The only real way to get out of a recession is for the population to spend money. Go buy that TV, eat out at a restaurant, spend spend spend. That is the mantra that is always being shoved down our throats. Did you know grocery stores put milk in the far back of their buildings so customers have to walk past all the goodies to get to it? Why? So that we buy those goodies. Why is candy at check out isles? So we buy it when we are waiting to be checked out. What does that have to do with efficient companies? Simple, why should we in our every day lives not be efficient money saving people when that is what we are being preached to at corporations?

When a company needs to be efficient, that means they need to save money. In the conversation with my friend, he pointed out that ‘wouldn’t it be good if you could half your team, fire them, do their work and increase your salary by 1.5 percent?’? Initially, I see the brass ring,1.5 percent! Hell yeah, i’ll take that 1.5 percent. But, after some thinking, it hits me, wait a minute, the company just fired some poor guy with a family to feed, doubled my work and saved a nifty .5 percent of salary in the process. Did I just get pwn’d??

Another friend was agreeing with efficiency model. They pointed out how some workers would read magazines at work, or have a job whose sole purpose was to go between two people and relay information. They laughed. Then my second friend talked about how he worked 12 hours a day, drank irish mist at lunch, and was loaded with stress.

What occurred to me after was a bit eye opening. Why are we trying to save companies all that money? Aren’t their CEO’s getting massive bonuses, millions of dollars a year, while we struggle for a fraction of that? In fact, if you do fire two people in a four person team, you save, lets say, 200k a year for the company. Ok, so you increase the salary of the other two guys, which never happens after layoffs, and save a total of 100k a year. You’ve just increased the stress of everyone, no one likes layoffs, and increased the workload of the other two guys, for what? The 100k savings is either going to go into managing the debt of the poorly run company or it’s going to go into the pocket of the CEO or executive board members.

This is where my opinion skews from everyone else. Do we really need to be workaholic a-holes who spend 9-10-11-12 hours  a day at work, work on vacations, work when we are sick, work work work, just so CEO’s get nice fat bonuses or we bail out the company that’s failing? I say, no. Instead of going for ‘efficiency’ why not go for ‘employee happiness’.

Lets say your company made one million dollars profit this year. You could, give it to executives as bonuses, save it, or hire 8-12 people to take stress off of everyone else. You know what happens when you have lower stress environment? People tend to be happier.

Now, I’m not going to go into the whole spiel about  having 10 extra guys and not being able to manage them or get them to do work. And  yes, over-population of your workforce is a concern, if you don’t need people, don’t hire them. If you have problems managing people, hire new managers. There could very well be a cultural problem and not an efficiency problem that you are plagued with.  

Bottom line, being efficient is great. I do agree that streamlining a process in a work place only makes sense. But, what doesn’t make sense is firing people just to fire them because someone thinks there’s not enough work for them. The more people you have on the payroll, the better the economy will do in the long run. Sure you can get the job done with one person if they work just a little extra here and there, maybe the occasional weekend, but does that really get you anywhere? So what if two people really only have 5-6 hours of actual work a day anyway. That’s two families that have health insurance, two families that can eat tonight, two families that can have a warm house tonight and one CEO that doesn’t get his new leather couches. I’m really ok with that.

There are many out there that would say to use yoga, deep breathing, or some other technique to lower the stress level. I whole heartedly disagree. Stress is not a symptom that can be treated. Stress is the result of an unfavorable situation or combination of situations. Treating the stress with deep breaths will provide a temporary relief, but if the source that is causing the stress isn’t removed, you’ll just start hyper-ventilating yourself.

My advice to you, remove the source. If your job is the source of the problem, get a new one. Yes, I am saying quit, find a job that’s better, less stressful. They are out there. They do exist. Now, you may be thinking I’m crazy, that this is impossible. You can’t just quit your job, the economy is tough, you have to stay. Again, I disagree.

What is the most important thing to you in your life? Is it the job? You may think so, but I doubt it. Now, the job is important, sure, a career is important. But guess what, one day you’ll retire. Doesn’t matter what job you have, in a certain amount of years, you’ll retire to live a quiet life. All that matters is earning enough money to provide yourself a comfortable retirement and give your children a boost in life. I personally think the most important thing in your life, and most people’s , is your family and your friends. Why do we work after all? Isn’t it to feed, clothe and provide for our children and families. We often take stressful jobs so that we can provide more money. But those stressful jobs wear on us a good deal, and usually we take that stress home and it makes for unpleasant evenings, fights with the spouse and kids, etc.

Remember, the goal here is to make money. The goal isn’t to please your boss so that you have job security. The goal is to make money, save for retirement, provide for your child’s education and if lucky enough, make enough to pursue your passions.

Ok, so how do you do it. How do you find another job that’s less stressful. First, figure out where the stressors are. Is it the commute? Ok, simple, find a closer job. Is it a bad boss? Try to talk to them. Doesn’t work? Talk to HR. Still no? Do not hesitate to look for another place to work. It’s just a job. Other’s have benefits as well.Don’t have enough skills to get that other job? Learn them. Yes learn them. This is the 21st century. There are online video’s, tutorials, training materials in just about everything. I recently saw where most major universities are video taping classes and providing them free online, with materials for study. See one of my earlier posts, how much education do you need? Honestly, none. If you know your material, are not working in a profession that requires it like law or the medical industry, then all you need is knowledge. Take my industry, if you know your stuff in the IT world, doesn’t matter what your education is.

Find more revenue streams is another way to lower stress. If money is the big issue, and lets face facts, it is THE issue, and having a stressful job is required because of the money, look for alternative revenue streams.  If you are in the IT industry, go to guru.com. Like to write? Start a website or blog and get traffic to it, then sell advertising. You’ll not be a millionaire but a little extra cash never hurts.

The real point here is, determine what is the most important thing to you, for me it is family and friends. Once you have that, find the best job to allow you to live happily with them. To me, it doesn’t make sense to work work work, get stressed out, and then don’t enjoy the time you spend where you really want to spend it, at home.

For me, I quit the stressful 2 hour commute job and found work at a not for profit. It is a zero stress environment, and though a little boring at times, the benefits, ability to work from home, and increased time I can spend with my family more than make up for it. Is it the most challenging work? Not even close. Is it the best job i’ve ever had for spending at home with my family? Absolutely.

My advice to you, change your goal like I did. Don’t look for the best job for your career. Look for the best job for you family. It may sound bad for you in the long run, but actually, I think it’s the best strategy and will lead to a stress free and enjoyable life. Isn’t that the goal?

I was once presented with a task at work which essentially boiled down to record all the email addresses that a certain program has built into it. Simple enough. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the one who set the program up and had to get this information from someone else. OK, I thought, shouldn’t be any big mystery here. And so it wasn’t, I asked the owner of the project how many emails there are and what they are. He responded with 2. Great. Simple. I updated the required documentation and was about to submit it to the proper people. I checked with someone else on another piece of the document and that someone else emphatically declared there were three emails. Now, I know this sounds to be a terribly simple, innocent and small issue. But, when you are being evaluated on the accuracy of a document, it can be a larger issue to management and to you.

This is where my over aggressiveness came in. I loudly, not with hostility, asked how was I to know what fact to believe when multiple sources said different things. I could tell I had pushed a bit too far and in the weeks to follow I noticed an increased unwillingness to assist me. And at times when she did, it was done with disdain. I quickly corrected the situation by being extra nice, comical, accommodating while at the same time not coming across as being too weak or a push over. Eventually tensions eased and I was able to rebuild the working relationship. Which brings me to the other side of this post, when to be aggressive enough.

There are times when being aggressive enough is just as important as not being so aggressive that you seem like an ass. In the work place, you simply can not lay down and let every co-worker walk all over you. In a lot of ways it’s just like the playground when we were kids. There are bullies and those that get bullied. Except, now, the bullying comes from verbal aggression and body posturing and not physically fighting.

When asked questions, you should confidently give the answers. When asked to do something beyond what you think you should be doing, push back! Tell them that you don’t feel this is being done right or isn’t part of your responsibility to accomplish. Of course, be certain it really isn’t part of your responsibility to accomplish. If you don’t push back, and people realize they have a live fish on their hands, they’ll know they can get away with more and will do so again. Others will notice this as well. If you display your self as never being aggressive, never taking charge of a project or task, others will think you just don’t want the responsibility. Maybe you honestly don’t, and if so, you may want to stop reading. For those that do, take the reins. Grab the project, tell your managers you’ll get it done and do it. Don’t wait for someone to give you the chance, not ever.

In my career I’ve also been the passive type. In one position I didn’t take the reins, didn’t push the tasks forward and as a result, I wasn’t even considered for a lead position. It wasn’t that I was considered and refused, it was simply that they didn’t even feel the possibilitywas an option. I realized even if I did a great job, even if I answered every single question, even if I got my tasks done on time, solved every problem, completed every project, if I was re-active and not pro-active, passive vs. aggressive, I simply wouldn’t be considered for higher up positions. Being passive would mean I would be a grunt, front lines type of person and not someone who could direct from on top.

Now, I do want to make a point here. Just because you are passive some of the time, doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing. There are times, in some situations, where someone else has authority or the project lead or it’s in another department, that being passive is required. Do not be aggressive on someone else’s playground. A great example is when IT staff intermingle with the Business staff. When these two school yards get together, it’s normally assumed that business wins. IT normally serves the needs of business after all. And some of those guys are just as aggressive and take charge as you can be. In those situations, don’t lay down and be a wet noodle, but also don’t step up your aggression either. When two bulls are in the same room, they’ll more likely fight than play cards.

So, it’s a balancing game. Sometimes you do need to tone down or back off from your aggressive work place stance so people don’t feel you’re a bully. Sometimes you need to step up and channel your aggression into accomplishing the work and show management that you can. And still others, you do need to let yourself be non-aggressive, but not passive, when you’re dealing with upper management or other teams. One thing is for certain, if you master the art of aggression in the work place, you’ll soon find yourself moving up fast.