Allow for the spontaneous
Two colleagues I share a bullpen with came into the room today excited about an interaction they had just had with a senior manager. They bumped into him by the water cooler, which sparked a conversation about a workforce message they collaborated on a week prior. My colleagues had ghostwritten the first draft, and this senior had edited it and put the management seal of approval on it. The feedback on the piece from the workforce had been positive, so the senior suggested they collaborate on similar messaging together much more often.
The interaction was brief, but impactful. Both of my colleagues remarked that they never would have known what the senior thought about their work if they hadn’t bumped into him. And without the chance meeting, he probably never would have carved out the time to tell them that he aspired to work with them more.
Allow for the spontaneous. Use the water cooler. Have lunch in the cafeteria some days instead of at your desk. Hell, go into the office ever if you’re a person who never has to. You never know who you’ll bump into. Some (most?) of our best ideas and plans are born in the spaces between meetings. Spaces devoid of ceremony and expectation.
At the water cooler
The Masters golf tournament begins today and concludes Sunday. The big news is that Tiger Woods plans to play, despite injuries sustained in a car accident last year that many thought would keep him from ever golfing again. Executives at CBS are probably crying tears of joy. Tiger’s presence in a golf tournament can almost double TV viewership. If he makes the cut and plays Saturday and Sunday, CBS can expect quite a “Tiger bump” in ratings—especially because Americans love a comeback story.