As I laid in bed riddled with Pneumonia this weekend (a sadly uncommon side effect of Asthma), I had a serious meltdown. I relocated last year to St. Croix, and finding employment wasn't as easy as I had expected. So, after being unemployed for 4 months and without health insurance, I was offered an opportunity to work in my profession, in a managerial role, and the job came with Health Insurance. Only Caveat? The job was in St. Thomas. Of course I took it. Of course I was ok with being away from my son during the week. Of course it was an increase in pay. OF COURSE!!!!

Today, I’m going to shift gears to my career and would like to discuss about one common issue I have seen over years working in teams – Asking for help at the right time. The reason I want to write about this is due to the fact that yesterday evening, my team member and I were discussing about a new hire who had joined our team and would not ask for help and would prefer do everything by himself.This made me think of sharing my perspective on asking help at work.

Last week, I noticed a surprising online rant from a seasoned employee and resume coach. He was angered about a performance review that gave him a “Meets Expectations” rating. While this employee said all of his supervisor’s comments were favorable, he blew up because the overall rating wasn’t an “Exceeds Expectations” as it had been in the past.

What’s wrong with meeting expectations? Isn’t that what we are asked to do?

Perhaps this gives you a chance to step back and consider some other interpretations around meeting expectations. How about these instead?

Years ago, I read The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Not because I wanted to necessarily be more effective, but because everyone else in management consulting was reading it (so it HAD to be good, right?). While a lot of the book was lost on me, the opening sticks with me to this day. If you had to write your own obituary, what would it say? Would it focus on your professional accomplishments and accolades?

Have you ever had a great idea, but you stopped before you even started?

Maybe you thought you weren’t good enough, or that it was never going to work out, or that you didn’t have the means to do it, or you feared that everybody would think you were crazy?

Or you wished you were braver?

The problem is that if we procrastinate, ignore, or stop the flow of our divine guidance long enough, eventually our creativity dries up.

My daughter is almost 14 months now, and recently I took a moment to stop and reflect on my newish work/mom life balance.

At work I'm leading a fairly stressful project to deploy new software that provides network connectivity for my company's thousands of global users. My team is encountering issues, tracking them, working to resolve them, etc. Not to mention the other critical tasks on the back burner. It's a lot to keep track of, and I really care being able to deliver good results for the company I work for.

Hello my dearest bloggy buddies!  My beloved Cheap Winos, have you missed me? Why do I even bother asking? Of course you missed me! I haven't blogged all week! WTF? 

We had a training program at work today on communication. The office provided pizza. Unfortunately, I was far back in line so by the time I got to the pizza, the kind I wanted was gone. I brought soup today so it wasn’t that big of a deal. Until apparently, my decision to not settle for cheese pizza became sort of a deal.

Him (walking by with several slices of pizza): It’s almost all gone; get some pizza! You need three.

Me: Three what?
 
Him: Three slices! You’re too skinny. Way too skinny (complete with a downturn of his nose).
 
Second Him: Who?

Divorce can bring out the best and worst of the couple and also those who surround them.  There will be friends and relatives who distant themselves; there will be those who will takes sides.  There are those who will stick their nose into your affairs just to have something to gossip about or to stir up emotions.  There will be those who will respect you for your decision and will support you.  It is the latter