Things on my mind
Thinking about thinking, missing creativity, feeling remote, and the changing nature of Holidays.
I’m just going to state up-front that, as I sit down to write this post, I have no idea where this is going. I have a million things I have thought about writing about but nothing that seems to want to stick.
So, here goes… Maybe you have thoughts about which of these themes you’d like to hear more about? If so, drop me a comment, and it might spur me into action.
Thinking About Thinking
Were you taught how to think in school or university? I wasn’t. I think a lot about a lot of things, and in some cases, I think pretty deeply about things, but what I don’t have is a framework, process, or structure.
It’s been my unofficial theme this year to study thinking: how successful people do it, what frameworks are out there I could put in my toolkit, and what mental models get in the way of good decision-making.
In my many explorations, I’ve been enjoying the clear and easily digestible writings of Wes Kao, the human-centered approach of Adam Grant, and the easy-to-reference lists of Pawel Huryn. Pawel operates more in the Product Development space (where my current job resides), but I find that Product Development is basically one big crash course in thinking and strategic decision-making.
Right now, I’m in absorb mode. I don’t know that any of it has truly landed or improved my thinking yet. Like everything these days, there are more things to consume on any given topic than time to consume it. However, I am definitely feeling frustrated by my inability to operate at the same level as some of the people I work with. And when I feel frustrated about something, that’s always a clue that I have something to learn.
Missing Creativity
I’ve been missing creative pursuits. Work has been mentally draining, and the aforementioned lack of thinking frameworks is definitely a factor there. I need to make that shit more efficient, so I can have more bandwidth left at the end of the day for… other things.
What worked for a while was having my photography business, which I stopped serendipitously in the Fall of 2019. It gave me a creative outlet and the opportunity to meet people. With those things gone and my energies more exclusively focused on advancing in my career, it’s been hard to do anything other than zone out at the end of the day - something I swore I would never succumb to. Like, who even is this person that over-works, talks almost exclusively about work, has little-to-no social life, and then drools in front of the TV before reting to bed as early as possible with a heating pad?
I’ve started learning the guitar and signed up for countless online apps but never used them. I bought a book with prompts to help me pick up sketching again, but I can’t get into the habit of actually doing it. Unless I have a commitment to someone else to photograph something, I rarely pick up my camera anymore, and my muse for many years, my daughter, is a teenager with photo boundaries that I do my very best to respect. And then there is this Substack, which I have all kinds of designs in the shower to write on but then, once dried off and dressed, generally sideline for Netflix and chill.
I want to want to make time for creative pursuits.
Feeling Remote
A co-worker of mine wrote a Substack post about how remote has the potential to level the playing field for DEI efforts, especially for the neurodiverse. It’s an excellent point and definitely something to celebrate about this new reality. I also want to state, for the record, that the ability to work remotely as a parent, and especially as a single parent, makes many things possible, both personally and professionally, that otherwise would be impossible or at least extremely difficult. In short, I’ve been working remotely for 16 years and love it.
Now for the ehhhhhhhh…buuuut…
Remote work sucks for:
Collaboration
Brainstorming or working together to figure out complex problems
Building relationships with the folks you work with and resolving interpersonal challenges
Developing culture (and I don’t mean that in the Kumbaya way, I mean “the way we work around here” way)
My actual list is likely longer and more thoughtful, but this is a hot take, so those are the things that immediately come to mind.
I feel this acutely right now in my job because the kinds of challenges we’re trying to tackle often require the time to work through things with people, and the nature of remote work is that things have to happen in 30-45 minute Zoom/Teams meetings. It often results in conflicts that never truly get resolved.
I went to Boulder, CO, recently to do some brainstorming and collaboration work with two super smart people at my organization, and what I noticed was that we had the time to work through and out the other side of disagreement and toward some form of consensus. Sometimes my mind was changed, sometimes theirs was. In all cases, greater understanding and respect grew. You just can’t do that as well remotely - and I’ve for sure tried.
I have a lot more to say on this topic, but, as I commented on my co-worker’s post on LinkedIn, I think we should stop arguing about remote/hybrid/in person and instead move on to think about how companies can transform the way we work so that we can find ways to get back some of what we’ve lost by being on the other side of a computer screen. Many CEOs are driving conversations around resistance vs innovation and don’t hear enough conversations about trying to solve this meaningfully.
Holidays
It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and I guess I should be listing all the things I’m thankful for. But, I’m not going to. I feel like I’ve been doing a really stellar job of openly appreciating things and people lately such that I don’t need to announce it in a blog post.
I am, as always, excited about the Holiday season being upon us. I love this time of year. I’m especially happy to return to England for Christmas for the first time in 15 years. It’s been a long time coming, and the first time that my daughter has had a British Christmas. As you may remember, my parents returned to the UK in March, and it’s been strange to have them across the other side of the world again. For many reasons, the circle of family and friends we celebrate these things with around here has shrunk significantly in the last 7-10 years. That makes me quite sad. I love being around friends and family, and I love this time of year, especially because of that. I guess everything has its season, and this is the one we’re in right now.
Happy Holidays if I don’t get back on here before the end of the year. Let me know if anything in this post sparked curiosity for more. I’ve been toying with longer posts about all these subjects but can’t quite commit. Your feedback might just drive some accountability in me.
Always lovely to read what’s floating around in your mind. What are the main differences between an American Christmas and a British one?