Handle & Hustle
A Digital Industry Employee Reference for Tough Situations
Millions of things happen every day at work. Decisions, glances, words exchanged, tides changing. It boggles my mind. If you work in digital at an agency or startup, you know the culture can be intense. You work with creative, passionate, competitive people, clients and CEOs.
Some days, glitter will burst from desk drawers and on other days ceiling tiles will fall on your head. Most of the time, I absolutely enjoy work. On occasion, I encounter tough situations. The following scenarios include my personal advice on how to maneuver the hard stuff.
Tough Situation #1
The task at hand is outside of your skillset OR it is the definition of your skillset but it was not assigned to you
You will probably encounter both of these situations and both require patience. Digital work is inherently collaborative and all work is shared. There is no such thing as “mine” and “yours”. In this situation you have the opportunity to take on the role of the teacher or the student and it will have nothing to do with your title or experience. It’s a teachable moment. Learn more and more every week, month and year until you can contribute to all of the tasks at all of the hands! This sounds simple but it is easy to forget.
Tough Situation #2
You notice that the client is unhappy before anyone else does
First of all, congratulations, you are in a leadership position. As a leader, you need to continue to do the best you can at your job and you need to politely and diplomatically cover your own booty. This most likely includes asking for the resources you need to make the client happy via email early and often. It also includes being as responsive as possible to client emails. Leave a pristine paper trail. At the end of the day, some clients will love you and some will leave. When they do leave, strive to understand the real reason as best as possible and make sure no one has the ability to put the blame on you. I’ve seen it happen to innocent people.
Tough Situation #3
The project is not moving forward and no one has acknowledged it
There are many reasons a project can loose momentum. Poor project management is a common reason — no timeline, no accountability, no milestones, other projects take priority. Another reason is that the majority of the team does not have an understanding of what it takes to execute and everyone is doing laps around the easy parts. These are both tricky situations because simply throwing everyone under the bus will just cause chaos and create friction when you need teamwork. Be warned — it takes a long time to hire and fire people in corporate land. One trick that has worked for me is to start doing everyone else’s job without making it seem like you are doing it on purpose. If you are the UX Designer and you code up a prototype of something that the developer has not gotten around to yet — the developer is going to want to re-do it better. Same thing if you design the icons, write the copy or create a timeline. Once in a while, people will try to do your job too. Don’t get offended or territorial. Act as a mentor and use the opportunity to share knowledge. In the long run, it will benefit you if other people understand what you do because you will not be there for every conversation and the more people who can represent your ideals the better. If all of that fails, you have to find the right words to maturely express your concerns to whoever is supposed to be charge.
Tough Situation #4
You are being bullied or harassed
This is the worst and can really mess with your head. If someone is bullying you — it is not because of you — it is because of they’re own weird shit. You have to pretend it is their birthday every day and be nice to them until they go away. Secretly, keep a record of every incident. You don’t have to share it if you don’t need to — but if things get out of control you will be able to articulate the facts.
Tough Situation #5
You feel creatively stagnant, isolated, cut cown or belittled
Apply for new jobs. You might have thought this was your dream job — but it is not. You are talented and can do so much more in a different environment.
Bonus Advice — Build a fort out of compliments
Compliment others a lot. Compliment your coworkers to their faces and to their bosses in person and via email. Do it genuinely of course. This will give you more freedom to ask for help when a problem arises.
Hopefully you will get to wear a cape and crown to work every single day. But when you don’t, simply polish your invisible armor, put it on and quietly wear it around until it stops hailing insanity.
