Within the last month, I’ve been promoted to a team leadership / manager’s position.  Within our company, that gives me responsibility for people, budget, and client management, as well as gives me additional opportunities and responsibilities for supporting the overall health and development of my company.  This is exactly what I’ve looked for, and is a defining step in my career.  You’re never hired into one of these positions unless you can demonstrate you’ve done it well before, so it’s a significant step forward.  It’s also a milestone for me in determining whether I have or can develop the skills and talents to start my own business.  All in all, a good thing, though like in any job, there’ve already been a few challenges more significant than just the daily bustle.

Leadership challenge #1:  [can’t talk it about it here until the fullness of time has passed].  Will update later, but is causing me to stretch and weigh commitments to team members versus commitment to company, and determine whether I’m serving my office well.  If I’m not, I need to figure that out quickly.

Leadership challenge #2:  a new company policy came out that is unexpected.  There’s no argument that it’s within the company’s rights to establish such a policy.  There’s some debate in my mind as to whether it’s in the company’s best interests overall.  It’s distinctly not in the employees’ favor, which makes my leadership job a bit more interesting, particularly since I get the copy of the policy at the same time as everyone else and have no more insight into its reasoning or intended application.

Just jotting these down to remind myself of interesting items and dilemnas.  When / if it’s appropriate, I may fill in details for my few readers and figure out how I did versus should have handled these things.

Off to work to see what the day holds!  And reminding myself that there are no surprises to the One who’s allowed me to step into this role.  May my service be useful.

So, remember last week, when I meant to do 16 but only ended up doing 12? I wasn’t going to repeat that this week. Due to various scheduling complications on my part, my running partner and I decided to not try to run together Saturday. Saturday morning dawned, and I was on my own.

Left the note for my hubby on the table indicating when I left (no one’s up on Saturday when I go) and when I thought I’d be back. 18 mile runs take a very long time for me. Headed to the trail.

Long story short, this was an agonizingly long run. At one point, I even had to stop and sit down – like I said, an agonizing run. However, I did every last mile. No bailing, though I did consider it a few times from about mile 13 on… Was weighing how long it’d take my hubby to get there, after getting kids in the car, and how just miserable I’d feel sitting there waiting for him. So, I always managed to push myself just one more interval. Some of them I ended up walking all of, some of them parts of… at the end, I was promising myself beers if I’d finish an interval completely (5 minutes run, 1 minute walk).

When I got home and went to shower, I discovered chafing in more areas than I’ve EVER had. My sports top left its marks, as did the waistband of my shorts, and the seam on my inner thigh. I did use BodyGlide before hand, but apparently either not enough, or it was just plain hot and sticky enough out that nothing was helping. I’ll pay for that for a few more days, but it should be all healed up before next week’s 20 MILER!

Today was planned as 16, but ended up as 12. I overslept: my running buddy was in the driveway at 6am, but I didn’t even wake up until about 15 minutes later. So, out on the trail on my own. For whatever reason, my iPod wasn’t working today, which didn’t help on the motivational end. I had had to change course slightly, because 16 miles is greater than the distance for an out-and-back from where we’ve been starting. So went the other way on the trail for 2, doubled back the 2, and then went down the trail from there. At 4 miles in, was wondering if 16 was a good idea today, and probably psyched myself out. 4 more miles down the trail, some 4 miles from where my car was, I opted to turn around and head slowly for home. Lack of sleep (common refrain for me), and missing my long run last weekend probably didn’t help. On the plus side, our original training schedule only had us doing 9 miles today, so I netted +3. However, going to increase my mileage during the week, and make sure I’m in bed earlier on Friday nights to try to push back to the tougher schedule.

I’m not sure what I’ll do for next weekend: 18 on our tough schedule, or some increment beyond 12. The additional fly in the ointment is I may have to travel on Saturday to visit family, so would need to fit in my long run on the treadmills at work after my meeting on Friday afternoon. The treadmills at work are better than the treadmill at home, but still – a bit mind-numbing.

The Pampered Chef fundraiser was a resounding success! I received a stack of boxes yesterday full of PC items, and then received a check for $182.63 from Pampered Chef in the mail today. That’s my single largest contribution to date, and brings the total raised to $329.63. I’m having difficulties getting the fundraising site to let me enter the “offline” donation, but that fundraising bar is about to take a jump!

I’m still well away from my overall goal, but making progress. With each Pampered Chef order, I’m sending along a thank you note along with an invitation to contribute directly. I’ll also be sending out direct fundraising letters in the mail this week. I’ll ALSO be sending follow-up emails to folks who I’ve sent emails to before and not gotten a response. Persistence in fundraising is key!

By the way, if you’re similarly interested in doing a Pampered Chef fundraiser, contact me to get the contact info for my PC consultant. She was great!