Stressful Bottlenecks

I'm tired, folks. For the last two weeks, I've been doing a consulting assignment in New York City. Yup, the Big Apple, the city so nice they named it twice; okay, I heard that somewhere and thought it was cute.

Anyway, working in New York City is pretty much like working anywhere else, believe it or not. People are still people, the work is the work, and the buildings, though many much higher, are still the same on the inside. I can honestly say that working in New York City is pretty much the same as working anywhere else.

What I don't like is driving in New York City. I never thought I'd be daily trying to drive in a place worse than when I was in a certain part of New Jersey, which incidentally was directly across the bay from New York. However, the parameters were somewhat different. In New Jersey, it took me 30 minutes to drive 3 œ miles, but mostly it was one way, single lane streets, and, because the buildings were so high and the cars were parked on both sides of the street and the streets were very narrow, you drove slower because you never knew if someone was going to dart out; New Jersey is a pedestrian right of way state, period.

That ride doesn't compare to the congestion that is New York City; upwards of five lanes going one way at 10 miles an hour if you're lucky, cars darting in front of you without signaling, no matter how close you are to the car in front of you, motorcycles riding in between the cars and trucks, which are already so close you can reach out and slap the mirror of the vehicle next to you (I wouldn't recommend trying it, though). It's taking me upwards of 90 minutes to navigate the streets for a trip that's less than 15 miles. At least if there were accidents I might understand, but there's not. On the trip, there's one toll, which I could understand might back some people up, but the rest of it? Hard to understand the bottlenecks and how they occur when, every once in awhile, suddenly the road is clear and you can actually get up to the speed limit, no matter how brief it is, and there's no obvious reason for either the back up or the let up. It's very frustrating, to tell you the truth.

That kind of stress is draining, to say the least. I've found myself tense and tight; it's hard to let go. And yet, for some reason, I'm glad to have the experience because it's making me realize what many people go through in their normal working day in the office. I've never felt this type of pressure at work, but I've known many people who have. I have talked to them about this pressure, most of the time self inflicted, and have tried to help them reason why they may feel like they do. Though the impetus is much different in the drive I'm doing now and what goes on in the workplace, the result is the exact same. The difference is that, in a work situation, there may be more ways, and better ways, to alleviate some of it.

As a manager or leader, one of the best ways to help alleviate stress on others is to ask them to contribute to the process. Some of the most recent human resource studies have shown that the main thing most employees want is to have a say in what goes on with the work they have to do. It has nothing to do with a power trip; it has something to do with how, in feeling part of the process, they have a full understanding of how they fit into the equation, and when people really understand their role then the pressure is reduced because the unsurety of what they do is gone.

Another way is to fully define your expectations and ask them to define theirs. The worst thing in the world is trying to figure out what pleases someone else when it comes to the work you do. In the past, I've had to create reports for someone, not knowing how they'd like to see them. If I was the type to worry much about that type of thing I might want to ask a lot of questions, which would make me uncomfortable with what I had to do. Instead, I'd put together a report in the manner that I'd want to see it in, and give it to the person with an explanation, if one was needed, of what all the numbers meant. But I also know that I would ask people to create reports of figures for me, then, once I received them, would have to fight the urge to change them around so they eased my aesthetic sense. But I would realize that it was my fault for not better telling someone what I wanted to see and how I wanted to see it.

As I talk to other consultants, I find that this question of what to tell a client and how to tell a client something comes up as one of their biggest worries. I worked with one consultant years ago who said you never tell the client anything bad about what's going on with their business. I responded that if you didn't tell the client what was bad, then you're doing them an injustice because they then have no idea whether you're fixing a problem that needs to be fixed, or changing something that they actually like, problems and all. Having to tell a client that what they contracted for initially has suddenly changed because, once you started looking into the issue, the scope of the problem has drastically increased, isn't pleasant either. Yet, I've found that just saying it directly, of course in language that isn't so direct that it will feel like a slap in the fact, is the way to go.

One final way to help alleviate stress in others is in figuring out whether something needs to change, or whether something needs to stay the same, or a combination of both, while allowing them the opportunity to have their say. Some people get stressed with lots of changes; others get stressed when nothing seems to change except the worsening bottom line. And others get stressed when they feel something has been tried in the past, and failed, and now here's someone new saying we're going to try it again, yet there's no confidence that it will be any better. The best conclusions are made when one can learn as much as they can about something so that an informed decisions are made, and getting some history from others not only helps that process, but gives them the feeling of being valuable and c ontributory.

These are just a few ways to help reduce the bottleneck that may be within your own office. If you're the employee, you can still try to apply some of these things with those you report to if you feel they're ignoring you, or are having you do things that aren't working. Staying stuck in a rut is really your choice, whether it feels like one or not.

As for me? I'm switching hotels, trying to get even closer so I can reduce some of this stress, which I'm not used to. Next might come the trains or the subways; it doesn't matter. What matters is that I decided I had to do something about it, asked people who knew the area much better than I did for some assistance, assimilated all the information I could, then made some decisions to change. How well will they work? I honestly don't know. I do know, though, that I will gain some control over which bottlenecks I'm willing to face, and know that I can keep trying until I get to something I can handle.