Workplace persona.

[Undercoverbanana]

We all have to work. Some of people us are successful, some of us not so and some of us really, really struggle for all sorts of reasons.

In a recent discussion with a couple of friends, one friend declared that it is all to do with your workplace persona. Not who you really are or what you really care about or think, but a persona for your job.

I have absolutely no idea how to invent/nurture a workplace persona.

It makes sense to me though. I couldn’t give a toss about the people I work with or my job. I hate it. But if I could invent this persona, perhaps I could wing it.

Is this what other people do? I have no idea how to get through my working day without a piece of me dying. Do I need a workplace persona?

I understand about taking issues from job to job and it’s useful to recognise that. Having said that I’m starting to work out which situations, tasks and management styles make me struggle more than others - I don’t know if that rings true for you?

Given the floaty, detached, unreal feelings, I wonder if inventing a persona would make things even worse. I’m not sure you’d find it any easier to make the persona concentrate but you could give it a go!

The stuff you do outside of work - what’s different about the experience? Is it to do with not being judged? Or that you get absorbed in it so the focus just happens without any effort?

The fake it till you make it approach does work for some people. It doesn’t work if you’re not really present enough to experience the feeling of things going well and to incorporate that into yourself as confidence. Not sure if that makes sense.

I’m assuming that since you’ve got to 50 and you’re still employed that, objectively, you do know some stuff and, in the right frame of mind, you are able to do it. But somehow that isn’t building up to feeling confident.

Sorry, more questions than answers there. I’m sorry you’re having such a tough time, it’s horrible feeling like that about work when you can’t just give it up.

OP I think most people have work place personae. EG at its most mundane, you've just had an argument at home, the plumber hasn't fixed the shower, you've forgotten to call your DM and she's upset. Or worse, you're very concerned about yours or someone else's health, you've had a final demand for some money, your LL wants you out in 4 weeks time ...The work place persona usually demands and you give as much of a smooth, pleasant performance as you can, or you explain to someone (HR? management) and ask for time out or understanding. Equally, you may be happier in jeans and bare feet at home - you don't wear that to work unless you're very lucky. And you may call a spade a spade at home, but at work you finesse your language so you don't upset colleagues or customers needlessly.

It's being rather precious to say a work persona demands you tamp down what makes you you eg "It's not what you care about or think" unless you are in totally the wrong job. You were presumably hired because of the skills and how you came across.

But if you hate the job, couldn't give a toss about it and don't like your colleagues ... can you leave? do what you want to do? or are you trapped by financial commitments? can you rethink them?

I definitely have a workplace persona.
I don't wear the same clothes, I don't make the same jokes. I make an effort to talk in a calm manner. (=Less hyper. It has become second nature tbh)

I don't discuss certain things at work. There are certain things I wouldn't do at work. And I react differently as well. (Annoying clients, colleagues, boss...)

I think that's fairly normal, tbh.

Most people are talking about personas in terms of the basic accommodations they make like dress, social niceties etc. It sounds like the OP has that sorted given that she’s held down employment for the last 35 years! It sounded more like she was after a persona that would struggle less and feel more capable?

I come across as more straight laced at work and that’s just fine by me. It does mean when things ‘leak’ from my personal life then my colleagues have been known to completely double-take, but by then they think of my as professional and efficient and accept that the fact that my life is more exciting/normal than they’d expected was them projecting what they saw at work.

Doesn’t mean I’m a different person, more that I have different priorities at work.

Example was at my last place I turned up for an evening do in DH’s sports car as he needed the Volvo for something...this was described by one of my bosses as ‘the most unlikely thing they’d seen all year’.