Your job description includes ‘going the extra mile’

I did not receive a written job description until my first day of work. But it wasn’t even the five sheets of paper listing around a hundred responsibilities that now make me shiver. In fact, I appreciated how the firm tried hard to be specific and to clearly define the role, which would, in theory, allow me to know what was and was not within the scope of my job. No unanswered phones – check; I’ll never let a call go to voicemail. Open/sort mail – got it; I’ll triage based on the request and relationship. What makes me shiver now are the responsibilities that include some variation on ‘going the extra mile’.

Other phrases in the same family: going above and beyond. Volunteers to help. Willing to provide support whenever, and as needed. But what if ‘as needed’ turned out to be all the time?

We shouldn’t normalise going the extra mile – doing more than what’s required – because this is ‘responsibility creep’. Your job can’t be everything and anything at all hours. When doing more than your job is built into your job, you are on a fast track to burnout.

Your performance is judged on your ‘positive, can-do attitude’

A line item on the supervisor-feedback form my boss filled out during our performance reviews asked whether I exhibited “a positive, can-do attitude”. Next to that was a scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being excellent, 1 being unsatisfactory and 3 being world-class.

Let me be clear: I believe, in general, that a positive attitude is a good thing. I had such a sunny disposition that my boss said I was “too much of an eternal optimist”. But there’s a problem when this attitude is codified, quantitatively, and written into the record of your performance review. It can act as an emotional straitjacket. ‘Can-do’ might mean saying yes to everything, taking on more work even though you have no extra bandwidth because you don’t want to be seen as ‘can’t-do’. ‘Positive’ might mean doing the emotional labour of constantly editing yourself and putting your own feelings aside for the sake of the team, lest you want to be judged as negative.

Putting too much pressure on employees to have a cheery, willing attitude encourages papering over issues. Because doing the right thing – speaking up for yourself or someone else – might mean risking your job.

“I was earning 6 figures working for a billionaire, and then I crashed. These are the career warning signs I regret ignoring”