How Are You Valued: Are You Using the Right Criteria?

When asking individuals about their work, and their value to an organization, it is common to hear about the volume of emails they receive or the number of meetings they attend as evidence of their importance. In fact, it has become a badge of honor for people to complain (disingenuously) about having a full voice mailbox, hours of emails to answer, and a schedule full of meetings. To be stressed is considered proof positive to many that they are important, even indispensable, to their company. Somehow, we have adopted busy-ness as a sure sign of our worth to our companies. Unfortunately, this is akin to the young soccer player getting a trophy just for participating, with his/her parents “high-fiving” them simply for their participation, not their contribution to the team or their team’s accomplishments. It is a false measure! This false valuation becomes a trap in terms of how we promote ourselves to others and, ultimately, how we value ourselves. By using these false criteria to value ourselves, we are essentially sub-optimizing our worth to the organization.

To further substantiate this assertion, a recent survey by Adobe Systems (2015) revealed that employees typically use email six hours a day, or more than 30 hours a week! This includes checking both business and personal emails at work. That is the equivalent of nearly three full workdays a week spent checking email. This happens in spite of the fact that 24% of employees understand they are using email “way too much.” Many are on the receiving end of “blast emails”—emails for which their input is not relevant to the issue, a common organizational CYA tactic (“They were included on the email”). Nevertheless, employees often read these irrelevant emails and reply unnecessarily (to the group, of course, in order to show that they have been attentive). This is a classic example of Stephen Covey’s observation that “the urgent undermines the important.” What is of high urgency to someone else may not be of high importance to you. Time can get away from you when responding to emails or attending meetings that are of low or no value to you. Although few would dispute that email and electronic communication are valuable assets in communicating business concerns, there is often a downside to such modes of interaction.

Citing statistics from various sources, a 2013 article in MeetingKing (October 21) reported that 37% of employee time is spent in meetings. This translates to about 15 hours per week in meetings, or an average of three hours per day. In addition, findings showed that managers attend more than 60 meetings per month. If this weren’t bad enough, 47% of employees considered too many meetings a waste of time, 39% of meeting participants admitted to dozing off during a meeting, and 70% brought other work to meetings. Unproductive meetings were a result of not having agendas, including the wrong people or too many people, no meeting outcomes or assignments, and no follow-up or accountability. Furthermore, attending excessive meetings contributed to employee fatigue and lowered employee morale.

The excessive use of emails and meetings, both communication tools, is ironic in that the single most concerning issue shared by individuals about their businesses is poor communication. In survey after survey, employees complain that the biggest problem in their day-to-day work is poor communication across the organization. How perplexing it is to find that two of the largest wastes of time in a company are related to communication! Just think of how productive companies could be if emails were more effectively managed and meetings were more productive. At the center of this perplexing problem is the degree to which individuals actually perpetuate the problem by automatically sending and responding to low-importance emails and attending meetings that do not add value. This behavior becomes mechanical and done without much reflection. It is similar to a moth’s attraction to light without differentiating between daylight and the light from a fire, ultimately culminating in its flaming demise. The result of this kind of robotic behavior could include your career stalling and your contribution to the organization diminishing. The root of this problem lies in having lost your sense of unique giftedness. In order to make the largest impact on an organization, and positively influence your career along the way, you must first change the way you see yourself. This requires reclaiming who you are—your skills and capabilities—and determining how you can best impact the organization. It requires going back to understand why, among all of the candidates for your position, you were hired (or promoted). What was it that your manager saw in you that set you apart from other candidates?

It would be difficult to argue that being a hard worker is a bad thing. It is equally difficult to argue that networking within an organization is detrimental. However, neither of these activities alone is sufficient for sustained success or maximum impact. In the extreme, hard workers can be less productive due to their inability to set priorities. They can mistake activity for productivity. Similarly, well-networked people can be seen as socializing and interfering rather than influencing or making an impact. In other words, being busy is not a hallmark of being effective! It is the intentional exercise of your gifts that makes a difference for you and for your organization.

In a recent Forbes article, Kevin Kruse (January 2016) interviewed 200 successful people and discovered that they check their emails only a few times a day. In addition, they avoid meetings at all costs, noting that meetings are notorious time-killers. Not everyone can check their emails only infrequently, or are in a position to turn down most meetings. However, there is hope. To get from where you are to where you want to be, consider the following ways to reclaim yourself as a capable professional.

1. Value Yourself

Take a close look at why you have been successful up to this point. This exercise may require soliciting input from trusted advisors or close associates.

• What are some of the key competencies and capabilities you possess?
• Why were you selected for your position over other candidates?
• What difference were you expected to make in your position?
• In what way have you compromised your sense of self on behalf of being, or appearing, “busy?”

2. Maximize Your Impact

Once you begin to reclaim your unique giftedness, consider how you can claim lost time to refocus your capabilities on more important issues.

• Time Management
  • Emails—Insist that you be included only on emails that either directly affect you now or in the future, emails involving matters about which you can make a difference, or emails that include critical information regarding the business. Unsubscribe liberally and respond cautiously. Do not send out blast emails yourself. Limit the time you spend on emails and find a specific time during the day that you will respond to them. Very few emails require an immediate response!
  • Meetings—Only attend meetings at which you can make a difference and where your attendance would be additive. Insist that every meeting you attend have an agenda and conclude with tasks, owners, and follow-up. Whenever possible, delegate meeting attendance to others—this will free up your time and could be a development opportunity for them. Do not schedule meetings when a phone call or two would suffice and do not include people in meetings whose value to the meeting is not critical.
• Priority Management—Consider the following ways to avoid reactively mistaking activity for productivity and allowing the urgent to sabotage the important:
  • Differentiation and calibration—Set aside the same time each day to review everything in which you are engaged. Take an honest look at triaging all of the activities into the following categories:
    • Urgent vs. important
    • Short-term vs. long-term
    • Essential to do myself
    • Can be delegated
    • Can be left undone altogether
  • Focused attention—Begin focusing your attention, and your giftedness, on those items that are important, have far-reaching impact, and can only be completed by you.
  • Execution—For all your prioritization above, set personal objectives with regard to the timeliness, quality, and resources needed to execute the item. Enlist a colleague to both review your priorities and hold you accountable. Work diligently to become intentional about your behavior, instead of mechanical or unthinking.

Keep in mind that the ultimate goal is to become intentional in the use of your talents and capabilities on behalf of the organization. Your value to the organization is directly related to your impact, not your busy-ness!