~~~ On 2009/10/10 03:31, James Fraser at
wheresthatistanbul-newtontalk@yahoo.com wrote ~~~
> It takes persistence, certainly. ¬ _¬
>
> Maybe it's just me, but I have a hard time simply *believing* the number of
> people who seem to expect a near-instantaneous reply to any query they care to
> shoot my way. This despite my telling them slowly and distinctly, (and well
> beforehand) that "it may take a day or two (and sometimes longer, depending)
> for me to get back to you." ...
- PLUS -
~~~ On 2009/10/10 04:17, L.W. Brown at lwb@mac.com wrote ~~~
> You mean, no one of you folks had a boss, coworker or customer - or
> close relative - treat the old land-line phone (or faxes) exactly the
> same way?!?!?
>
...and so on. We all have these problems, don't we? Makes me wish we could
ditch anything more instantaneous than a telegramme.
I guess I should have put more emphasis on "obstinate" here. And picking up
L.W.Brown's point, I started this back in the days of land-lines and faxes,
so it was easier to carry on with e-mails, texts and mobile calls.
A lot of this is up to us to set our boundaries. If you're afraid to say
"no" to someone, they assume you mean "yes". Everytime. I think of it as a
teaching/learning process.
In the past I've needed to justify my hard line to bosses. I've always
appealed to 3 things: [a] when I'm actually with someone, they have to be
more important than any remote communication, or I'll be teaching people
they can "jump the queue" by getting me to work for them then and there on
the phone/fax etc.; [b] when I'm engaged in other work, **if** I take calls
etc., I'll do it in such a way that I don't move people up the queue just
because they're impatient; and [c] except in emergencies, my down-time has
to be genuine down-time, or before long I won't be any use to anyone. Now I
call the shots, but I still use the same principles.
People have gotten used to being with me and seeing me turn off my phones
for the duration of our time together (in the old days I just switched off
the bell and let it go to the recorder). There are very few exceptions.
Nowadays, no one who knows me expects me to pick up a phone or answer a text
while I'm talking to a real person.
The other part of this is that I've consciously traded away people thinking
better of me because they have me on the other end of my e-Leash. I expect
to displease that kind of person. Instead folks have an option: to think
badly of me because I won't pander to them, or to decide they like knowing
that if we're face-to-face, they are, with very, very few exceptions, the
only people who matter to me at that moment.
I know that makes me sound rude. I've already accepted that. In this case
there are worse things.
Is this system perfect? No. But it does mean that I'm **not** on call
round the clock unless I decide it's appropriate, and I can get my work done
and take care of the people for whom I'm responsible -- including myself.
And in the end I'm pretty sure people get better results than if I let them
interrupt my work every time they get bored, frustrated, curious or antsy.
I'm suppose this is no more than what most folks do already. I had to get
here the hard way; after being a work-slave in my youth, I had to re-think
it and plan it out consciously, and this is the result. But the key is
still to be "obstinate".
FWIW.
Shalom.
Christian
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
łAny sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from a Newton.˛
-- what Arthur C. Clarke meant
http://youtube.com/watch?v=1ZzpdPJ7Zr4
(With thanks to Chod Lang)
http://tinyurl.com/29y2dl
http://www.diyplanner.com/node/3942
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
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Received on Sat Oct 10 19:17:58 2009
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