Hello and welcome to Working It.
It is the FT Weekend Festival on Saturday* and I look forward to meeting Working It readers and listeners. There is a VIP tent (I think the correct term is “lounge”) for FT subscribers and I will be there at 11am for some free ☕️. Please come and say hello and save me from that awkward situation of scrolling through my phone looking busy in a room or field full of strangers.
Read on to discover the benefits of keeping a work diary, which is also an excuse to start September with new office supplies. Yesterday, during a long train ride, I noticed that a woman sitting in the aisle in front of me had a stack of brand new notebooks and pens in front of her. Respect 🙇♀️.
Send me an email with your thoughts, ideas and complaints: isabel.berwick@ft.com.
*Promo code Newsletters24 We offer you £24 off tickets
How to Start Keeping a Work Journal (Even If Your Handwriting Is Terrible) 🙆🏻♀️
I’ve kept a journal at various points in my life, but I never thought about doing so in a work context. That’s about to change after speaking to journal enthusiast Ollie Henderson. Ollie is the author of an excellent guide to career transition (another good topic for September). Flywheel between work and life.
She posted something about her journal on LinkedIn and I was intrigued, so I asked her to share more details with Working It readers. It turns out she started it for the same reason as those of us who love personal journals: to keep a record of our daily lives, before they get lost in unreliable human memory 📒.
Ollie told me that when he began to pivot his career in January 2020, he realized that “thousands of moments that had shaped a decade of my work and life were blurring.” I can relate.
He continued: “As I thought about my next steps, I worked hard to identify the skills and experience I could offer other companies. That’s when I started my work journal. I began by listing the things I was proud of, exploring how I wanted my work and life to evolve, and focusing on what I had enjoyed about my career. Once I had some clarity, I made sure I didn’t forget anything else, jotting down key moments each day – achievements, challenges I struggled with, breakthroughs, and interactions with colleagues, collaborators, and clients.”
The practicalities of keeping a work journal will depend on your personal preference, but Ollie started with pen and paper. This fits into your life with very little extra effort (or “friction,” to use the technical term), which is key when starting any new work habit 🔑.
Jotting down small entries in a notebook, either “on the fly” or during a few minutes of reflection at the end of the day, allows you to record small things that would otherwise get lost. When you feel like you “haven’t done anything” during a work week, the records will (hopefully) tell you otherwise. Recording progress and accomplishments can be especially important for people who are self-employed and don’t have a manager to “check off the to-do’s.”
I asked Ollie to send me a photo (names redacted 🤞🏼).
One of the great things about journals (of all kinds) is that they can show us long-term patterns of behavior, preferences, and problems that we may overlook in the hustle and bustle of our daily lives. As Ollie told me, “I find it fascinating to see what moments I write down, positive or negative, because the same themes keep coming up. What does it tell you when you constantly highlight how great it felt to present your ideas to your team? You probably want to do more of that. What does it tell you when your boss constantly drains your energy? Maybe it’s time to look for another job.”
Ollie has since taken his journal digital, because he wants to be able to search and find useful information. He couldn’t find an app that did everything he wanted, so he’s creating his own with the help of contributors. (Follow him on LinkedIn to keep up with your progress.)
None of us are going to be able to turn back time (sorry, Cher). It’s nothing to get carried away with. also It’s profound, but keeping a work journal can help us make sense of the transience of our lives. Ollie’s final words: “One profound impact is my perception of time. I can often feel time slipping away. Stopping to reflect on what you’re doing each day makes time feel like it’s going by more slowly. Marking important moments helps you differentiate one day from the next. It prevents the feeling that life is blurring into one.”
This week on the Working It podcast
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how Lunch has disappeared for those working from home 🥪, according to data from virtual office platform Roam. The data shows no drop in work activity during traditional lunch hours, and instead, home workers are still attending meetings, sending emails, and generally working. We decided to follow that story in This week’s podcast episodeand talk more broadly about the state of lunch in the workplace. Has the business lunch disappeared, too? To find out, I speak to Nick Bloom, professor of economics at Stanford University, and Harriet Fitch Little, food and drink editor at FT magazine. It’s a fun and revealing conversation.
Five standout stories from the world of work
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The dangers of betting your career on the company’s rising star: Recent developments at JPMorgan Chase have sidelined a would-be successor to Jamie Dimon. When that happens, it slows down the progress of the would-be heir’s lieutenants, too. Michael Skapinker looks at the complexities of workplace dynamics at the top.
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Funds are betting that happier workers produce healthier returns: A new US exchange-traded fund is picking stocks based on data showing how happy and engaged workers are. Will Schmitt in New York is following the story: it will be interesting to see whether staff satisfaction can generate concrete returns.
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Interview: Google’s James Manyika on AI and Productivity: Cut through the flood of content on generative AI with this excellent interview from Henry Mance. James Manyika is Google’s SVP of Research, Technology and Society, and has an interesting and balanced take.
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EY has compiled a list of candidates for the UK’s top job, which is dominated by women: Well, the list is dominated by women in the sense that two of the three candidates to replace Hywel Ball are women. Simon Foy also describes the firm’s byzantine voting rules, which are 😨.
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Why is it so difficult to ask for help?: I love Enuma Okoro’s articles in FT Weekend, where she uses art to explore human relationships and emotions. This week’s column is about the importance of connection as we embrace vulnerability and ask others to help us.
One more thing…
A strong recommendation for The same as it always was, A new novel from American writer Claire Lombardo (the title comes from Talking Heads’ “Once in a Lifetime”). Julia Ames is a mother in her 50s who always feels like an outsider. She lives in an affluent Chicago suburb, with a loving husband, two wonderful children, and a quirky dog, but her life is overshadowed by her own childhood of poverty and parental neglect. The past threatens to disrupt the present, in what is a deeply satisfying read about complex family dynamics.
A few words from the Working It community
Last week’s newsletter, on the challenges we face human resources directorsgot this interesting response from Olivia Stone, CEO and founder of Tucker Stone, a boutique headhunting firm:
I have a personal wish that in the next 10 years we see a significant move towards making HR Directors CEOs – this would certainly see women move ‘to the top’. But do HR Directors want to be CEOs? Or are they willing prisoners within their own HR function? Specific skills are needed to thrive in an HR Director role – being uniquely skilled at managing executive dynamics, coaching, facilitating, challenging, negotiating, influencing – it is something that is not recognised as a hero and is invaluable to a CEO. But are these qualities unique to a CEO or is what makes the HR Director successful their innate ability to be the wind beneath the CEO’s wings?
Reluctantly, I think it might be the latter, although I am very glad that I am proven wrong in the next few years. The combined result of people living longer and retiring later, the professionalisation and growth of the HR function over the past two decades and the lack of a natural outlet for the CHRO to progress to CEO, means that it is becoming a crowded role, especially at the top end of the market.
Fortunately, private equity, startups and SMEs in general are recognizing the need for executive-level HR people at an earlier stage of their maturity, and this provides opportunities for some frustrated HR leaders impatient for their first executive appointment. It is also a dynamic, commercial and fast-paced place, but that is a discussion for another time.”