Choices at Work

Originally uploaded by Breath of Life

"Individuals who push their organizations, who inspire other individuals to change the rules, thrive." ~ Seth Godin in Tribes

You have a few choices of who you will be when you go to work each day. It doesn't matter whether you work for a small business or a large corporation. All of them have to do with attitude and who you've decided to be.

• You can go to work and be the cynic. He likes to pretend he is being realistic. He's the one who says, "You've not worked here as long as I have. Things will never change." when you present a better way of doing things. He's the one who will find something wrong with the new policies put into action, because management would never create a policy for the good of its employees. In short, the cynic will try to discourage you.
• You can go to work and be the sleepwalker. She likes to go through the motions with very little interruption. She's the one that panics when she is challenged to learn something new, because it disrupts her comfort zone. She's the one who is there because she has to pay the bills. She is watching the clock and waiting for the moment she can go to her next break, her lunch, and then home. In short, the sleepwalker will tempt you to be average because she appears to be so comfortable.
  

You have a few other options as well. You can be bitter, angry, victimized at every turn, resistant to change, and the list can go on and on. You'll be unhappy. You'll have numerous bad days at work.

The thing is, there is no reason to go to work and be any of those people. So you don't like your job? Get a new one. Change the one you're in. There's no reason to be sleepwalking.

So you feel as if you've been burned at some point in your career? Push through. Resist the temptation to be bitter and instead set things in motion to go around your setbacks.

Go to work with the intent to inspire others around you. Cultivate an atmostphere of teamwork. Change the culture if it needs to be challenged. It may require a complete change in your attitude, but it will be much better than the alternatives. Would it not?