How to Create a Working Team and Environment in Which Your Employees Can Thrive
Digital Advertising Executive, Gergana, gives us her main takeaways from our most recent team training on loves and loathes
Just R really is all about investing in their employees and encouraging us to be our best selves. Last week our Founder & CEO Rachael brought us together for what I like to call a ‘soul-searching session’ on finding our loves & loathes. This was an in-house training session getting us to take a deeper look into ourselves so we can get closer to creating an environment in which we can thrive – both at the workplace and in our personal lives.
The session began with a brief introduction to the books Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi & Love + Work by Marcus Buckingham. We also devoted a bit of time listening to some of HBR IdeaCast’s episode Find Joy in Any Job: What Do I Really Love To Do? The main similarity between the books and the podcast is that they all focus on and promote working within a job you love. Rachael asked us to think about activities that we would lose ourselves in, when we feel time slipping away, or even times when we would come up with a better way of doing something.
The second part of the session was discussion-based. We were prompted to talk about what we look forward to each day. Rachael created a safe space allowing us to be vulnerable and dig deep in search of what it is that we actually love doing, and those things we find more of a chore. Some of us even shared heartfelt secrets which had determined or influenced certain aspects of our lives or specific activities that we have now grown to love!
I personally found it difficult to talk about things that I love doing, because for years I never even asked myself that question. I never thought that an employer could care about me enough to encourage me to find myself but it really is a win-win. Working a job that I am passionate about means that I will always want to give my best and be an expert in that field.
At the end of the session we were given a Love and Loathe Journal to document elements of work and home that we like and dislike. In a month’s time we will get back together to discuss our findings.
just r
Here’s what I have written in my L&L Journal so far:
Things I love at work:
- Getting a sense of accomplishment at the end of the week after I have ticked everything off of my to-do lists
- Writing
- Learning new things
- The team! Especially my desk buddy Jennie…
Things I love at home:
- Self-care
- Cooking
- Listening to music
- Writing
- Reading
- Spending time with my loved ones
- Spending time with myself
- Travelling
Things I loathe at work:
- Feeling overwhelmed
- Not knowing/ being an amateur
- Fear of disappointment
- Falling behind on work
Things I loathe at home:
- Chores
- Being hard on myself (I want to be an expert in everything I do and I want to skip the being a beginner part)
The main takeaways for me from this training are:
- We need to be specific and really look inward if we want to create a life that we love living.
- We keep constantly developing and learning as human beings, so it is normal for things to change.
- Knowing yourself is key
- Past trauma can be a wake-up call for pushing us to build a life worth living.
- You can find so many similarities between the things you love and loathe in your home and work lives
