Understanding and managing workplace dynamics is a critical skill for success, yet many employees find themselves unappreciated and undervalued, particularly when they excel in their roles. This article delves into how employees can take control of their narrative, communicate their value and manage their workload efficiently while maintaining their autonomy.
Key Insights
- Employees who are competent and deliver consistently are often overlooked by management, as they are not seen as 'problems' needing attention. However, this can lead to a lack of understanding of their value and role, making them vulnerable during economic downturns.
- High performers often find themselves overloaded with work, as their efficiency and competence lead to more tasks being assigned to them. The article stresses the importance of managing workload and setting boundaries to avoid overcommitting and underdelivering.
- Proactive budgeting is crucial for CAD managers to ensure they have the resources they need. By budgeting in advance, managers can avoid being stuck with outdated equipment and ensure they have the necessary tools for high-end, demanding tasks.
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Based on the two rules I just outlined, do we now understand why our managers don't understand us? Which management rule are they applying to you? If you're competent and you get everything done, you’re not broken, are you? So, are they going to manage you? Probably not. But the bad news is, if they don’t manage you, then they don’t know what you do and they don’t understand your value. And if they don’t understand your value, is that a problem for your career? Yes, it is.
In the next economic downturn, you become expendable. I’ve seen far too much of that happen over the past few years, so I don’t want anyone in this room to have that problem. We’re going to look at some things later, in one of the later modules, where we’ll talk about how to communicate that, how to retain your autonomy while making sure your management understands what you’re up to.
Now, do this well. Function well as a CAD manager and keep things going out on time, and your reward is going to be what? They’re going to give you more to do, I promise. The reputation becomes: I don’t know how she does it, I don’t know how he does it, but it all gets done and the projects go out on time.
Therefore, he clearly must be underworked. Handle what they give you, and they’ll give you more—every single time, I promise. Now, the problem is, at some point, as they give you more and more, if you continue to say yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, you will overcommit and won’t be able to deliver on what you have promised.
And I don’t know if anyone in this room has ever made that mistake, but I have. And there’s usually yelling and all that. I find I work a lot better when I’m not getting yelled at. So, I try to avoid it if at all possible.
When people start throwing new tasks at you, you can say, fine, that will go on the list, but please understand that the task you just gave me is not related to a currently active or urgent project. It is on the list, but it’s not at the top. If they want to complain about that, then they have to do two things.
They have to say that their item—the one thing they want—is more important than the project that’s supposed to go out next week, which is kind of hard to justify. The second thing they have to prove is that they need more of me to perform all these tasks. Maybe they need to make me less billable. Maybe they need to give me more time for CAD management.
But either way, I’m going to have the argument in the context of supporting the projects and making sure everything goes out on time. If you use this logic I’ve just outlined to manage your workload, you won’t get into arguments about why aren’t you doing this, why aren’t you doing this, or why aren’t you doing that. You’ll say, ‘I’m doing what I’m doing because of these projects.’
Back that up with a spreadsheet—print it out. End of discussion. This is the only defense mechanism I know of for avoiding complete overload with tasks.
Again, it took me a couple of years to figure that out. I wish someone had told me that earlier. Or I wish I’d asked the question earlier.
Now, I’m going to change topics real quick. Because ordinarily, I wouldn’t talk about budgeting until later, after you’ve gained more experience in the CAD manager role and start worrying more about formal budgeting. But here’s the thing.
I find budgeting is much easier if you do it in little bits and pieces, a little bit at a time, and don’t have to cram for it once a year. It becomes an ongoing, keep-track-of-it process. So let’s just talk a little bit about the budgeting process.
You need to budget in advance. The new workstations you want aren’t going to be here next week. They’ll be budgeted three months from now. They’ll be allocated six months from now. And the machines will show up nine months from now. So, getting anything done in a CAD manager role requires proactive, early budgeting processes.
Otherwise, I’ll be stuck with old equipment. I don’t know if anybody here has that problem. But, you know, new plotters don’t just materialize because I asked for them.
They have to be analyzed and budgeted for. So don’t wait until you need something to ask for it. Proactively think about what you’ll need and budget for it ahead of time so it won’t be a surprise.
Now, I don’t know what your budgeting process is. I don’t know whether it’s done through IT. I don’t know if you do your own budget.
To me, it doesn’t actually matter. The point is, whoever submits the budget must hear from you. The CAD manager is the only person who knows what kind of machine it takes to run high-end, aggressive, three-dimensional BIM or to work with a 20-megabyte Topo file.
This is not the same as checking your email, is it? When you get just a plain vanilla office computer that’s totally under spec for CAD, while I weep for you, I wonder why you weren’t involved in the selection in the first place. Budgeting is what allows you to do that.