A look at our family’s first foray into mission statements, mantras, and values.
Are you thinking about how to #OptOutside? Check that, have you even heard of REI’s #OptOutside statement/campaign/movement?
When every other retailer is scrambling to open as early as possible on Black Friday, while simultaneously redefining “early Friday” to “earlier and earlier Thursday” (aka Thanksgiving), REI just announced that they will be closing all 143 their stores, and paying their employees to “head outside” rather than work arguably the most heinous retail day in the calendar (spoken from personal experience).
Talk about giving a WOW moment.
They’re encouraging their employees to take adventure. A paid adventure. They also open it up to the rest of us, to tell the world, explore the outdoors, or check out the #OptOutside gallery.
Here’s why, in an excerpt from a message put out by REI’s CEO and President, Jerry Strizke.
“For 76 years, our co-op has been dedicated to one thing and one thing only: a life outdoors. We believe that being outside makes our lives better. And Black Friday is the perfect time to remind ourselves of this essential truth.
“We’re a different kind of company—and while the rest of the world is fighting it out in the aisles, we’ll be spending our day a little differently. We’re choosing to opt outside, and want you to come with us.”
Well then.
While everyone else is jumping on the open-early or at least open-all-day bandwagon, REI created a brand new wagon and invites us all along for the ride. A lot is happening here:
- Mission: REI is holding true to its true north/noble cause (a life outdoors), the heck with what the rest of the industry is doing
- Community: REI is taking care of its people; not only giving them the day off, but paying them for it (close to unheard of with a primarily retail part-time staff).
- Inclusivity: REI is inviting the rest of us to do the same.
REI has a reputation for taking care of its own and sticking to its values. It hires employees who love the outdoors and is found year after year on top-companies-to-work-for lists. How does #OptOutside play into this? What can we learn from it?
We are so often stuck in our own whirlwind that it becomes hard to notice when we’re out of whack. How often do you take the time to examine your company’s efforts, and see how they align with its values? How reliant are you on your true north in moving forward? It can be easy to get off track. The Cranberries’ Everybody Else Is Doing It So Why Can’t We? speaks to this age of #FOMO. But just because everybody else is doing it, doesn’t mean you want to. It doesn’t mean you’re missing out. It might not be right for your business or your staff. What’s the impact of realignment? Power-packed strength in your community, and bold statement, and a compelling moment for your existing clientele.
Take a note from REI. Check your #FOMO and redefine it to what you’d rather be doing. And, for bonus points, follow REI’s model:
Invite the world along for the ride.
What do you think about the #OptOutside movement? Share in the comments section below, or tweet me @AliMercier.
Originally posted at The Leadership Program. Check that amazing company out at tlpnyc.com. #StepIntoYourLeadership
When I was in 11th grade, I was cyber-bullied: almost fifteen years ago, in 2001, when The Internet was still referred to as the World Wide Web, MySpace was still two years away, and TheFacebook.com was still waiting for Mark Zuckerberg to graduate from high school.
But we did have AOL Instant Messenger, or AIM. Through this (now stone-age feeling) tool, friends and classmates would leave away messages up for hours on end, with angsty pop lyrics, teen-founded wisdom, and, invariably, jokes. Everyone would race their siblings home to hop online, where invariably fights came up over access to the one home computer. Those fights didn’t stop ; rather, they came alive, and more vicious, with the added protection of indifference that talking to a screen enabled. When you can’t see the hurt in the eyes of those you’re talking to, are they even hurt? Well, when a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, it most assuredly makes a sound.
Back in 2001, we were only at the precipice of what the internet and social media would become. Fast forward to 2016 and I can’t imagine what kids growing up now go through. If one person over a rudimentary two-way conversation tool could hurt me so badly, what must our kids be going through with the myriad of sites that abound today?
October is Bullying Awareness month, and I am thrilled that one week (October 16-22) is being further designated as Digital Citizenship week and will be dedicated to Digital Citizenship efforts. Digital Citizenship is defined as the norms of appropriate, responsible behavior while online. At Leadership, our model for approaching Digital Citizenship can be described as a preventative intervention.
Digital Citizenship Activity
Do you want to try this with the kids in your community? First, hold a conversation about values. What are the values that they identify with? Have the students discuss and identify the values that they come up, and encourage them to continue to refine them. For example, my personal values were originally excellence, authenticity, honesty, erudition, and kindness; when I revisited them this summer, I realized they were in need of refining and settled on curiosity, earnestness, transparency, erudition, and kindness. Notice that erudition and kindness stayed the same, but excellence, authenticity, and honesty all had to be tweaked (to, respectively, curiosity, earnestness, and transparency).
Facilitate a conversation around the values your students landed on. Find out why they picked each one. What about the value seemed core to who they are? Get from them all the reasons why the values are important. When you can connect a student’s previous, positive behavior to one of the values they share, be sure to point that out. Show them the different ways in which they are already living these values, and that the point of the exercise is to make sure that they are doing it all the time. Point out how you, as a teacher or parent, have used your own value pillars—great examples include on cover letters and resumes, in interviews and meetings, and while teaching or parenting. Ask them to identify how they might have seen your values come up before. For even greater impact, give them an example of when you didn’t live up to your values, and let them know the fall out, both internal and external, of compromising yourself.
Explain that these values should guide their behavior in life, which includes the lives we live online. Every post or comment or photo that they engage with should be in line with their values. For example, I might have a bad day in traffic, but am I posting about the jerk that cut me off? No, because it undermines my more important message of kindness. Have them apply a value filter to their current activity on social media—does it pass the value test? Encourage them to use these values to guide their online activities going forward. Does it pass all five values? No? Might want to rethink, retool, or just delete the post in question. Deleting is always the safest bet—and that goes for already existing posts as well.
At this point, bring the conversation back to values. Highlight what values you heard and what values you saw throughout the experience together. Close with a whip around asking each student to share 3 or more of their value pillars.
As one final step, ask them to consider finding an accountability partner for when they lose their way.
They’re still kids after all.
Thoughts about Digital Citizenship? Questions? Please let me know all about it in the comments below, or tweet @alimercier.
Originally posted at The Leadership Program. Check that post out here: http://tlpnyc.com/digital-citizenship/
"From this point forth, we shall be leaving the firm foundation of fact and journeying together through the murky marshes of the future into thickets of wildest guesswork."
—Albus Dumbledore ("the future" replaces the original quote's word "memory")
I'm going big and heady here—get ready for it!
Automation, artificial intelligence (AI), and robotics have already taken on today's workspace. At a recent summit on the future of work put on by McKinsey Global Institute and New York University's Stern School of Business, some of the most revered experts in the world shared how the majority of candidates entering the workspace are utterly unprepared. Let's take a brief look at what the summit taught me about the evolving landscape that adoption of these technologies has created (and will continue to create at an epidemic pace) to help ready our students for what's ahead.
Already, you might be thinking about ways new technologies have started affecting your life. How many times have you called customer service, only to get a scaffolded menu run by a polite robotic voice, guiding you forward?
Now, think about how it's already helping you. Do you have an Amazon echo at home? The internet of things (or IoT) is already replacing people with robots to complete easy tasks. And the rise of self-driving cars? That's not even on the horizon anymore; they're already here.
That's the thing. The future of work is already here. If you can believe it, half the tasks performed by today's workforce are already ready to be automated using existing technologies. What?! That blew my mind. If it's half today, in this exponentially-fast changing world, what will it be tomorrow?
The summit expressed that education must be restructured to address these demands; however, to me it seems that traditional school isn't malleable enough to adapt quickly enough.
Out-of-school time work, on the other hand? Well, that's a completely different story. Malleable might as well be our middle name!
What the summit experts taught me is that automation, AI, and robotics will not just impact low-skill labor, but every industry at every level of seniority. That's kind of scary, when you first hear it (or at least it was to me!), but the more I thought about it, the more excited I got. I started to think about all the potential it would release on the workforce, the high-level thinking and innovation that will take over the workforce.
How exciting is that?
Beyond the need for STEM (we're with them there!), these experts also spoke about a different need that hit my heartstrings dead-on: the need for human knowledge.
You know, the stuff robots can't do. Social-emotional intelligence. Care-giving. The youth development line of work, plus many outside of it—not just facilitators, but nurses, social workers, coaches, therapists, teachers—anyone who invests in others.
As venture capitalist (and panelist) Albert Wenger (@alberwenger) put it: "Education needs to go back to raising great human beings, not meeting the needs of the job market." He went on to express that "tomorrow's education will not be focused on what job you are getting, but what kind of person you are becoming."
Be still my heart.
The youth development community is ready for this work. We're already doing this work.
The summit went on to express the real needs. Tomorrow's workers—today's workers—need to be flexible, adaptable, and resourceful. Self-directed searching and learning are quickly becoming (and, in many cases, already are) the norm and need. Rote knowledge of the past will soon be replaced by tablets carrying information and research as up-to-date at the very moment. That's a skill no human can compete with; it's our responsibility to prepare our students with skills that these technologies can't replicate and often surpass.
And—get this—these folks anticipate that, sooner rather than later, jobs as we know them will go away. Yep, you read that right. No more jobs.
But that doesn't mean there's no more work. We are anticipating a gig economy where work is broken down into three different categories: tasks, projects, and services.
The good news is that the United States is one of the most prepared economies for this environment. Believe it or not, this transition is already happening here: 35 percent of American workers currently do some type of freelance work. My husband, a children's book designer, is regularly taking on these projects—which I'm sure is true of many folks reading this very piece.
What does the gig economy look like?
Deep specialization will turn many workers into contractors, as super-specialization is rarely needed on a full-time basis from one firm. Globalization means that tasks and projects will be outsourced to the less-expensive work-seekers overseas. But the gig economy doesn't equal traditional outsourcing as "any layer of inflexibility on the structure of work arrangements will impede progress" (Allen Blue, co-founder of LinkedIn [!]).
So, what economies should we embrace? According to the experts, look at the caring economy (examples above), the craft economy (Etsy is a great example here), and the circular economy (think about all those dying strip malls that need to be broken down and upcycled).
Phew. That's a lot.
So, how do we get ready for this? What do the experts say?
Embrace experiential learning, problem-solving, and raising team-players.
Embrace experiential learning, problem-solving, and raising team-players.
Embrace experiential learning, problem-solving, and raising team-players.
I think we're ready for that.
(By the way, much of this knowledge was gained with social listening—just another 21st Century skill. Want to know more? Feel free to reach out to me. I'd be happy to chat!)
Originally published by the National Afterschool Association. Check them out, and the amazing work they do, here.
These days, everyone is a brand—whether or not they intend to be. It is essential to cultivate a strong personal brand in the modern landscape—and equally essential to start that process offline.
Here is the first step of my proven effective recipe to set you up for success.
Ask 5-10 people: "In your opinion, what are the three top things* that stand out to you about me?" I highly encourage you to carry out this step in person whenever possible. When thinking of who to ask, try to get as wide a variety as possible. Friends? Family? Coworkers? Clients? You should speak with all of them.
Let them know that you are going through a process that calls for the sit down as a means to develop professionally. Try to avoid saying the words "personal brand/ing" until they've given you their thoughts.
The question is strategically open to interpretation. I asterisked "things" because you may choose to play around with language like attributes, strengths, or differentiating factors. The power of "things" is that it is purposely vague and allows for more free form—and at times unexpected—answers. You can always follow up with the words above—and others of your own—if the person you're speaking with is seeking clarity. You can also rephrase the question if you find that helps, but I caution you against traveling any distance down that road (you don't want to accidentally lead them somewhere they wouldn't have gone or, worse yet, away from an unexpected golden nugget). Some people might ask if they should answer on a personal or professional level. Greet that question with a happy: "Yes!" Both will inform your brand strategy.
Guide your interviewees to answer with their gut responses. If they work with you a lot or know you well, they have spent time thinking about it—if not intentionally, or even consciously. The gut (rather than a more thoughtful response) is best because it is neither edited nor regulated—and therefore usually closest to the truth. You may find that a few days after your sit down, your interviewee reaches back out to you with, "Oh, I realized I didn't say you're [really-important-thing]." This is worth taking note of, but doesn't need to be prompted—it's a naturally occurring part of the process for many (though not all).
If you get through 10 interviews and are feeling like you need more, go for it. In this case, more is never less.
Remember that this is a process and can feel uncomfortable at times. That is normal.
Questions? Comments? Freaking out or just need more support? Use the comments section (that’s what it’s there for!) or tweet me @AliMercier, and I’ll be happy to help.
Originally published on LinkedIn.
How long should my LinkedIn article be in order to provide optimal viewership? According to LinkedIn, just under 500 words. PRDaily suggests 3,000-10,000 word long-form articles will encourage the greatest amount of shares. OKDork advises titles between 40 and 49 characters, and insists on long-form articles of 1,900 to 2,000 words to maximize viewership—just make sure your articles are at the readership level of an eleven-year-old. Hubspot encourages writers to keep their titles >70 characters and descriptions under 250 characters. I need to know all this, because Kasanoff is telling me all the reasons why I must publish on LinkedIn.
Huffington Post can tell me the fifteen career milestones I should have made before turning thirty last October, and LifeHacker has the most important money milestones I should have made by then, too. LearnVest has the thirty smart career moves I should have made by now, of which I can only claim about half. Big Think is here to remind me that thirty is not, in fact, the new twenty, but just in case, there’s Mark Manson with the ten life lessons that I need in order to excel in my thirties. Forbes can tell me what the three career stages are, tell me where I really should be, and in finding I’m not there, Marc and Dangel has the seven reasons why I’m not successful. In need a pick-me-up, Forbes is back again with the seven reasons why I’ll never be successful.
But not all is lost. Forbes can also tell me how to fast-track my career up the corporate ladder; The Ladders has seven ways I can move up by moving over; and LifeHack has an article on everything I should do and not do to ensure career progression. As a lady, I have to Lean In, but carefully, carefully, because it can easily be taken as bossy (God forbid) and backfire. Inc tells me success can’t be achieved in a forty-hour workweek, but Forbes and LifeHack are back again demonstrating the need for work-life balance, and tips for finding it.
Most of my peers have a graduate degree of some sort, and those who don’t have vague or definitive plans of getting their own in futures both concrete and ever-elusive. We’re all coaching each other on both writing at least 500 words and posting a picture a day. We’re having a hard time following our own instructions.
Welcome to the Millennial Generation: inundated with lists and descriptions and criteria of what to do, how to do, and when to do, exactly, everything that we should be doing.
Because as these conversations about career and ambition are taking place, my peers are also stuck in conversations and arguments about how long is the right amount of time to be in a relationship before moving in together, and how long is the right amount of time to get engaged after that. We are sure that some are moving much, much too fast, and others far too slow. Everyone has the answer, or, if they don’t, at least the internet does: Bustle says there’s just one answer to when is the right time to move in, while Psychology Today has the eight steps that must be made before taking the step.
My Facebook feed is telling me that we’re all getting engaged, or married, or having kids. Meanwhile, Twitter is clearly demonstrating just how much wittier my network is than I could ever dream to be, and kindly telling me how many more followers my followers have than I do. My newsfeeds are flooded with smiling family faces and travel photos of friends near and far, living blissful lives full of rainforests, medieval villages, and Balinese sunsets. The NYTimes is tantalizing me with the 52 places I must travel to in 2015, while Elite Daily has the list of the 50 unpredictable and non-clichéd places to travel to while in your twenties.
With all this ubiquitous advice, I’d hate to be cliché.
I had a moment a few years ago, breaking down in confidence to a trusted mentor. I was in a situation where I had several influencers (colleagues, friends, and digital alike) advising me on what to do next. I was looking at everything, trying to do what was right, trying to take everything into accord, trying to move forward in the best direction with everything in consideration, but I couldn’t. I was stuck. In the piles of guidance was a web of contradictions, and within the contradictions and counsel was me, tangled like a fly, unable to move, not even knowing where to go should I break out.
For all my luck, my mentor put it plainly: “You just take it all in, you think about, and you choose. You make the decision. You do what your mind and your gut says. Of all the right choices out there, you pick the one that seems rightest to you, and go with that.”
My generation came of age into our careers with this pervasive technology and content; with the lists, and how-to’s, and best practices pervasively surrounding us. Imagine the possibilities if we started to break out of what we’re told we should be doing, and do what we think we should do—or, better yet—what we want to do. Unleash ourselves from the bounds of omnipresent and incongruous norms and see just what we’re made of, being guided from the inside out, rather than bending under the outside, in.
I’ll do my part, at least, by posting a 900+ word LinkedIn article on a weekend. We’ll see where it goes from here.
Originally posted on LinkedIn.
At Leadership, our first core value is Forge the Path, Enjoy the Journey. Lucky for me, as you’ll find out below, our second is Lead, Learn, Lead Again.
I started coordinating the hiring process here in May 2009, just shy of 10 months on the job. Since then, I’ve moved from coordinating to managing the process, bringing hundreds of talented artists, evaluators, athletes, social workers, musicians—even magicians—into our fold and on to our team.
We have never had a perfect hire. I don’t expect we ever will.
Like many organizations, we were searching for a hiring process that would allow us to effectively evaluate candidates, ensure we were meetings the candidates needs as well as our own, and efficiently use our staff’s (and company’s) valuable time.
For the sake of this article, I want to hone in on our hiring of Leadership Trainers, who make up the vast majority of our staff. At least once yearly (sometimes more—this school year, we’ve held five hirings), we onboard from 5 to 45 people to provide direct services in the schools we serve.
Original Process
Here was the breakdown of our hiring process when I first started. It had been in place for several years, and was gifted to me as such:
- Resume Review
- Phone Interview
- Face-to-Face Interview
- Audition
- Orientation
- Reference Checks
After a couple of years, when I was moving to manage the process more, I realized the breakdown needed to evolve. We were spending too much time—cost hours—on the process:
- The Face-to-Face Interview, previously conducted with (ideally) one candidate and two Leadershippers, was proving to be a poor use of company time. We also realized we weren’t having a chance to see how candidates interacted with and engaged with others until the Orientation, which is a paid training (although still a part of the hiring process). In addition, candidates weren’t seeing how we define facilitation until the Orientation. This was much too late. Bringing in Teambuilding element solved both of these problems.
- At the same time, we were finding that the Audition, which required a pool of staffers to watch the candidates facilitate and partake in a follow up deliberation that took just as much time as the observing, was also not an effective use of company time. I created a system for including everyone’s voice, complete with form, rubric, and grading, streamlining the deliberation process. I also sent the candidates some of our own exercises, complete with basic instructions for facilitation. Along with instructions, we sent them some sample videos of some of our stars facilitating these activities. Seeking clarity, we re-titled this step the Sample Lesson.
- Finally, we weren’t getting the results we were looking for in the time-consuming Reference Checks.
First Revision of Process
So, we did an overhaul:
- Resume Review
- Phone Interview
- Face-to-Face Interview
- Group Interview with Teambuilding
- Audition
- Sample Lesson
- Orientation
- Reference Checks
Then, a couple more years later, things were feeling off again. The Resume Review and Phone Interview seemed to be working. But:
- The Group Interview with Teambuilding (where we start the interview by putting the candidates into teams and facilitating an exercise that we do with kids to see how they do together) was taking up a lot of time. The candidates seemed to be getting more out of it than we were (Leadership does a mean teambuilding), and although they were leaving smiling with new friends, we were spending a lot of (wo)man-hours with very little pay off. After much deliberation, we found a question for the Group Interview to test their agility working with others, and cut the teambuilding.
- With the Sample Lesson, we were getting closer, but now the candidates were being hand-fed instructions to show them how to do the facilitation, so candidates that were particularly adept at copying others watched the videos and did just that—which we found didn’t translate in helping us find strong facilitators—though we did find strong copy-cats (a skill in itself). We needed to go back and move forward at once. We went back to having the candidates bring their own exercise to the team, and renamed this step the Facilitation Demonstration to provide further clarity to the candidates on what we were hoping to see. We continued to use the system I created last time, but deliberation was cut to two people, who worked to decide on candidates based on the entire team’s notes and rankings.
- We brought back a re-imagined Reference Check. It took a lot of research and team work, but after two years of witnessing fibbers come in through the cracks, proved necessary.
Second Revision of Process
With a couple minor tweaks, we found ourselves here:
- Resume Review
- Phone Interview
- Group Interview with Teambuilding
- Group Interview
- Sample Lesson
- Facilitation Demonstration
- Orientation
- Reference Checks
This system was mostly working. Until this years’ multiple hires, that is. This year was like no year I had experienced before, due to increases in city funding from the de Blasio administration. We hired 30 or so people in September, and by November we needed 10, which by December increased to 15. Then in January, we needed another 10. Then in April, we needed 5. Efficiency and adaptability became paramount. I started seeing where in the process we could cut—saving both company-time/cost-hours and candidate-time—a lucky win-win.
- The Phone Interview became much more basic—something anyone on staff could do, crucial in a time where nearly half of our Programming team of experts were either working in schools or on maternity/paternity leave.
- In a pinch in August, we tried doing the Group Interview and Facilitation Demonstration in one session, and it worked better than I could have imagined.
- We kept the Orientation, but a shortened version in the school-year with bolster trainings,
- And conducted Reference Checks on an as needed basis.
Final Revision of Process…For Now
This year, our hirings looked like this:
- Resume Review
- Phone Interview
- Abridged Phone Interview
- Group Interview
- Facilitation Demonstration
- Group Interview and Facilitation Demonstration
- Orientation
- Reference Checks
- Reference Checks (as needed)
Going into my seventh summer hiring for Leadership, we’re keeping much of the same structure of this year’s hires, which freed me and the team up to conduct our ideal hire: a rolling one. Now, throughout the year, we are constantly going through steps of the hiring process. No matter the month, we could be Resume Reviewing or conducting the abridged Phone Interview. We are holding Group Interviews and Facilitation Demonstrations once weekly over the summer, as Resume Reviews and Phone Interviews continue to take place. With the national teacher shortage and our dedication to bringing on team members committed to excellence, this was another opportunity to meet our stakeholders where they are at: now, candidates aren’t out of the running if they happen to be away for the couple weeks that we have saved in the past for these steps. Throughout, Reference Checks are taking place.
Important Note: The focus of this piece is on the breakdown of our hiring by steps, but it is essential to note that at every single hire, we change the content of some part of the process—as big a total overhaul of the phone interview and in-person interview questions in one hire to a slight tweak of the wording in another. In our five hires this year, there’s been at least a tweak in each.
Times change. Needs change. Expectations change. We must change with it.
Questions? Comments? Best practices? Share them below.
Originally posted at The Leadership Program. Check it out, here: http://tlpnyc.com/changing-your-hiring-process/
A few weeks ago I was meandering my way down my long walk home from the subway, getting some good pondering time in. While wandering through my ponderings, I stumbled upon the word enjoy in a different way than I had ever previously thought of it, and it struck me.
Going through life we all have moments of enjoyment. Sitting in the sun reading a book with coffee in hand on a Saturday morning? I’m enjoying myself. Cuddling with my lovely cat, The Kit, while she purrs like a motor boat? I’m enjoying myself. Laughing with coworkers as a spontaneous dance break out takes over? I’m enjoying myself. Hanging out with my hubs, sister, friends, family and discussing literature or politics or the newest SNL skit? I’m enjoying myself. Being at the front of a boat (or motorcycle… or skidoo…) going really fast, I’m really enjoying myself.
I do get to enjoy all these things and a whole lot more. Which is awesome.
But.
What struck me on my meandering was the actual etymology, or word origin, of enjoy—specifically, the “en” in enjoy. Following a hunch, I looked up what “en” means and found two definitions: 1. Near, at, or on; 2. In, into, within. With the first, it implies a separation from joy. With the second, a possession of it.
My hunch was for the second definition.
I’m a little bit of a language geek (Writing and Literature graduate that I am), and often think about the limits of language and how that effects our ability to understand everything around us. If we have one word for, let’s say, reindeer, but the Sami people, who live in the northern tips of Russia and Scandinavia have as many as 1,000 words for reindeer, there are potentially 999 other ways in which I can understand reindeer that my English speaking brain doesn’t know—and, therefore, those other 999 reindeer don’t really exist for me.
Do you see what I mean?
So thinking about enjoy, I started to think about how a one letter switch could make a big change. I started thinking about injoy.
That small difference ignited a spark in me. It feels different, to injoy something, because you’re in the joy of it. You’re joy embodied. In that moment, joy is in you, and you have all of joy’s power.
I don’t know about you, but that bowled me over. Since then, when I find myself enjoying a moment, I’ve been taking time to switch the letters to injoy. With the shift I’ve noticed a difference in presence, in availability to the moment, and in personal power: joy is powerful. While I’m injoying myself, I hold that power. And that power for positivity and happiness and JOY… well… it’s quite remarkable.
How can you injoy?
Challenge: the next time you’re feeling joyful, take a moment to think about injoying it. How do you feel possessing joy? How is it different from enjoying? Please share in the comments below or tweet me @AliMercier (I’m sure Erika would like to hear it to! Catch her @ErikaPetrelli1.)
Originally posted at The Leadership Program On Wings & Whimsy. Check out more posts, most by the magical Erika herself, On Wings & Whimsy here: http://tlpnyc.com/author/erika/
On January 3rd, Winter Storm Grayson took the eastern seaboard by, well, storm. My husband Phil and I were expecting our first child to appear about any day now, and Grayson had been one of the top names on the boy-name list. We decided to rule it out, hoping to cleverly ward off getting accidentally hooked on any storm-name trend and future conversations of “wait: are you talking about Grayson C., Grayson N., or Grayson S.?” When our baby boy arrived, we picked a name 1. we liked and 2. we anticipated would avoid any name-trend populations.
He weighed 7 pounds, 10 ounces. We named him Quinn.
Last week, another storm dumped about 12 inches on us. Want to guess its name? Double-n and all, a Quinn of a different sort was on the scene.
The best laid plans, eh?
As I pondered this, texting Erika that I was having an On Wings & Whimsy moment, I started to recognize a trend—for as much as I love to wing it, all of my recent plans have seemed to go straight out the window.
Quinn’s birth, for example, was planned to be natural. When it got to the 19th and he showed no signs of showing up, I was induced. So I labored. For 30 hours. I didn’t plan to need any sort of epidural, so when the pain got crazy, I asked for the narcotics option.
They had no impact on my pain. So. Suddenly I was getting an epidural!
I’m sure the anesthesiologist planned on nailing the epidural in the first go. However, that did not work out. Nor the second. Nor the third. Fourth times a charm?
I continued laboring, going from 5cms to 8cms in a matter of literal minutes. It was the progress we’d been waiting for. We thought the soon-to-be-named Quinn would arrive at any minute!
And then an hour passed. And then another couple. And then another couple. And then I started running a fever and went from 8-cm dilated to 7.
The very smart and capable doctors decided I needed a C-section.
So, after laboring for 30 hours, they opened me up. By this point, the anesthesia had stopped working, and I could feel every cut of the knife—I sure hadn’t planned on that!
And when they took out my wriggly little boy. My wriggly little boy who was not crying. Because he was not breathing.
I certainly did not plan on *that*.
Gratefully, the issue was quickly remedied, and after a quick lung deflation and a few days in the NICU, the Quinn-baby was as good as new. Which was great. Because that’s actually what he is: brand, spanking new. And cute. And currently hiccupping cute little baby hiccups.
It didn’t go as planned, but it certainly worked out.
That’s just one thing that jumped to mind. Another is that the townhouse that we fell in love with—when we planned to get a loft-style apartment—was supposed to close in December. Then January. Then February.
We closed, magically, three days ago. In *March*. After bouncing from my mother’s, to an Airbnb, to a friend’s/saint’s loft. If you count the NICU, Quinn lived in four places by the time he was four weeks. Once again: plan out the window. But it worked out.
It worked out.
Here’s another: we moved up to New England this fall. I had been planning on waiting and setting a plan that would make sense for me to work for The Leadership Program for when I was ready to move back to New England. And then I found out I was pregnant! Months and months earlier than planned.
Another plan bites the dust.
And that said, a decade ago—March 2008—my then-boyfriend convinced me to move in with him in NYC. After finally acquiescing, and with ample encouragement from a roommate of his, the lovely Kelsey Suemnicht, to come work with her at this amazing company full of amazing humans doing amazing things, I planned to join her team. For months, without speaking to anyone else at the organization, I told anyone who would listen about my soon-move to NYC and my soon-to-be job at said company, The Leadership Program. No such job existed. I planned anyway. Surprisingly a temp position opened up, and it worked out. Once again, it worked out.
And it worked out a little better than planned: I initially told my then-boyfriend/now-husband that I wouldn’t be in NYC for more than one year. We stayed until this fall. That put me a little over 8-years past my proposed deadline. And it was my doing.
You see, I didn’t plan on falling in love with that amazing company and those amazing people, but I did anyway. I let go of my one-year plan, and I was all the better for it.
Sadly, my time at Leadership is coming to an end—both much sooner, and much later, then planned. With all these plans out the window and surrounded by the snow left over from Winter Storm Quinn, I’m embracing my inner Elsa and letting it go. Both because I have no choice, and because I never really had one in the first place.
I’m planning on taking care of the Quinn-baby full-time for a while, something that I never imagined for myself. Maybe I’ll catch some consulting and freelance work on the off-hours. I’ve loved being on this Wings & Whimsy journey with Erika and many of you. It has been a privilege to play in inspiration and laughter for so many years. But it looks like this will be my last post.
At least that’s the plan for now.
Catch me @AliMercier on Twitter and at alimercier.com. You’ll see what ends up with all *these* plans.
How can you let go of your best laid plans today?
Originally posted On Wings & Whimsy over at The Leadership Program.