"The Boring"

Like a bad movie title, we all have boring work to do. Here are some tips to deal with or even reduce "The Boring" tasks assigned.

Transcript

Welcome back to my podcast, Scaling Out!

There are going to be times when you don’t like the task because its not interesting. Boring work is never fun, but the task is required to get done and lucky you got the proverbial short-straw. And you know, that’s why its called work & not play. There are things that just have to be completed. You have to look at the big picture, in the scheme of things this boring task consumes just a small portion of your career and you are surrounded by more interesting & challenging tasks.

At my employer, we have access to an incredible class called Energy Management that is run by our Work Life development team. This class talks to how to get energy out of your day by scheduling the boring or hard within the fun & rewarding. Whether its within a day or within a week, giving yourself something challenging or rewarding to do around the boring stuff will keep you energized & focused. And when you address the boring with the focus needed, you actually can complete the task faster and who knows maybe come up with a creative way to solve it.

But if you feel like everything that you have been assigned recently is in the boring category, check in with the boss. Ask for a change in assignments, have an honest conversation on how much longer the boring will be happening. If you are ONLY qualified for this - meaning maybe your skills have gotten stale, ask for training time around the boring so that you can pick up different projects. Or what if you are the only one on the team that can do the work, ask for an entry level resource to train up, even as a backup to you (take a long vacation), so ultimately there is more than just you to do it & then you both can juggle some fun stuff around the boring stuff.

Hope you are still enjoying the podcast! Find me on LinkedIn or on Twitter if you have ideas for more topics or want to be a guest!

Until next time, stay safe everyone.