Manage Reality

​​For years I fought last minute projects. I asked for projects to be submitted two weeks early. Then three weeks. At one point I think I tried one month. Nothing was working and I was frustrated. Inadvertently, the only thing I was doing by asking for more time was making each request seem even later than it already was. 

I had created a doom loop of sorts. The only way the ministry teams could win with me is if they planned further out. But you know what my rules weren’t doing? Actually changing anything.

One day I walked into the office and I thought, “what if I designed a system that took reality into consideration”. That’s when everything changed.

Let’s just say you work in an environment where things don’t get to your desk until the last minute. Theoretically, of course. Rather than implementing rules that are trying to change the behavior of the entire staff in order to work with how you’d like to work, what if you accept that the team around you will be last minute? Would you build your system differently?

When I began considering other people's timelines as a constant rather than a variable, so much of the emotion and tension in my job shifted. I was no longer defensive when people came to me last minute. Instead, because my new process accounted for this sort of thing happening, I could lean in and problem solve. The relationships of me and my team improved dramatically, and we were more helpful to the ministry teams we were hired to serve.

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