www.itminddesign.com

I have been married to a wonderful man who I compassionately call my geeky husband. At first it was different calling him a geek because to me geek just sounded really derogatory but he says he’s okay with it because he is a geek. He even calls himself a geek.

We have been married seven and half years now and it’s been pretty good. Yeah, I know, I said pretty good because there were times when we first got married that I felt like I was competing with the phone calls in the middle of the night, the cell phone that would ring in the middle of dinner when we would get to go out and the pager going off in the middle of the night then the phone ringing right after the pager going off. I thought, jeez give him a chance to get to the phone to call but it was what he lived for in the beginning. He would jump out of bed grabbing the phone, of course cordless so he could talk while he walked down the hall to the office he had. I didn’t always feel like I was competing at first though. I told myself that this was part of his job description and it’s to be expected. He was this way before we were married and I just can’t expect him to drop everything because we were now married. I figured it would change over the next couple of months or that I would get used to it but it didn’t change nor did I get used to it. It stayed the same and it actually got worse. When he wouldn’t have calls or the pager going off, he would call into conference calls just to listen to see what problems were going on to see if there was something he could do to help, which is nice and all, but there were times it was a Saturday night when we were supposed to be going somewhere to spend time together. I felt robbed of my time with him, especially since we weren’t working the same kind of work schedule. He was Monday thru Friday and I was Tuesday thru Saturday, so the only true day we had together was Sunday and that was usually spent doing housework and getting things ready for the coming week. Possibly, you can see where my frustrations were coming in to play. Usually when he would get his calls or be working on the problems they would call him early in the evening and I would end up having to go to the bedroom to watch TV or be really quiet with what I was doing because there were several people on the phone with him and sometimes he would have a hard time hearing them. By no means am I quiet person either. I try but every time I try to be quiet, I make the most noise. Go figure. During all of this, which was the first three years of our marriage, there were times that I would step back and take a deep breath to think if things were to change, we may not have had the house we were in and be able to do some of the things we would do when we could. Most of the things we had were due to him working the way he did at the time. We were able to take little trips when we could get the time off together. We were able to go out to dinner then to a movie and have that large popcorn instead of coming home and cooking dinner and having really nothing on TV to watch. I took what I could and let him do what he had to do to keep us going. Yes, my contribution monetary wise was helpful, but not like his. He was the breadwinner in the family and I’m not saying I just let him walk over me because of it, I’m saying it was because of him doing all of this we were able to have a life where we weren’t fretting over the little extras that some people can’t afford when they first get married. Yes there was fretting but it wasn’t the the type of “how are we going to pay the electric or phone bill”, etc..

Here we are though seven and half years later and things have changed. It just took time and a couple of moves in the company, good moves. He no longer has the calls in the middle of the night or the constant calling from those he works with to ask questions. There is though however the one thing he can’t get out of his system completely and that is the occasional calling into the conference call to listen to a problem. It’s not as often as it was but he still gets a rush when there is something he can do to help.

After all of the “competing” as I call it when we first married, I wouldn’t trade it for anything because after a few times that you get frustrated and you want to pull your hair out because they called in the middle of the night and woke you up, you start to get an understanding of the job and like to watch your geek work and sometimes get a little rush by the way he reacts when he does get that problem that no one else could fix, fixed. At least I did. If you start to feel overwhelmed by it, it will take you down and take you down hard. Sometimes it takes talking to your geek to get things on a page where you can compromise to work things out. You may have to page him with an emergency though to talk to him or grab him by the collar and say ‘Look we have to talk’, but hang in there, remember you said you would stand by him in sickness and health, through good times and bad times. Well sometimes those good and bad times take the form of his “geeky” job but remember he’s doing them so you can have a life to do what you want.

Every survey of employees I have heard people reference rate money below #1 as the biggest motivator or what makes employees’ the “happiest”.  I know that some would disagree and that’s fine.  I am as rapacious as the next guy and go to work to make money.  However, I don’t understand how people work at jobs they hate.  I respect that people have families and bills to pay, but long term how can any person be miserable for so long in a job they don’t like or don’t feel accomplished in?

I guess I now know what it might be like to go to a support group and realize that there are others out there who feel like I do.  I was touched by this article I read in the Wall Street Journal.  The title was “A Modern Conundrum: When Work’s Invisible, So are its satisfactions.” written by Jared Sanberg.  The link to the whole article can be found by clicking  Cubicle Culture - WSJ.com.  Several times through out my career I have moments of existential crisis.  I think most people want to be able to see their value and feel that they have left something positive in/to the world.  I often wonder, if I die today, would anyone in a hundred or thousand years ever know I existed and did I do anything to add value to humanity.  I’m not saying that I have to cure cancer to feel a sense of success, but at a minimum I want to give back to humanity at least as much as I have taken.  I truly relate to this in part the article:

In the information age, so much is worked on in a day at the office but so little gets done. In the past, people could see the fruits of their labor immediately: a chair made or a ball bearing produced. But it can be hard to find gratification from work that is largely invisible, or from delivering goods that are often metaphorical. You can’t even leave your mark on a document in increasingly paperless offices. It can be even harder trying to measure it all. That may explain why to-do listers write down tasks they’ve already completed just to be able to cross them off.

I actually do add things to my to-do list so I can just mark them off. I do feel good when I mark something completed. (It also allows me to keep a written record of what I do week to week) 

The team does have some metrics (KPIs) that measure our accomplishments but its hard to see how the company is doing any good in the world. I believe we do make products that make people’s travel process easier but seeing their impact to the end customer is hard.  I think when companies want to improve productivity and want employee buy in on the mission, they must find something for the employees to get behind.  The mission statements are usually a bunch of BS bingo and considered a joke at most places. It can be powerful if used correctly.  Saying that ABC company wants to be leader of XYZ industry and make $999 Billion dollars by 2010 isn’t very emotional to me.  Though if my salary is tied to revenue, I might get teary eyed thinking about my bonus. :)  Seriously, if I’m GE medical and we make defibrillators, then a mission statement of saving a million lives a year with our devices is an awesome mission to create.  I know I would want to contribute and work hard to help save a million lives a year.  Working late seems more trivial when lives could be at stake. I think meeting those people and know the good that is done by devices like that, that’s how IT people working in the “intangible” products get to see their work. 

The goal is to help each company find out how they contribute to something emotional and provide the easiest way to see the effects of everyone’s work.  All of us out there, we work for companies and have to help them find those things, so we can bring meaning, success, and fulfilment to our coworkers.  Until that’s true everywhere, including at my company, I will take comfort in knowing that I’m not alone out there, and others feel the way I do.  For now, that’s enough to help me keep digging for the emotional meanings in my world.

Comments/feedback always welcome.   email feedback at itminddesign dot com or hit the comment button below.

Frederick the Great said, If you try to hold everything, you hold nothing I want to modify that a little bit to say, if you try to do everything, you do nothing.   When it comes to the all the projects and efforts placed on a Technology team you have to fall back to a list of agreed priorities.  I am currently watching my fearless leader trying to be every thing to everyone.   Don’t get me wrong, he is a super guy.  However,  he is going to run himself into the ground and I will need more than an oven mitt to clean up the post nuclear fallout from pieces of what will be left of his sanity.

This is isn’t an article pitching project management or time management. It’s about focus triage.  We are under siege, love that movie by the way, and we must repel borders. It is warfare and we must apply some military tactics.  A fight to the end is being waged for your time and attention by others. There is only so much one person can do and being pulled in to many directions simultaneously is very tiring and unproductive say nothing of the impacts to one’s quality of work product.

Know thy enemy — real time distractions have to be contended with (IM, phone, SMS, people stopping by to talk, etc).  I often have to combat some of these intrusions by just working from home a few days a week. Not that I don’t have a few interruptions at home from time to time.  Also, we are being barraged by “normal” distracting activities such as ill purposed meetings. These are a little more subtle, like having a meeting with no written agenda and the famous meeting to discuss having meetings.  Everyone has their jobs and priorities but we have to focus only the top ones.  I see one little one hour meeting here and there turn into 10-15 hours a week of idleness.  Then there is the endless followup meetings which seem to just become perpetual.

Since I have deemed the year 2008 as the year of “getting real”, we need to cut out the low-priority/useless meetings and interactions that we participate in.  We feel like we need to appease our friends/co-workers, contribute, or be a part of the issues.   We have to stop pretending that we can be all to everyone.  It’s just not real.  But if we choose not to recognize it  or continue to rationalize it we are going to look around and it will be September or October and we won’t really have completed anything but have started many.

We will always get taken to task for those things that we didn’t accomplish or play out the should’a woulda, coulda’s  but if I’m going to get my ass spanked for not doing everything, then I’m damn well going to get beaten for the little insignificant things.

For many it’s that time again — performance review time. I thought it might be a good time for me to review some lessons I have learned. Some of these tips are minor compared to others, but I have seen, been part of, or done most of these errors.

1. It is called a review for a reason

It’s a review — that means if there has been something the reviewed person has been doing wrong, the review is not when you bring it up for the first time. If a direct report is doing something wrong, schedule a different meeting than the review to bring it up. As a manager, you want to lose lots of respectably, drop a new “screw-up” in the review.

2. Watch were you sit

Some may never think about the little things. The environment where the review is done is very important. It must be done in a private place that is free from distractions. Don’t answer the phone if it rings, don’t email or IM either during the review. This is often a general courtesy and respect given when someone is in your office anyway. However, have been in my review, the phone ring, and my boss answer it. That behavior sends that “your not that important to me” message loud and clear. Also, don’t sit behind a desk or table across from the person being reviewed. That layout is often seen as intimidating, so swing your chair around and sit next to the person. It subconsciously communicates that “we are on the same side - a team” feeling.

In this global environment, many managers have direct reports scattered over the planet. There are two things I believe should never be done over the phone — being fired or be given a review. Managers, if at all possible, fly, video conference if you must, but it is critical to see the person your reviewing. I once was given a review over the phone and it wasn’t a lot of fun. I personally do not have a personality that requires large amounts of performance feedback so I was generally okay with it. However, I know lots of people who live or die with their performance reviews. For me it boils down to be a value and respect issue.

3. Two way street

A review isn’t like watching television, it requires active participation by the reviewer and the person being reviewed. So both parties must be ready!

4. Know why; ask why

If you give someone a rating, know why that is. If they get an average or below average rating on something, be able to explain why with specific examples. Also, be ready to give guidance on how to improve that rating. If you can’t do these things, your not ready to give the review. Time for a personal experience on this one. I once had a review with my manager where I asked –as I do on every review — “this rating was my lowest, what can I do to improve it?” and all I got was “Ah,Ah, well… you know…” At that point, I couldn’t respect his opinions of my performance. It was not even a negative rating, it was just the lowest numbered one. I just said okay and played the review out as fast as possible because I didn’t care about what he thought anymore.

For you being reviewed, you don’t get away so easy either (see #3). Reviewees, it is your job to ask questions and understand why. You need to know why you got the ratings and what you can do to improve them. No one is perfect and there is always room for improvement. A career is always a moving target, if you ever reach the target there is something really wrong.

5. Career Path & Objectives

These two items are often and should be discussed during a performance review (see #3). A reviewee should have a good idea of what they want out of their job, their desired career path, and should communicate it to his or her management. Likewise, a manager should seek this out from his or her direct reports and do what is best to help the employee achieve their career path and objectives in line with the company’s needs. Training (internal and external), mentoring, and possible growth challenges should be addressed as well.

If you have any others you think should be added, let me know. Email : feedback at itminddesign dot com.

A discussion with a colleague of mine around career paths made me want to write this post. He indicated that he was always interested in learning new things but mentioned that he would not take a certain certification because it is not down his “chosen” career path. My immediate thought was, “Wow, how those statements must be in conflict.” He went on to say that being involved in hiring at a previous employer, he was instructed to look for a consistent track in the previous employments of a potential candidate. I think what struck me the most was his hubris about not taking some classes that would actually allow him to provide some value to his team. The arrogance to think that he knows what path he is on and where he is going and anything “beneath him” would just be wrong. I can respect not wanted to focus in areas not in your perceived path, but you don’t have to be condescending about it. I do not have that certification that he doesn’t want, however I think it would help all of us if we had it, and I am more than willing to take the classes. Any training a company is willing to give, I think employees should want to take. Whew, I feel better now.

So, my little rant leads me to want to look at this more. We need to flush out any realities in his perspectives. What makes a career path? Is it really possible to fully plan one out? I know that expectations of what makes a good career has changed. For my father’s generation it was find a good job with good benefits and work hard. Longevity and loyalty was rewarded. Regrettably, those days do not really exist anymore. I remember not too long after the company’s transition from mainframe technology to Open Systems. When my boss at the time and I began sorting resumes for an additional Unix Systems Administrator, my “old school” boss did not want to talk with or meet anyone who jumped around from job to job every couple of years. After finding very few candidates, we learned that the reality of the candidate market for open systems was one where longevity did not really exist. As I have assisted in the candidate acquisition in my various roles over the years, the pattern of job hopping still is predominate.

To try to answer the “What makes/is a career path?”, I think the answer is the some total of jobs and positions through out someone’s life. Individuals often define themselves in terms of their occupation or career. Don’t believe me? Try this then, start meeting new people and keep track of how many minutes or seconds go by before they ask you what do you do for a living. I’m not discounting a person’s job. I am trying to point out that for some it is the greatest defining factor to”who they are”. So, be careful in handling that factor, it can be extremely fragile and easily crushed if inadvertently stepped on.

Now, to evaluate the realism of a fully planned out career. I find out it hard to believe most people, if they had a plan at all, end up where they had planned. I admit there are some with a clear path, who have one goal and work their whole lift to achieve it. Those who want to have a professional sports career or participate in the Olympics. However, the majority of people who set out for these laudable goals ever make it. For those of us with careers that do not have a clear, predefined pinnacle position, how do you know which paths will take you to the perceived “top” position. When I went to college and got my first IT job, all I knew was that I wanted to work in “computers”. At the time, I had no idea how vague that statement really was. Lucky for me, the folks who hired me must have saw something or felt I was worth the chance. I was told long after I was hired that one reason I was hired was that I had worked at one big-box retailer for many years and they found it odd that someone so young could take a job and stick with it. Some more of my embarrassing remembrances about my interview can be found in the posting, IT Workers - The Next Generation. Lucky for me I had “old school” principles.

I have been reading the book Age of Turbulence by Allan Greenspan. I am more than 2/3 through the book and one of the biggest surprises to me is that, Greenspan did not start out focusing on being an economist . He played the clarinet as well as a sax in a jazz band in college. When he went to college for economics, I do not think he was driving toward becoming the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. I’m sure in regards to the careers of economists this position could be seen as one of the capstone job. It is not fair to say that if someone does not reach a pinnacle position in their lifetime that they were not successful. Success, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. As for IT, what job could be considered the pinnacle? Being a CIO or CTO? Maybe. What about those awesome technical wonders who could not manage a team out of wet paper bag? Maybe the Chief Architect at some Fortune 500 company or Principle Architect at some global conglomerate? Could be. I reject that the premise for a job candidate is to be a good, stable employee. There must be some clearly evident path for a person’s career. The span of a career or multiple careers are 30-50+ years for some. I think people require defined levels of stability, variety, and growing challenges. That’s how I define a career no matter what combination of jobs or fields. Those individual levels are set by a combination of several factors including personal, family, and social expectations. An individuals own ego and self-esteem also play into these levels. I’m sure further discussion of these factors need an article of its own.

If someone is still looking for the area that interests them, I can not see holding their search against them. Some need more variety and challenges than others. It’s only our hubris that makes us think that we can be the judge of someone’s career. It’s often easy to forget behind each job title and email is a human who faces similar issues and feelings through out their lifetimes.