Unrealistic Expectations
professional tendencies of a system designed to fail
I used to spend nights burning the midnight oil with the false hope of cashing great rewards. If I could just pull another “miracle”, right?
It all starts with an urgent email or call, usually associated with the words just-this-once. At first the promises of wonderland seems so attractive that your mind starts to wander with thoughts of future happiness and prosperity, but as you call your friends to postpone a dinner or a weekend trip, reality kicks in. What have I done?
Suddenly you are the one holding the ball and it’s too late to give up, so you turn on the hero mode and start doing some work despite the clock showing it’s already 10pm.
Finally it’s monday morning and you still remember the roller coaster of emotions that went through the last hours or days: excitement, anxiety, guilty, sadness, relief. Your boss arrives and call the team for a meeting just ten minutes before the presentation for that important client, as you give them the news: I couldn't do it. WHAT?
Your words resonate so loud across the room that makes the initial urgent demand sound like a whisper, people look around searching for someone to blame and just like that the worst of human behavior is now at place because of a system designed to fail: the support of unrealistic expectations.
It is safe to consider unrealistic expectations as the psychological cancer of the productivity gold rush, it affects all kinds of relationship and is rooted within companies and peoples minds. Although people know that the chance of success are sometimes minimal, they are brought into play to masquerade past mistakes. Someone failed to estimate a future event (go figure), or failed to read an extra chapter on the specification document, or were just afraid to say no to a last minute request and instead of facing the truth once, people rather play the “let’s do a miracle” card with disregard for its consequences.
I couldn't give a shit about the missed feature or presentation, but the real problem lays on the emotional drain caused by these situations. Forget doing great work, forget the smile and admiration of getting something done or the peace of mind needed to be creative, all that remains are the miserable faces of the exhausted team and the frustration on the boss’s eyes as he finally hears the truth. Bad day at the office.
As a shallow attempt to avoid last minute bad news, companies are hurt spending countless hours on midnight status reports, urgent meetings and tools that show the exact time each employee spent using the company’s apps, all designed to find the escape goat of a collective error that can't accomplish anything more than unhappiness.
That is the antitheses of great work.
Justifications reveal a state of mind unable to respect other human beings and propagate the feeling that life is worth living, that work is just a word to represent the time you devote to put a dent in the universe, building a better place for you, people around you, everybody.
I fail to see the upside of a guy waking at 6am after two hours of sleep just to tell his boss that he failed. The irony is, he didn't fail as a professional or a craftsman as the extra hours on the project manager report will show, he failed for being human, just like his boss, both for believing on something impossible.
In a era of remote working and world collaboration, we should let people be the best they can be, at their own terms and pace, exchanging experiences and respect without ignoring the fact that we are all humans. We can only accomplish the results of our actions, thus it makes no sense to invest in a system that ultimately ships bad results.
I urge that we devote ourselves to nurture a lifestyle surrounded by realistic desires, with less promises and more pleasure, with less stress and overnight work and more joy and proud for the process and the work done.
Life can be much better once you stop the cycle of unrealistic expectations.
This is for Thomas Lopes, a friend of mine who died at the age of 30, but in his brief time helped to ship great work and focus on happiness and quality of life. Constructive comments are always welcome — @etimesg
[1] to foster the collaborative spirit, I illustrate my posts using one of the awesome free pictures people send to unsplash.com
