Do you love your work?

I try to read a book a month and the book I am reading at the moment is 'Bear Hunt: Earning Your Living by Doing What You Love '- Malcolm McClean.

You can see more details at this Amazon link.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/1841126667/qid%3D1123354599/sr%3D2-2/ref%3Dsr%5F2%5F11%5F2/202-7772311-7538234

I think Malcolm McClean has produced an easy to read and yet profound piece of work.

I felt engaged immediately and I enjoy the way he illustrates through powerful case studies how we can all love our work if we can convince ourselves to change our view of work.

I have always believed people can love their work. This book proves not only that you can love your work but if you do love your work your life priorities are more likely to be adjusted favourably.

The paradox is; loving your work does not mean you become a workaholic - in fact you will enjoy life more because you are happier in a huge part of your life i.e. being at work.

My favourite chapter is 'Think Like An Eight Year Old' and there is a lovely moment described by the author when his own son tells his Dad he is acting ‘like a kid’ – Malcolm McClean feels this was a fabulous compliment that meant he had achieved that special creativity and innocence of an 8 year old – wonderful stuff.

I hope you will consider buying this book.

Managers don't have all the answers

I remember one of the most profound learning experiences of my career.

I was in my early twenties and had been successful in securing a fairly senior management position in a hospital.

One of my responsibilities was to manage a team of six porters. They were all older than me - some of them over twice my age and between them they had many years of experience.

I was successful in securing extra money from my bosses to employ one extra porter on condition I introduced a night shift that would give 24 hour porter cover in the hospital.

These were the days before Excel spreadsheets! and I spent many hours at home and at work writing out in 'long hand' various alternative shift suggestions for the porters to consider.

Whatever I tried I couldn’t produce a satisfactory Rota. I was stuck!

George White - one of the older porters came into my office and asked what were all these huge sheets of paper on my desk. I explained my predicament and George - trying hard I am sure not to laugh - said he would have a try with the other porters.

Within an hour or two he was back with two or three options that the porters liked.

The messages to me that I have remembered for my entire career:

• Being called a 'manager' does not mean you are an expert in everything
• As a manager you really do not have to do everything
• The staff who do the work know the answers
• Don’t beat yourself up by battling alone - just ask for help
  
  

Just thought I would share that little story with you.

Involving people in change

Speaking recently to a few people in the National Health Service (NHS) has awakened my interest in a thorny old problem faced by hard working and dedicated staff out there in ‘NHS land.’

At the moment there is major management reorganisation going on in the NHS and many people’s jobs are under threat. There is nothing new in that and in my experience in the NHS it was a constant threat in the background.

Security in ‘one job for life’ went out of the window many years ago.

What does intrigue me is that every time there is significant change in the NHS many staff become quickly disillusioned and feel undervalued. They are often not involved in the process of change – often despite promises they will be fully involved.

I would have thought there was enough experience to make such changes less painful for the people most affected by involving them fully in the change process instead of having it all decided by a select few people behind closed doors and then telling the staff.

But then again ….

Maybe I am out of touch with good practice in management and leadership … I don’t think so do you?

Carers - an invisible army

Throughout my career as a manager in healthcare I had a passionate interest in finding ways that we could support carers. I spent many hours listening to the stories of carers. I learned much more from listening to carers then I ever did reading and studying.

I was fortunate to work with and for some forward thinking managers and leaders who shared my view and as a result we did some interesting things to help carers.

Carers are those people providing unpaid care for loved ones who are family members or friends. In America I believe they are called ‘care givers.’

Here are some interesting facts about carers in the UK

1. One in eight adults are carers... around six million people
2. Carers save the economy £57 billion per year, an average of £10,000 per carer
3. Over 3 million people juggle care with work
4. The main carer's benefit is £45 for a minimum of 35 hours, equivalent to £1.26 per hour
5. 1.25 million people provide over 50 hours of care per week
6. People providing high levels of care are twice as likely to be permanently sick or disabled
7. Over 1 million people care for more than one person
8. 58% of carers are women and 42% are men
9. By 2037 the number of carers could have increased to 9 million
10. Every year over 2 million people become carers

I do not believe carers are properly valued by government.

It is true that things have improved dramatically in recognition of carers. This has slowly happened over the last 20 years or so. But there is still a huge gap in what is promised and what is delivered.

I have decided to do some voluntary work in support of Carers UK – a campaigning organisation whose job is to raise the profile of carers and the role they play in keeping this country financially solvent – that is not an exaggeration.

The truth is that if carers withdrew their labour today – the country would be bankrupt tomorrow. It is as simple as that.

Carers provide the care for a variety of reasons – love/ duty/obligation among them.

Carers rarely ask for help – they are usually too busy simply looking after the person they care for.

The rest of us have a duty to support them and raise the profile of their good work. I hope you will visit the web site of Carers UK http://www.carersuk.org/Home to see some of the work carers do.