The Big Picture:  What Is Your Job?

Anyone who has raised a child knows that it is not easy.  Even though the first few years may be filled with joy there are lots of tedious jobs that need to be performed, getting up in the middle of the night to a crying baby or changing of diapers, the doctor visits etc.  However when you talk to parents they still find joy in their parenting job.  One of the reasons is they don’t focus on the chores; they focus on the bigger picture of raising a child.  They think in terms of the end result..  They focus on a child who will have a better life and even make greater contributions then them. 

Participants were coming into my workshop and there I was shaking hands.  I stood at the door and we greeted, one after another, “I am Mary a CS145”, “I am Bob, case manager 2” and after about 60 people in came John held out his hand like others but said “Hi I am John and I help raise the quality of life in Riverside County”.  I was not ready for that, but he had it correct, he was focusing on the end result.  That is what all of our missions are, to raise the quality of life in the area we work in.  If I were to use the metaphor of parenting: One of the reasons that we get burned out is that instead of focusing on the big picture we focus on the diaper changing and cleaning up after the client (paper work etc) and not the bigger picture of what we are doing as a team.  We don’t think of our contributions to society.  We are raising the quality of life and the standard of living in our area.  If you were to describe your job to others what kind of things do you think about?  What do you do to keep the focus from the paperwork and focus on the bigger picture? 

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