Difficult Seasons

What's your target? Photo credit: Jake Vance (Flickr)

If your organization is focused on laying off people and cost cutting, then it’s not focused on your mission.  And neither are the people who work in your organization.  They’re focused on whether they will have a job or not.

Times such as we are in now seem to be consumed with organizations laying people off and focusing on cost cutting — you know, the serious expenses like coffee for employees and visitors, pens and pencils, paper, printer cartridges.  It’s crisis management.  And anyone who’s ever been there knows that when crisis management rears its ugly head, the organization and all of its members totally lose their focus on the mission of the organization.

Leaders seem to actually love crisis management.  It makes what they do seem so important — they’re “saving the organization” to fight another day.  But what happens in reality, is that on another day, the organization will not have the critical mass of talented people to continue to fight, to continue to do the mission.  And slowly but surely the organization will begin to decline, as it finds itself thrown back into crisis management again and again.

Organizations need to stay focused on their mission in times like this.  Providing healing care for people in their hospitals.  Providing reliable financial services to other businesses and to individuals.  Providing for reliable flows of materials and products.  If they don’t, someone else will rise and and do it in their place.

And organizations need to take care of their people, because their people are the ones who carry out their mission.  If they’re constantly worried about losing their jobs, the mission will suffer.  If they don’t have confidence that the organization’s leadership can lead the organization through the “crisis,” the mission will suffer.

When will we remember that our organizations exist to perform the mission, not merely to survive as an organization?

Need Help

One of the most powerful phrases in the English language is:  I need your help.

People everywhere love to be able to help someone else.  What keeps them from doing so is that they don’t know who needs help, or even if they do, they don’t know what help those folks need and how they could provide that help.

Turns out that if you will just use this powerful phrase, almost anyone will do their best to provide the help you need.   It works in person, it works on the telephone, and it works with email.

Here’s a script where you can just fill in the blanks:  “Hi.  My name is ______ and I need your help.  What I need help with is ______________.  Can you help me with that?”

Several years ago there was a woman in our job seeker group who missed the deadline for submitting an electronic resume for a job she was eminently qualified for.  So she took a paper resume to the employer’s location and asked the receptionist to help her by giving her resume to the HR representative.  The receptionist was happy to help, and the woman got the job.

I’ve seen it work over and over in an amazing variety of situations.

Put it to the test.  Make a list of the things you need, whether you’re a job seeker, a caregiver, or someone dealing with a chronic illness.  Think of people who might be able to help you with what you need.  Then make your requests.  You’ll be amazed at the goodness of people.

Bless some one’s life by letting them help you.  And be blessed in turn.

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Photo Credit: annethelibrarian on Flickr

Eloise and I went to visit her mom this last week, and on Tuesday took her mom to visit the places where she spent her early life.  It was a day of remembrance for all of us, coupled with some history lessons as well.

As we left Abilene (TX) heading to Nugent, we made a brief stop at the old Fort Phantom Hill ruins.  Fort Phantom was one of a series of Calvary forts

Fort Phantom Hill

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

scattered across that part of Texas to protect the settlers.  These forts were established around 1850, about the same time as my great-great grandfather, Dr. Ransom Tuggle, was surveying and laying out the city of Comanche, Texas.

A short way on down the road, we came to the farming community of Nugent.  This is where my mother-in-law Reba was born and raised.  We drove past where her dad’s grocery store had been located, then by where a house had been where she lived as a child, then out to where the farm had been where she also lived.  Interestingly, of the places she remembers as a child, only the churches are still standing and actively used.

Nugent Church of Christ

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

From Nugent we traveled the short distance to Lueders, another farming community, but a town that is famous for Lueders Limestone and which also had a small oil refinery.  Lueders is where Reba’s family lived after World War II.  During the war, Reba worked at Camp Barkley in Abilene, and then at the Sweetwater Air Base, before joining her family in Lueders.

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

J.W. Stapp, her husband-to-be, worked in this bank building, and Reba was working across the street for her brothers. She told us that she came up with as many excuses as possible to visit the bank to see J.W.

Reba graduated from high school in Lueders, when the school consisted of the building on the left.

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

We drove all over Lueders looking at houses where her brothers and sisters had lived, and also stopped at the house where J.W.’s parents lived when Eloise and I got married.

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

I remember lots of good meals in this house, watching Cowboys’ games, and killing a rattlesnake in the driveway.

We also went by the Lueders Church of Christ. We all spent lots of Sunday mornings there, and attended some funerals there as well.

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

We ended the trip by visiting the cemetery located at Funston, another small farming community. It’s the resting place for many of Reba’s relatives, including her mom and dad.

From Nugent, Lueders, Funston Trip

It was a trip back in time for the three of us. We miss those who are no longer with us, and we honor the hard work and good character of those that preceded us. We come from good stock!

And as our parents get older, it’s good to remember and celebrate!

There’s so much to learn when you become a caregiver.  Learning who can help you is a big part of that.

At first, you feel like you’re all alone, that you have to do everything.  That’s not a good feeling, and that’s certainly not a place you want to stay.  So here are some ideas to get you started thinking about who can help you, whether you’re new to caregiving or a seasoned pro.

1.  A trusted friend of the person you’re caring for or someone they accept as an authority figure can be priceless.  They can say things that the person you’re caring for needs to hear, but won’t accept from you.  They can give advice you can’t give.  They can sometimes be “the bad guy” when one is needed.  Nurture these relationships, and call on them as needed.

2.  A support group, formal or informal, of people who have been through caregiving situations similar to yours can provide immense help.  They provide an amazing sounding board for what you’re feeling and what you’re dealing with.  They have experience that will be helpful because they have been through many of the same things you’re facing already, and know what works and doesn’t work.  Meet with these folks regularly.

3.  The medical team that provides care for the person you’re caregiving for can help in many ways.  They can provide information, answer questions, refer you to others who can help, and maybe at times serve as the authority figure we talked about in point no. 1.

4.  Your personal physician should be part of your support team.  Be sure to discuss your caregiving role, as well as any personal concerns brought on by your role.

5.  Your friends and family can help you in innumerable ways.  But don’t wait for them to offer or to just jump in.  Generally they don’t know what to do.  Make lists of things that would help you in your caregiving role.  Ask those you think might be willing to help from time to time to take on one of the tasks.  Learn the magic phrase, “I need your help.”  You’ll be surprised at how well people respond to being asked to help.

This list just touches the surface of who can help you in your role as a caregiver, but it should be enough to get you started thinking about assembling a whole team of folks that can share your responsibility.

You’re not in this alone.  Unless you choose to be.

We’re visiting my mother-in-law. Actually, we’d planned to come home today, but Eloise came down with a bug, so we stayed.

It’s giving me an excuse to write a post from my iPhone using the WordPress app. I’ve played with it some before, with mixed results. But there’s no computer connection available.

I haven’t had a good cup of coffee in two days. My MIL keeps only Folgers instant. I’d forgotten how bad that can taste. I bought some coffee at a local donut shop today, but it was about as bad.

She also doesn’t have Internet. I miss a real keyboard and a big screen. And something faster than Edge.

I realize this sounds pretty petty, and it is. I really like the things that make my daily life enjoyable — good coffee and high speed Internet.

But it gives me just an inkling of what it must be like to have to move from your own home and leave behind things that make your day enjoyable.

What are those things for you? What are they for your loved one?