Why You’re Doing Everyone Else’s Job (And How It Creeps Up on You)

Ever noticed how the most capable managers end up drowning in work that isn’t theirs? This episode of A Job Done Well dives into the maddening cycle of overworked employees who absorb tasks like a sponge—only to realise they’ve become the bottleneck, the scapegoat, and the office’s unofficial problem-solver. Jimmy Barber and James Lawther dissect why good managers fall into this trap: the ego boost of being the "heavy lifter," the fear of short-term chaos, and the delusion that this time the extra effort will be appreciated.

From budgeting processes that mysteriously become your job forever to stepping in for incompetent bosses, they expose the absurdity of corporate "reward" systems where doing a great job just means more work. But it’s not all doom—there’s a way out. The duo offers sharp, practical advice: pause before saying yes, make the invisible work visible, and resist the urge to rescue everything. Because let’s face it, if the world falls apart without you, you’ve already failed.

Five key points:

• Capable managers absorb work like a black hole—because no one else will (or can).
• The "hero complex" feels good in the short term, but it’s a one-way ticket to burnout.
• Once you do it once, it’s yours forever—(welcome to the budgeting process).
• The opportunity cost of being the office fixer: your actual job suffers.
• The solution? Be intentional, teach others, and ask: What’s in it for me?

Transcript

Speaker 4 0:03

Hello, I'm James. Hi, I'm Jimmy and welcome to a Job Done Well, the podcast that helps you improve your performance enjoyment at work.

James 0:15

Hello. What we're talking about today, then?

Jimmy 0:17

Today we're gonna talk about why capable managers gradually absorb work that just isn't theirs, it's really costing you and your teams, and how to break the cycle and stop. Accumulating work without becoming that person you know, the unhelpful, negative one.

James 0:35

I have never been accused of accumulating work mate.

Jimmy 0:37

No. But I bet you've looked at your to-do list and thought some of it actually

James 0:43

Well, this is very true. That is very true. I was gonna make a gag about capable managers.

Jimmy 0:49

Ah,

James 0:49

Very good. I was surprised you didn't get in there first.

Jimmy 0:53

But you've looked at your to-do list, and I bet you found slides that you've gotta present to someone that don't make any sense, a tsunami of emails that you didn't ask for. You can have project meetings that you've been invited to, and somehow you are the bottleneck and you are the problem for all of

James 1:12

very true, and it just is, keeps going. I mean, if I look at my to do list today, if I'm honest, I'm gonna finish this call. There's an article that I have to write. For somebody, which I promised I'd write and only 'cause I promised I'd write it for 'em. It's not something that's gonna make a damn of difference to me at all. So, yeah, it keeps coming.

Jimmy 1:30

So,, that's what we're gonna talk about, why good managers slowly become the most overworked person in an organization. It's incredibly hard to stop once it starts. And now, James, tell me, apart from your today experience in your post corporate life, when, when have you felt like that you were accumulating work that wasn't yours?

James 1:51

Well, interestingly, at this precise moment in time, I'm busy batting off work that isn't mine. I'm involved with a nonprofit and

Jimmy 2:00

Yeah.

James 2:01

I get involved in conversations and they would love me to be more involved and there's a part of work that needs to be done and nobody's putting their hands up for it. And you can see the guys that are willing me to put my hand up for it. But I'm just thinking to myself, if I put my hand up for that, I won't be able to do something else. But it is so, so easy just to get sucked into stuff.

Jimmy 2:23

Therein lies one of the problems, James, is it's easy to get sucked in. You

James 2:29

Okay.

Jimmy 2:29

you feel good about it, but it's what does it stop you from doing?

James 2:33

Oh true. And once you're sucked in. So it's one thing doing something for somebody getting sucked in, but then stopping doing something for something for somebody that's like renewing on a commitment. So that's a bad thing to do. So yeah, it's almost, it's like, okay, it's like a ratchet. Once you get in, it just ratchets its way up and up and UPS a little bit more and a little bit more.

Jimmy 2:53

It becomes the norm. So your core role might be to run a team, get the performance out of a team, and then you take on all this other stuff around the periphery and all of a sudden that's not extra. That's part of your

James 3:07

Yeah, so let me give you a another example, a more tangible one.

Jimmy 3:13

Yeah.

James 3:13

dim and distance I was responsible for capacity management for a large contact center organization. And of course, capacity management is very closely linked to. The finance budget, particularly for a call center operation. 'cause all your money goes on labor, right? The number of people you've got really dictates what your budget is. And the finance guys were just. Well they're accountants. They, they don't see it that way. They were just sort of faffing about with the budgeting process and everybody in the operation was getting really irate about this and I just stuck my hand up and I said, oh, give it me, I'll sort it out. 'cause actually a pro budgeting is just a process, right? You do this, you do this, you do this. And we were providing 80% of the data anyway, so it kind of, sort of made sense for me to run the budgeting process. No, I put my hand up for a one year and it was a bit of a pain in the ass, but we did it. But of course, the next year, oh, James, you do that, don't you?

Jimmy 4:09

Yeah, it's

James 4:09

Yeah. Well, nothing to do with the flipping job. I'm not qualified to get five accountant. Budgeting is nothing to do with me, but I put my hand up for it. And consequently I was yeah, tired with that brush until I left that organization.

Jimmy 4:22

My couple of examples of this is once, the CEO of the organization asked me to run a project across their UK business. And, you know, I felt good, it was absolutely nothing to do with my core role, wanting me to do it, it turned out to be an absolute thankless task. Nobody, appreciates the fact you're going above and beyond. Nobody appreciates the fact that you're stepping out outside of your core role. Nobody appreciates you're trying to help and you're probably not being paid anything for that. All I got was like mountains of absolute shit for months trying to knit together. It was like

James 4:58

Yeah.

Jimmy 5:00

The other example I had was in one organization, I was running all of the operations and tech and data functions and stuff like that. Stuff that I've done many, many times. But I've done a good job anyhow. They had problems in their marketing and brand space. can barely spell

James 5:18

Yeah.

Jimmy 5:18

brand James. Anyhow, I was asked to look after those and try and help fix the problems. Now, took them over, the team. The team were absolute

James 5:28

Yeah.

Jimmy 5:29

you know, gave them the, gave them the support for them to use their expertise, and they fixed the, fixed the problems. There was no appreciation that I'd taken it on and sorted it out. So that's one of the problems I think often occurs is there's a lack of appreciation for the efforts you do outside your core

James 5:48

Yeah, and I think, well, another reason why we take stuff up is when you feel the pain. And somebody else isn't fixing it. So let me give you an example of that. So going back, it's out. Same organization. I was doing this capacity management job and one of the systems fell over, right? And this was fairly core system and it just screwed us up endlessly. And it was just driving thousands, thousands of calls into the contact center because it was driving thousands of calls into the contact center. They're all bitching at me. The forecasting is wrong. The forecasting is wrong. The forecast wasn't bloody wrong at all. It was the fact that this flipping system had fell on over. So guess which Muppet stuck his hand up to coordinate the effort? So you get this system back up and running and I knew nothing about it. Absolutely nothing. Yeah. As far as I was concerned, it was a question of going, switching the damn thing off and switching it back on again. Yeah. 'cause it was causing me pain and I stuck my hand up to fix it. So it is very easy to attract that type of stuff. And do, you know, there is a little bit of, it plays to your ego when you're doing it. You feel good about yourself. I'm a hero, but it doesn't necessarily help you.

Jimmy 6:52

Yeah. But you do have that he hero complex, don't you? That that plays in. The other one that I'd pull out, that happened, well, I say happened to me that I would definitely been guilty of was you often end up. Compensating for your bosses inadequacies. So, I used to do this in

James 7:12

What, which bus are we talking about?

Jimmy 7:14

no, no, I was talking

James 7:15

Oh, sorry.

Jimmy 7:16

like

James 7:16

You were compensating for your boss.

Jimmy 7:18

no, people would, comp would compensate

James 7:20

Oh, for your, sorry. Oh no, I remember this well.

Jimmy 7:23

Yeah, you would've

James 7:24

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

Jimmy 7:25

But I would surround myself with people who were very good at things that I was less good at. and that, meant that I would put on their shoulders quite a lot. So whether it was, I dunno, you as n analysts, James, or people that were good at writing decks If there was some stuff that I wasn't good at, rather than learn how to be better at some of these things, I'd lean on others. So to this day my skills on PowerPoint and Excel are poor, because I surrounded myself with people who were good at

James 7:56

Yeah, to the

Jimmy 7:57

I think that's one of the issues.

James 7:59

the end. It should be noted to anybody who's listening to this podcast. I am the podcast help desk. 20 minutes ago I was showing Jimmy how to save bookmarks on his browser tab.

Jimmy 8:09

And what

James 8:10

Yeah. Thank you very much. But yeah, you can yeah. Can get dipped on you.

Jimmy 8:14

So, so we've got lots of examples of where

James 8:17

I.

Jimmy 8:17

we've been guilty of taking on that extra work outside our core roles and some of the impacts both positive and negative, but I think. If you step back, just sort of, it does creep up on you a little

James 8:30

Yeah. But there are a lot of patterns and I think we touched on one or two of them. But I mean, the classic one is, and my, well, both of us had this, right? I'll just do this. The once my budgeting process and your branding process. Yeah. All of a sudden, 'cause you've done it once and everybody, it's like that thing isn't, you know, I need to volunteer to take a step forward and you're standing there and everyone else is taking a step backwards.

Jimmy 8:54

And another, another pattern I think is performance punishment.

James 8:58

punishment. Yeah.

Jimmy 8:59

Yeah.

James 8:59

Yeah.

Jimmy 9:00

Yeah. So you perform well and automatically all the work comes to you. It's like I, I know as a kid, James, did you ever get to do, asked to do the washing up, and you did it really badly, and the hope that you never got asked to do it

James 9:13

Yes.

Jimmy 9:14

It's the same thing. You know what I mean? You do something really well, and then they keep coming back, keep coming back. Whereas the person who's sitting next to you who does a shit job, they never

James 9:24

Well, but this comes back to my ego points. Yeah. Because you think it's good for you. I remember vividly about 15 years ago, one of the senior guys said to me, oh, I always come to you, James. 'cause you're one of the heavy lifters. Oh, heavy lifter. That sounds good. Woo woo. Right?

Jimmy 9:41

He was

James 9:41

Yeah, absolutely.

Jimmy 9:42

your ass,

James 9:42

King size smoke, but yeah, it just plays to your ego and you just take stuff on and on and on. But there is a little bit of what's in it for me. I had a boss once a long time ago. It took a slightly different attitude towards this, and he got a he got a promotion and but he didn't get promotion. He got a bigger job. He didn't get any more money for it. So he said to his boss, who was technical director at the time, he sat down,

Jimmy 10:03

I.

James 10:03

well, you know. What's in this for me? You know, where's the money? And which his boss said, oh, well there's no money, but there's a lot of extra scope, which Peter said, yeah, but you can't eat scope, can you? Which I think is maybe the way you ought to go about these things. But yeah. Anyway, more is the pushback letter

Jimmy 10:20

And I think also the you often do feel, back to my example, you'll feel you feel pressure from above and sometimes you want to help your boss out. I mean, we've been, we've worked for bosses together and we were more than happy to help 'em out because of what we got in return. But sometimes that isn't always the case. You might be getting nothing in return, but you still feel that upward pressure that you've got to deal with the issues that your boss has.

James 10:44

Yeah. Another pattern is I think, almost learn behavior about the people around you because they, they stopped trying before coming to you. So, two examples of this, right? One where I really didn't help myself and Chris, Chris has probably listened to this podcast, was I fair chance. But I remember Chris saying to me I haven't really done this properly, James. 'cause I knew you'd tell me to do it differently after I showed it to you. Oh, well, yeah. Okay. Well there's a lesson for me. Don't be such a micromanaging prat. But sometimes people won't do the job 'cause they realize you're gonna do it anyway. Another example of that, another one, and she won't be listening, but my sister-in-law and I've got three, right? So we, you know that disguise is a little bit safety in numbers exactly right. But whenever there's a family problem or anything like that, she always picks it up and then she starts telling people what to do. And then 'cause she's telling people what to do and getting a bit irate 'cause we're not doing it to her liking. We all back away. 'cause whatever we do is never good enough. Right. And then 'cause of all, 'cause we always back away whenever there's a next problem, you know, well she's gonna pick it up on you, go pet. And then it, it's just becomes a reinforcing loop. So I think a lot of it is we do not have ourselves.

Jimmy 11:59

I think,, yes, there's some good things to it, but there's clearly some patterns to to it,

James 12:04

Oh, can I give you another, well, I've got another pattern. I've got another pattern.

Jimmy 12:07

Yeah.

James 12:08

Do you do? This is me. Maybe this is me, but do you ever get involved in this situation? And you sit there looking at everybody tossing this flipping discussion around the meeting room. At which point I just get so frustrated, I think a fuck sake, give it here. And it's yeah, not helpful, but there's a repeating practice for you.

Jimmy 12:26

Well, it's, it's, it is the old saying, you know, if you want something done, do it

James 12:29

Mm.

Jimmy 12:30

But there is a, there is a definite danger to to that for sure. And like you say, you just, people become reliant on you either because they know that, you know, James will always fix it, or you become the reliable

James 12:43

Or

Jimmy 12:44

which

James 12:44

know,

Jimmy 12:45

it's not

James 12:46

is the case of my sister-in-law, they're too scared to do anything differently. But what is interesting is none of this, that's the bad decision.

Jimmy 12:52

It doesn't, you're right, James, but the impact it can have can be positive. But it also. can be negative. it has an impact on you. It can bring you extra stress, frustration, know, annoyance, extra hours. equally it can unlock sort of a variety

James 13:12

Yeah,

Jimmy 13:13

It can make you feel important,

James 13:15

yeah,

Jimmy 13:16

So it, it can, it's quite mixed in terms of how it

James 13:19

Yeah, and I, there've been a lot of jobs I have been given after putting my hand up for something else, so there is a huge upside to it. Yeah, I think there's just this quite, well, we talk about it a lot, but intentionality, choosing the thing that will help 'em take you where you want to do, which is not necessarily the same as check cherry picking, which is picking up the easy stuff all the time.

Jimmy 13:41

But it's, well have an impact on you. It can have an impact on your job, so. I mean, we've, we've all worked with people who, put all their focus on their projects and, and neglect their core role. So all of a sudden you're there to manage this team and deliver results. Your results are crap. But that's okay. 'cause you're contributing really well to project meetings that you've been invited to. But equally, like you said, James, it can lead you to

James 14:08

Yeah, can do.

Jimmy 14:10

And then there are the impacts it has on other people. So it does, back to my point about I've never learned certain things 'cause I never needed to. It can limit their capability, their chances to learn. It encourages the wrong behavior. But equally, people can, when you, when you're seeing as the reliable one, that can make you quite popular a quite superficial way. But I think the core is James. It's about being intentional, about how you get that balance between, what you're taking on and the benefits and the impacts

James 14:45

it means for you. It's a bit of a mixed picture. It needs managing.

Jimmy 14:48

So if it has an a mixed impact, James, why do you think it's so hard to stop it? Because it is like a, it can be a bit like a drug.

James 14:57

Yeah.

Jimmy 14:58

extra work, the extra glory, the extra projects.

James 15:01

Well, I think a lot of it is emotional and it links to your self identity. We want to be seen as the hero, the safe, pale of hands. Yeah. So I think from that perspective, it is really difficult to stop because it plays to our own perception of self work.

Jimmy 15:20

Yeah, it can give you a sense of a sense of control. You, you get invited on projects because they're going to impact your area. When you get on those projects, it feels like you're gonna have a say, I dunno they're putting a new system or something like that. But It also avoids short term pain. So to your point, I'll pick up this process, I'll fix this problem, I'll do this piece of work because others won't, or it won't be done well enough or whatever. In the short term, happy days. In the long term, it becomes part of your job. Maybe that's not what you were signing up for, but to your example about running a budget process year after year after year,

James 15:58

No.

Jimmy 15:59

you were signing up for.

James 16:00

And it does, there is this thing about you, you feel it's protecting your reputation. And this is different, right? 'cause we did do a podcast. We talked about not being able to say no. But nobody's actually asking you to do these things. You are sticking your hand up for them. Yeah. So it's just it, it makes you feel like you're protecting your reputation.

Jimmy 16:20

And, and ultimately you feel, you can feel valued, you feel helpful, you feel important. These are things that are, you know, core to our DNA.

James 16:30

But I suppose the key question really is a thing to ask yourself is what will, what am I afraid of? Right. What will actually happen if I do not step in? Yeah. What is going to happen?

Jimmy 16:40

And frequently the answer is

James 16:43

Yeah.

Jimmy 16:43

Anyhow, let's have a, a discussion about some of the ways you can. Think about it, some shifts that you can make without becoming a, a completely different person and alienating absolutely everyone.

James 16:57

Yeah. Okay. So I think, the key one for me, and we've talked about it before, is just pausing. Right before you pick something up, just sit back and yeah, just pause and take the time to think rather than diving in with two feet.

Jimmy 17:12

Your initial gut reaction will always be to say yes, but the, the pause can help. I think another thing that will help you is try and make some of the stuff visible. 'cause I think one of the problems that always happens is of the stuff that you're doing above and beyond all the project meetings, all of the. know, extra work often invisible to people until it causes a problem. And then you're addicted. And they're addicted and it's hard to get off. So try and make work visible from the outset. Discuss about who should be doing it, why should it sit with

James 17:50

Does it need to be done at all?

Jimmy 17:51

Have those conversations. Does it need to be done? You know, do they need to have somebody at every project meeting, or do they just need to have a point of contact that they can come and talk

James 18:01

Yeah. Another one for me, I is just try to resist the urge to rescue everything. Yeah. And when something comes to you, just sit back and ask what has been done so far, rather than saying, we need to do this, it's almost like returning the problem to people.

Jimmy 18:17

Just on that rescue point, we, we often do, we love to be a rescuer, don't we?, It's like I want to be the person that fixes, I want to be the person that saves the

James 18:27

Mm.

Jimmy 18:27

It's back to that hero complex, which in the short term feels really good. It's a big hit of dopamine, but in the long term, it can absolutely your performance.

James 18:40

Another one that comes to me is that you think you're being helpful, but that's not necessarily the case.

Jimmy 18:49

It's the old saying, isn't it, James? About teaching someone to fish.

James 18:53

Yeah, go on.

Jimmy 18:53

Rather than just do the job for them, show them how to do it. So then next time round they can do it themselves? Or do you just keep doing it yourself every year? Did you have someone from finance in your process that you could teach how to run the process themselves? Or did you just keep running it every year yourself?

James 19:14

and there's an interesting point, right, because. But you know, helping could just as equally mean pissing people off. 'cause I'm sure with the benefit of hindsight, there were people in finance thinking, what the heck is he doing? Jumping up and down on our budgeting process. We should be doing that. Yeah. So just being conscious of actually helping and picking stuff up. Not everybody's gonna thank you for it.

Jimmy 19:37

And the example I gave where the CEO had asked me to project across the uk, nobody wanted, nobody wanted the project, right? And by default, nobody wanted me,

James 19:47

Okay.

Jimmy 19:48

So. All I did was put myself in a position unwittingly, put myself in a position where I was making myself incredibly unpopular.

James 19:57

I think the other thing I was touched on as well is just think about the opportunity costs, right? And focusing what's really important to you, right? Because if there's a pile of something that's really smelly and brown, right? Nobody is going to stop you from. Cleaning it up, right? They'll all be very grateful that you code it up. But that does come at an opportunity cost. What could you have been doing instead? So I, yeah, that will be a, a key thing for me.

Jimmy 20:22

Well, to, to quote you from a previous episode, James, every, every yes is a no to something else. And often in this sort of stuff, the no is, are you focusing on your core role? Are you getting a great job out of the team, the unit? Operation you're responsible for.

James 20:41

Have you ever heard, I can't remember, some, some American sort of business scientist type, professor type person, but they talk about givers, takers, and matches, givers, takers, and matches.

Jimmy 20:55

I'm intrigued, James, but I'm worried about the avenue

James 20:58

Well, sorry, not like that. It's not so the theory is there are three types of people. There are people who always give, they give of their time. They, you know, constantly helping us. There are people who always take, we've met a couple of those as well, who will always just take, take, take, take, take. But most of us actually aren't givers or takers. What we are is we're matches. So if a giver gives to you, you'll give back. And if a taker takes from you. Pretty soon get upset about that and you start taking that. The theory goes right, that if you are, you think in the short term the takers always win 'cause they're taking, but because most people are matches, if you start taking, yeah, very soon you find that people are taking from you. And that's a bit of a zero, some or worse game. It is the givers who run the risk of suffering if they're always giving because they just keep giving. But actually the trick is to be very selective about where you're gonna help. So let me give you an example. Hey a friend of ours, he was on the podcast, Andy, Andy Warren is just a great network. He always knows somebody who can help you. Always, right? What would be a problem is he'll find somebody for you. And he's very generous with that. He'll always give you the name of contact, so he is always giving, but that's his all. He'll give, he won't run the project for you. He won't run you to your spreadsheet. He won't, you know, write you a memo, but he will give you the name of people. 'cause actually the giving the name of the Pearson is invariably very valuable to the person who hasn't got the name, but to Andy know spouses of people. It's, it's nothing to him. So just be selective about what you are giving. And then of course, get those people matching and give back.

Jimmy 22:32

So in this example of, getting overloaded and taking on work, the givers are the people who just take, take, take the work off you, you know, so you're always, you are always saying yes, always. But actually the art I think you're talking about is yeah, take on the work when the cost to you is very low and the return

James 22:54

Yeah. So for example, alright, so we just about it. But I love playing with numbers. I enjoy analysis. Right? Very happy. Always. If somebody's got a bit of a problem with data to have a look at it because actually for me's,

Jimmy 23:07

Yeah.

James 23:08

very easy. I enjoy it. B, I'm good at it, right? Whereas for people who can't do it, then it's it's incredibly valuable, right? As opposed to me. Sticking my hand up to do a project. Well, I can do it well for God's sake. It sucks the life out of me. So stick your hand up for the things that you're good at and you enjoy doing, and don't take a lot of effort.

Jimmy 23:27

I am glad you clarified that, James, when you started talking

James 23:30

I don't wanna know what you were thinking. I don't wanna know what you think. This is obviously a North London thing going on here, isn't it?

Jimmy 23:36

no, I thought you were going down, a sexual avenue followed by a trendy drink. Apart, from how you go about tackling some of the these issues practically. I do think the other thing is changing how you think about this, because otherwise,, you just get in this cycle of, I'm taking on work, I'm taking on work, I'm taking on work, and you take the burden yourself. And you get none of the credit for it. Your core role slips and then all of a sudden you're getting knocked for

James 24:05

Yeah.

Jimmy 24:06

So I think changing how you think about this is important and, just remembering that, the, the job isn't just to be the most useful person, it is to build a team around you and build organizations around you that doesn't need you

James 24:24

Well. 'cause if it needs you for everything. Yeah. If it needs you for everything, it's gonna fail. There's a problem.

Jimmy 24:29

So I think shifting that, thinking from I'm the core, I'm the hub, I'm the center of everything to actually, I'm here to make an environment that makes these people successful. That kind of flips it on its

James 24:42

Yeah,

Jimmy 24:42

Apart, apart from changing how you think about things, I think, just thinking about. your point, the balance and are you being intentional about the, what you're taking on? So are you focused on your core job and you're getting value out of the extras that you take on? Are you getting to the right level of support with your team? But they're not becoming dependent on you. So I think it is always being intentional about the balance so that you can get some of those upsides that we mentioned about kinda reputation. Promotion, all the rest of it without the downsides of impacts on performance and

James 25:18

Yeah. And what I'd say just build on that. I mean, what does good look like? Right? Does good look like you doing everything or does good look like you teaching other people to do it? Yeah.

Jimmy 25:27

And, certainly when I started out on my career, to me, good look like me being able to do everyone else's jobs better

James 25:33

yeah.

Jimmy 25:34

and then quickly I realized that wasn't sustainable, but. Then as you go further through your career we would have a view that good for us looks like our ability to teach

James 25:46

Yeah. No, absolutely. And so a similar related point. I came to the point. With teams of people where actually the most powerful thing was not to say to people, this is what you need to do, or I will do this, but actually to say just, well, how can I help? Because actually by saying, how can I help? You'll find that there are a lot of people who are all over it, like a bad rash anyway, and they don't want your help. They'll say, yeah, it's alright. We'll sort you out. Thank you very much.

Jimmy 26:19

Yeah. On a similar vein, when you step back and let people get on with it. And like you say, give them the help they need. But when you, and get on with it, does the world actually fall in I dunno if you remember, there was time when I was sent away on some exec course and all the team had to step up and be much more independent and own, really own their space. Anyhow, when I finished the course and I came back, everyone was like, yeah, don't, don't come back into my space now. You know, we don't, we don't need you to step back into. It so I, I could leave everyone to get on with it, So the fact is, stepping back, everyone did a better job than me with me breathing over their shoulders. So when I came back, I left. Let everyone carry on.

James 27:03

I do remember it was good.

Jimmy 27:06

Yeah.

James 27:07

So go on and summarize that. Then the dangers of taking on too much work.

Jimmy 27:12

So I think it happens to everyone, and it happens by stealth, and it happens from a place of good intentions. You wanna be helpful, you wanna be important, but often it does get in the way of either you or your team or others delivering on their core role.

James 27:32

and just to pile in there, we talked about intentionality. But being really clear in your mind what your core role is and what is important to you, I think is really important.

Jimmy 27:43

We discussed some practical and some changes around mindset that can help you manage it and not get sucked into everything. But to your point, it is all about being intentional and getting the value out of work. And not just always putting back and always taking on new stuff.

James 28:03

Very good. Just one other point I need to make. If you send this to my sister-in-law, I, I am gonna fucking kill you

Jimmy 28:10

Well I'll send it to all

James 28:11

just to be on the safe side. Yeah.

Jimmy 28:13

just to be on the safe

James 28:14

Make sure you get your bases covered.

Jimmy 28:17

Exactly. So hopefully this, episode has kind of resonated with you, give you some food for thought, maybe giving you some ideas for how you can manage your workloads slightly differently. And if you see anyone around you struggling with that, pass the podcast onto them. Alright, thanks

James 28:34

Super. Speak to you later. Cheers now.

Speaker 2 28:36

We cover a whole host of topics on this podcast

Speaker 3 28:39

from purpose to corporate jargon,

Speaker 2 28:41

but always focused on one thing, getting the job done well,

Speaker 3 28:45

easier said than done. So if you've got. Unhappy customers or employees, bosses or regulators breathing down your neck.

Speaker 2 28:54

If your backlogs are outta control and your costs are spiraling and that big IT transformation project that you've been promised, just keeps failing to deliver,

Speaker 3 29:03

we can help. If you need to improve your performance, your team's performance, or your organizations, get in touch at Jimmy at@jobdonewell.com orJames@jobdonewell.com.