Thursday, July 6, 2017

About Crazy Days and Rope Bridges

On some days I fully focus on discovering the unknowns of our product, in close collaboration with my teammates striving to deliver value to our users.
And on some days I mainly work on company-wide topics like workshops, recruiting, or organizing meetups.
Some days are extraordinary, like going on a two-day offsite and building a rope bridge over a gorge. We had a team of talents coming from very different backgrounds who never worked together before. Still, we had fun, did a great job and learned a lot for our everyday work.

On some days I have so many tiny tasks and topics to follow-up on my desk that it's hard not to feel overwhelmed. Time just flies by.

On some days my team forms a spontaneous mob and I find myself learning a lot, but also contributing my perspective. On other days I work a lot in pairs in different constellations. Love those highly collaborative times.

On some days I hop from meeting to meeting having hardly time to follow-up on agreements, and finding myself wishing to not have accepted so many meetings in the beginning. But mostly they were important and valuable; and if not, we realized we have to make them so.

And on some days I extend the day to have dinner with my team or go to local meetups, to have a good time with awesome people and great conversations.

To be honest: I like the kind of days where I can fully focus on the task at hand the most, when I don't have to switch between too many contexts. But even though I plan for those days, I learned that plans are just plans and reality might be different. But that this is totally fine as long as I work on topics that provide value. Even better if I work on those that provide the highest value first.

Within the last three weeks I encountered all kind of days described above. Some have been crazier than others, but none of them were wasted. I have the freedom to decide myself on what to work on. So for me, it's about finding the right balance of how to use my time to achieve the best overall outcome, trying to do less in order to focus on what actually provides value.

Sometimes I excel at the right balance. Sometimes I fail miserably. As long as I learn something every day so I can improve myself and my surroundings, I'm fine. Every day is different, but never boring.

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