When Did I Become A Manager?

Here’s a list of things I did yesterday:

• Tracked down the email list that was being reviewed by John, a program manager, and had settled into the mountain of papers on his desk
• Talked to Oliver, the IT guy about upgrading our publishing software
• Talked to Jeannie, the staff member, who is producing the layout for a promotional packet
• Uncovered the list of possible funders that we should be in touch with and reviewed them for Alex, our development person
• Checked in with Canton, a staff member, about the promotional board for the front of the office
• Met with Jamie, a director, about re-writes for a presentation packet
• Searched for tools to use to re-organize our overflowing image collection (15,000+ !)
• Stared at the screen for ten minutes as my brain began to melt down

You will notice that nowhere on this list is the word, “wrote,” or, “produced,” or , “designed.” Somehow I spent my entire day tracking people down, tracking things down, and tracking the status of projects. At no point did I do any actual communications work.

I guess this shouldn’t be too surprising as part of being a director involves overseeing the whole program and making sure it keeps moving toward the goal. But I guess I envisioned at least some of my work involving the act of communicating – writing, designing, creating, producing.

The flood of projects, large and small, that pop up each day, that need to be done by tomorrow, by Friday, by next week, means that management is going to be a big part of my job. I will have to manage the flow of the projects. I will have to manage the people contributing to the projects. I will even have to manage getting my bosses to finish things for me.

Taking out time for writing, turning off my email to think about a design, finding a quiet conference room in which I can sketch out my thoughts – these things are going to be hard to do. I will have to consciously block out time for this work. I will have to intentionally set aside the more immediate, pressing concerns and focus on the creative task. I will have to make my need for this clear to me and clear to all the people putting things in my In-box that they needed yesterday.

This is a challenge I was not prepared for. I kind of like the idea of stretching myself in this direction, trying out the management hat, seeing if I can do it. But for both my professional success and personal satisfaction, I need to keep creative time as a conscious priority and not let it get swamped by the here-and-now.

Thoughts?