Expectations

Last week was an interesting week for me. I got back reviews from two presentations I gave, one out of town and, the other, a teleseminar I was a participant in, where I got to sit in my office and talk on the phone. The reviews weren't terrible, but they also weren't perfect.

That bothered me, not because I'm not used to criticism, but because, in both cases, I really wasn't the one in control of the presentations. For the first presentation, I had been told that there was a specific audience that I should gear the presentation for. Turns out that's not the audience that showed up, so most of what I had to offer for this group they already knew. For the second presentation, which I did with someone else, I had been telling the moderators that I thought the presentation should be geared towards people who were looking at this particular concept as a new idea, but that's not how they marketed it, and thus, the negative comments. Lucky for me, in both reviews, they at least liked me personally, along with my energy, but that didn't make me feel much better overall.

It made me think about expectations as a general topic; those that others have for us, those we have for others, and those we have for ourselves. Expectations are always difficult to live up to because most of the time we have high opinions of what we expect across the board. For instance, I had a doctor's appointment last week, and walking in, I had an expectation of what the doctor was going to say to me and how he was going to say it. I'm sure he had an expectation of how I should have been treating myself also. And the end of our encounter, I'm sure we were both somewhat disappointed in what happened, and yet there were some positives in there also that, at least from my perspective, we acknowledged in passing and moved on with what was going to come next.

Every day, we have personal and business encounters with people and family members, where we expect them to act a certain way. Sometimes we're pleasantly surprised by what we get, but many times our expectations are way too high for others, so high that there's no way they could ever live up to them. Of course it's blatantly unfair when it's family, but when it's work sometimes it's even worse. When family members don't live up to expectations, you're disappointed in some fashion, but you're hopefully going to love each other anyway. When it's in the workplace, feelings get hurt, work performance can suffer, and when work performance suffers it impacts cash for the entire organization, and then everyone suffers.

What about the expectations you have of yourself, since I brought it up? I like to think that most people have high expectations of themselves, though many don't really seem to try their best to reach those expectations. Using myself as an example, I have a goal of a very big house, along with great fame and wealth. Nice dream, but, though I work a lot of the time, I know that there are things I won't do, or haven't done, that might get me there quicker. I'm not always as mentally directed as I need to be; I don't get out of the office nearly enough when I'm not on assignment; I sometimes try for perfection, and when I can't attain it then there are things I don't finish, because I don't want to put out an imperfect product. Logically, my mind says there is no such thing as the perfect product; emotionally, though, sometimes it stops me in my tracks anyway. I'm probably no different than anyone else on this one, but luckily I fight my way through it often enough.

So, we're back to this bugaboo about expectations. I feel the need to clarify one thing here. Expectations is the term I'm using here, but the word doesn't quite fit across the board. We can interchange wishes, hopes, aspirations many times when we're looking at this subject, especially when we're talking about family members. Sometimes we have to keep certain things to ourselves; I don't have to tell you what, because you probably already know what.

What can we do to work through our expectations of each other, and about ourselves? Here are some tips:

1. Think about the expectations you have of others first to determine if they're fair. This is probably the most critical part of expectations. Is it fair to expect straight A's from a student that has learning disabilities? Is it fair to expect your spouse to prepare certain meals when your money situation doesn't support it? Is it fair to expect those customer service people who you talk to on the phone to always fix issues that weren't of their making to begin with?

   Sometimes, the answer is yes; sometimes, the answer is no. Sometimes, the answer is somewhere in the middle. Expecting perfection is one thing; expecting consideration is another. Expecting competence and courtesy are more things to consider. Thinking about whom the expectation is about is the most important thing, though. Do we expect someone five-foot-two to be able to dunk a basketball as easily as someone six-foot-seven? Do we expect a 12-year old to be able to throw a baseball as far as a professional baseball player? Do we expect that all employees are going to work at the same pace and the same proficiency, and if we do, are we being realistic with our expectations?



2. If you have expectations of others, but they don't know about those expectations, how logical is it to assume that they'll be able to live up to them? If we're talking about family, one of the problems many families face is that they don't really know how to communicate well with each other. Spouses don't always do it well, and it causes distress in the family. Parents don't do it well with their children and it causes distress in the family. Everyone in the family deserves to know when they're not living up to expectations; that is, if the first point has been adhered to first. Expecting your spouse to bring home more money when you knew that spouse didn't have the job skills to make your family wealthy makes no sense. Knowing your spouse was a big spender before you got married and expecting that spouse to change just because you got married is the same thing. Yet, not talking about them only makes both parties miserable.

   As it pertains to work situations, waiting for performance evaluations to tell someone that they're not living up to expectations isn't fair to the employee, the company, or yourself. Waiting for that one more event to occur before you tell a fellow employee that they're not living up to your expectations of them probably means you've lost your temper, and that will cause more problems than it could possibly solve. One of my favorite lines is "I'm not Kreskin"; how many of us are mind readers? One has to be ready to talk to others, to share their feelings and expectations of each other. One also has to be ready to accept others expectations of themselves if you're going to do it, though; expectations aren't a one way street.



3. How do you deal with expectations of yourself? You have to be willing to be critical and compassionate with yourself at the same time. Many times, as with others, we avoid looking intensively at ourselves because we're afraid of what we'll see. At the same time, we may elevate the performance of others, even people we don't know, and compare ourselves to them. Sometimes that's good, while other times it's bad. Overall, each of us can only do what we can do; whether we do it is another matter entirely. I know I could probably find an hour a day to work out, even when I'm on the road, but if I can get in my half hour a day, I don't beat myself up because I didn't take the time out to get that other half hour in. But if I don't get my workout in and I had the opportunity to do so, I will be very critical of myself and, hopefully, make amends the next day.

   We can't expect perfection from ourselves. Let's look at some of the products in our lives as a comparison. Who thinks Microsoft Windows is a perfect product? How many of us drive perfect cars, or live in perfect houses? How many of us have read the perfect book, seen the perfect movie, married the best looking person in the world (that the entire world agrees upon, that is; let's not get anyone in trouble)? There's nothing wrong with pretty good; many people have gotten rich off being pretty good. As long as you try your best, no one can ever legitimately ask for more, including you.

We can get what we expect if our expectations are realistic. If they're realistic, sometimes we'll even get more than what we expected. And when that happens, usually we're very happy. And who doesn't want more happiness in their lives? Expect people to be people, expect yourself to do the best you can, and you'll be happy. Be fair to others, and let them know, when you can, what you need and expect from them, and then they'll have the opportunity to be happy also.