Facing Challenge

By Whitney Greer

Women's Interests

T oday I am challenged. Actually, this whole week, month and year I’ve been challenged. I live in a perpetual state of challenge. Why? I’m part of the typical sandwich generation with a parent who falls ill without warning. I have kids whose schedules shift based on their own unexpected challenges – a forgotten lunch or sudden cold. All keep me racing so that my own work is crammed into corners of the night and caught up in a doctor’s waiting room.

I’m not a-typical. Speak to any woman and the best laid plans are easily blown. I try to see my challenges as opportunities not roadblocks. But the truth is I’m no Pollyanna. (If you haven’t read the book, you can watch it on PBS.) Sometimes the challenges seem crushing. Yet really so many people (and pets) rely on me the choice to stop and indulge in a pity party is short-lived. I have to get up and go.

So why am I bothering to write this? Because like the mollusk I am writing about in our career development book There’s Sand in My Oyster! I’m driven to dig deeper and use my experience. If my life were like the perfect wedding with no challenges, it would be boring. I’d be a lousy leadership trainer because I’d lack the insight into the challenges my clients face when I ask them to step outside their comfort zone. What is stepping outside a comfort zone? How about offering a personal observation to a knee-jerk reacting executive team? Or, leading a team of people into a new way of doing business and knowing if it fails you could lose your job. Those are big challenges if you’ve never done them.

Don’t think I’m confusing life challenges with work challenges. I know the difference. How you process the challenge is what matters most. The first time I found myself at a hospital acting as a patient advocate, I wasn’t sure how to manage. How do you convince an insistent doctor not to give someone a medication because you’re the only one with the family history to know it could kill them? Especially when you don’t have any written proof with you? The second time I did better. By the third visit I could have turned pro. The same holds true with any challenge. Support and skill development work best, but experience is still an excellent teacher.

My advice? Stop trying so hard to head off the challenges. They’ll come anyway. Instead spend the energy finding support and developing skills. And remember to mentally record your story. Like wedding mishaps, a story of challenge is much more interesting to share.

Whitney Greer is a communications and leadership coach with a passion for sharing knowledge. She can be reached at www.thumbprintcommunications.com.

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