I had a wonderful long lunch with the maestro of fun, Bernie DeKoven last Friday. I've been blessed to work (and play) with Bernie some over the past few months, and I'm especially lucky that his daughter, son-in-law and new grandchild live in Indianapolis. Hence, our long lunch.
During our fun and stimulating conversation we talked at length about people finding the true fun in their work, and at one point Bernie described it exceedingly well for me. He said, "People feel the fun when they are experiencing their competence."
Experiencing our competence.
You know what he's talking about - the times when you are really working well, the times when your ideas get legs in the meeting and everyone is onboard. The times when you are working on the parts of your work you know the best - and your excellence shows through with out any apparent effort.
I expect you'll hear and read more about this concept from both Bernie and I in the coming months.
But for now, I encourage you to think about the times in your work when you are deeply enjoying yourself. Think about when it happens, how it happens and what it feels like.
It is my guess that as you ponder this, you will begin to contemplate these times as times when you are experiencing your competence.
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I could not agree more. I guess I began to experience the feeling of "enjoying your competence" in all-night study sessions in college, when I'd be explaining engineering concepts to my class-mates. Not only did I feel good, and not only did I learn that I'm a pretty good teacher, but I also learned that it's "the teacher" who learns the most, not "the student."
ReplyDeleteAfter college, I went into sales, and still am. But at one point I did work as a "facilitator" of a TQM strategy in a manufacturing plant, and I really miss it - communicating a concept, its value, its application, and seeing it sink in and then put into action. I miss seeing others take to heart what I'm saying, because they understand it, and they see that I really believe what I tell them.
My true passions and skills are in communicating. And there's nothing more thrilling to me, professionally, than seeing that others "get it" when I'm explaining something, and at the end hearing "Oh!! So THAT's how it works... THANKS!"
Ezequiel Quijano
equijano @ sbcglobal .net