I used to dread picking up the phone at to make a work call.
If I had to made a work call, I'd procrastinate until the last minute. Even calling colleagues was dread-inducing.
I've gotten over this dread...for the most part.
But it came back to me this week, as it does occasionally, when I finally got around to making the four calls on my to-do list. All fine until the last call—when the dread came creeping and I sat there, frozen, for several minutes with my mouse hovering over the Call button in Teams. (It used to be even harder when you had to punch in a full phone number!)
And I paused, feeling it, that old dread.
But I made the call.
Just make the call.
It's a valuable lesson I learned from my current boss, who never puts off making calls.
If we are in a meeting and realize we need more information from someone to make a go/no-go decision, my boss doesn't hesitate—he calls that someone.
There's no dread in it for him that I can tell, even though these calls are sometimes weird or awkward. (I know because I've sat through several of them.)
In fact, if there's dread present in him at all, it's in the idea of not making the call, in waiting to make the call later, a later—as I can attest—that can easily retreat and retreat into the future.
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