Magic In The Office – 3 Sneaky Things I Really Do At Work

Okay…I’m gonna pull the curtain back a little bit and let you into my ordinary life. I have a job. Actually I have three jobs. I write about magical things. I co-own a metaphysical shop, and I’m a business consultant in a very specialized industry. Two of these jobs I really love. One pays the bills. I’ll leave you figure out which is which. Two of these jobs allow me to practice magic right out in the open. The other one, I have to be a bit more sneaky about. But I do practice office magic every day I work.

Sneaky Magic Office Thing #1 – Using Wands

“If you could wave your magic wand, what would you like the end result of this project to look like?” – This is usually one of the first questions I ask a company that has hired me as a consultant. As I interview each person connected with the project, I ask them the same question too.

Here’s a funny thing about that question. About half of the people just answer the question with their goal or desired outcome. The other half nearly always pick up an imaginary wand and swish it, as they tell me what they really want. This second group nearly always looks up to the right as they use their wand. Folks that study such things typically say that looking up to the right indicates a person is accessing their creative process, actually imagining what they want as they use a magical tool to make it happen.

The people that look up and “play” with their wands are usually the folks that have the most creative ideas about how to solve the problems the company has. Coincidentally, these are the same folk that tend to occupy “lesser” positions and are infrequently asked their opinions.

Sneaky Magic Office Thing #2 – A Little Light BDSM

Okay, not that kind of BDSM – Banishing, Distracting, Spell work, & Magic. After I speak with the executive level folk that hire me, I basically banish them from the process. I tell them this up front. “I’m going to work with the folk in your company see how creative they can be. I’ll report back to you in X days with the findings and you can make your decisions from there. Let me have unfettered access to your staff and stay out of the process, so they can speak freely”. Then I give the execs a project to distract them, usually something about reporting or 5 years business plans.

Then the fun begins. I gather various groups of people together and we do spell work. Okay, I do spell work, they make lists, collaborate, show me examples of what works, what could work, what doesn’t work. I’ll say things like “We’re just looking for ideas here. Imagine this desk is a big cauldron and each one of you has at least one secret ingredient that no one else has. What is it that you bring that’s different from everybody else”? Then I encourage them to name the ingredients they bring to the cauldron and literally have them mimic dropping ingredients into a cauldron.

Once this group has created their elixir, we talk about how their spell would impact the rest of the company if it were implemented right now. Then I repeat this exercise and slowly, a multi-layered, multi-person, multi-department brew begins to boil.

Here’s the magic part. The folk that are into it, start getting excited and raise a little energy about the project/spell. They talk about the process and repeat it with their staff. They share more ideas. A creative buzz makes its way around the company. The buzz often sounds like “he’s a little weird, but we totally came up with XYZ solution by ourselves and I think it’s gonna work this time”.

Sneaky Magic Office Thing #3 – Set It And Forget It

Each department has contributed to the spell. Many voices and hands have played a part in stirring this cauldron. That’s when I usually say, “Well, you’ve all done the hard work and now it’s my job to make sure this sticks. So, for 30 days, just keep doing this work the new way, even if it feels weird and you question whether it’s working.”

For the next 30 days, I check in, collect feedback, and build a report for the Executive staff that shows how the spell is working, er… I mean I report back how the changes to the company are impacting productivity, morale, or whatever else they wanted me to do for them.

Weirdly enough, the “C” level team usually tells me what has changed long before I tell them.

What I’m Really Doing

The practical magicians among you already know exactly what I’m doing here, but just in case you don’t here’s the quick magical breakdown:

• What’s the problem that needs solving? (Air – Communication, breath, change)
• What are the actions that need to take place to make the spell work? (Fire – Action, inspiration, change)
• What is blocking the flow and how do we navigate around it/through it? (Water – Flow, ease, change)
• How do we make it stick? (Earth – Grounding, making it part of our blood, breath, and bone, knowing it has already changed)

Someone asked me once, at the end of a project, if I was a magician because I must have worked magic to get the project done on time and so successfully. “Nah! If I were a magician, I’d convince you to pay me more”, I said with a wink and a grin.

I got an extra bonus from them 🙂 True story!