Working in the middle column

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Working in the middle column

During my review two weeks ago my manager help me connect some dots that before were just that, dots hanging out in space.

2 months ago we had a career discussion where I shared my strengths from a profile from strength finder. Here is a picture of my strengths.

We had a great conversation in May and an even better one two weeks ago during my year end review.

Today, during our 1-1 we revisited the review by way of "What did I learn during the review and what will I commit to for this year?"

There are very few people who can hold up the mirror for me the way she does. It is a gift for both of us that she can be honest with me AND I can be open to hear, process and modify my behavior.

The essence of our conversation was the balance of work between strategic HR work and tactical HR work. My natural inclination is the strategic. That is the way I think and is confirmed by strengths in the strength finder. I often seen things as binary so I was dividing the work into two buckets and did not see that they were connected. In fact I bragged that on my white board the blue pen indicated strategic and the red was tactical. I further bragged that I glanced at the board to make sure that I was working enough in the strategic.

My manager's insight, and observation, which she helped me to understand by physically connecting the dots is that the HR Business Partner work is not one or the other. She actually listed the strategic in a column, the tactical in another and in the middle of these two she drew some circular scribbles to indicate that this is where the work is. That is the middle column work and is where we should be working. Her challenge for me into figure out how to operate and work there.

In the past two weeks I have felt myself irritated with the tactical UNTIL I can catch myself and reframe my mindset and approach. After a few of times catching myself I actually believe that working in the middle column is "the work". I don't get as irritated and I have started to enjoy my whole job. This does not mean that I don't slip back and get irritated. Behavior change is hard but I have been able to reframe my approach most of the time.

We have a code word now of the "middle column work".

We both agreed that my review was a very intense conversation. This may sound trite but I believe that feedback is a gift. Taking it to the next level of rewiring my mindset and reframing my work will be hard work but well worth the effort. I am beginning to like working in the middle column.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

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Quote of the "Day" Archive

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Always Asking Why (?) - Sarah's ramblings

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Working in the middle column

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