Coefficient of frustration

I'm yet to see a perfect system that involves people. Even if I thought I did it's just because I have not yet reached the flaws.

At first one brushes, it off, "just get on with it" whispered in silence. 

It isn’t the mountain ahead that wears you out; it is the grain of sand in your shoe. — Robert W. Service

Day in day out I sit in the corner watching people work, I'm on a mission to continually improve their working lives. I see handsets getting slammed; emails typed in anger and hands tucked in on the team retrospectives.

Bit by bit with post-its, sharpies, CLDs and Force Fields I do my best to unpick the challenges, but at the end of the day, I can't make all of it disappear.

If you are working with teams and see the symptoms of frustration in the eyes of their members you know what I mean. Obviously, it's all situational but maybe you will find some of the approaches outlined below interesting or even useful.

Don't let it be Tabu

It seems obvious to many that we should just get on with our jobs without complaining, everyone gets the short end of the stick once in a while. The unfortunate aspect of suffering in silence is that we do not only add to the frustration but feel unappreciated and underperforming in the process. Creating the environment where it's fine to talk about how challenges of work, will help enormously. The frustrated person is no longer a slacker not able to complete the seemingly straightforward task. Instead, he or she may be viewed as servant leader volunteering for the job no one wants to do and fighting against the odds.

Battling with frustration is part of the effort

Do the teams you work with estimate their Tasks/User Stories? I don't want to get into the #NoEstimates debate here nor explore the only correct definition of a Story Point, but whether estimation is your game or not it's still important to consider an additional factor. Are the tasks slightly misaligned with your skills? Or maybe they require you to deal with an unpleasant stakeholder? Fighting with frustration is part of the effort, something that has to be acknowledged and taken into account.

Laugh it off

Humour relaxes people. Often the processes used are frustrating because frankly, they are quite ridiculous. You may not be the master comedian that you hope you are, but as they say, practice makes perfect ??

Being cross-functional means teams should be able to take most of what is coming their way; not everyone can be in a state of constant Flow, the coefficient of frustration is a part of everything we do it's time to embrace it.