June 15, 2023 – Repertoire Magazine recently sat down with sales expert, keynote speaker and author Tim Richardson to discuss the importance of maintaining a sane and productive workplace. Richardson has worked for IBM and a Five Diamond resort property, and he’s worked as a professional speaker for almost 35 years.
For Richardson, the reasons why the office is so stressful for so many people revolve around four primary expectations:
- Individual performance expectations
- Organizational performance expectations
- End-user/customer expectations
- Workforce expectations
“I think work expectations and anticipated outcomes are at an all-time high. Also, customer expectations are higher than ever and it’s critically important to get them right. If we fall short of our customer expectations, everyone has a megaphone in their pocket and can communicate mistakes with hundreds, even thousands, of people in an instant.”
Expectations are now more complex. For instance, on the one hand you have the always high organizational performance expectations of the shareholders and stockholders of the organization, while you also must contend with the dynamic expectations of a diverse workforce. “If you just break the diverse workforce down by generational preferences, that is complex enough,” Richardson said. “Just think about being in a leadership position and having to cater to people with very different work styles and needs.”
Since 2020, working in an office has become more complex. COVID-19 created so much chaos and disruption for the workplace, sending many “nonessential workers” to be furloughed or work from home. While working from home has become widely accepted, it took some significant adjusting for a lot of people to settle into what was, for many, a new way of working.
“Workplace comradery was severely lacking for quite a long period of time creating loneliness, anxiety, and family challenges as parents had to rearrange their work lives while their kids were at home,” Richardson said. “Not only did you have to manage your own feelings around mental health, but you were responsible for gauging the mental health of people around you.”
In fact, COVID is the reason that Richardson spends so much time speaking about mental health and creating a sane workplace. “I had a long pause where I didn’t do any of the things that not only provide an income for me, but also provide me with a sense of purpose. Ultimately, my speaking focus came as a result of what I call the pandemic pause.”