Life is full of stakeholders. Family, friends, bosses, colleagues, neighbours, your energy company, the manager of your kids' netball team. Some are more important than others. My husband, our children, our parents - they're key stakeholders. The bloke who drives the 210 bus rates reasonably low. Unless of course he's running late; then he's top of my list for every minute he's delayed.
Like it or not, all of these stakeholders have to be managed. Management may be as simple as telling hubby you'll be home in 20, so get the water boiling for the pasta. Or it might be paying the overdue electricity bill, lest hubby be boiling the pasta on the gas cook-top by candle light. At work, it might be delegating a task to one of your reports (managing down), getting together with a peer to discuss a shared issue (managing across), or letting your boss know her deadline is way out of the park and that if she wants you to meet it, she better bring in the Army Reserve (managing up).
Right now, my brothers and I are managing up on the home front. We've hit that sobering intersection in life when my 85-year-old father requires what's officially known as "residential aged care". Sadly, my 83-year-old mother's unending devotion and dedication to my physically immobile father is no longer sufficient to keep him safe and well.
He's currently in respite care in a relatively nice facility, where the Department of Health and Ageing will allow him to stay, courtesy of Veterans' Affairs, for 18 more days before the nursing home starts charging its usual four-star-hotel equivalent of a daily rate. For my mother, whose generation endured rationing during the war and wears economisation as a badge of honour, the idea of handing over hard-earned savings and superannuation for Dad's daily upkeep is nothing short of appalling. I don't think it's the money itself, I think it's the concept of depleting a life's work of accumulated wealth - going backwards, if you like.
Of course, my brothers and I see it differently. Thus we're managing up, trying to persuade Mum to consider the sale of the family home, or at least a reverse mortgage on it in the short-term, as an investment in hers and Dad's quality of life. At this stage, I think it would be easier to convince my boss to bring in the Army Reserve. I'll let you know how it goes.
