We launched an employee engagement survey at work today, our first one ever, and a project that I am really excited about. What better way to learn about what is important to our employees other than to survey them confidentially? To collect hard data to learn what projects we should prioritize? To prioritize those things that will have the biggest impact? Over the past couple of weeks I’ve worked directly with the wonderful people at Culture Amp who have been so patient with me. I’ve asked endless questions about how to set up the survey, how to enter demographics, how to analyze the data. Which culminated in today’s launch.

I had some conversations with employees, mostly revolving around whether the data could be tracked back to them individually. I assured them that no, the data was confidential, and wouldn’t be reported for any demographic that had fewer than five data points. I encouraged people to be candid and honest. That the only way we could improve was to know what was working, and what wasn’t. Be honest!

In the quiet of my home this evening, I clicked on my own survey link to submit my thoughts about working at Automattic. I answered the first few questions, then came to a statement that I didn’t agree with. That I had critical feedback for.

And what happened next surprised me.

I paused before answering. Should I be completely honest? Or should I go for a more neutral answer? It’s kind of my job to make Automattic a great place to work. What did that mean if there were things that *I* wasn’t happy with? What if somehow the leaders in the company figured out what my answers were? Would that reflect poorly on me?

Let’s dissect this. I set up the survey. I *know* that answers can’t be tracked back to an individual. I’ve told this to multiple other people. And yet, there was a nagging fear that something bad would happen if I gave critical feedback (this is probably fodder for at least a few sessions with a psychiatrist). After the voices in my head debated for a while, I eventually gave honest feedback, and felt confident about my decision. But that moment of pause gave me a much greater appreciation of what we’re asking our employees to do.

I came across this today, detailing the daily rituals of creative people. It’s fascinating to click on the poster and zoom in on one of the sixteen creative people highlighted to examine their routine.

It made me think about my own routine, how I work best, and how I tend to work (they’re not always the same). I work best when I get a good eight-ish hours of sleep, exercise first thing in the morning (yoga, a slow run, or a swim are my favorites), then dive into work from my home office. I like to have long chunks of time to work, even if I might jump between multiple projects during that time. I’ll usually work until mid-day, then take a  break for lunch or to walk to another work spot. I’ll work for several more hours, break for dinner or to meet friends, then do another hour or two after returning home. Those last hours tend to be my most productive. Maybe it’s because things are quiet (not many people are pinging me at 10 or 11 pm), or maybe it’s because I feel more energized. I typically don’t want to go to bed before midnight. And then I read. That’s my favorite way to end the day, to be transported to another world through a story.

I know this is how I best work, yet it doesn’t always happen. Some mornings I wake up with so many things racing through my mind that I jump on the computer immediately, telling myself that I’ll just do “one more thing” before heading to the gym. And then one more thing turns into another and it’s lunch.

I read somewhere that the best way to be effective is to create a routine in order to reduce the number of decisions you had to make. I’m probably botching the theory here, but it reasoned that you have more energy to focus on work/creativity if you aren’t expending energy deciding what time to wake up, what to eat for breakfast, whether to exercise in the morning or not, etc. I’m going to give it a try. See what decisions I can predetermine, to allow more creativity to flow.