As a frequent traveler, my goal
for each trip is to travel light. Despite thoughtful planning,
sometimes that goal is shattered when I go to close the suitcase
and realize I need a larger, or even second one. I can't always
get my packing right and end up taking more than I need. When
that happens it's frustrating. I hate lugging extra baggage and
feeling encumbered.

Work is like that, too. We often
bring too much baggage. It may not look like baggage, but it weighs
us down just the same. It's disguised as past relationships with
bosses; previous work experiences; mind-talk about whether we
can or can't do something; how we've been treated in work (and
life), or how we think we have. And usually there's at least one
duffle bag stuffed with our expectations.

I've found in twenty years of
management most people bring suitcases full of self-doubt, old
patterning from old relationships and self-fulfilling prophesies
to work every day, and it stifles them. Most people let past work
experiences dictate their future ones. So if they've worked in
three different jobs or companies, those three job experiences
are packed into the suitcases they're lugging. Some people end
up lugging dozens and dozens of them.

They're like the travelers in
this story I heard. One day a young man stopped his car at the
side of the road as he entered the township limits. An older woman
paused from her gardening as he approached. "I'm thinking
of moving to this town," he told her, "and I was wondered
if you could tell me what the people are like here?" "Well,"
she said, "what were the people like where you lived before?"
"Demanding and competitive and not very helpful," he
said. "Well," she told him, "I think you'll find
people the same way here."

A little while later another man
stopped and approached the woman. Again she was asked what the
townspeople were like and again she asked the traveler what his
experience had been where he lived before. "Oh, the people
were great. Everyone was helpful and supportive – a real
community." "You'll find people the same way here,"
she said.

People who are winning at working
are like that second traveler. They know in work (and life) you
tend to get what you expect. And if they're encumbered with emotional
baggage and poor expectations, they get poor results. Instead,
they follow advice like Deepak Chopra's, "Always expect the
best and you'll see that the outcome is spontaneously contained
in the expectation."

People who are winning at working
are one suitcase people. Like a seasoned world traveler, they've
learned what essentials to pack. They bring to work only those
skills and experiences that will positively impact their work
and future. They leave the rest of their baggage behind. Want
to be winning at working? Travel light.

© 2006 Nan S. Russell.  All Rights Reserved.