Waiting for others

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Today's daily dose: Waiting for others
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If you are waiting for other people, you will have to "walk" at their pace.

Take any kind of project which involves other people. The project will only move forward as quickly as the slowest person, or the lowest common denominator. If your entire team cannot see the benefit of moving the project forward quickly, it won't.

So what can you do?

Make sure your team know the reason for and the benefits to be gained from whatever task / project / goal you have set them. Everyone wants to know "What's In It For Me" - and workplaces are no different.

If you have a chronic malingerer - and you need the project to move quickly - then a replacement may need to happen.

Although you need to check project scope, time lines and deliverable dates before getting too grumpy. But you can almost always find someone in an office environment who drags the team down with excuses as to why they couldn't do something. We all know the kind of person we're talking about here, the one who always says "well it's alright for you, but I am so busy with - " you can fill in your own blank. These are usually the same people who find time to have extended lunch breaks and spend hours on the phone to random friends and acquaintances. But whether they get any kind of sustained productivity has always been open to debate.

Now, before we go on, please check your ego at the door and make sure you're not the project slouch.

Or if you know who the project slouch is, you might like a quick word in their ear about sharing the work load, doing their bit and the classic "team work" springs to mind. But sometimes, it doesn't matter what is being said to these people, they will do what they want and only what they want, regardless of the consequences.

Now am I saying if you want something doing, then you'd best do it yourself? Well no. But it's well worth remembering. If you work with other people, rarely will they work to your level. However, as we have mentioned, it is worth checking your own level occassionally as there will be times when we can still pick up the slack. And you know I'm right.

Speak soon

Elle

To add your comments -

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Today's blog post: Open Plan Living
I don't know whether open plan living spaces is uniquely Australian, or just a West Australian concept - but sometimes it would be nice to have doors on some of the rooms in this house. Read more at: http://www.motivateme.info/through-the-barrier/2008/10/26/open-plan-living.html
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Comments

[Rob Wallis]

Waiting for others to act is always something that has driven me crazy. your priorities are simply not the same as everyone else's. In order to get things done, sometimes you have to make your needs explicitly clear--Rob

[Elle]

And isn't that the truth Rob. BUt i've known instances where they were stated, and the person still didn't do what they were supposed to...and they got away with it. More fool management I suppose.

Cheers, Elle