Determine your own terms of success
Most people who know me professionally know me as a flexible work specialist. The work I do centres around creating more flexibility in our organisations, giving people choices about their hours, days and/or place of work.
What most people don’t know is why I spend most of my professional time pursuing greater flexibility.
Before I became an HR professional, I studied economics at university and I loved it. When I was finishing my studies, economics was just starting to get really interesting. It was the early 2000s and there were high profile economists, like Joseph Stiglitz, who had worked at the World Bank and in the Clinton administration, criticising the way we were growing our economies and insisting on how foreign nations should grow theirs.
Although I never became a professional economist, as I focused on my budding HR career, I found myself geeking out on emerging economic thinkers who had something bold and challenging to say about previously settled ideas. There were challenges to the idea of economic growth for its own sake. Kate Raworth blew my mind with her concept of ‘Doughnut Economics’. She offered an upgrade to our economic model that put people and the planet at the heart of our economy in a way that had never been done before. To cut a long story short, I loved how these human and humane economic ideas were rubbing up against old, outdated economic thinking. These old ideas had created damaging levels of economic inequality and proved catastrophic to our earthly home. The old idea desperately needed replacing.
I started looking for ways that I could blend my passion for a new kind of economics with my professional HR background. I wanted to find a way to make a meaningful contribution to an economy like the one Kate Raworth described, the wellbeing economy. An economy that took into account people’s needs, the planet’s limits and pursued economic growth that was sustainable over the longer term for all of us.
That’s what led me to my passion for flexible work. It’s something I can do that gets us just that tiny bit closer to an economy I want to see. When flexible work is done well we can expect higher levels of wellbeing through lower stress levels and more equitable outcomes for people through a more inclusive workplace. We can also expect to see higher levels of productivity while also lowering carbon emissions. This leads to people staying longer in their jobs mainly because they feel happier and more supported to lead a meaningful life, inside and outside of work. It’s by no means the answer to a wellbeing economy, but it certainly fits into the picture.
Why am I sharing this story now?
I had my own epiphany recently about how I run my business and how that fits in the picture too. My partner and I were out at dinner and I was talking about how anxious I felt about how I define my business success because I wanted something different from others around me. I didn’t want to be really busy and racing around from one client to the next, but sometimes I felt like I should. I was stuck though, because I knew what I didn’t want for my business, but I knew I couldn’t define my business by what I didn’t want. I needed something positive to move towards. He said to me, “I see that your business serves you, it doesn’t drive you”. This was the epiphany moment. I realised then that what I am trying to do with my own business is a micro-version of what I want to see for the economy as a whole. It’s so important to me that I prove to myself that a wellbeing economy, at least from the perspective of a single business unit, is possible.
With that clearer now, I can define the measures of success I want to have in place, not the ones I don’t. What kind of measures am I talking about?
Can I pay my bills comfortably? (yes, money still matters… and…)
Am I a good mum, partner, friend, sister and daughter?
Can I frequently (at least once a week) get out into nature for a stomp? (a decent walk in most people’s language)
Am I well?
Am I having a positive impact for the organisations and people I’m working with?
Am I learning new things and testing new ideas in my work?
There are a couple of reasons why I wanted to share this story with you.
The first is that I think it’s helpful for you to know why flex matters to me. You now know that my passion for this is a long-term commitment and anything I turn my energy to will be in pursuit of this big idea of a wellbeing economy. If that’s something that resonates for you then we will have an awesome time working together.
Secondly, I thought it might help you think about the terms you set for your own success. Whether you’re employed or self-employed, it doesn’t matter. If like me you know what you don’t want, but find it hard to articulate what you do want, perhaps this story will help you connect to what would be most meaningful for you.
If you don’t want to follow the crowd, how can you move towards a positive vision of success on your own terms?
What are your measures of success?
When more of us commit to an economy that is in service of the people and planet and make that real in our own lives, the faster we can transition to that in practice, which is what I would ultimately love to see for us and our future generations.
Image by Nattanan Kanchanaprat from Pixabay