Our Core Values: Embrace Fun
This post is a message that I wrote for our team to provide additional clarity and meaning into our core values and is a part of a series that was started with our article Establishing Core Values that Actually Impact Your Business.
Have you ever been accused of taking yourself too seriously? Ever been called a workaholic? Ever been asked what you do for fun only to not know how to answer? I have… and if you have as well this message and this core value is for you.
The Work/Life Balance Fallacy
In any given book or article about business it’s not uncommon for you to hear about the merits of a healthy work/life balance. This is where they pit professional vs personal or office vs home in an ultimate battle for value and life satisfaction. Of course, that’s not how real life works, does it? Or should it?
Each of us are the culmination of all of our experiences. All of our victories, failures, joys, and sorrows, work together to make each of us a whole person. These events shape us both professionally and personally. They create our thick skin in some areas and our sensitivity in others. They are why only you might have that one amazing idea and why someone else might have a completely different one. Because no one else’s whole self has had the exact same experiences as your whole self.
One of the most miserable things I can think of is having to leave my “life” on hold while I get about my “work”. Work shouldn’t be the “have to” and life the “want to”. Or to put it in Basecamp’s ShapeUp terms, work shouldn’t be the “must-have” and the rest of your life the “nice-to-have”. Your work should be a joyful part of your life, not something separate. That’s not to say that everything you do at work will always be fun or even enjoyable. Only that it should be an overall fulfilling part of your life. Not something separate.
Saturday Drive Wants the Whole You
We don’t just want professional you at Saturday Drive. The part of you that has specific job skills and punches a clock. The part of you that checks off a list of tasks. We want the whole you. The one that is passionate and has values. The one that has ideas that come not just from your professional background, but from your personal experiences AND your professional background. We want your silliness and strange observations. We want you to care about all the things you care about in and out of your work schedule.
We want your work to be a part of the joy and fulfillment of your whole life. We want your work to have meaning and satisfaction. Your work should make your life better, not worse, because it’s a part of it. For that matter, your whole life should make you better at your work. We are all better when we bring our whole selves to every part of our daily lives.
Saturday Drive Doesn’t Want Everything from You
At the surface this may seem to contradict what we just covered. The distinction is subtle, but it is there. While we want you to bring the whole you to the work you do, we don’t want Saturday Drive to wear out your whole self. We don’t want you used up, or burnt out. Yes, those are three ways of saying the same thing. I want it to be that clear.
We have adopted and continued to adapt ShapeUp as our work process for those reasons. We don’t want our work to be frantic or frustrating. We want plenty of room to breath and relax. We don’t want you to have to take stress from work to other parts of your life and we want room for more of who you are to be brought to your work and to the company.
What Does This Have to Do With Embracing Fun as a Core Value?
Great question. As I started writing this I wondered that myself. Embracing fun is more than jokes, memes, and fun video chats. It’s more than Kenatees (if you don’t know ask someone), Haunted House outings, team pranks.
Embracing fun is a conscious effort to not just engage in silly conversations, but harvest joy and fulfillment out of your work. Perhaps it’s helping people. Maybe it’s solving complex problems. It could be as small as making sure you remove stress from someone else or as large as wanting to impact huge organizational change. Whatever it may be, find it. Apply your whole self to it. Embrace Fun and enjoy the ride with all it’s peaks and valleys.
A Word of Warning
You are responsible for your own joy. No one can give it to you or take it away from you. Joy is the result of contentment in yourself. Find peace with yourself and bring that peace to your work and your peers. Don’t allow things outside your control to rob you of peace. Don’t ignore the things that are within your control. They will diminish your clarity and cause strife. And if you don’t know how, ask for help.