Issue 319
Have you ever examined your views on whether everything happens for a reason? Events occur during a working day, some of which are pleasant, productive and satisfying, while others are painful, unproductive and dissatisfying. If you do start to think about work, much of it is taken up with trying to figure out what cause will produce what effect. If I design this product will it sell, achieve its aim, make me rich? If I put this strategy into place will it result in the desired change I seek? The more you push the thinking the more you realise that work itself is about trying to harness causes to desired effects.
Look at your day – you want to get someone to learn, to co-operate, to achieve – how do you do it? What will produce the outcome you need? – this is management. So crucial is this skill that large sums of money are paid to people who can predict results from actions. In the financial sector making the right call can have dramatic results (and a wrong one disastrous ones). There is a long monologue in the movie, ‘Benjamin Button’ where Brad Pitt, as Button, narrates a complex series of seemingly random events that conspire to produce a terrible result for the heroine, whose career is ruined as a result. In real life, however, we are not privy to the narration which describes the train of events as it arrives at our particular station.
So you are left with numerous outcomes every day for which it is impossible to analyse the actual cause. This is nothing new; questioners asked Jesus of Nazareth for the reason a man was born blind; Job’s encounter group kept searching for direct causes for his collapse of fortune, and clearly events surrounding a fallen tower in Galilee or the mob attack were exercising Jewish minds when Jesus addressed their concerns.
We want things to make sense, to follow sequences, to have explanations, and when we can’t see them our stress levels rise. But as we attempt to solve the puzzle of love and work there will come a time – many times in fact – when things don’t make sense. Here, the skill is to place them in the psychic ‘pending tray’. There may indeed be a reason, a cause or an explanation but it is too complex, multi-layered or hidden for you to know what it is.
Rather than run down the road of stress screaming in frustration I suggest to you that it maybe wise to factor in ‘mystery’ to your working week and learn to manage it. I don’t know of many books on ‘mystery management’; most work cultures wouldn’t like it. Going back to biblical times, witness the livestock farmers’ plea to Jesus to leave their neighbourhood after the two thousand strong herd of pork literally sank without trace for reasons which no one even today quite understands.
Maybe, however, mystery management (the management of mystery) is the next piece to place in our puzzle. The bottom line of this strategy is that at a profound level you are able to recognise that there is only one Narrator who can oversee the whole story. This is the doorway to wisdom for it contains at its centre the fear (respect, recognition, honour) of the Lord. That, I suggest, is a way of designing mystery management.
Proverbs 9:10-12
10 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. 11 For through me your days will be many, and years will be added to your life. 12 If you are wise, your wisdom will reward you; if you are a mocker, you alone will suffer.”
In preparation for the next GEOFFSHATTOCKweekly, do feel free to email us your thoughts to wtw@worktalk.gs or leave a comment on our Facebook or Twitter profile. You can also visit our YouTube channel - get inspired and share Worktalk's vision with others.
Work well
Geoff Shattock
© Copyright 2024 Geoff Shattock
All GEOFFSHATTOCKweekly archives are for personal use only. For permission to use for any other purposes please email using the address below thank you.
WORKTALK LEARNING
1 Washington Villas, Hythe Road, Marchwood, Southampton, Hampshire, SO40 4WT United Kingdom
T:+44 (0)23 8086 8543
http://www.geoffshattock.com
comms@worktalk.gs
