Love Your Working Life
  • Work With Carleen
    • About Carleen
    • Career Strategy Session >
      • Get The Most Out Of Your Career Strategy Session
    • Listen Up
    • Coaching Programs >
      • Lead with Impact
      • Career Impact
      • Purpose to Impact
      • Recognize Your Leadership Potential >
        • Welcome to Recognizing Your Leadership Potential
      • Realize Your High Potential
      • The Art of Influence at Work
      • Your Time By Design
      • Assessment
    • Book Me To Speak >
      • Persuasive at Work
      • Workshops That Work >
        • Getting Hybrid Right
        • Leading a Hybrid Team Workshop
        • Communicating Comfortably in a Hybrid Setting Workshop
        • Finding Your Leadership Compass Hybrid Teams Workshop
        • Communicating Comfortably in a Virtual Setting Workshop
        • Career Health Check Workshop
        • Leading in Ambiguity Workshop
        • Accomplishing Work Through Others Workshop
        • My Values Driven Workplace Workshop
        • Leading Teams Virtually Workshop
        • Working Successfully From Home Workshop
        • New Habits for Life Workshop
        • Valued Living Workshop
        • Working Resilience
        • Addressing Conflict Workshop
        • The Many Faces of Unconscious Bias Workshop
        • Building A Culture of Trust Workshop
        • Time Management Workshop
        • Business Intelligence of Empathy Workshop
        • Finding Your Leadership Compass Workshop
        • Foundational Conversations Workshop
        • Conscious Conversations Workshop
        • Leading with Emotional Intelligence Workshop
        • Success in A Mulitgenerational Workforce Workshop
        • Networking in A Digital Age Workshop
        • The Psychology of Decisions Workshop
        • Purpose Driven Feedback Workshop
        • Dynamic Team Communication Workshop
    • Awards
  • Client Stories
  • Blog
  • Testimonials
  • Free Resources
    • Working Life Wellbeing Assessment
    • Hidden Habits Holding You Back
    • Secrets to Boost Your Job Security
    • Working Life Serenity
    • Virtual Influence
    • Hello Monday Videos
    • Career Resources
    • Life Practices >
      • I Feel Angry
      • I Feel Stuck
      • I Am Overwhelmed
      • I Need Self-Compassion
      • Emotions At Work
      • Mindfulness
      • Triggers At Work
      • Naming Emotions
      • I Feel Frustrated
    • Balancing Time Workbook
    • Working Life Persona Quiz
    • Career Health Quiz
    • Healthy Boundaries Quiz
  • Referral Partners
  • Connect
BLOG

EMPOWER YOUR
​WORKING LIFE

Three Powerful Steps to See How Your Work Makes a Difference

12/13/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
Work, career, profession is important to everyone.  

We all need to pursue something larger than ourselves to feel connected to a wider purpose, to feel connected to other people and (most importantly) to foster connection to ourselves in our work.

While this connection is important, it can also be very illusive; it’s difficult to see how completing a task, or a sitting in a repetitive meeting, is really moving the bar forward for your organization (or your career).

Fundamentally, your work is important (why would someone be paying you to do it if it wasn’t?).

Here are some strategies to connect more deeply to the many ways your work makes a difference.
  1. Listen to the stories.  Your organization serves a purpose and a specific group of people (be they investors or end-clients using your products/services).  Deep organizations with complex hierarchies and highly matrix-ed working environments don’t often give every employee visibility to the ways these clients benefit – but that doesn’t mean it isn’t being collected somewhere.  Check in with your sales and marketing team (do some internal networking) and ask to hear client feedback and stories on the ways your organization has impacted them by meeting their needs.
  2. Thread the stories back.  When you have a better idea how the organization makes a difference, the next step is to connect how what you do at work supports that difference.  On the surface it may be difficult to see how attending your weekly team meetings contributes, so thread it back.  Attending that weekly meeting ensures your team stays in alignment with organizational needs, allowing you to be informed and your team to make priority calls on what work gets completed, when and how.  You are in a better position to ask questions, and to highlight areas of concern, or impact, in the work you do. Maybe that team meeting doesn’t have a direct correlation to those client stories, but without it, your team would not be as effective in supporting them.
  3.  Look at it in reverse.  If you are still unclear how your work makes a difference think about it another way; what would happen if the work you do just didn’t happen?  What would be the impact then?  Think of this not in terms of someone else having to pick up the slack (although that is an impact) but more in terms of the down-flow issues this would create in the way your organization operates.  Would not having this work done create a capacity issue?  Would your works’ absence mean there will be health and safety concerns?  Can all the right decisions get made without your works’ contributions?  There is always an impact, what would it be?

It’s important to remember that how you are recognized for the work you do is different from the value of the work you do; they are not always equal or compatible.

Both are key parts of meaning, but in better understanding how your work makes a difference, you are able to connect to the value and meaning of it (absent of others thoughts, opinions and actions).

This is a vital first step, because if you can’t connect to the difference your work makes for yourself, no amount of positive feedback, or recognition, will make you feel good about yourself in your work.

Not getting the recognition from others you deserve at work?  

Giving a voice to the value of your work, using concrete examples, empowers your ability to foster the respect your work deserves from others
Learn how to influence without authority, ensuring your contributions are noticed
for all the right reasons. 
More impact, more confidence,
less work.

Power Me Up!
Picture
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Subscribe 

    Looking for a Blog? Search here:

    ABOUT MY BLOG

    I believe in empowering others in many tangible ways.  When I learn new career strategies  or see something that might help others, I share it using my blog and website. 

    View my profile on LinkedIn

    Archives

    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    August 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    October 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    December 2013

All photography on my website is courtesy of the generous artists at Pexels and Unsplash.
Book Your Career Strategy Session
Privacy Policy
Integral Coach™ is a registered trade-mark in Canada owned by Integral Coaching Canada Inc. and licensed to Carleen Hicks.

  • Work With Carleen
    • About Carleen
    • Career Strategy Session >
      • Get The Most Out Of Your Career Strategy Session
    • Listen Up
    • Coaching Programs >
      • Lead with Impact
      • Career Impact
      • Purpose to Impact
      • Recognize Your Leadership Potential >
        • Welcome to Recognizing Your Leadership Potential
      • Realize Your High Potential
      • The Art of Influence at Work
      • Your Time By Design
      • Assessment
    • Book Me To Speak >
      • Persuasive at Work
      • Workshops That Work >
        • Getting Hybrid Right
        • Leading a Hybrid Team Workshop
        • Communicating Comfortably in a Hybrid Setting Workshop
        • Finding Your Leadership Compass Hybrid Teams Workshop
        • Communicating Comfortably in a Virtual Setting Workshop
        • Career Health Check Workshop
        • Leading in Ambiguity Workshop
        • Accomplishing Work Through Others Workshop
        • My Values Driven Workplace Workshop
        • Leading Teams Virtually Workshop
        • Working Successfully From Home Workshop
        • New Habits for Life Workshop
        • Valued Living Workshop
        • Working Resilience
        • Addressing Conflict Workshop
        • The Many Faces of Unconscious Bias Workshop
        • Building A Culture of Trust Workshop
        • Time Management Workshop
        • Business Intelligence of Empathy Workshop
        • Finding Your Leadership Compass Workshop
        • Foundational Conversations Workshop
        • Conscious Conversations Workshop
        • Leading with Emotional Intelligence Workshop
        • Success in A Mulitgenerational Workforce Workshop
        • Networking in A Digital Age Workshop
        • The Psychology of Decisions Workshop
        • Purpose Driven Feedback Workshop
        • Dynamic Team Communication Workshop
    • Awards
  • Client Stories
  • Blog
  • Testimonials
  • Free Resources
    • Working Life Wellbeing Assessment
    • Hidden Habits Holding You Back
    • Secrets to Boost Your Job Security
    • Working Life Serenity
    • Virtual Influence
    • Hello Monday Videos
    • Career Resources
    • Life Practices >
      • I Feel Angry
      • I Feel Stuck
      • I Am Overwhelmed
      • I Need Self-Compassion
      • Emotions At Work
      • Mindfulness
      • Triggers At Work
      • Naming Emotions
      • I Feel Frustrated
    • Balancing Time Workbook
    • Working Life Persona Quiz
    • Career Health Quiz
    • Healthy Boundaries Quiz
  • Referral Partners
  • Connect