Every other week, my entire company meets. During this 2 hours on a Friday, various team members present on a wide range of topics. Each time another team presents what they’re working on, or what they’ve just completed, I find both numerous questions (chances to learn form them) and I also see many opportunities.
While most aren’t in the habit of always sharing what they’re doing, I see that doing so would provide countless opportunities to offer help to others and share expertise and insights across the organization. Here’s how it can benefit your company.
Getting To Know You
No matter how good you are at your job, or how well you know the thing you’re working on, there are always opportunities for others to offer insight. Sharing what you’re doing with others helps them to understand what’s happening within the company, even if all they offer is a “Good job.” once you’ve shared.
Sharing your work with others can help to bring a fresh set of eyes into the mix. They may not know your work as well as you do, but maybe they see something you never would. Maybe thinking like a marketer isn’t allowing you to see things that are obvious to others. Or maybe another group in your own department sees opportunities you may have missed.
Opening our work to those we work with (including those we don’t work with directly) can lead to great insights and finding unseen oppertunities.
So, How Do We Share
Sharing should be open and often. The more others know about what you’re working on, the better they can understand it, and the greater the chances they’ll be able to offer insight into items you may be missing. While there are tools to share what you’ve done each day, like iDoneThis, you want to be able to present your work in a much more detailed way so that others really grasp what you’re doing.
Sharing sessions should be long enough to be provide detail about what you’re working on and frequent enough to keep everyone up-to-date. Ideally you’d find time every couple weeks or at least once a month so that everyone is current on what others are doing. Make sure you plan enough time for them to provide feedback in the meeting or to follow up afterwards with any thoughts they may have. Even if that feedback is simply a pat on the back, it’s still huge to have your coworkers let you know you’re doing a good job. It helps build a tighter knit company at the same time while also bettering the work.
Share For Success
While it can be difficult to open up and share your work with others across your organization, the value of doing so may be priceless. By sharing what you’re doing, the opportunity to have others identify potential spots for improvement will far outweigh any fear of opening up. By making time to share and being open to suggestions, we see things we may never have on our own, and create even better final products.
