connection

Are you proud of your work?

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How many of us can truly say that we’re proud of the work we do on an ongoing basis? I’m not suggesting that the work isn’t worthwhile or valuable. But do your efforts make you proud?

I wonder in a world of increasing complexity at work, whether we are making more jobs that remove the concept of personal pride. The simple linear relationship between actions and outcomes that allow us, at the end of the day, to feel that our contribution not only added value but gave us a sense of pride. If we are dealing with the fragmentation of task and the complex interrelationships that exist in many modern workplaces, is it possible to have that simple reaction to our work?

I immediately think of the challenges that teachers, nurses and those in the services and forces talk about. How the “stuff” gets in the way of their personal pride and drive. Whilst this is perhaps the most simple and obvious examples, is a similar issue occurring in workplaces across the world? Can we help retail employees, call centre operatives, warehouse workers and office staff simply feel a greater sense of personal pride?

“I’m proud of the work I do and the contribution that it makes”.

That feels like a pretty powerful statement and one that would potentially help us understand the level of connection an individual has with the work that they’re doing and the organisation that they work for. Far better than asking whether they’re proud to work for the company – as is often seen on employee and staff surveys. If one could create an organisation where everyone felt proud of their work and their contribution, would that almost undoubtedly lead to higher performance?

How proud are you of the work you do?

Four decades of connection

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I was born in Cardiff on November 11, 1973. It was the same year that Motorola showcased the first mobile phone, although I was ten by the time the first handset was commercially available. I’m not sure either of these things really concerned me, but for the record it was also the year that Ethernet was developed, in case you’d care to know?

By that time, I’d moved to the Isle of Wight. I moved there in 1979, the year the Commodore PET was released here in the UK. For a (then) astronomic £914 you could get yourself a whole 32KB of RAM. It was also the year that the compact disk was invented, but I don’t really think I cared. I was settling in to a new school and making new friends. Life is tough when you’re six, you know?

I was still there in 1990, when Microsoft released Windows 3.0 to take on the dominance of Macintosh and IBM. In 1991 when the first website was made publicly accessible by the clever chaps at CERN. And 1992 when IBM introduced the ThinkPad. But I was more interested in sex, drugs and rock and roll. I was a six former god dammit and I was ready to shape the world.

In 1993 I was living in France. That was the year that the IBM Simon was launched, arguably the world’s first smart phone it combined a phone with a pager AND a fax. It was also the year that the first Pentium processor was released by Intel. I’m not sure I noticed. I was too busy falling in love and reading poetry. These things take time to do properly.

I got married in 1995. The first Playstation was launched that year. I had other things on my mind. Hutchinson communications were launching this brand called, “Orange” and Sun Microsystems announces this thing called Java. I was more interested in coffee. It is important to get your priorities right.

When I was making friends, we hung out, we played, we talked. When we partied, we arranged things by phone, or letter, so we had to plan things well in advance. When I was falling in love, we braved the cold winter evenings to find a phone box at an allotted time. We hand wrote letters and we accepted silence.

On Saturday night, I got to spend an evening with friends and family to celebrate my birthday. It was a collection of the old and new. People there that had been with me throughout my life, people who I had grown up with, played with, drunk with, fallen in love with, cried with and married. And people who I’ve met more recently, that I’ve felt a connection to, that are close to my heart. We’ve got to know each other through so many different ways.

Whilst I’ve been growing up, technology has been too. And in the same way that it has become more consumer focused, I’d like to think I’m also a more sophisticated, more complicated, but ultimately more user-friendly version of my former self.

Yet still some basic facts remain.

The thing that connects my school friends, to my professional friends, to my social friends, to my family is mutual respect, love, understanding. It is true connection. It isn’t about the means or the reason, it isn’t about the timing or the technology. It is about the people.

I’m incredibly blessed to have such amazing friends, family and colleagues. People who interest, challenge and care for each other. And people who care for me.

So as I start my 41st year, as I write this blog on my MacBook Pro, using WordPress on broadband, before publicising it on Twitter and LinkedIn, I want to say an old-fashioned thank you. Thank you for being you, for those that were there and those that weren’t, for those that I speak to once a day and those that I speak to once a year. Life is nothing without people, life is nothing without connection. Both old and new.