Undoubtedly you’ve had a time when you’ve been disappointed about something business-related, and you let it show—on your face and in your mood. For me, this happens when I find out I didn’t win a contract that I worked hard on, when I’ve learned bad news about an existing client; or when I’ve learned something bad has happened to an individual in my network.
I hate that feeling, and I’d like to just crawl into a hole for awhile until I can shake it off.
Unfortunately, we usually hear this rotten business news when we’re in the middle of something else—where, in fact, we still have to be at our best—positive; energetic; engaging; productive. In other words: PEEP, as in ‘Don’t say a peep and just keep on keeping on.’
Well, that’s easier said than done for those of us that wear our hearts on our sleeves. And let’s face it, many of us in the AEC industry do tend to take things personally. Mind you, I have any hard statistics to back up that observation. Nonetheless, I thought I’d put together a list of questions that I ask of myself—in short order—to get the bad news out of my mind until I can complete the PEEP situation. Perhaps it will be helpful to my fellow sensitive design and construction colleagues.
Anne Scarlett’s ideas to (at least temporarily) shake off bad news:
In short order, ask yourself these questions:
- >Will a catastrophic outcome occur because of this news? No.
- >Are there worse things that could happen? Yes.
- >Now that this has happened, is it going to lead to an avalanche of other bad things, or will it likely be an isolated incident? Hopefully, the answer is that it’s an isolated incident.
- >Is there anything good that has come out of this news? Anything at all? Hopefully yes.
- >In one month from now, is this still going to disappoint me? Three months? One year? Hopefully not!
- >What is one positive thing that is going on this week for my business? Hopefully I come up with more than one, once I start thinking about it.
- >How much longer do I have to stay in PEEP mode, before I can have some time to digest this disappointment privately? That answer can never be more than the span of a workday, and hopefully it will be just a couple of hours at most.
- >Who can I call or meet with later with that will lift my business spirits? I try to keep a small list of the ‘upbeat people’ in my life for both business and personal disappointments.
Finally, once I am able to digest the news in private, I need to ask myself: What are the advantages of feeling disappointed? Will it serve me well, or do I need to work through it and move forward?This does not mean that disappointments—opportunities lost; people leaving the firm; layoffs; economic hardships; etc—should be ignored and not discussed. They absolutely should be addressed and discussed. But for times when you find out the bad news and in the very next moment you need to be ‘on’—in a client meeting or a conference or an internal staff meeting—then that’s when you might be able to use some of these ideas for temporary shake off.
Always welcome your ideas as well. Feel free to direct message or post your thoughts.
One final note: I learned renditions of these techniques from a research project around Cognitive Behavioral Therapy at Northwestern University. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is evidence-based, which means it is supported by research that proves that it is effective in helping people make emotional and behavioral changes. Check it out.