Which Kind of Person Are You?

There are different choices you can make as a business owner, whether you’re a client or a vendor, a per-project freelancer or on retainer, or whatever your particular setup may be. These choices will impact your interactions with others on a job, and that may also affect whether you get hired again. But it seems people often forget, or don’t care, to think about these things. It all goes back to some common themes on this podcast – mindset, communication, and being a decent human. So, which kind of human are you? -- Connect with me @aardvarkgirl on your favorite platform: https://pods.link/aardvarkgirl -- I was recently on a project with a large crew. I had 35 on my team and there were hundreds of others working together to make a big event successful. It had been a while, about a year and a half, since I worked with anyone in person. Being there, I was reminded that one thing I do love about being on a set is that it feeds my fascination with people and how they act. You get so many different personalities, working styles, communication preferences, and somehow everyone has to work together as somewhat of a cohesive unit.   I had some really great conversations that week and someone brought up something interesting about production, but I imagine it applies to plenty of other job types as well. We often bring together these big groups of people. Some may know each other personally or from previous jobs, but many are coming in with no familiarity at all. They quickly have to form bonds, learn some particular nuances, and then do what they do to ensure success. Sometimes it’s a day or two, sometimes it’s a couple weeks or more, but these people work closely together, often for 10 or more hours a day, and then when it’s over, they part ways and may never see each other again. It’s an odd type of relationship building where you get close fast and then break up just as quickly.   Merging so many different personalities can be challenging, as I talked about in episode 59. That was more about dealing with others. Now, I’m asking you to be a bit introspective and figure out which person you are, and whether you’re making it easy for people to work with you or if you’re the one they have to deal with. Are you the one who complains or the one who makes the best out of it? Are you the one who gets stuck or the one who figures it out? Do you care more about yourself or the team? Think about the realistic answer and why you choose to be that way.   The One Who Complains vs the One Who Makes the Best Out of It   I’ve expressed my feelings about complaining here before. While I think it can be important to vent and get things off of your mind, there’s an element of tact that comes into play with how you do it during a job. If conditions are unacceptable, that’s one thing – if you’re being mistreated, put into uncomfortable situations, or something like that, it’s important to speak up. It’s another thing when you just aren’t happy about something and wish it was better. We have to remain professional. If something is wrong, talk to someone privately and calmly and give them an opportunity to make things better. But don’t complain to others and expect the ones who can do something about it to read your mind, and then go at them when things have escalated on your part, even though you never talked to them about it in the first place. All that does is shows the people around a bad side of you, which can unfortunately overshadow all of your good qualities. Nobody wants that.   My main rule with complaining is that you only get to do it once. Beyond that, you have three choices – accept it and move on, find a solution, or walk away. Each has its own repercussions, and I would never recommend walking away from a job just because everything isn’t perfect. And constantly complaining on a job doesn’t really do anything other than make people not want to work with you. To me, the best choice is the one-two punch of making the best of it