To balance both a career and family, Prowess believes that we must holistically care for ourselves. In this lesson, we will focus on setting boundaries, protecting our energy, and finding your “flow”.
We want to dig into how to keep work at work even though you may be in your home office. How we keep the client from asking more and more of our time (scope creep)? How we keep ourselves from taking on unnecessary stress? Because no one has time for that.
Be protective of your schedule:
Of course, managing schedules and communicating is key to creating successful boundaries, but there is also the emotional side. For some who are introverts, one comment can throw us into an emotional hangover as we debate in our heads, “Did I offend them? Did they not know that was a joke?” Or maybe the issue is more with taking on something new and that is going to stir up emotions for those in our inner circle. So how can we be proactive and conserve our energy and be present for all that we want in our lives?
There is an element of tension and anxiety that your clients will have regarding their company’s goals such as meeting sales quotas, reaching company milestones or even how someone delivers a presentation. While you are trained to anticipate the needs around these dates and objectives, you can’t also take on the personal stress that surrounds them.
For example – you prepare an excellent PowerPoint for the meeting but whether or not everyone laughs at the team leader’s jokes is not your responsibility.
OR you triple-check the agenda and follow-up items, but you are not responsible for the bad mood of the team leader because he had a flat tire that morning.
Conduct yourself in the same professional manner with empathy, support, and returned focus to the meeting objective. People respect when you can stay true to your standard of practice.
What to do if your client gets angry?
We are all human and you will make mistakes. Instead of hiding, beating yourself up or trying to ignore the problem, face it head-on.
Psychology Today lists these 8 steps to avoid taking things personally:
(Psychology Today Posted Feb 19, 2018)