period. Instead of feeling constantly overwhelmed and stressed, I now knew enough to get the clear understanding of the desired outcomes. I was able to prioritize my work more effectively. I knew what projects to take and what to reject, or redirect. My work life and personal life began to come into balance and I was able to achieve better results, both at work and at home. 

It Was A Valuable Experience

I'm glad I went through the awful experience of having to do that presentation over and over again. It was the most stressful period of my work life. I felt constantly anxious and sick to my stomach. It was genuinely awful. I also learned so much about my work, myself and the best way to do things. Now I am much more confident in my work and almost never have to do things over. My job is much more satisfying. To this day I still ask what the ultimate goal is with every project and it has always helped me to do better work.

Do you struggle with working too much or having to redo work over and over? Why do you think that is? Will the question I learned to ask help you in your work? Tell me about it! Post below or contact me!