Power Lunches

The corner office is elusive. It’s corporate America’s highest honor. To receive one’s private office is to ‘make it’ in some circles. Commanding enough attention and responsibility to require a private space entails decision making and power to decide the faces of all those working en masse on the floor. In this Saturday Executive Table series, we’ll take a look at some of the advice that I’ve received each week from those higher up than me. Whether they sit in the corner suites, or are only divided by a cubby and myself, everyone who has been in the game longer has valuable experience to share, especially to a youngin’ like myself. Everyone has something to teach and something to learn. So, without further ado, welcome to Executive Table #1: Power Lunches.

For some reason, the theme of this week centered around food. Since my first day of work, I’ve been eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which have just about reached their expiration point. I don’t know if I’ll be able to face any more peanut butter come Monday. But, the classic PB&J represents something about the office culture, and understanding the power of the PB&J is essential to fitting in.

On my first day, the team bought me lunch. I entered the workforce thinking that perhaps this is what the adults do with lunch money? I can’t afford this! I still am like a broke college kid! However, I came to find out that the act of going out wasn’t important. Instead, being on a team where work is the center feature of the day, taking lunch breaks is a valuable part of how coworkers interact, and how that builds community. Our team looks for efficiency. Getting as much done at work comes from wanting to get home to our families (or in my case, my solo riding apartment), but also comes from our belief that getting our work done efficiently and well matters to the mission of our company: getting planes safely into the sky to protect people.

However, I came to find out that being part of a team where hard work is the center feature of the day, taking lunch breaks rarely comes into play. We’re so intent on work that we half-mindedly snack and munch on sandwiches during team meetings or project discussions. Lunch breaks for us are often the opportunity to cross one more item off the to-do list, even though we all attempt to eat at a similar time so we're all munching together.

Let’s contrast this workplace experience to another company culture. When I worked as an intern, going out and off-plant for lunch was much more common. Led by a different leader in a different workplace environment, we were heading off to have lunch and commune over a meal multiple times per week. While neither is better than the other, or impacts workflow too much, I found that the intentional interruption of a workflow can be a tactic to leverage once you’re in the position of leadership for a team: Will you be a leader that encourages a more lax culture? Does your organization have room for that culture right now?

In the first example, I’m working at a plant that is growing quickly. We eat at our desks because we’re working at a new plant in flux. We have much to prove, so our company in its essence is scrappy… startup culture. For a while, we were sitting out of renovating offices because the growth around us is happening so quickly around us that we can barely keep up with where our monitors are set up. On the other hand, eating together and leaving the plant comes as a privilege in a company culture where the offices have been standing for the past twenty years. There is more space for communing because the processes have worked out most of their kinks. In one, being scrappy comes with the culture of the mission, in the other, confidence and space for interaction come with maturity.

I think that both represent the importance of feeling like you are part of the team. I’ve been able to assimilate to my teammates, because being in the trenches with them and eating at our desks, together but in-work, has made us all feel like we’re achieving something. We might be at the starting line, but at least we’re here together.

This week, I had a conversation with a tremendously kind HR rep about this subject. He illuminated several words of advice that I’m sure you’ve heard before, but he told them in a way that I enjoyed.

Firstly, congrats on getting your first job out of college. I’m sure that your resume looks great. But in six-to-eight years, that shiny resume that you spent hours on is going to be obsolete. When you get laid off because of a downturn in the economy, or unexpectedly miss a promotion and are just looking for a next step, your savior is not going to come from having a prime resume. Instead it’s going to come from the people in your network ‘safety net’ that you’ll be able to call to catch you. So, when we’re thinking about the spirit of lunch, my colleague couldn’t state enough the importance of coffee time. Buy someone lunch and let them talk to you.

When you’re sharing a meal with someone, often you have the time and opportunity to change environments and enter a space where friends or family might meet versus coworkers. Environment can have a lot to do with how we let our guards down. I remember something I read about our nervous centers releasing enough oxytocin and dopamine to calm our bodies in situations where we feel safe in various locations as well as with select companies. You don’t need to worry as much about who is going to hear you.

Professionally, if you’re an HR rep, someone with a guard down also means that you can build a relationship that makes someone feel comfortable enough to tell you if something is wrong or not. His advice? Jump in the car for a fifteen minute ride. Be a shoulder and notice if someone looks a little off. Know your people so that you can know their baselines, and perhaps maybe how to make them feel better or know what they need to feel comforted. You’re their safety net personally just as they might be yours one day.

Secondly, be a human. Everyone somehow has gotten so divided from humanity with the concept of ‘professionalism’. In my first week as an intern, I sent so many emails where I would change out my vernacular for words that made me seem smarter or more professional. That’s just wasting energy.

In communications, our mission is to be direct and communicate as clearly as possible. Cut the fluff. If you’re saying Mr. and Mrs. to everyone and ‘sincerely’ instead of ‘thanks’, maybe it's time to reconsider that culture and if it actually requires that level of cordiality. Lockheed for me fosters a culture better that I’ve seen in other places because it encourages us to BE HUMAN. Send your emojis. Say “Hey!” instead of “Teresa speaking”. Check in with people. Every element of that culture, however, hinges on how well you buy into it. When people say that the chain is only as strong as its weakest link, they’re talking about YOU, new kid. If people are being friendly and kind, be even kinder. Rise to meet them at their level so that you can raise the entire bar of how well an organization can function as well as how well you can treat each other. Going to work with friends is a lot easier than going to work with strangers.

Thinking about your lunching and brunching, also think about what you talk about when you’re sitting down with someone. Hopefully lunches will be a repeat occurrence if you do them right. Don’t hit your upper management with questions of what they did in college and what their advice is. You’ll learn more from listening actively to someone’s story and learning through their experiences. But consider listening to what might be missing from their days. What sounds like a problem that can be solved?

I had an opportunity to talk with some leaders and just listen to what they wish could happen. For example, employee recognition. One leader was speaking about how she wished that she could better recognize her employees for the great work that they were doing.

She told me a story of how she’d had a boss who was an absolute stone of a human. He was strict, tough and did what needed to be done. He drove his employees hard because that’s what the world asked of him. One day, someone actually found out that in his free time, he was a volunteer with the Boy Scouts. When talking to a troop leader, the employee was shocked to find out that the troop viewed their boss as one of the silliest and kindest people he knew. That positive review changed their perception of him and helped them understand maybe why they were being asked to work as hard, and perhaps that it wasn’t their leader’s fault that life had shaken out this way.

Being in internal communications, my role is to handle how people inside the business get and share information. But how do I fit into the broader question, and as she raised, the growth area of making every individual working feel like they mean something?

She reframed my notion of communications to be this: Communications is the morale, culture and stamina of the business. Yes, being a good writer helps. Also, knowing how to write quickly helps. Sure. But what’s most important? Knowing how to keep employees engaged with the mission when things get tough.

Recently, our team got to experience the first flight of a jet that had been in production. It was all on the news, and a huge deal. But, it was my first day of work and I’d never seen a jet take off before, let alone be close to one. When we all gathered outside to watch this momentous event, some employees were crying as we walked out. Others had their arms around each other as they watched the jet move down the runway. Everyone was hoping silently for success, because they’d spent their last two years working together towards this day.

Those feelings of emotion--hope, anxiety, courage, fear--are human. When you’re a true team, you will feel them together as one. Nothing else will matter except for you and making a goal happen together because that dream keeps you in motion. So, if ever anyone tells you that the way that you interact, or the way that your job does or doesn’t matter as much as anyone else’s, firstly, that’s a sign to find a different culture. But also, if a company isn’t striving to build relationships where everyone understands that they’re in the trenches together, maybe it's a sign for you to step up and be the first invitation to changing that culture. My best recommendation? Ask someone to lunch and make it count.