8 Questions You Should Be Asking Your Boss - The Muse

8 Questions You Should Be Asking Your anfhrer - The Muse8 Questions You Should Be Asking Your BossWhen my client Sarah contacted me to work out some issues at herbei job, I didnt think it would be a very tough assignment. After all, she was bright, good at what she did, and committed to being successful.The trouble, she explained, was her difficult anfhrer She saw him as an obstacle that she had to work around to achieve her goals, rather than an essential parte (or, frankly, any part) of her success.But as I continued to ask questions, I was surprised at how little she really knew about her assignments, her boss expectations, and overall, how to work with her manager effectively. In fact, she tended to make assumptions about what her manager needed or thought, based solely on her observations- without any real facts. No wonder she was strugglingIf youre having similar issues seeing eye-to-eye with your manager, take the advice I gave Sarah, and initiate a one-on-one meeting to ask t hese eight essential questions. With the answers you receive, youll better understand your managers point of view, be able to work together mora effectively, and, ultimately, create mora opportunity for success- for the both of you.1. Whats the Most Important Achievement You Hope to Accomplish in Your Current Role?This question will give you insight into your managers short-term motivation, which will give you a better idea of what your goals and objectives should be. Managers, unfortunately, arent always clear with employees on their goals and plans, but if you understand a bit more about what your boss is focused on, you can better prioritize your own responsibilities and position yourself for success in your boss eyes.For example, perhaps your organization is in the middle of an acquisition and your managers goal is to create a smooth transition for the newly merged department. With that information, you should be aiming to help her to succeed in that, whether that means spending a few weeks beefing up company documentation or simply volunteering to assist with training.2. What Are Your Career Goals?While similar to question number one, the answer to this will give you insight into your managers long-term goals. Does she want to be a VP by age 35? CEO by 50? Does she want to start her own business one day? Knowing her long-term plan will help you understand why she might make certain decisions. For instance, maybe she volunteers your department for a project that doesnt seem important to you, but it puts her squarely in the visibility of top executives- which could put her in the perfect position for a promotion.By having insight into her goals, youll better understand why she manages your team the way she does, instead of doubting her strategies.3. What Is the Most Important Thing Your Boss Cares About?Unless youre working for the CEO, your boss reports to a manager, too. So, asking this question will help you learn more about what the upper level of your organization expects.And finding out these higher-level goals will give you a deeper sense of meaning in your work, since youll see exactly how you and your team fit into the bigger picture.Plus, getting your finger on the pulse of the companys higher-level projects may give you the opportunity to volunteer for initiatives you otherwise wouldnt have been aware of.4. What Can I Do to Make You More Successful Today (or This Week, Month, Quarter, or Year)?This should be a question you ask on a regular basis- because you should always be trying to make your boss as successful as possible. When youre able to get a straightforward answer to this, youll be able to focus your energy in the right places- because youll know exactly what tasks need to take priority.(And as a bonus, it will also remind your boss that youre truly invested in his or her success.)5. Whats One Thing I Could Do Differently?Having clear expectations is the key to delivering winning performance- and this question is a sneaky way to find out those expectations. For example, if your manager says hed like you to make more of an effort to actively participate in meetings, youll know that he values a collaborative environment of ideas- rather than coming up with every initiative himself. And knowing that can help you perform exactly to his expectations.6. What Should I Know About Your Work and Management Style?Does your manager expect you to be available 24/7? Respond to emails on weekends? How does he or she handle stress?Asking this straightforward question may not get you all the answers (for example, a micromanager may not readily admit to micromanaging). But even if you get just a tiny bit of insight, youll have a better sense of what to expect and how to handle it.7. How Would You Like to Receive Feedback From Me?No matter what, you wont agree with your manager on everything. But, you dont have to simply simmer in frustration- as long as you know how to present your gripes in the right way.To p repare yourself for an eventual point of contention, ask how your manager prefers to get feedback- youll get a much better response if you play by his or her rules, whether that means scheduling a one-on-one meeting, rather than catching him or her off guard in a hallway conversation or summarizing your thoughts in an email.Once you know how to deliver your constructive feedback, youll be much more prepared to ask for what you need Whether youd like more frequent updates on deadlines, regular one-on-one time, or faster decision-making on projects, its important to be able to feel comfortable making these requests.(And if youre nervous to do it, heres how to give honest feedback that isnt scary.)8. Why Did You Hire Me?When you get a new job, youre often so excited that you forget to ask why you were selected over all the other candidates. But this is an important question to ask, because it will help you hone in on exactly how your boss believed you would make the team better.Perhaps your boss will say that you demonstrated your ability to present complex data in a simple way better than any other candidate. And so, now you know thats a major part of what your boss expects you to deliver. (Plus, since you probably do this better than anyone else on the team, its your chance to really shine)By spending some time in your managers shoes and asking these questions, youll be able to smooth out any rough edges of your professional relationship. OK- it might be a little intimidating at first, but give it a try. As you build that rapport, youll stop seeing your manager as an obstacle and start seeing him or her as an essential part of your mutual success.

Go to the next level of your life before you feel ready

Go to the next level of yur life before you feel readyGo to the next level of your life before you feel readyJohn Burke is a 30-year-old pianist from Atlanta, Georgia. He has composed several doppelalbums and mora recently has begun writing musicals. In 2016, he released the album, Orogen, which welches nominated for a Grammy Award for Best New Age Album.One of the songs on Orogen is called, Earth Breaker, which Burke calls, Finger Breaker because it is extremely fast and intense. The purpose of Earth Breaker is to create the emotional experience of living through an earthquake.When Burke wrote the song, he couldnt physically play it. It was too fast and frankly, above his skill level. He wrote a song he could leid play. After enough practice, he was able to master the sequence of notes at increasing speeds.Earth Breaker is just one example of how John Burke continually pushing his creative boundaries. While writing, Willpower Doesnt Work, I interviewed Burke and asked him about his process for creating such a large and powerful body of work at such a young age.Heres what he saidHe rarely does the same thing twice.Hes always attempting something different and more challenging than hes ever done before (creativity, after all, is about pushing boundaries and making new connections).Once he gets an idea for a project, he immediately puts all of the pieces in place to ensure the project gets done in a timely manner.He embraces both internal and external pressure to propel himself forward.John Burke is continually disrupting himself and everyone else in his field. He is very creative but also very strategic. In fact, his strategy is what allows him to tap deep into his creative potential.Heres specifically what Burke does the moment he decides hes going to pursue a creative project.He calls his sound engineer and gets scheduled several months in advance for when his album will be recorded.Being on the schedule and being financially invested now gives him a pressing end-date (To achieve great things you need 1) a plan, and 2) not enough time - Meg Jay TED talk).He then blocks out his calendar for the next several months for Creation Time. This is where hes actually going to sit down and do the work. If its not on the calendar, it probably wont get done. If a paid-gig or another great opportunity pops up during creation time, he says he already has a meeting. That meeting is with himself.He then tells all of his fans via social media and his email newsletter about his upcoming album. This creates positive expectation and anticipation in his fans. Burke really cares about ensuring his fans trust him. So when he makes a public declaration to his fans, he feels compelled to make good on that promise.When Burke decides he wants to do a project, he doesnt overly-wait until he feels ready. Instead, he immediately creates conditions to make that project a reality. He forces his own hand. All of his strategies fit under the category of Forcing Function s - which are strategic situational factors put into place to ensure you produce a desired result.Forcing functions are flow triggers, because they force you to act and produce. They absorb you deep into what youre doing. This is how you remove procrastination and confusion.- - - Its a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until youre ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Now is as good a time as any. - Hugh LaurieThe remainder of this article is going to give you the psychological and strategic tools for continually pushing your own boundaries. Most of the people and organizations in any industry are avoiding change. This is especially true of those already successful.It is human-nature to seek homeostasis as fast as possible. In order to combat that, you need to continually disrupt yourself. Like Burke, you need to push your own boundaries and attempt stuff you havent done before. As Tim Ferriss explains, youll need to pursue excitement in the form of bold experiments instead of happiness.Specifically, this article will coverAnticipation (how to use it rather than be destroyed by it)Adaptation (and the fact that you should take on big stuff because as a human being, youll normalize very quickly)Excitement (why it should be the basis of what goals you pursue)Experiments (why you should try stuff youve never done before)Disruption (how youll plateau personally and be irrelevant in any market if youre not continually innovating what you do and how you do it)Here we goThe anticipation of the future is more intense than the future itselfThe anticipation of loss is much more frightening than the actual loss as anticipation leaves room for the vorstellungsvermgen to create that which, in all likelihood, will never transpire. - Craig D. LounsbroughThe anticipation of an event is usually far more emotionally powerful than the eve nt itself. This is true both for positive outcomes and negative.Anticipation is a double-edged sword. On one hand, anticipation is what holds people back from acting and on the other, anticipation is what can move you forward.When you project negative outcomes - like failure - you needlessly torture yourself. Psychological research has found that high achievers reframe anxiety and fear into excitement. If youre getting ready to do something that freaks you out, reframe it. Excitement is empowering while fear is disabling.Anticipation, then, can stop you from acting but it can be the very thing that gets you to act. As author, Peter Sloterdijk said, Faith is purely anticipatory, in the sense that it already has an effect when it mobilizes the existence of the anticipatory towards the goal through anticipation.Faith is a principle of visualization and action. Its when the anticipation and expectancy of a future outcome becomes so compelling and so real that you cant not act. This is what psychologists call, Pull motivation which is far different from Push motivation.Push motivation is a behavior that an individual forces themselves to complete in order to satisfy a need or achieve a goal.Pull motivation is a behavior that an individual feels drawn towards.Push motivation is rough. Its exhausting, depleting, and requires constant willpower, which quickly burns-out.Pull motivation is much more powerful. It draws you forward, and actually gives you more energy while youre doing it.Thus, anticipation can and should mobilize you, rather than paralyze you. Said Napoleon Hill, All thoughts which have been emotionalized (given feeling) and mixed with faith (expectancy), begin immediately to translate themselves into their physical equivalent.The final and potentially most important component of anticipation is the fact that people adapt very quickly. No matter how badeanstalt or good the future will be, it will quickly become normalized. Youre new norm may be unfathom able to most people, and even to a previous version of yourself. But to you, in this moment, it feels like any other day. Heres how bestselling author Russell Brand explains itPeople do this a lot. They dont seem to realize that the future is just like now, but in a little while, so they say theyre going to do things in anticipation of some kind of seismic shift in their worldview that never actually materializes. Tomorrow is not some mythical kingdom where youll grow butterfly wings and be able to talk to animals - youll basically feel pretty much the same way you do at the moment.This is helpful because you no longer need to fear change. All change quickly becomes your norm. Hence, you need to continually disrupt yourself because homeostasis creates apathy and lack of stimulation.Humans normalize very quicklyYes, a man can get used to anything, but do not ask us how. - Viktor FranklViktor Frankl wrote one of the most important books in the past century, potentially in the past mi llennial - Mans Search For Meaning.In the book, Frankl describes his experience as a victim of the Nazi Concentration camps. What surprised Frankl most was how quickly the shock and horror of watching people murdered and tortured became apathy.Everyone in the concentration camps - the victims and the perpetrators - became apathetic to the ridiculous and horrible situation. Psychological research shows how quickly we adapt to the roles we assume in a given situation. We then act out those roles without even questioning.The fact that a concentration camp can become normalized is both frightening and also empowering. What it shows is that people can endure far more than we think we can.No matter how difficult an experience, youll quickly adapt to that experience. Therefore, you shouldnt wait to do something until you feel pre-qualified. Instead, you get to work and the very situation will qualify you. It will quickly become your norm. For instance, earning millions or even billions of dollars is NORMAL for some people.What do you want to normalize in your life?Happiness has a ceiling-effect because we quickly adapt to new situations. One of the enemies of happiness is adaptation says Dr. Thomas Gilovich, a Cornell psychologist who has studied the relationship between money and happiness for over two decades. According to Gilovichs research, its far more powerful to seek and invest in experiences than it is to seek material possessions. Said GilovichPeople think the experience will come and go in a flash, and theyll be left with little compared to owning an item. But in reality we remember experiences long afterward, while we soon become used to our possessions. At the same time, we also enjoy the anticipation of having an experience more than the anticipation of owning a possession.Its powerful to stop pursuing final destinations and instead pursue experiences and growth. The problem with end-points or finish-lines is that youll quickly adapt. This is one of t he reasons people who attain a desired goal quickly plateau and lose their purpose. Greg Mckeown in the book, Essentialism, has said, Success is a catalyst for failure.Success, therefore, should not be a destination, but instead, an approach to life. Youre successful so long as youre following YOUR OWN curiosity and pushing YOUR OWN boundaries.The opposite of success is trying to beat someone else. This is also the opposite of innovation. Disruption is about walking away from competition rather than engaging in it. Said Billionaire Peter Thiel in his book, Zero To One, All failed companies are the same they failed to escape competition.Excitement is your super-powerExcitement is the more practical synonym for happiness, and it is precisely what you should strive to chase. It is the cure-all. - Tim FerrissKey things to avoid if you want an amazing lifeCompeting with other peopleSeeking end-points or outcomes as the ultimate source of successSeeking possessions to make you happyContin uing to do the same things for long periods of timeNot pushing your creative boundariesNot stepping into fear and disrupting your own status-quo and the status-quo of those around youExcitement comes from trying stuff you havent done before. John Burke, for example, is always pushing his boundaries. Over-specialization can be a path to stagnation. If you do the same thing every single day, your work and life will probably not have enough stimulation to drive deep emotion.Deep emotion and intense feelings are what inspire powerfully creative and innovative work. In order to experience deep emotions and intense feelings, you need to continually try new things. You need to reach the threshold of your current identity and go beyond it. You need to open yourself to new experiences that reshape how you view the world.According to Dr. Stephen Covey, a paradigm shift usually requires a new situation or a new role we take onWhere we stand depends on where we sit, which is a way of saying how our roles in life affect our paradigm, which then affects our behavior Many people experience a fundamental shift in thinking when they suddenly step into a new role, such as that of husband or wife, parent or grandparent, manager or leader.What would absolutely excite you?What ROLE have you been playing in your life that perhaps hasnt been so exciting?What would an exciting life look like to you?What would exciting work look like?What would exciting experiences look like?According to Dan Sullivan, there are two major types of people in this world needers and wanters.Needers are externally motivated, seek security, have a scarcity mindset, and are reactive to what other people are doing.Wanters are internally motivated, pursue freedom, have an abundance attitude, and are highly creative.Sullivan further states, Wanting is unpredictable because it creates things nobody knows about, ways nobody thought of before, and results nobody considered possible.Needing is based on push motiv ation. You have to force yourself to act because you feel you have to.Wanting is based on pull motivation. You let your deepest desires and curiosity direct where you go. You dont limit what you can do based on what other people do or have done.Therefore, you stop watching what others are doing and you chart your own course.You stop following convention.You break rules and create your own.To other people in your field, you come-off as radically creative because youre doing things way outside their frame-of-reference. Youre not even playing in the same game as the people in your field anymore because youve now created your own category and field.Said R. Buckminster Fuller, You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.Collaborating with people way outside your niche is powerful, because it stops you from living in an echo-chamber. When youre too far inside a particular field, you cannot see outs ide of it. This is really bad for creativity. Its bad for business and innovation. And its also bad for happiness and excitement.Experimenting is the best form of goal-settingBroadly speaking, as good as it feels to have a plan, its even more freeing to realize that nearly no misstep can destroy you. This gives you the courage to improvise and experiment.On how to get over analysis paralysis set deadlines for decisions (put them in your calendar or they arent real) and break large intimidating actions/projects into tiny mini-experiments that allow you to overcome fear of failure.- Tim FerrissInstead of pursuing traditional goals, a more exciting approach is to pursue 36 month experiments. Experiments are a fun way to pursue goals because they allow you to get innovative and bold. Experiments are short-term - and thus relatively low risk. They are your moon shots.Why play small?Whats the worst that could happen, you waste a few weeks or months and learn a lot while doing it?One of t he reasons experiments are powerful is because they arent based on what has been done before. By nature, an experiment is trying something NEW, where the boundaries of possible arent clear-cut.Heres a powerful process for developing a 36 month experimentThink about a PROCESS and an OUTCOME that would EXCITE you. In other words, what is something that would be motivating, fascinating, and stimulating to attempt just for the sake of it? But also, what is a bold and powerful outcome that could potentially come from it? Whats the most bold and powerful thing you could do in the next 36 months?Set a hard timeline. Dont make it too far away. The pressure of a timeline is an amazing forcing function - which will create flow and deep creativity.Focus on WHO - specifically WHO could you collaborate with to take this 10X or 100X bigger? WHO could you help that would fast-track your results so you are not re-inventing the wheel? WHO could you involve that would take this experiment beyond wh ere youve currently imagined it? True experimenting is far more collaborative than competitive. The best experimenters and scientists always work with people who push them past their own limited ways of thinking. Moreover, trying to do everything by yourself often leads to procrastination and failure. You can easily get other people on board by turning your experiment into a mission. Explain the WHAT and WHY of the mission to get people committed and excited to help.Invest upfront. A strong forcing functions is financial investment. John Burke did this by getting on the schedule and paying his sound recording engineer months in advance. In psychology, escalation of commitment occurs when you become so invested that turning back no longer becomes an option. This level of commitment will deepen your WHY-power, making motivation and inspiration organic and subconconscious.Block out your schedule to actually do the work. If you dont have it on your calendar, the time will go very fast. If its on your calendar and you put first-things-first, time will slow down. Youll be stunned by how much you get done in a single day.If youre not disrupting yourself, someone else isDisruptive change is the only way to avoid a career-killing plateau. - Whitney Johnson, Harvard Business ReviewAccording to bestselling author, Whitney Johnson, you can avoid stagnation and instead have continual growth in your life and career by doing the followingTarget a need that can be met more effectively.Match these needs with your disruptive strengths.Think about what you can do that most people cannot.Understand that market risk is better than competitive risk. In other words, dont compete against established players (as Walmart learned the hard way, dont try to beat Amazon at being Amazon). Create Blue Oceans by being radically honest with yourself and by following your own curiosity, rather than what other people are doing.Large companies have a hard time focusing on smaller, riskier, and mo re lucrative markets, people established in their careers do the same thing. Use this to your advantage. Stay small and lean and flexible.Let the strategy emerge (When the WHY is strong enough youll figure out HOW - Bill Walsh). Dont make overly detailed plans. Instead, focus on experiments and feedback and then adapt accordingly.According to Peter Diamandis If you dont disrupt yourself, then someone else will. Diamandis also said, In 10 years, its predicted that 40% of the Future 500 Companies will no longer exist. Things are changing so quickly that if youre not adapting and changing as well, youve already lost.Disrupt yourself every single day. Wake up and try something new. Try something that forces you out of your shell. Think bigger. Think more creatively. In the words of Ryan Holiday, conspire. Come up with a crazy plot that no one could possibly expect. Dont worry about all the people who will try to copy you. They will always be at least five steps behind.Ready to upgrade? Ive created a cheat sheet for putting yourself into a PEAK-STATE, immediately. You follow this daily, your life will change very quickly.Get the cheat sheet hereThispostfirst appeared on Medium.

The high cost of health care is keeping people up at night

The high cost of health care is keeping people up at nightThe high cost of health care is keeping people up at nightAnational surveyby CreditCards.com found that 38% of people reported losing sleep because of their finances.Specifically, health care and insurance costs are keeping all those people awake at night,compared to a 29% in a similar 2016 survey.The 2017surveyof 1,000 U.S. adults was conducted via telephone, and has been reportedly been done five times since 2007. With 1 in 3 American adults already being sleep-deprived as of 2016, the surveymade it clear that money is on the brain during some sleepless episodes, saying,financial insomnia is at its highest level since the Great Recession.The reason health care reform.Health care hasnt been such a big source of insomnia since 2009 (35 percent), when newly inaugurated President Barack Obama rolled out his landmark health care reform bill. The recent debate in Washington about overhauling the health care system again likely exa cerbated a financial worry that bugs consumers even in times of political calm, the company said.James Chessen, chief economist at the American Bankers Association, said in a statement that health care costs are one of the major financial burdens people have trouble keeping up with.Health care costs are one of the three major drivers of delinquencies in consumer creditI think its always a concern. For individuals who are living paycheck to paycheck, thats one cough or accident away from creating a financial problem, Chessen said in a statement. Even with health care on peoples minds, other costs are also taking a physical toll on them.Why you should put your health before your billsWe all know that getting enough sleep should be a prioritybecause deprivation can cause health problems.A Harvard Healthy Sleep article highlighted the connections between sleep and disease risk, providing explanations about obesity, diabetes, heart disease and hypertension, mood disorders, immune functio n and more.But the article also made a more morbid point clearData from three large cross-sectional epidemiological studies reveal that sleeping five hours or less per night increased mortality risk from all causes by roughly 15 percent.What financial worries are causing insomniaThe 2017 survey found that the amount of people dealing with this is trending toward levels not seen since the Great Recession, saying that 65% reported staying up worrying about money at night, compared to 69% in 2009. The entire era since the Great Recession has seen a huge spike in financial anxiety as proof, in 2007, 56% of people were struggling with financial sleeplessness.Here are the other reasons for respondents financial insomnia,in descending order, as presented in the write-up.Thirty-seven percent of people reportedthat retirement savings were keeping them up, compared to 39% in 2016. Thirty-four percent reported that the culprit was student loans, compared to 30% in 2016.About 1 in 4 people said that the monthly mortgage or rent payment caused their insomnia. Lastly, credit card debt was at the bottom of the pile, at 22% this year.So what did the people staying up over money do about it? Sixty-four percentsaid they cut back on costs in the last 12 months.Geographic mobility has slowed downThe trouble with money concerns is that they rarely have quick or easy answers. Its not always easy to uproot your life and relocate for a new higher-paying job, and millennials arent job-hopping as frequently assome think.An article on the role that demographic shifts- in particular, the nations aging population- have played in the recent decline in interstate migration by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York sheds light on just how many people have stopped moving across state lines.About 3% of the working-age population- defined as people from ages 25 to 59- moved to a different state in a given year during the 1980s. Starting in the 1990s, this rate declined steadily, falling below 1.5 % by 2010,the authors write, attributing the change to the business cycle.People are losing sleep over money and moving less for a variety of reasons.