Write a manual for operating yourself#
I came across an interesting technique called a personal user manual: the idea is to write, either from a simple template or in free form, an operating manual for the object known as “Me.”
Covid/post-covid, remote work, people no longer seeing or knowing each other — and in that context, sharing personal information is said to:
expose vulnerabilities and build respect within a team the idea is to write down key things you want team members to know about each other
The premise is that everyone opens up, shows where they’re vulnerable, and starts to understand and trust each other better.
It sounded reasonable, so I did both — the template version and the bonus challenge: the free-form one. And I liked the idea so much that I found myself wishing every person had such a user manual. It would be invaluable to be able to read somewhere that a particular person considers certain things to be “basic” or part of that much-suffering “common sense” — which, as it turns out, is different for everyone.
This should be especially useful for my colleagues and acquaintances from other countries — a chance to remind once more that we grew up in different cultures, so the set of “defaults” can vary.
The manual itself#
So here it is, the manual — though it might just be a collection of facts. Work in progress; we’ll see what comes of it and whether this is even a good idea. In the worst case, there’ll be something to laugh about in a few years.