Tip #3: Emergency Action Plan (EAP)
Here’s the situation. Bossibal Lecture has stopped by for The Casual Interruption (see Tip #2: The Casual Interruption).
You’ve given your standard responses. You’ve done all you can, but she’s not giving up. She’s settling into your doorway. She’s taking sips of her morning coffee right then and there. She’s savoring the flavor. She’s sloshing it around on her devilish tongue. She’s not going anywhere until she devours her prey.
She swallows her coffee in one angry gulp.
Here they come—the evil questions.
If you’re lucky, she’ll say, “What are you up to?” That’s if she’s still trying to maintain her illusion of casual civility.
If she’s thrown that shit to the wind, she’ll cut to the point and say, “What are you working on?”
If she’s attempting to flat-out call your bluff and catch you in the act, she’ll step around your desk and look at your screen for herself.
But you’re ready for this, aren’t you, comrade? You know this moment is all about preparation. You launched your EMERGENCY ACTION PLAN (EAP) as soon as she stepped in the door, when you “saved” what you were working on and scrubbed your desktop clean.
Your display now shows an email in progress, or a Word Doc draft of a report, or an Excel spreadsheet of data in need of analysis.
And you have the answer to her question ready. Not because you wasted precious brain space remembering your answer in your mental RAM. No, you needed all of that for writing.
You’ve written the answer on a Post-It note and stuck it to your monitor.
“I’m working on that Productivity Report you requested, Bossibal, ma’am,” you say.
You can even swipe the Post-It up with your hand for dramatic effect, and show it to her.
Visuals are always better. And the bigger, the better.
If you have a whiteboard in your office, write your answer up on there in big letters. Underline it. Circle it. Contrast black and red colors for ominous intensity to show her how bloodthirsty you are to get shit done, too. You won’t even have to answer her. You can just point at it.
You’re working on work. She can see that for herself. She can practically taste it.