Expected Instead of Recognized

There is nothing worse than having your efforts and accomplishments ignored.

It happened to me yesterday.  In front a large group of people as part of the recounting of events, the accomplishment of an audit with no observations - arguably an important event - was not even mentioned.

One's mind runs the gamut in such situations.  First one lets it pass by.  Then one becomes angry, then agitated, finally settling into a simmering heat. Two weeks of preparation.  3 days of effort, accomplishing nothing else.  All to have it swept under the carpet.

This is one of the questions I have added to my repertoire of questions during interviews:  "How do you recognize and reward achievement?"  It is a bold question, I know.  But I have come to realize that how companies portray their recognition of effort is how the ultimately treat those that work for them.

To treat the extraordinary as ordinary is to ensure that efforts will become minimized.  There is nothing more enervating that to demonstrate in actions that the effort that everyone claims they want to see is nothing more than something to be expected - and ignored.

For me?  There is nothing much to do at the present time:  any public display of "look at me" looks exactly like the petulant activity it is designed to be.  It will hardly change the course of my year.    But it does (perhaps finally) give me some of the clarity that I have been seeking.

As Seth Godin would say, in today's economy no-one is going to pick you.  Pick yourself.