I am happy to report that things have been going well at work lately. This past year has had some difficult times but recently there has been only minor problems, having mostly to do with conflict between my dad and I. I am continuing to work on my reactive nature and in knowing when to keep my mouth shut even if I know I am right (Kristen, I know you can understand how hard that can be for me!) and although I still let my mouth get the best of me at times for the most part there has been a marked improvement. What I have to keep asking myself is that if my boss wasn't my dad, would I react that way. It works both ways though, they treat me like a child at times but there will always be overlap. It takes while to feel out those boundaries.
I am now in charge of the contract documents for all of our current projects which keeps me very busy. I haven't been blogging much lately because I haven't had the time but I would rather be busy than bored at work. I am finally in a place where I feel competent and know what I am doing, which took me longer than I expected creating a major source of frustration for me. Patience is also continually something for me to work on. I hope things continue on this trajectory not only for me but for the company as well.
Some of you don't know this, but my area of emphasis when I was in my doctorate program was Family Business Dynamics. Unfortunately everytime I tried to do a research project under this topic I would be constantly told it was not communication based enough and be forced to change it so it was no longer rooted in family business. This ended up being one of the reasons I decided not to continue, I wasn't able to do what I wanted even though in my application I clearly stated this was the direction I wanted to go. Most research in family business is about succession planning and not on day to day interactions. Working with your family is very challenging and unique and anyone who has worked with their families can attest to this. I would like to somehow help and be involved in other family businesses but I have to figure out my own family business first and then see how I could be of assistance. We will have to see where that goes in the future.
4 comments:
i'm always amazed how little we know about one another (i mean all our friends) despite the amount of time spent together.
it's pretty interesting that you were wanting to study that. where did they feel that would be more appropriately suited, perhaps an mba program?
one comment i have regarding this topic is that this falls into the same trap that "we" have/use in all parts of our lives...i have to get thing A in order before i can move on to thing B.
if we look for it, there is always something that can keep us from doing what we are intending to do. so i hope that you don't think that you have to have a perfect family relationship/business before you can pursue/help others in that area.
I agree Ed, there is always some bit of information that I will hear about one of you and think, huh, I had no idea.
But yes some of the feedback I would get from my professors was it was more business oriented. When I would research the topic, the articles I would find were 99% of the time in business journals. When I would try to apply communication concepts to family businesses I would be critiqued that it was too narrow a focus and if I wanted to be published the concepts would have to be applied more generally.
I never felt this was accurate. Working in a family business is just different then working with people you dont know. In non family businesses you dont maintain strong relationships with your co-workers outside of work and you dont go into businesses with the baggage of established close personal relationships with your co-workers. They are far more complex.
Among our group of friends there are at least 3 of us that I know of that work in the family business. They are extremely prevelant but their unique dynamics are given very little attention in academia, and when they are looked at, it is not through a wide variety of lenses or views.
I would love to find a way to incorporate my interest in this topic into something of value for other businesses, just haven't found a way yet.
Mike - I agree that I do not need to perfect my knowledge in this area, but I am the type of person who likes to learn as much about something as possible before jumping into it. This can be a good thing because I feel prepared and competent when I do get to that point, but also a negative thing because it can be a waste of time and like you said, it could prevent me from doing something I want to do.
Sometimes I need to be reminded to just jump in and go with it and figure it out along the way. There should be a happy medium there somewhere. Really though, it is knowing how I could get involved that is my brick wall at this point.
Post a Comment