What Do You Expect?
Every so often the world gives you the opportunity to remember something you’ve known but allowed to move off your radar. For me, it’s the power of expectation, which equates in many ways to intention.
Expectation is a powerful thing. More and more research is pointing to the creative power of human thought, and expectation boils down to what you’re thinking about a situation, place or thing in a particular moment or moments.
Yesterday, I had the distinct frustration of being able to receive email, but not send any. I knew that this was due to a problem with my outgoing server, provided by my ISP. This has happened a few times in the past; usually it’s resolved on its own. Only once have I had to call and deal with a tech person to resolve the issue. Although I remember the experience being tedious, I also remember it resolving just fine, with the help of the tech support person.
Before I called my ISP support desk, I called a few other tech people in my life, just to be sure that I wasn’t missing something. I’ll admit it; there are times when I question my own judgment. All agreed that the ISP support desk was where I needed to look. One person, as we were signing off said that she hoped the support staff would be kind. Which threw me for a smidge of a loop, because it never occurred to me that they’d be anything but. You see, I’ve always had really good experience with my ISP support. And so, my expectation was that the situation would resolve easily and painlessly, albeit with a small time investment on my part.
Given all that was on my agenda yesterday, I decided to do what I could from my secondary server, leave an autoresponder for my clients and colleagues in case they wondered why I was taking so long to get back to them, and then deal with the situation this morning. First thing this morning I called the ISP support desk. After a wait of about 5 minutes (which is so much easier for me at the beginning of the day than at the end) a lovely support person by the name of Karen came on the line. She patiently heard my concern, then walked me through a series of steps to rectify the situation. It took no more than 5 additional minutes. And now the situation is resolved. She answered all my questions (not that there were many), she was pleasant the whole time, and her explanations were clear.
It was a fabulous experience, and no less than I expected. Which, ultimately, is the point of this post. I firmly believe that the expectations you hold set the stage for what will happen. As a leader, being cognizant of the expectations you hold will allow you to tweak your expectations so that you actually create the outcomes that serve the big picture, whatever that is for you. Holding small expectations, whether of your staff, your self, or your projects isn’t wise. You’ve really got to expect the best, as cliche as that might sound.
With curiousity, I’m now going to explore what other expectations I have in my life. And I’m going to invite you to do the same. When going into a meeting, what outcome do you expect? When networking, how much business do you expect to glean? When preparing for an exam, do you expect to pass or fail? When going out socially, do you expect to have fun? Expectations really are powerful. Pay attention to yours, tweak and notice what shows up. Bottom-line: you’ve got to ask yourself, “What do you expect?”
Want weekly doses of life and leadership wisdom? Surf on over to www.stellarcc.com and sign up for the LAUNCH ezine in the bottom, left-hand corner. It’s just what you need to be playing a powerful leadership game in all of your life. And in case you’re wondering, my ISP is Bell — and I’ve been very pleased with them throughout the years 