OVERCOMING THE PRESSURE COOKER ATMOSPHERE OF THE CORPORATE WORLD

OVERCOMING THE PRESSURE COOKER ATMOSPHERE OF THE CORPORATE WORLD

Corporate businesses operate in high-driven environments. They are a highly charged environment that demands accountability, speed, uniformity of purpose, synchronization of processes, and constant demand on performance and results that happen at breakneck speed. Working in a corporate environment can be very demanding and equally rewarding.

The corporate world is an environment filled with intense competition. It is not for the faint-hearted and the unmotivated. It is like a pressure cooker environment. Overcoming the pressure within this environment requires deliberate approaches to maintain one’s sanity and become proactive self-starters.

Most people that suffer from burnout, (including myself during my days in the corporate world) are those who refuse to take conscious steps toward maintaining balance in their capacities and their competencies. Most of us get torn between working on our deliverables and taking up other colleagues' roles (colleagues and superiors) just to be politically correct and create an impression of being readily available to take up whatever is thrown at us at our workplaces.

If you do not learn how to say NO, you will most likely be put under constant pressure at work. It will spread you too thin and eventually impact your work negatively. Being competent to do a task does not directly imply that you can and should carry loads of work that might be thrown at you.

Many workers de-risk their capacities and competencies by throwing away a lot on their plates and focusing on deliverables that are financially rewarding and which align with their overall goals. So, how can we start to ease this pressure that is not going away anytime soon? Let me share my thoughts with you.

• Understand your job and expectation: A salesman selling alcoholic beverages finds it uncomfortable visiting highbrow spots because he is not conversational. Already, this will spell doom for both company and the individual. Knowing and understanding what you do can help you get comfortable with the pressure and demands that come with it.
• Be realistic about your commitment: A lot of us do not commit wholeheartedly to our deliverables because most of the time they are unrealistic. Unrealistic goals are not motivating, aid procrastination, and are recipes for disaster.
• Seek support and leverage available resources: We all need help; at least at some time in our lives. You will need help at work and should not be ashamed to ask for it whenever you feel so. Knowing your limit and asking for help can only get your better than otherwise.
• Stay focused and resilient: Focus is everything. Doing things procedurally, with less distraction and more deliberateness will give you a head start that will reduce the pressure created on your job.

We will never be free from pressure, whether at work or in our personal lives. These sometimes are unavoidable challenges that we face, and which will test our character, competencies, capacities, and resilience. It is for you to understand that you must find a way around the pressure and not let the pressure make mincemeat of your sanity. Are you ready to try these out? Let me hear your thoughts on these.