After interviewing hundreds of workplace experts, Pete Mockaitis—host of How to be Awesome at Your Job—has distilled what makes someone exceptional at work down to one word: care.
That does not mean loving every part of your job or turning your profession into your life’s passion. It means connecting the work to a group or outcome that makes it feel important. And when talented employees lose that connection, disengagement is not always a sign of laziness or a bad attitude. Sometimes, it is a rational response to the workplace around them.
This week on Management Muse, Pete and host Cindi Baldi explore how organizations unintentionally train good employees to stop trying, and how managers can reconnect effort to impact. Pete also takes the 80/20 rule further, explaining why your most important initiative may be the one no one is requesting and why a handful of activities can be 16 times more valuable than everything else competing for your attention. Plus, he shares the $1,500 mistake that taught him to ask two deceptively simple questions before making an important decision.
Episode Highlights:
- The one trait Pete Mockaitis believes matters more than any productivity or communication technique
- How companies unintentionally train good employees to stop contributing ideas
- What separates healthy commitment from caring so much that you become exploitable
- How managers can help employees see the impact of their work
- Why your highest-value work could be 16 times more impactful than everything else
- Two questions that can expose a bad decision before it becomes an expensive mistake
Watch This Episode on YouTube:
About Pete Mockaitis:
Pete Mockaitis [Muh KITE iss] is an award-winning trainer and coach who helps professionals perform their best at work.
Pete has delivered 1-on-1 coaching to over 700 leaders hailing from world-class organizations (such as LinkedIn, Google, FedEx, Amazon, Apple, Anheuser-Busch, and the United Nations), 50 countries, and every Ivy League university.
He began his career at Bain & Company and currently hosts the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast. The show has been downloaded over 25,000,000 times and regularly ranks as a top business show in Apple Podcasts.
Connect with Pete:
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Want to Go Deeper? Check Out Our Recommended Reading:
- Duke, Annie. Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts, Penguin Publishing Group, May 2019, https://link.amazon/B068pQOEU
- Koch, Richard. The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Achieving More with Less, Crown Currency, Oct. 1999, https://link.amazon/B0he9ImyK
- How to be Awesome at Your Job Ep #867 with Richard Medcalf: How to Stop Being Busy and Start Being Strategic: https://awesomeatyourjob.com/867-how-to-stop-being-busy-and-start-being-strategic-with-richard-medcalf/
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