Why in this Corporate World are we asked to do everything, all the time?
I recently got into a debate with an old boss of mine regarding whether I am a 90:10 man or a 60:40. We both agreed that my strength does not lie in details and that I excel at being an ideas man who sets things up and then let's other people run with things. That's why I am great on teams and less so when all on my own. My arguement was for the 90:10 as I prioritise what is important and he argued for the 60:40 as he doesn't prioritise the way I do and is a details man instead.
This got me thinking about jobs in general in the contexts of each individuals strengths and weaknesses. My company (a major Global corporate) expects everyone to be responsible for everything from the bottom up. Compliance, data protection, FSA, Treating customers fairly (I
work for a financial company in case that wasn't obvious) is made the responibility of the individual in addition to their day jobs. Let's take Data Protection, why do I care what is and isn't confidential? I think enough in doing my job that I don't have time to work my way through flow charts every time I want to send an email. Just dafault my mail server to encrypt all of my emails and be done with it. Funny thing is that when I tried to encrypt something the bloddy thing didn't even work!
The point of this entry is that everyone has to recognise that we are all individuals with various strengths and weaknesses. We can't do everything or always be all-rounders. The sooner companies understand that the better as curtrently productivity is suffering badly as a result. In this time of stagflation, every little helps.