Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction
00:01:55: Examples of red flags…
00:02:29: … 1: things are on repeat
00:03:15: … 2: busy burnout
00:04:32: … 3: everything feels like it's staying still
00:05:06: … 4: enmeshment
00:06:36: … 5: directionless development
00:07:39: Some further red flag examples
00:09:11: Questions about red flags…
00:10:01: … 1: red flags waving at you
00:11:52: … 2: frequency of red flags
00:14:56: … 3: obstacles to changing
00:18:33: … 4: risks of not changing
00:22:39: … 5: rewards of turning red flags to green
00:24:42: … 6: learn from who does this well
00:29:51: Ideas for action…
00:30:15: … 1: things on repeat - give even-better-if feedback
00:30:58: … 2: busy burnout - if/then technique
00:32:18: … 3: staying still - bring the outside in
00:33:12: … 4: enmeshment - active rest
00:34:28: … 5: directionless development - design your own job description
00:36:40: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Helen Tupper: Hi, I'm Helen. 

Sarah Ellis: And I'm Sarah. 

Helen Tupper: And you're listening to the Squiggly Careers podcast, a weekly show where we talk about the ups, downs, ins and outs of work, and give you some ideas for actions and tools to try out, and hopefully a little bit of support along the squiggly way.  And often, it's helping us with all the things that we're navigating as well.  And if it's your first time listening to the podcast, it's worth knowing that as well as the episode, which always focuses on a particular topic, and Sarah will tell you what that is in a minute, we also create lots of resources to help the learning last longer.  So, you can download a PodSheet, which is a one-page summary with some coaching questions in and some of those summarised ideas of action; there is a PodNote, which is a swipable summary.  You can get that on our social media pages, so just @amazingif on Instagram or LinkedIn.  And then there is PodPlus, which happens most Thursdays, that is my caveat, most Thursdays at 9.00am on Zoom.  It's 30 minutes of free learning with the Squiggly Careers community.  And all the information for that is in the show notes, or you can go to our website, amazingif.com. 

Sarah Ellis: So, today we're talking about career red flags.  And these red flags are a signal that something isn't working for you.  And I think though it can feel quite negative, but Helen and I were just saying doing some preparation for this, we're like, "Oh, it does feel a bit negative at times", because you are talking here about what's not working, the idea is that by acknowledging and being aware of your red flags, it's hopefully a useful prompt to do something differently.  Because I think with red flags, we can all be a bit guilty of hoping that something's going to change, or maybe we're waiting it out, just being like, "At some point, hopefully they'll disappear".  But most of the time, the likelihood is the opposite happens; they actually just get bigger, they dominate your days more, and usually they're associated with lots of unhelpful emotions. 

So, we're going to talk about some examples of red flags, see if any of these feel familiar for you.  We came up with quite a lot of examples, so I'm assuming everyone will have at least a couple of these.  And then we're going to talk about how do you then move from a red flag to a green flag, what does that look like?  I don't think this is an easy thing, because some of these things are quite tricky. 

Helen Tupper: And so, we'll go through the ones that we think come up most frequently, but as we go through these, maybe have a listen to which ones you recognise, so which red flags feel familiar, but also maybe think about which ones we haven't mentioned that could be a potential problem for you.  So, the first red flag is when things are on repeat.  So, this is where you're having the same conversation and nothing is changing, or when the same person that you're talking to keeps creating the same feelings in you, you know, every time you meet that person you're like, "Oh, I have to work with them again", or the same frustrations happen, but you don't do anything different, you don't share any insight or information that can change the situation, you're stuck in the same pattern. 

Or, it might be a career conversation you have with a mentor or a manager and you feel like you're having like career development déjà vu when nothing is changing, because it's just going round in circles and that is just an inefficient way of you managing your time and it's not going to help you feel really positive about your development.  So, on repeat is the first red flag. 

Sarah Ellis: The second one is busy burnout, and this is one that probably we all recognise at some point in our years.  It's when you get to the end of a week, you know you've been really busy, but you couldn't actually describe what you've done or what you're proud of.  So, you're in that moment of when you feel like you're sort of doggy paddling super-fast just to stay on the surface and almost feels like you're perhaps not even going that far forward, but it feels like you're running really fast but perhaps staying still at the same time.  This might be because you've got a bit of yes overload, perhaps you've said yes to too much and now you're dealing with the consequences of that, perhaps you feel like you don't have any option, perhaps you feel like loads of work is being piled on you and you're not sure how to escape that.

Or sometimes, I think this can also feel, we've used this phrase before which I always find quite helpful, you know when you feel like you're stuck in the tunnel but there's no light at the end of the tunnel?  You're just like, "Every day feels like I am firefighting and troubleshooting and I don't know how to do anything different, and I'm so busy being busy, how am I ever going to find the time to do that?" 

Helen Tupper: Yes, I do know what that feels like, or you weren't asking me!

Sarah Ellis: You're not allowed to answer the questions yet!

Helen Tupper: Oh, you were asking the listeners; got it!  The third red flag is when everything feels like it's just sort of staying still.  You're doing your job, but your skills are stagnating and maybe your career progress feels like it's stalling, like you're working hard, but what for?  And you just feel like you're in a bit of a same-again pattern.  Maybe you've not got that stimulation of a stretch, or you feel like maybe you're coasting in your comfort zone and you haven't got that enjoyment about, "Oh, I'm learning, I'm developing, I'm growing", you just feel like your career development is stagnating a little bit.

Sarah Ellis: And the next one is enmeshment.  So, this is where the red flag is you and your work have become one.  So, you stop doing things outside of work that you really enjoy; perhaps you find yourself only ever talking about work because you think that's all I've got to talk about; maybe you're spending less time with friends or family; or you just can't remember the last time you did something maybe in an evening that wasn't work related.  Or sometimes I think, and I've definitely had this before, your weekends feel like they are just recovery from the week, ready for the next week, rather than feeling like you can go into the weekend or the days that you don't work actually with energy to do other things.  So, it's sort of when your identity has become really wrapped up in the work that you're doing.  You're often here, you're working long hours, you might even be enjoying it.  I do think sometimes you can get quite lost and immersed in the work that you're doing, but you start to have a bit of a red flag of like, "That's all I do". 

Helen Tupper: Yeah, enmeshment is different to being busy and burnt out, I think because of that point, Sarah; you might be enjoying what you're doing, like I've definitely had this situation, and then it's only like three months down the road where I'm like, "Oh, all the things that I love doing, like cooking or the things that I really enjoy, like going on my peloton, I've not done that for absolutely ages", and suddenly you realise that work has just taken over.  And those other things give you creativity and energy, so you really start to miss it when those things are stopped in your life. 

And then the fifth and final red flag is about directionless development.  So, this is where you can't see anything in your future that you can attach yourself to, you've got a lack of energy about your possibilities, you're like, "Where is this all going?"  And you might feel a little bit lost.  I definitely have heard that when I've been coaching people before; they're like, "I don't really know where I'm going", and they're hoping that somebody gifts them an answer like, "Here is an amazing project [or] an amazing position for you", and they're sort of waiting for this kind of career guidance to come to them because they can't see it for themselves.  And sometimes they can also be overwhelmed by options. 

I remember when I was at Microsoft and there were so many things I could do and people were saying to me, "Where do you see yourself going next in the organisation?"  I was like, "I don't really know, there's just so many things".  And I think sometimes it's having too many options and not knowing what to do, and sometimes you just can't see anything in front of you.  So, your direction for your development just feels a little bit random and it doesn't give you that confidence over the direction of your career. 

Sarah Ellis: And the examples don't stop there.  We didn't struggle with examples for this episode.  So, just a couple of others, again if you're thinking, "Oh yeah, that sounds like me, ones that I could just recognise in my own career": the "when" red flag.  So, we've talked about this in podcast episodes before, "I'll focus on my career when... this project finishes on a Friday afternoon.  I'll start really learning when..." and the when never comes, so maybe you recognise that.  I wondered about an email times meeting red flag.  So, if you feel like you spend all of your time really, or the majority of your time, answering emails and sitting in meetings, that might be a bit of a red flag unless they're incredibly productive and always brilliant.  Maybe there's a say/do red flag.  So, it could be that might be a manager, could be an organisation, but maybe you feel like there's a red flag that's popping up time and time again that what's being said doesn't reflect the reality of maybe your role or your experience. 

Or the other one that we spotted was perhaps there's a red flag that all the relationships you have at work are very connected to delivering on your day job.  So, you're not really creating a career community outside of your day-to-day tasks.  And again, could be even things like making your development dependent on only one person, say like your manager; that's the only person you're having career conversations with.  So, just think about maybe which of the red flags that you can spot in your career so far, and do any of those feel particularly pressing right now? 

Helen Tupper: So, having talked about all those different red flags that maybe you can recognise for yourself and maybe you've seen some repeated red flags, because they've crept into your career multiple times, what we're going to go through is six questions to ask yourself about your red flags, which will help you just understand them a little bit more so that you can take action, which is going to help you move from red to green, and that'll be really specific and relevant to you. 

Sarah Ellis: And as Helen described, I think sometimes this might be a pattern, so something actually you can spot that has come up multiple times in your Squiggly Career, or it could feel very in the moment.  And I'm going to hazard a guess that as we go through this and we answer these questions, and Helen and I are both going to answer them, I think Helen's going to take the in-the-moment perspective, and actually I think I've looked at something that I think, "Oh, actually this is a recurring red flag".  So, Helen, question one, what red flag feels like it's waving at you right now? 

Helen Tupper: The one that is waving most significantly is the busy-doing-everything-and-nothing red flag. 

Sarah Ellis: Okay and is that something that you recognise repeatedly or does it feel particularly in the moment, would you say? 

Helen Tupper: I've seen it before but I think it's particularly pertinent right now probably!  It's very like a January/February feeling I would say.  I started the year with that red flag kind of popping into my ear.  I'd quite like to take it out again.  What about you? 

Sarah Ellis: So, mine was the on-repeat one.  So, I think I'm somebody who definitely gets those repeated feelings of frustration, things going around in circles, same conversations or same issues or challenges or problems, they don't get resolved, which I obviously take accountability for.  But then I get really annoyed that they then come back again, and they take up quite a lot of my headspace.  And I think that is something that I can spot multiple times in my career.  So, I can see it now a bit, it's sort of a small red flag right now.  But then, when I was reading all of our examples that we were coming up with, I was like, "That's probably the one that's most likely to get in the way of me succeeding in my Squiggly Career".  Out of all of them I was like, because of my conflict gremlin, because I don't really like detail, because I just then ignore it and hope it'll get fixed and it doesn't, I can see how my patterns of behaviour mean unless I do choose to do something differently, that it's always going to be my reality. 

Helen Tupper: Yeah, it's sort of unresolved issues. 

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, it's like an unresolved red flag!

Helen Tupper: Nice, that sounds great! 

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, brilliant.  That's like I said, it does feel quite negative, doesn't it?  Well, we get a bit more positive later.  So, how frequently does the red flag make an appearance?  So, is it waving every day, is it every week, is it every month, or is there something else that means it makes an appearance? 

Helen Tupper: I'd say at the moment it's daily but not all day, and so it stops waving at me.  So, like if I'm doing a podcast with you now, I feel like this is a very focused attention, so it's not there because I'm here, I'm present, I'm doing this with you.  Or earlier, I was running a big programme for lots of people and it was very present and very focused and it wasn't there.  It's the second I have some time where I think, "Oh, I'm going to progress something now, it's my time", And I literally will open up, well, a combination of WhatsApp, Teams, and emails, and then it's just like an explosion in my brain.

Sarah Ellis: Like a deluge.

Helen Tupper: A deluge of stuff that I just can't get done.  And I think it's at those moments, which also probably happen in the evening.  So, in my mind, I'm like, "Oh, don't worry, I'll get those 3 things done in the evening", and then the 3 have become 300, and I'm back in that same kind of busy brain pattern.  I get a lot done but it doesn't feel that it's very impactful, because it's lots of other people's priorities, I would probably say.  What about you? 

Sarah Ellis: I conveniently forget my red flags when they're not pushing at me, if that makes sense, if they're not waving at me. 

Helen Tupper: You kick the can? 

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, I think I sort of go, "Oh, it's not that important".  And because I'm quite good at compartmentalising and good at saying focused, I sort of go, "I get that this is frustrating and this is a bit of a red flag".  I always spot that it's on repeat, so I don't find it hard to think of examples.  But then I put it in the drawer and shut the door.  And I just go like, "Yeah, fine".  But then obviously, each time it comes back, I feel like it's a bit of a bigger flag, I feel like the flag gets bigger every time.  So, often for me it's not that it's a daily or weekly thing, it's that it just comes back, like it comes back to bite you basically and I'm like, "Oh God, I've got to open the drawer again" and I've happily ignored it for a little while.  And it's like your false sense of security, it's that sort of thing. 

Helen Tupper: Just before we get on to the next questions, I think what is really helpful in listening to you and talking this through with you, you start to take something that feels not great and it already is starting to feel a bit more practical.  Even just calling yours "the repeated red flag", and mine "the busy red flag", it's sort of contained it a little bit and made it something I can talk to you about.  I think as soon as you start talking to somebody else about this, you can probably, well we'll see what happens everyone, but you can probably unlock some ways to solve it rather than feeling like you're stuck with the red flag, but let's see! 

Sarah Ellis: Or feeling like I never want to have a conversation.  It's not fun, is it, to feel like you're moaning, or to feel like you're like, "Oh, I'm just going to be really negative".  Like, I don't want to have a chat with you about all the red flags I've got, really, I don't even want to have that conversation!  But actually, if you start to make it practical, then you're like, well if the purpose of the conversation is to turn the flag from red to green, then that feels much more useful. 

Helen Tupper: Yeah. 

Sarah Ellis: Before we get to the good stuff, what's stopping you from doing something differently?  So, often with these red flags, if they were easy to solve, we'd be doing this already.  So, it's good to know what's the biggest obstacle, what's the reason behind why you don't sort this, given there'll be loads of other stuff for everyone listening that you're very good at sorting, but this is probably not one of them; so, Helen, why not?  So, my busy red flag, I think any time that I have where this busy red flag is flying, it's because I'm trying to get it all done.  And I think what I don't do is take the time to prioritise individually or collectively.  So, I'm working through probably one channel of noise at a time, whereas what I should say is, "Over the last 3 hours, 30 things have come my way that you would like me to work upon across the team.  These are what I think the three priorities are", and actually agree it with people.  I think I don't take that time.  I mean, that's an extreme example, but I pretty much go, "Right, that's everything that's come in.  I've got to work through it". 

So, I think that prioritising first what needs to be done and agreeing that with people, it will probably be effective use of time.  And then I also think sometimes I sort of reinforce a busy bottleneck.  So, all this stuff will come in, and what I probably think in my mind is, "Oh, this doesn't need to wait for me, or someone else could have sorted this out", or whatever, but I'll just do it anyway.  And what I probably won't do is give that feedback.  So, all that happens is it comes back to me again in the future.  So, I think probably not prioritising and it's not -- pushing back is the wrong word, it's not pushing back, it's just challenging the assumption that I'm the right person to do this or it is the right thing to be done in that way.  I don't think I take sometimes the time to challenge the busyness. 

Sarah Ellis: Do you think there's anything in, you've sort of got used to being the person that everyone needs, like you end up being the go-to person, and you're almost like, "Oh, it doesn't need to be me", but almost you've got used to doing it, it just feels like, "That's how I've got used to working"? 

Helen Tupper: I think less so now.  Maybe a year or so ago, I would have said that, but I think that's happened less now.  I think it is more, there is too much to do and not taking the time to prioritise.  I know everyone says there's too much to do, but I think there's just too many things going on, all of which have their own projects and actions and things, and I think there just needs to be more of a prioritisation, which is like, "I'm not going to work on that till Friday", or just that kind of thing, rather than everything sort of having equal priority and coming from lots of people at the same time.  I think it's the prioritisation thing that would unlock it for me.  What about your repeated red flag; what do you think? 

Sarah Ellis: I think some of its laziness! 

Helen Tupper: You're the least lazy person ever!

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, but I'm not.  I am lazy in some things and I honestly think that might be true.  I think I just look at it and go, "Honestly, I can't be bothered". 

Helen Tupper: Is it not avoidance rather than laziness? 

Sarah Ellis: No, some of it's, "I can't be bothered".  Some of it's avoidance.  It depends how hard the repeat thing is.  If it involves conflict, I think I go to avoidance.  If it's just more like, you know, I've spotted three times that a process feels messy and we just need to sort it out.  That's not avoidance, that's just like basically, I know it's draining --

Helen Tupper: "I can't be bothered to do this now".

Sarah Ellis: -- it's not fun.  It's draining or not fun for me, so I just can't be bothered.  So, I get lazy and I just ignore it, and I know that it's a great personality trait!

Helen Tupper: Well, I like your personality, so it's fine!  Okay, so what's the risk if you don't do something about your red flag, so if you let laziness keep that flag flying, what's the risk? 

Sarah Ellis: So I think then, the more something gets repeated, the more frustrating I find it, and then actually it becomes quite almost emotionally draining, because those frustrations really kind of feel more significant, I think it often feels harder to fix the longer you leave it.  You know like, "Okay, well it was this big, and now I've left it for two months and the same thing's come up again and now it's even worse.  If we'd have just fixed it fast or taken the time to try and sort it at the time, it wouldn't be now even messier than where it was, so it feels even harder to do".  And then that feels quite demotivating. 

Also, I think I find it a little bit demotivating because I feel disappointed in myself.  So, having just said I was lazy, which I think is also a bit true, but then I think when I see the stuff on repeat, I am then like, "Well, this is stupid.  Why did I not just sort this?  I knew this and I didn't do anything about it".  So, you've basically only got yourself to blame, so I think I feel bad about myself.  And then, yeah, get very frustrated and probably a bit angry, to be honest. 

Helen Tupper: I mean, the inner critic's looming large with this one!  I was thinking slightly more positively. 

Sarah Ellis: Oh, yeah?

Helen Tupper: Well, when you get your repeated red flag, what's the alternative action?  So, you have this repeat red flag and at the moment, due to your words, laziness, but I'm kind of avoidance or just a lack of energy for the thing that needs to change, you kind of leave it there, and then it just goes round in a cycle.  But you're kind of, "What would it take to fix this fast?" and of course not all of it can be fixed fast, but then it's probably like, "What would it take to get this on someone else's agenda?" so it's not just you who's finding it frustrating, it's on someone else's agenda.  But I think one of those questions in response to that feeling of frustration of the red flag repeating would probably be quite helpful, "What can I do to fix it fast?  What would it take to fix it fast?  And who else could share the frustration?" might be useful rather than you kind of going, "I'm so cross at myself".  That's probably not going to help. 

Sarah Ellis: What are your risks, so if you're not going to do something about this busyness and being always on? 

Helen Tupper: Oh, I think I'm just being frustrated.  I think I'm probably not doing the things that add the most value because I'm stuck doing quite a lot of incremental activity, whereas I think I can have a bigger impact doing other stuff.  I'll leave stuff in its broader sense, but I think that it just consumes all of my time and with it quite a lot of energy, so I don't have that excitable energy left over to create stuff which I think is good for me and good for the business too.  So, that's probably mine. 

Sarah Ellis: Yeah, so maybe for you the question would be more like, "Where do I have the highest impact across Amazing If?" because like where you have the highest impact won't be in lots of those things you just described.  It might be great, I'm sure you're efficient, I know you are, but if I was to describe to you where you have the highest impact, it's never going to be in any of those things, right?  If I was telling you, I'd be saying, "Well, you have the highest impact when you prototype things really quickly".  So, we've had an idea together and then you create a quick prototype, and you're really good at getting fast feedback on things that we could do to be really useful for people in their careers.  Or, I think you also have a really positive impact when you build relationships with people that we don't work with today, because you're a great relationship-builder, brilliant listener, really good at creating connection.  I think you're also brilliant at just spotting gaps for, what do we not do that we could do? 

So, if I think about those things, that's probably none of the things that are keeping you in that kind of busy burnout, you know, I imagine a lot of them are not connected to that.  So, maybe it's an impact question for you. 

Helen Tupper: And so then understanding maybe what's the risk of not doing something about it, we want to move on to the reward.  So that fifth question becomes, what is the reward of turning your flag from red to green?  So, this is kind of hopefully unlocking a bit of motivation to do something different.  So, if suddenly you are not stuck doing stuff on repeat, Sarah, what's the reward; what's good about the green? 

Sarah Ellis: I actually found this one quite hard to answer.  I think one of the things would be, I like the idea of things being streamlined, that appeals to me, like things working well.  I suppose my number one value is achievement, and so if I could connect it to a value that I've got on achievement of being like, "Well, if we don't do stuff on repeat, if we sort it when we need to, we can achieve more generally because we'll have more space, we won't be doing stuff on repeat".  But I do also like the idea of things being streamlined.  I'm never necessarily like the person who does the streamlining, I'm never the most efficient person, but I love things that work well, I really appreciate things that work well.  And so, I think there's probably a bit of that, like I think I would feel proud of that. 

I think it's in particular the time one, you know, like if you sort it now, the delayed gratification of the time back that you're going to gain from not having to do it in the future.  And I'm very future-oriented and I protect my time and think a lot about how I spend my time.  And so if I was like, "Right, okay, I've spotted this is an on-repeat conversation, I'm going to call it and I'm going to sort it now, because that's going to save me three conversations in the future when I'm trying to do other stuff, and probably stuff that will give me more energy".  I think if I did that, like the, "What is this area in three months' time going to say thank you for?" that probably I'd find quite motivating.

Helen Tupper: And I think my reward would be I think just more energy, and energy is one of my values.  So, I think feeling energised by the things that I'm spending my time on, I think that helps me and helps everyone around me.  So, I think probably that's it.  I just get to do -- your values and what motivates and drives you, so unlocking any one of your values that you get to live more at work is a good thing for you. 

Sarah Ellis: So then the final question is, who does this well, and what can you learn from them?  So, someone who, when you think about those red flags, you won't have some of those, maybe that's the thing that you're really good at.  Can you find someone or can you see someone who you think, "Why do they never seem to have that red flag?  What are they doing differently?"  And then almost be quite forensic about like, "Okay, what could I learn, and what do they seem to do?"  Or, if you know them, ask them.  So, Helen, who never has busy burnout; who is this Nirvana of a person?

Helen Tupper: Well, I've got two people who, I mean maybe they have busy burnout.  They're very different people, but I think I could learn from them.  So, my first is Avivah Wittenberg-Cox, who we've talked about before.  There's some amazing work on gender and generational diversity.  And I just feel like she's very clear and calm and considered, and I never see the busyness.  I just see somebody who is just very clear about what they're working on and manages that message, and just I think that clarity and that control I really admire about the way that she works. 

My other person, who's very different and I don't know personally, Steven Bartlett.  I was trying to think about, you know, has loads of things on, right, so podcast, TV, business, creating loads of content, doing shows and obviously has a team.  So, arguably, there's a lot of things going around Steven Bartlett's brain.  So, we interviewed him on the podcast, and I've kind of observed some of the things.  I think he has a very principled way of working.  I mean, he markets his principles as a way of working. 

Sarah Ellis: That's one of his principles, "I will market everything"! 

Helen Tupper: Basically, yeah, "What's working for me I'm going to sell, so it can work for other people, and monetise it". 

Sarah Ellis: It's not a bad model!

Helen Tupper: I mean, it's working well.  But I think that idea, if I have some principles, that's what I could learn from him, is that he would arguably have a busy brain, but what are my five principles that I will not market and monetise, but just actually help me be like, "This is what good work looks like for me".  The opposite of a busy brain, from my perspective, is what good work looks like for me.  And then writing those principles, and then maybe sharing them might be a helpful thing that I could learn from just looking at it through their eyes.

Sarah Ellis: For me, I once worked alongside somebody who's one of my very good friends, and I would describe her as, she stands out to me as someone who never shied away from the tough stuff in a way that I never saw from anyone else.  And there were other people who could definitely do the challenging things better than I could, and I set quite a low bar on some of that stuff to be honest, so lots of people would be better than me, but in terms of anything that was on repeat.  So, the minute she spotted, "Well I'm having the same conversation, that's a red flag", or, "This process still isn't working and it wasn't working last time, that's a red", anything like that that she saw.  And she was senior and it would have been easy for her to be like, "Well, this is not my job", or, "I'm just going to leave it".  She took the determination I think I have, but then sort of applied it to that to like, "I'm just not going to shy away from these things". 

Then actually you saw that as a result, (a) it meant that she almost increased I would say her credibility, her reputation, and I was full of admiration for that, watching her do those things; and (b) that you could also see she hasn't done that thing of kicking the problem down the road.  She's been like, "No, I can see now, and it probably isn't the funnest thing, because I don't think some of this stuff is the funnest thing, but I can see if I don't do it now, it is just going to come back and bite me in six months' time".  She always did it, and I think she just made time for it.  And to your point on prioritising, rather than being like, "It's easier to wait", she'd be like, "No, I am going to sort this". 

So, I think if I could combine my determination I do have with almost a bit of channelling that inner, "Don't leave it to another day.  You're going to be in a worse position and I don't want to be in a worse position".  So, I think that might help me.

Helen Tupper: So, hopefully you've heard from going through those six questions that there's almost a process of kind of awareness to clarity that you get to.  And the whole point here is that the more aware you are of your red flags, the more able you are to take action.  But also the more aware you are of other people's red flags, the more able you are to support them.  And Sarah and I could do this because we know each other very well and we're very used to kind of taking this sort of peer-to-peer approach when we're talking through problems that we've got.  But I think if you've got a red-flag friend, so somebody that, you know, we've all got red flags, so it's very likely that someone that you work with has a red flag; but taking time to go through these six questions, and your role is really just to listen, maybe play back a few things that you've seen, but you're just both answering those questions and just creating this space to work this through. 

When you get to the end, like where Sarah was saying there like, "Oh, actually, if I could combine that and that, I feel like I would feel better at the end of the day", you're like, "Great".  And I'm like, "Oh, if I had those five principles, I think that would help me".  So, you can get to a lot of clarity just by walking through these different questions that we've got.  We have though, we don't want you to have to do all the hard work yourself, we have got a few specific ideas that we would suggest, which we have connected to the most common red flags.  So, we'll put all the questions that we just talked about in the pod sheet, so you've got them if you want to kind of do that discussion.  But there are five ideas that we've got that if any of those common red flags earlier resonated, we think would be worth giving a go. 

So, the first one is if your red flag, just like Sarah's, is that you feel like some stuff's going on repeat and it's not getting solved, one thing that you could work on is giving more even-better-if feedback.  So, often it kind of gets stuck in a situation because you're not sharing what would be even better if.  So, if you can be in a pattern, let's say Sarah and I have got repeated red flag, our podcast meeting always gets delayed, for example, I could say to Sarah, "One thing that I think would make our podcast recording even better if, is if we did it at the start of a day before everything else happened so that we could keep to the time that we've put in the diary".  So, just practising that habit of even-better-if feedback so that you're injecting a different thing into that discussion, rather than it just playing out the same way that it always does. 

Sarah Ellis: And so the next red flag is busy burnout.  And this is where if/then as a technique can just be useful to support you to make a choice, it's a forcing function to do trade-offs, essentially.  So, rather than being busy and just thinking, "I just have to do everything and I feel like I'm pulled in a million different directions", this starts to get you practising, prioritising, I think.  So, when Helen was talking about this, she was like, "I just basically do everything in the order that I see it".  Whereas actually, what Helen would do probably is just pause and be like, "Right, I've got 30 things [or whatever] that have come my way.  What do I think is the most important?  XYZ".  And it's like, "Well, if I do those tonight, then maybe these three things are going to need to wait until tomorrow".  

Or, it could even be, "If I do these things now, then I'm then going to stop work".  It's like, "Well, the three most important things are ABC.  I think that's going to take me an hour, so if I do that, I feel like I've done what I need to do, then I'm going to take a break for the rest of the evening, I am going to watch a bit of Netflix, I am going to do exercise", or whatever it is that you would want to do.  But I think using that can just help you to really think about what's most important now. 

Helen Tupper: So, the third one we talked about was that staying still when you feel like you're stagnating.  Really useful action if this is your red flag is to bring the outside in.  So, do something outside your organisation.  It could be attending an event, it doesn't have to be an in-person event, it could be a virtual one; could even be just watching a TED Talk.  But basically, take your brain outside your current business and engage with it.  It could be a curious career conversation, but what you want to do is bring the outside in.  So, once you've taken your brain outside the business, think how you can bring those insights back, because when you're sharing your learning, remember for this one, we don't want to be stagnating, we're trying to really make our brain think differently and activate curiosity; and so, when you are sharing what you have learned, not only is that kind of useful for other people, it also lasts longer for you.  So, it is a real win to collect curiosity outside your business and then share it back in the business so it stays in your brain for longer. 

Sarah Ellis: In measurement, one thing we would suggest is some active rest.  So, active rest is where you are fully immersed, fully present in something that isn't your day job.  So, it's something for you, so you're essentially taking some time for you, but it's on something that's really specific and focused.  And if you did a small bit of that every day, you're basically escaping the enmeshment.  So, let's say this was Helen, Helen loves to cook, she might just be like, "Right, I'm going to spend ten minutes every day just making something.  Maybe I'm going to make my own lunch every day, like make a nice salad", I'm going to use a Helen-based example there, the sort of thing she would actually make, or think of a nice smoothie or juice. 

Helen Tupper: I'm quite a fan of the Miso soup variation. 

Sarah Ellis: Anything along those lines, there you go.

Helen Tupper: Oh, this is making me really hungry, all of that, I would love that. 

Sarah Ellis: So, that would be active rest.  If it was me, for example, I would probably be like, "Right, I'm going to do some sort of exercise, I'm going to go out for a walk", or it could be gardening.  It can be absolutely anything as long as you're fully in it, and you've got no choice, so you can't spend that time thinking about work.  So, again, it will just help you to just get out of this like, "Everything I do and all that I am feels like my work". 

Helen Tupper: That's such a bad statement, isn't it?  "Everything I do and all that I am is my work", yeah, we're trying to avoid that!  So, the final one that we'd highlighted earlier was this directionless-about-your-development red flag, you feel like you're getting a bit lost, you don't know where it's all going.  Really useful thing to do if this is your red flag is to design your own job description.  This is quite a fun activity.  To be honest, I'd recommend this for everybody.  Go on something like LinkedIn, search randomly for some jobs, so maybe just roughly in your profession or areas of interest, scan through all the jobs that come up, save five that feel quite interesting to you.  That could be based on the job title or the business, or anything really, just triggers your intrigue, and then go through the detail of the job description and just cut and paste any sentences or statements or skills that feel really interesting for you. 

What you're trying to do across those five different job descriptions is design your own.  So, take all those different bits and then come up with something.  I mean, it doesn't have to be the perfect job, it might not completely make sense, you might be doing lots of different things.  But what it does give you insight into is, "What have I got energy for?  What feels really interesting to me?  What might I like to find out more about?"  And any of those things, energy, interesting, curiosity, are going to give you a sense of direction for your development versus you just sort of feeling a bit lost and having no idea what good might look like for you.

Sarah Ellis: I also think if you do this in a very intentional way, which is the way that we've just described it, and perhaps, Helen, you and I will have to give this a go now because we need to practice what we preach, I wonder if it will make you feel really good turning these red flags green, just that like, "Well, I was very transparent about, I've got this red flag that I need to fix, and I've gone away and I've done something about it and this is not easy and I've done something differently".  So, this could be a brilliant source of pride, in terms of feeling good about the progress you're making, growth, learning, probably taking you out of your comfort zone a little bit, a bit of unlearning and relearning.  I think there might be quite a lot of very positive side effects to taking this seriously and really thinking about addressing these red flags for you and your work and career. 

Helen Tupper: I agree and hopefully, even though it might start in a place of frustration, we've ended up in a territory of being able to fix this and to do it with somebody else as well.  So, all of those things that we've talked about will be in the PodSheet and if you want to talk about it more, come to PodPlus.  We'll definitely be going through those exercises and seeing if we can identify any other red-flag unlockers for you as well.  And if you've got any questions or feedback, you can always get in touch with us.  We're helenandsarah@squigglycareers.com. 

Sarah Ellis: But that's everything for this week, we'll be back to you again soon.  Bye for now. 

Helen Tupper: Bye everyone.