Get out of that muddle you created at work

There will be many occasions when you land up in a burrow at work. While some keep going ahead in the dark, there are some who jiggle and joggle and manage to get out. In their perception, perhaps doing so is a good option. Needless to say, getting out of the burrow is always accompanied by a boom or a thud.

Though not a management argot, there is something that could be termed as the ‘burrow premise’. It is an extremely apt description of getting out of a mess that you may have landed in; and it is, “Stop burrowing if you don’t want to go deeper and get trapped”.

          Whenever you get an impression that you are in a burrow at work, there is always a tendency to smoothen out everything. You have a propensity to get agitated and disturb each and every thing. You create an immense splatter with a momentous feat that perhaps is considered an excellent initiative. Regrettably though, it is rather not unusual for most people to land up in circumstances or state of affairs that perhaps they never ever thought they would be in. Why? They burrowed and got entrapped in the burrow. Something that was the beginning of a fine initiative gradually transformed into a frightening issue; the fright made things worse for them.

            Have you ever noticed a dog trying to dig a hole in sand? The bigger the hole he is able to dig, the more he attempts to dig. Similarly, when people land up in fissure-like situations, they develop an increased tendency to create bigger messes for themselves. Why is it so? Is it because of that murky, self-satisfying, unintentional and subliminal foresight that shows us the way to our cravings for annihilation of oneself? Something like committing harakiri? There are occasions when we do flourish at the instance of burrows.

It is unfathomably cavernous to inter your career. A large majority of people dig themselves in burrows and land up in embarrassing situations due to various reasons, mostly a mishmash of some and notable ones being:

·  Undue assertiveness:  You become extremely obsessive, to an extent even fanatical. You become too difficult or try to do more than what you are able to. You take on responsibilities that you are not competent to handle. It is no point taking on situations that you cannot master. Rather than going to the extremes, it is always better to keep your nose to the ground stone.

·  Excessive hope: A strong mind always hopes and always has cause to hope. But then, excessive hopes are dreadful things because you make commitments that you will never be able to fulfill. Moreover, you also get to indulge in self-petting lies.

·   Unwarranted self-interest:  Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of stupidity. It is an art of seeing in your own self what others cannot see. If you are self-centred or arrogant, you are more likely to indulge in trivial and diplomatic untruths to make impressions or uphold them. In fact, you would be thus protecting your ego.  

·   Excess independence:  This implies having the power to choose, respond and change. But it has to be within the framework of existing rules and regulations. Insisting on going one’s own way, especially at var1ance with set norms eventually proves detrimental.

·   Terrible wariness:   The secret of a successful career is to find that secret. But you cannot be secretive about it. Being terribly cagey, whether for good or bad, is unlikely to pay any dividends for understandable reasons. You can well get caught for doing something that you never made it known to anybody; your hidden aims could get exposed.

·   Poor communication skills:   The essence of a successful lies in your ability to articulate what you are doing, to be clear about it, and to stick to it is, To be able to do that, you have to be lucidly communicative and eloquently expressive. If you lack this, there is every possibility that you will be misunderstood and misinterpreted. 

            The above reasons land you in a mess alright, but when you attempt to throw a veil of secrecy over your mistakes, difficulties multiply. Or if you try to hastily resolve a slip-up or attempt to bypass others to get into lead positions, you will find that the mess that you will land up in will be more brutal and rigorous. Three qualities, if you have them in you, will definitely lead you into a deep burrow; these are:

·   Dishonesty:  They say that anything is better than lies and deceit. You could be generally seen as a person of integrity, however, one single act of deceit can destroy your whole reputation. You should remember what the Bible teaches – the bread of deceit is sweet to a man, but subsequently his mouth gets filled with gravel. 

·   Unexpressiveness:  You could be deliberately not wanting to divulge something or even if it is not so, you are unable to put across your point of view. Any problem, whether big or small at any place always seems to start with bad communications; they invariably leave you with less room to grow.

·   Zeal:   You could be fine as an individual and have the inspiration to work. But you have a self-image, a sense of self and an opinion of yourself. You want to guard your self-worth and self-esteem and while doing so, you have a tendency to rush. The results could be contrary because great haste invariably makes great waste.

So what should you be doing?

You should be transparent in your approach; this will prevent worries related to minor slipups or deviations. The tendency to go out of one’s way to impress others should be curbed. And last but not the least, never ever let your ego accompany you at work; it will be the very cause of your downfall. What you should be subscribing to is a commitment to be honest and frank in all your dealings. Remember that honest people do not hide their actions; they do not become liabilities for themselves or the company they work in.