I do empathize with their plight and try not to be harsh with them. Poor guys, they take it easy till they near the quarter-end or the year-end. Realizing that they still have a large ground to cover, they come under pressure and desperately try to pick an order or two from customers like us. People who call may either be vendors who have ongoing business with us or others, aspiring to build new relationships. While we can avoid or ignore a few calls, we are generally obliged to pick up a few.

Let me describe types of calls that I encounter:

Cold calls: These generally are from new vendors who pick up your contact number and call up without a reference. They insist on a short meeting pleading their case and promising path breaking solutions. A few smart ones manage to slip into the organization in the pretext of meeting someone and suddenly appear in front of your desk seeking a minute to introduce themselves. Their desperation surely kills our peace and quiet.

Follow-up calls from the current vendors: Vendors currently engaged with us use their privileged position to fix up review meetings or to make courtesy calls. The intention however is to persuade us to expand our footprint, use new features or to use further services.

Friends & acquaintances who seek a meeting: Some of these are our friends who would have dealt with us in the past or who would have met us in a seminar and exchanged cards with us. Then there are others who are referred to by one of our friends and they use that channel to seek an audience. It is difficult to say ‘No’ and we are obliged to meet.

Vendors engaged in ongoing talks: They are the vendors with whom talks are on and the assignment could either be at the feasibility, exploratory, or evaluation stage or even at the negotiation phase. However, being under pressure to meet their targets, they press on asking us to close the deal immediately so that they can add those numbers to their tally. Refusing to give up easily, they come back to lure us in the form of special discounts and freebees to close the deal. We have to endure and pass this test of patience.

How to manage these situations

New parties or non-significant salespersons can easily be given a go-by but we may not be able to cold-shoulder many others for a variety of reasons. It may be necessary to grant audience to a few in the interest of maintaining relationship or to understand if there is anything worthwhile for us to consider. The CIO can himself meet a few who he considers important but pass on the others to his managers.

Delegating this responsibility to some of your senior officers is a good way to spread the extra load of answering sales calls. This has three advantages. One it gives your manager a sense of importance as he acts as the company’s representative and gets vendors’ attention. Second he develops wonderful experience of dealing with vendors and also gets updated with the latest technology introductions. Thirdly, vendors are happy for having got a hearing.

All of this saps his energy. If he is resigned to his fate and carries on with complaints, he faces the danger of stagnation. If he wants to grow and rise up in his profession, he will have to break free and find a way out of this daily rigmarole. This is however easier said than done.

1. Take a break

He is to come out of this monotony, take himself away from the clutter and give some time to himself — time to be quiet, to think and relax, without the constant interference of TV, telephone, and the Internet. He will find that he comes back clear-headed and refreshed, and his work time will be more efficient and productive. He can take off and go for an adventure which brings back joy and the challenge in him.

He can take the entire staff on a development break — let us say a team building exercise which has adventure, role play and pep talk by motivators. Being together but away from the workplace, increases bonding amongst the team members and infuses new ideas into the group.

2. Professional development

It is the responsibility of each individual to effect the change necessary to reinvent work so that it has personal relevance. Companies want that employees take responsibility for their own careers. To accomplish successful career transitions within an existing organization or a new organization requires personal motivation. Successful transition can be achieved by a willingness to learn and by possessing a positive attitude. He has to work on himself to add new skills and to expand his horizon of thought and action. To do that he can work on various ways to renew himself:

3. Reading

A good way to attain knowledge is to read chosen books on management, self-development or on technology. He has to ride over excuses of time availability or of not being in mood. I have often set aside one hour before dinner for reading and then it turns into a habit which lets me finish the book soon.

4. Attending development programs / workshops

I have sometimes seen CIOs shying away from developmental programs arranged by their HR departments. Sessions on leadership, negotiation skills, motivation, or managerial skills can often act as change agents and instill renewed enthusiasm into the individual.

5. Requisition for professional short term courses

Many event management firms and management institutions hold short- or medium-term executive development programs. These may be on management subjects, technology, or personnel development but are very useful. Personally, I have benefited from them and was fortunate to get opportunity to apply the learning in my workplace.

6. Attend seminars

Various technology seminars held from time to time present an opportunity to keep you abreast of the new developments and the changing landscape.

7. Join courses like MBA, MS, etc.

There’s nothing like adding new capability. Of late, I have seen many from the lower- or the middle-management levels taking a shot at new degrees either on full-time or part-time bases. They come out stronger and are ready to take a leap.

Blessed are those who keep reinventing themselves and are ready to grace new pastures. No one knows one’s limits and therefore it makes sense to test our worth and stretch ourselves to the extent that we can.

This scene repeats each day and I am so consumed by these routine tasks that I start cursing the company, the environment, the people, the work assigned and so on, but lay no blame on myself. I try to reason and find justification for my actions. I retire for the day with a resolve to complete some of the tasks next day but do no better in the day that follows.

After reading a book, ‘First Things First’ by Stephen Covey, and a couple of workshops later, I realized the folly of falling into this do-loop. Starting the day with a vague sense of purpose, I understood, doesn’t get me anywhere as I start reacting to whatever scene that unfolds in front of me. I am therefore led by the events that occur rather than I determining how the day should proceed for me.

The task list

The best thing therefore is to start the day with a clear sense of purpose and lay down for yourself matters that you think are important to attend to. In simple terms what you need to do is to write out a ‘to-do’ list. Set a plan for the day. Spend five minutes before turning on your computer in the morning to write down what you want to accomplish that day. Be realistic. Schedule time in your calendar to get each thing done, putting the harder tasks at the beginning of the day.

Just preparing the list is not enough; the tasks have to be executed too. Every hour, take a minute to stop what you’re doing, look at your list, and reflect on your last hour. Was it productive? What can you do to make the next hour productive? At the end of the day, as you are closing down your work, review your day and ask yourself what you were able to accomplish. If you have been unable to achieve much of what you set out to do, ask yourself – what will you do differently tomorrow to be more productive?

Prioritize your chores

How we spend our time usefully during the day is the key strategic decision. You may end up doing a lot of unimportant tasks and leave out key tasks because you did not have time enough to execute them. It is natural to pick up simple and miscellaneous tasks thinking that once you get them out of the way, you can concentrate on the important ones that need time.

These include disposing off all pending papers, going through the inbox to read/delete/forward mails to keep the inbox clean and stopping at your colleague’s desk to exchange pleasantries. The truth is that before you realize, most of the day gets over leaving very little time to work on larger tasks that have been waiting for your attention. These tasks therefore are put off for the next day and the same routine gets carried forward.

The task list therefore needs to be split into those tasks that are large and critical and others that could be important but not urgent. It is better to address the critical jobs first and the smaller tasks can fill in during the time available in the day. Towards the end, as you prepare to wind up for the day and are relaxed, you could clear your desk and the mailbox and get back home with a good sense of having accomplished what you had targeted and come back the next day with new targets.