New Year New Start

There’s never enough time to do the things you’d really rather do …….

New Year is always a good time to rethink what you do and whether you could save yourself time and effort by streamlining stuff. No-one ever wished they spent more time at work, but alternatively, no employer wants an employee who’s mentally absent, never gets things done, doesn’t meet deadlines, leaves colleagues to finish their work, and generally cruises along. You definitely don't want to be that person. It’s perfectly acceptable to need thinking time but not all day; a business needs to be productive and that means getting through tasks and completing projects.

Making a list of daily, weekly and monthly tasks will help you sort out what needs to doing by when and is both enlightening and rewarding. Ticking off that list really works, it’s why it is such a popular suggestion.

Another is to look at your last appraisal and see what objectives are on that - what can you be working on now that will be measured this year? What’s incomplete? What needs doing to complete it/them? Make a plan to finish your required tasks and you’re set fair for a really positive review – know what the obstacles are and try to work out how they can be overcome.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help – everyone loves to give their opinion – make it generalised if you have to.

Be clear on what your objectives are though – and be clearer on what isn’t. You can reasonably be asked to do more of the same but more responsibility means you need to have a conversation about additional reward of some description. You may be working towards a promotion or pay rise. Do you have the right skills or training for the additional role? You may need to have a chat about what can be dropped to encompass additional work.

Don’t be afraid to speak up, if you can’t have a reasonable discussion with your line manager then you need to sort that first. Good managers always want to chat things through with you before making changes – happy people work better and more efficiently. Poor managers are out of their depth, inexperienced and prevent work – they should be enablers who have a team that makes them shine! 360 degree feedback is supposed to wheedle out this sort of issue (where all the colleagues that you interact with are asked to give feedback on you). It can sometimes make uncomfortable reading but mostly it's very positive and can give you areas to work on and usually some praise too.

Taking criticism is a whole other topic for another time...

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