Recently, a colleague, Paige Harris, and I were working on a presentation about incorporating joy at work. We were brainstorming about what joy looks like for each person and that each supervisor doesn’t have to create joy in the same way for it to be meaningful for a team. We ended up coming up with characteristics for four different Joy-Making archetypes at work: The Camp Counselor, The Librarian, The Captain, and The Cheerleader. This article is an expansion on those four archetypes! Read through the descriptions to find what archetype fits you best, common pitfalls, and suggestions for your archetype this upcoming year!
The Camp Counselor
- Characteristics:
- Plans activities that they know THEY will like
- Mentor/inspire next gen
- Multi-tasker
- Keeps track of everything going on around them
- Can turn anything into a game
- Stays calm during conflict
- On all the time
- Pitfalls:
- Trying to do too much to ensure a good experience, when something simple could do the same thing
- Being on all the times results in not being able to turn off, so burnout is high
- Sometimes hard to focus on one thing at a time because they are trying to keep track of everything else
- Suggestions for the year:
- Ask RAs what activities or learning they want to accomplish this upcoming year. This often leads to way better learning outcomes because they often have more creative ideas on how to better develop the team.
- Work on one task at a time – decrease the number of tabs open on your computer by half (am I typing this article right now with 16 tabs open? Yes, yes I am)
- Lean into your fun-making skills – what is one policy/procedure training that you could gamify?
The Librarian
- Characteristics:
- Enjoys routine
- Community-focused
- Have specific expectations for a space
- Likes things sorted a certain way and to have them stay that way
- Only operate during open hours (closing time is closing time)
- Appreciate predictability and efficiency
- Pitfalls:
- When things don’t go exactly as planned, stress increases significantly
- Since largely focused on community, can sometimes struggle to connect on an individual level with staff
- May be seen as inflexible and rigid, which can impact how colleagues perceive your work and if they want to collaborate with you
- Suggestions for the year:
- Delegate some organization tasks to the RAs your supervise – maybe this looks like cleaning the shared office space, or managing the staff Calendar, or something else that makes sense to you! Let it be their responsibility completely even if it doesn’t match your vision.
- Practice breathwork when things start to get to stressful – I recommend box breath technique (inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 4, hold for 4) to calm your nervous system and reduce stress or coherent breathing (inhale for 6, exhale for 6) to slow your breath to 5 breaths per minute which puts your body into a rest/digest state.
- What is one question you could ask your RAs during a 1:1 to get to know them on a little bit deeper level? My most recent favorite question to ask is “what do you wish more people asked you about and why?”
The Captain
- Characteristics:
- Go with the flow
- Good at adapting to changes
- Quick on their feet
- Solution-oriented
- Able to keep morale up during challenging times
- Focused on their locus of control
- Accepting of reality
- Pitfalls:
- Too much fluidity can lead to lack of clear expectations and frustrations from staff (mutiny!)
- Sometimes staff don’t want solutions, they just want to be listened to. Or they need to be able to figure out the solutions on their own in order to grow.
- Accepting reality can make it hard to think outside of the box and imagine or create a new reality
- Suggestions for the year:
- Lean on your ability to keep morale high even if that means revamping your expectations to be clear and concise for all. This will help staff to be on the same page.
- Ask an RA when they start complaining about something if they want ideas for solutions or if they just want to be listened to. I have done this in multiple 1:1s and it always helps me to best support the RA based on their response!
- Take some time to reflect on your locus of control at work. What are some things that you can start to let go of or things you can incorporate this year?
The Cheerleader
- Characteristics:
- Relentless optimism
- Rah-rah
- Can rally a group and make sure everyone has a good time (or else)
- Goes to the concerts, races, or other student org events to support
- High energy
- Recovery after fun is important to go cheer again the next day
- Pitfalls:
- It can be exhausting always being the “fun” one
- May struggle with administrative tasks and accountability because you want everyone to be happy and having a good time all the time
- Gets really impacted by negativity and people who refuse to buy in for the good of the group
- Suggestions for the year:
- Plan for your recovery each night after a big work day! Make sure you will be able to have enough energy for the next day. Maybe that looks like a night-time routine, maybe that means scheduling your favorite meal for a high energy day, whatever recovery looks like for you.
- Commit to going to one event for each of your RAs and then don’t go to any more. You can still cheer them on without physically being present all the time.
- Schedule excess time into your Calendar for the tasks you don’t want to do.
Navigating Power + Joy as a Supervisor:
The four joy-making archetypes are all people who have power in their positions and as a supervisor you do have power in your relationship with RAs. It is important to think about what your joy archetype is, but also how joy at work shows up for your RAs. If those archetypes are different, how can you navigate being your authentic self with the supervisor that your RAs may need? When you are creating joyful experiences for your team, ask yourself if this is for the good of the staff or if it is just something you would find fun. ? If it is for you, then what can you do to pivot so that the collective team can find joy – even if that means breaking out of your archetype.
