I've just finished reading Fish from the management book stable also responsible for The One Minute Manager which is another of my favourite management books. (Don't you just wish all teachers COULD give one minute reprimands rather than the one hour reprimands so beloved of our profession. Teachers just love to hear the sound of their own voices. Why else did they become teachers? Let's not go into the why else territory because there are very few good reasons why aperson becomes a teacher but any number of bad ones that I can think of.)
Anyway, Fish.
Fish is a fictitious account of a manager finding inspiration in an allegedly real place, the Pike Place Fish Market in Seattle. This is a place where the fishmongers have turned throwing fish around into a performance art and as consequently much happier in their work. Hmmm. There are four rules of fishing. The second one is Play. Hmmm. I can't off hand remember rules three and four. The first rule was the only one that made me sit up and think and it was this:
YOU CAN'T CHOOSE YOUR WORK BUT YOU CAN CHOOSE YOUR ATTITUDE TO WORK.
I may be paraphrasing.
Having become the grumpy old sod of the management team in the very two years when I have become far happier in my personal life this made me think. Perhaps I should go around radiating light and happiness. Perhaps I should start thinking what a wonderful place the school I have taught in for twenty years is. So for the last few days I have tried to be really positive and answer phones on the first ring and cheerfully go out to catch truanting pupils and escport misbehaving pupils to the behaviour centre and so on even when it is not my shift to be doing these things but the seniour manager who should be doing them is having an unscheduled meeting or out of school or just nowhere to be found. I have tried to be cheerful and positive and to some degree it has worked. I have felt better about work. As they say in the book:
TODAY'S MENU: SMILE OR FROWN: TAKE YOUR PICK.