Everyone Has Their Strengths

After being in the office for two weeks now and getting to know who everyone is and what their roles are, things are becoming both more clear and more interesting. There are no dead-set roles that people fall into, however they have general responsibilities. Going off of this, there are teams for each project that is going on. Depending on what project you are on, that is who you will have your meetings with, so you end up working with a majority of the office at one time or another. This creates an extremely friendly atmosphere where everyone knows everyone and is able to works with a continuously changing group. Interactions are very casual where people yell over cubicles to say anything from hello and ask what they did last night to specifics about a campaign they are about to launch or the login for a certain software. This seems to promote collaboration and correspondence so that everyone is clear on what they are doing and nothing goes wrong on account of bad communication. 

In order to familiarize myself with everyone in the office as soon as possible, I began meeting separately with everyone so the they could tell me what it is that they do, who they report to, what projects they are on right now, and anything else that may be necessary. Those closer to my age told me what I should wear and where the best coffee in  the office is. Little things like that made it so much easier to open up to them and be able to work with them easier from the start, which stems from their open attitudes and interactive workspace. 

Because I am with the marketing, there is a lot that I am able to do right off the bat that allows me to use my creative skills and show what I am capable of. It is also a more relaxed environment than some others where if deadlines are missed by a few minutes billions of dollars are lost. I am able to have time to really think about whether size 14 or 14.5 looks better with the graphic that is chosen, and although the sizing may sound trivial, know that it is far from it. 

This morning I was greeted at my desk with an email from the head of Sotheby’s International Realty and his mid-year progress report including his vision and thoughts, and the results from the survey that was sent out the week prior. It was interesting to read about what he believe needed improvement upon in the office. I had only been there a short while and had not seen any flaws because it was such a new environment for me. The one that stuck out to me the most was that he highlighted the importance of more role clarity among the group. It seemed to me that everyone knows exactly what they are doing and what they have to do everyday. He proposed that we hold focus groups to clarify what falls under whose jurisdictions, as well as more meetings with next-level managers to keep communication lines open. 

It will be interesting to sit in on these focus group to see how exactly roles will be clarified, and how much will still be left up to interpretation as they wanted to keep the creativity up and give tasks to those who have the best talent for it.