“The most significant tool you can bring to your job is a passion for what you do”

Do what you love and you’ll never have a problem with Monday. Agree or disagree?

Agree.

I’ve been in places where I was treated well, the pay was great, and the company’s mission was meaningful, but since I didn’t enjoy the actual nature of the work, I trudged into the office with a sense of gloom hanging over me. I’m blessed to have since found stimulating work that I love.

Doing what I love doesn’t mean there are no challenges or that I get paid merely to be in a state of bliss. I work hard and carry a lot of responsibility. There are days when I don’t feel like working and times when I wonder what I’ve gotten myself into. There are frustrations with clients, and struggles with hitting targets. But this is true in every industry and in every role. The difference is that when you’re doing what you love — and equally important, in an environment where you love to be — you can weather the challenges and acknowledge that there’s no gain without pain. You work hard, but you don’t burn out.

Bottom line: If you’re looking for entirely stress-free, obligation-free Mondays, you’ll need to win the lottery or rob a bank (preferably the former). But if you’re lucky enough to do what you love in a supportive, healthy, growth-oriented environment, the inevitable challenges will be an invigorating — rather than crushing — part of the climb.

—Rachel Grunbaum, Growth Strategist, Fluex Media

Agree and disagree.

No matter how much you love your job, Mondays have a bad rep for a reason — they are hectic days, and there are often fires to put out. But when you love what you do, Tuesday will be there before you know it.

—Yisroel Leiner, Vice President, Meridian Capital Group

Agree.

The most significant tool you can bring to your job is a passion for what you do. Enjoying your workmates and work atmosphere creates a pleasurable environment.  A passion for the kind of work you’re doing and a sense of accomplishment are integral to feeling fulfilled and not stressing Mondays.

Though weekends are for recharging, setting aside time to plan your weekly objectives smooths the transition from weekend to weekday.  Coming into Mondays with a plan of action and clearly defined goals of what you want to accomplish will guarantee that your Mondays will be different.

—Yossi Schuck: Partner, Bernath & Rosenberg, CPAs and Wealth Advisors

Agree for the most part.

Doing what you love is critical. Aside from job satisfaction, it’s also a key piece to being effective at your job. Loving what you do will make you a better teammate and will encourage you to go the extra mile when needed. That being said, as much as you love what you do, it’s still “work” and can’t compete with whatever your weekend routine is, which usually has a recreational and family component to it.

—Ben Kurland, CEO, Allaire Health Services

Agree.

When you love what you do, you look forward to doing it again. Not only don’t I dread Mondays, I look forward to them. It’s the start of another business week in which I can hopefully accomplish my dreams.

—Joel Lieberman, President and CEO, Mint Capital

Inbox Arrangements

David Singer, Founder, Calloway Capital, shares tips for keeping an organized inbox so emails don’t fall through the cracks

MY email is my sales force, my lead book, my pipeline tracker — it’s my everything. Organizing it properly is essential for my business. I find that a cluttered inbox causes things to fall through the cracks, so I’ll only leave the to-do emails in it. I typically leave the office with fewer than five emails in my inbox.

There are sophisticated apps such as Slack or Monday.com, but those apps usually send me right back to my Outlook, so I just focus on creating the right folders and subfolders to keep my emails organized.

Once I’m confident that someone on the chain is on top of something, and that no further reply is needed from me, I’ll put it in the appropriate folder. Throughout the day, I’ll repeatedly scan those folders to see if something needs to get done, but otherwise I’ll focus on my inbox and the tasks and inquiries that are waiting there for me.

Before leaving the office, I scan my sent emails and make sure someone isn’t ignoring me 🙂

I never delete an email unless it’s spam. Everything goes into an appropriate folder so it can be found later on.

If an email needs to stay in my inbox, I will move the rest of the thread into the folder and only leave the last response that needs to be dealt with.

I use flags for emails that I want out of the way, but need to be revisited. This way they show up on the side of my Outlook so I can eyeball them every day.

If I’m firing off emails over the weekend and I’m afraid they’ll get lost in less-organized people’s inboxes, I’ll flag all the sent emails that I need to stay on top of.

An important tool for me is the calendar. Everything I do gets put on my calendar — conference calls, meetings, closings, deadlines, and of course, simchahs. Throughout the day, and definitely at the beginning of the day, I’ll review my schedule and make sure everything is there.

Keep It Clear

I believe 90 percent of all workplace stress stems from miscommunication — between coworkers, between managers, at all levels of the company. Almost no environment is immune to this.

The only way to deal with this is to over-communicate. Communicate everything — every thought and feeling. Don’t give hints. Don’t expect people to understand things on their own. Don’t think, “This is so simple — why don’t they get it?” Assume no one gets anything on their own.

If you want to say something, say it. Say it clearly, say it respectfully, but say it precisely. You feel somebody is not doing his share of the work or is taking advantage of others? Say it. You might get an explanation that changes your feelings. You might be able to fix the situation. A lot of problems could be avoided by just talking about them.

Joel Freund, Founder and CEO at Fluex Media

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 930)