BUILDING
YOUR VALUE AS AN EMPLOYEE
When you come to work every day and really make an effort
to do your job well, you develop a reputation as a good
worker. You build what I call social capital. I think of it
just like regular capital (money). If you have come to work
regularly, completed your work on time, gotten along with
your co-workers, that is like saving up social capital. If
one week your child is sick and you come in late every day
because you need to take her to your mom's house before
work, it is like a withdrawal from your social account.
Your supervisor and coworkers will still consider you a
good employee and feel it is worth overlooking this
incident. Another person never does any more work than she
absolutely has to. When she is late for work for a week in
the same situation, her supervisor looks at it as just one
more sign that this person doesn't care about the job. If
you have been a very hard worker and very reliable for a
year and you just want to take a day off, your boss may see
no problem with your request to take Monday off to have an
extra-long weekend. After all, you are a really good
employee who she wants to keep happy. However, if you have
only been on the job three weeks, and ask for that Monday
off, your boss will probably have a whole lot less
favorable response. You haven't built up enough social
capital. Remember the story about Myrna and the training
course in Arizona. Her behavior there - not bothering to go
to the course, shopping all day - cost her in my respect
for her as an employee. The next time she wanted some pay
off from me in terms of helping her understand something on
the job, I wasn't willing to spend my time because I did
not see her as an employee worth the effort.
Seek out experiences that get you good habits of speaking
up, collecting facts to back up a point, meeting with other
people, getting publicity, marketing. How are you going to
get these experiences, especially if you have never worked?
Volunteer! Every single community organization is looking
for good people. Get on the pow-wow committee. Serve on the
Head Start Parent Policy Council. Volunteer at your child's
school.
Frank de la Paz, trainer with the Spirit Lake JOBS program.
has very useful advice for those just entering the job
market. He believes that changing your view of yourself can
lead to a change in work habits. "View yourself as an
investor, " Frank says, "not a day laborer." Why not? The
image most people have of investors is old, white men in
business suits sitting around a big oak table, not tribal
members in jeans. Did you know that lots of employers,
including the Spirit Lake Casino, will put 3% of your
salary into a 401 k? Think of yourself as someone with
health insurance who has the choice when not satisfied with
the IHS clinic to take her family to any doctor she wants.
See yourself as a successful person.
Being a good employee is easier in a well-managed
organization. Click here to read about how good employees
have been ruined by bad
organizations.