How do you do it?

How do you do it? https://www.linkedin.com/posts/antlerboy_how-do-you-do-it-the-other-day-a-charming-activity-7338100669897232385-u_y-

How do you do it?

The other day a charming young couple stopped lll me to compliment my dog. It happens regularly, and I have to say, is quite a new experience for me!

This time, they must’ve had something else on their minds. As well as the usual coo-ing and cuddling with the dog, they asked

‘How on earth do you manage it? It’s such a big commitment to have an active dog.’

I have an idea that they had something else in mind in their lives… but it’s a valid question. Not just about the dog exercise every day.

At the moment I’m working with

— Clinicians who are still dealing with Tom and model injury from Covid and beyond, juggling complex portfolio careers, major rebuilds, target driven top down priorities — we have the power of a massive punishment or reward — massive savings, which might undo all the progress they’ve made inpatient care — and you also have to pay attention to self-rostering and, perhaps, self-care

— chief execs who are trying to push through major major transformations in local government, deal with a collapsing NHS, and try to get their heads around the truth complex these I’ve not just proposing a structure for local government reform *and* devolution, but also think about the actual sense of future organisation-our services can be delivered, what it means for communities and so on. In a context where chief executive of the prior organisations, as councils go to unitary status, are in a role that has to be publicly advertised, and where the previous incumbent from one of the merging organisations is always going to be a disadvantage

— social care leaders caught in the crunch between I put local provision, CQC, savings, failing I.T., and staff retention and turnover challenges

— Senior civil service leaders facing conflicting demands of commercialisation — under-defined — digitisation (under resourced and over-sold), and market shaping, which they have never been trained

It goes on! Oh, how it goes on.

So how do they do it?

I don’t mean the dog-walkers, lovely as we are. I mean the people we work with every day.

The ones who hold complexity in their heads and humanity in their hearts.

Who keep services going when funding collapses, when strategy contradicts itself, when ‘transformational’ plans feel like bureaucratic vandalism, and when everything is urgent and political.

The ones who stay. Who try. Who keep showing up.
There’s no single answer, but I do see some patterns.

Those who are able to swim in the complexity, come up for air, and focus.

They build tiny routines. They know who their allies are. They keep a sense of humour. They learn not to get swept away by every new initiative. They hold boundaries — and sometimes they let them go.

And, somewhere inside, they have a reason.

Maybe that’s the real answer to the couple’s question. Not ‘how do you manage the dog?’ but ‘how do you choose the commitments that shape your life?

How do you manage?