A little solace for office irritation

picturepeople People who love their jobs have a few grievances. Even people who are good at their jobs have problems. A distracting office environment. Their colleagues are incredibly annoying. Career paths within the organization are not clear. There are aspects of the workplace that aren’t entirely redeemable, like “reply-all” email threads and all kinds of role-playing. This column is here to administer a balm of comfort to recurring irritations at work.

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Start with the pervasive problem. i.e. interrupted. I’ve muted Slack notifications and cleared my calendar. The prelude to Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 is being played. Your fingers rest on the keyboard and thoughts of world-changing profundity are slowly forming in your mind. Then there was a knock on the door and a colleague asked if we had time to discuss the air conditioning. By the time they leave, that vital thought and sense of well-being is gone too.

This kind of context switching is more than just annoying. A study conducted in 2021 found that it takes 9.5 minutes to return to a focused state after switching apps. But being interrupted has a bright side. In a paper by his Harshad Puranik of the University of Illinois at Chicago and co-authors, we asked a sample of American employees to record how often they were distracted by their co-workers and to report their sense of belonging to the organization. . They found that being interrupted involves social interaction with co-workers that can strengthen workers’ feelings of connectedness. Remember

What about some characters who make office life gnashing? Every company has some crazy person who specializes in administration. Compliment your boss and claim more credit than you deserve. Being careless is definitely exciting. However, it can sometimes have wider benefits.

A recent study by Wei Cai of Columbia Business School and co-authors found that having a crawler in the team improves team performance. People who were rated better by their bosses than by their peers in the performance appraisal process were designated as “upward influencers” in the study. Too many characters of this kind is not good. At some point, his members of the team end up spending more effort competing for recognition than completing the actual work. However, these personality types are ready to spend more time communicating with their managers, so their presence in the minority does not make the team invisible to their bosses. There are also good things for

What traits do employees find most frustrating about themselves, and what might hold them back? It is a belief of the people and is usually considered bad for individuals and organizations alike.

Research by Basima Tewfik MIT The Sloan School of Management found that people who worry about becoming scammers are seen by others as having better interpersonal skills than those who don’t suffer from self-doubt Concern about incompetence may lead people to try to compensate by building stronger relationships with others. In a world where collaboration and soft skills are becoming more and more important, don’t sniff it out.

Weaknesses can turn into advantages in other ways as well. For example, the idealized entrepreneur may drip with confidence and charisma. But not everyone fits that mold. In a recent study, Lauren Howe and Jochen Menges of the University of Zurich asked participants in an investment game about their own shortcomings and asked them to allocate funds to startups. They found that entrepreneurs who reveal personal shortcomings such as indecision and insecurity are more likely to attract funding from investors who share these same traits. not available. For example, stupidity or narcolepsy. But imperfections can sometimes help people move forward rather than get in the way.

The problem with silver linings is that they stick to clouds. you are still disturbed all the time. You are still surrounded by annoying co-workers. Imposter syndrome still causes unnecessary anxiety. Your weaknesses are still weaknesses. But most things in office life have a bright side and go beyond payslips.

Read more from management and work columnist Bartleby:
Use and abuse of hype (March 2)
Unobtrusive abilities bring disadvantages as well as advantages (February 23rd)
Why it’s time to capture your coffee meeting at work (February 16th)

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https://www.economist.com/business/2023/03/09/the-small-consolations-of-office-irritations A little solace for office irritation

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