Dinner Out

Jake came home last night and said he wanted to take me out to dinner. Since my back got real bad, I’ve been spending almost all my free moments in bed, so this was a refreshing change. We walked over to this little Italian restaurant in our neighborhood and sat for a cozy meal.

I started talking about my struggles at work. I seem to be one of those people who takes everything to heart. Everything is extremely important and everything is personal. As I explained the situation I’m having at work, he told me that I can’t do everything. He talked about redefining my ideas of what makes me successful at my job. He explained that even if my project becomes a major failure in my eyes, it might be seen as a huge success by my users and managers. He’s right, of course. Sometimes even if I’m aware that I didn’t do a detail in the perfect way, it doesn’t affect the system in a visible way and no users are disappointed.

Working for a corporation, especially one whose main line of business is not technology is as much about politics as it is about building systems. You need to make sure that you lose some fights so the user feels like he’s getting his way even if what he wants is wrong and you know it. Even if I build the most amazing system that functions in the most efficient way possible, if no users use it, the system is a failure. The trick is to make everyone feel like the system was especially built for them while not giving up the idea of building it the right way. One of the reasons I am building this system is cause the two other systems that are supposed to function in the same way were both built with a narrow-minded focus and they are inflexible.

As I explained to Jake last night, one of the reasons I went part-time a few months ago was to use my time more efficiently. In the last four years, I had to put way too much face-time and it drove me crazy. I’m happy to stay at work until the wee hours of the morning if I have work to do, but during the quiet times, I like to leave early and do the million other things I’d rather be doing. I figured that if I only worked three days a week, I’d have more to do on those days and I’d stop feeling like I was giving up my life to make money. I am delighted to say that I was right and my new schedule is fantastic. I get tons of work done and I can take eight classes a week and spend a day volunteering. I get to use my minutes more wisely and feel much more fulfilled.

As a side effect to this new belief system, my ideas of success seem to have morphed as well. Since I have sort of taken myself off the road to quick stardom and upward mobility, I am less concerned about whether others think that I did a good job. I want to do things the right way. At least, I want to know what the right way is and then make it an active choice not to go that way (if there is a decent reason) . I don’t want to work just to make money, I want my work to push me to learn and to challenge myself. Otherwise, I’m back to wasting time. I’m not saying I don’t care what the users think or whether my team members agree with me, I’m just saying that I don’t want to do things the sloppy way. I want to feel good about my job. I want to feel like I learn, like I make a difference, and I want to be proud of the quality of work I deliver.

It seems that’s too much to ask.

Previously? Help Me!