Prep Work

In a restaurant I read about, none of the chefs wanted to do prep work. The new sous chef spoke up and said she was happy to do prep work, under one condition. The executive chef was not to demean that work as less valuable than other work in the kitchen. This sous chef turned the culture around by showing the rest of the team how important and valuable the prep tasks were to the overall functioning of the kitchen and the successful creation of each dish. It soon became a coveted task rather than drudgery.

I think there is a corollary to restaurant prep work in many of the tasks we do at work and at home. We think of them as busy work or annoyances that must slogged through. But doing laundry and folding clothes can make or break your successful departure on a work morning. It could be an opportunity for thankfulness (that you have so many clothes to fold). Finding a way to organize your files at work could make or break your successful retrieval of material needed for a report or a presentation. Allocating a little “learning and development” time to your routine could prepare you to use new software before the inevitable requirement, thereby reducing stress.