#Weeknotes 90 (6 Sept) — Interpersonal relationships, easy long streaks, and getting away from comfort
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Work wise:
I spent half of this week running research sessions and the other half in between sessions catching up with various team members for alignment. The bigger and more complex the project, the more team members across different functions and multiple levels of stakeholders involved. When I started my design career 14 years ago, I did not anticipate how much of my work would involve relationship management and communications alongside a rise in seniority. I was quite naive in thinking I would get to do fun creative work most of the time and leave the complex people management to well, people managers.
I’m always ready to solve complex design challenges but the navigating of complex personalities and interpersonal relationships is a different beast. Intentions can be misunderstood, and words can be misinterpreted and nuanced based on upbringing and culture. I’ve known my partner for 8 years and misunderstandings still occur. With strangers, it’s inevitable. In a more globalised workplace, building trust between people who never worked together before guarantees tensions and hurdles. Trust takes time. When projects are under tight deadlines, developing proper ways of working alongside team building can feel like an unaffordable luxury. But the cost is an increased risk of misalignment, distrust, burnout, mistakes, lack of accountability/ownership, siloed working and a decrease in morale and momentum.
I can’t recall how many ‘alignment’ sessions I had in a matter of days because teams on different workstreams are running full steam ahead in different directions. Without good mechanisms in place to ensure proper coordination and communication across all team members, the overhead becomes huge.
I don’t have a solution but I do have hope. My hope is time. That over the course of the next few weeks, as the team members get to know each other, we can then better adapt to each other to truly work as one team.
Life wise:
I got a notification from Duolingo that I officially hold a 6+ year streak on Duolingo! It feels like something worth celebrating but at the same time not. It’s one of those things that once you manage to form a habit around, you stop thinking about it. I don’t remember at which point it became second nature akin to brushing teeth. While the streak number 2192 looks impressive, I’m not putting in much effort to keep the streak going. Not doing a lesson on Duolingo to me is like not showering before bed. That feels weird.
But hey, I’ll still take that compliment!
While I believe in the power of forming good habits, I also struggle with adopting any more. I have been having success with daily journaling in addition to Duolingo. I also want to read, exercise, and practice violin more daily. But I find that once I get all the things I want to get done in the day, I have very little motivation and willpower left to do the would-also-be-great-to-do things.
There can only be so many things we can fit in a day. And if it’s all planned and structured, we’re depriving ourselves of what life has to offer: spontaneity and flexibility to what we feel like that day or moment. Some of the most memorable and fun days are those that are unplanned and unexpected.
Things I came across:
The latest DD article talked about letting go of certain comfort to gain back agency and I love it:
“To create environments in which humans can truly thrive, we need to be guided by different principles than just comfort and ease. A small first step would be to become a little more self-sufficient again. Learning how to solve shit by ourselves and within our communities will help us to reclaim some level of agency.”
Then a day later, at the park playground, a dad shared this quote he came across:
“Comfort is an addition.”
How timely!
A podcast I listened to talked about our reliance on painkillers (in the context of post-operations) which can lead to addiction, over-reliance, substance abuse and worse, death. Evidence suggests that by weaning off of painkillers and exposing ourselves to pain, we’re bringing agency back into our lives.
No pain no gain indeed.
Photo of the week:
Quote of the week via the Work Life with Adam Grant podcast: the Internet doesn’t need your opinion on everything with Rebecca Solnit:
“Despair is a self-fulfilling prophecy and so is hope”
Until next week!
