The weight of being a heavy lifter

This week has taken a toll on me. The work I've been doing for the last month or so –and probably the thing that has excited me the most in years– is going to be removed, just because it doesn't match the vibes.

I've been in this position for a while now. I've usually moved from my previous positions after one year and a half or two years, at most, to more challenging positions or to another step in "my career path". It's been three years since I started in this one. And while it's late by my normal standards, I've come to understand that this position has been more difficult to master than previous and I that's why I didn't mind staying in it.

I'm one of those guys who join a new position or department and start strong, like, really strong. Late nights, weekends, whatever's necessary to catch up to my teammates and not be a burden –and actually be of use. I like to put an effort first to reduce my learning curve the most possible and once I'm all caught up I start looking at our tools, our processes, our standards and all the things that may be an obstacle in making my job faster or easier. Then, I work to remove all of those things. I like to think that's the exciting part, right? Leaving a place in a better position than when you started. Being an agent of change. Collect feedback and see that everyone has ideas on things that they wish could improve, that you're not alone, and that their ideas may be even better than yours. You get to learn and to teach.

The good ol' motto

I've always liked the "move fast and break things" motto that's attributed to Mark Zuckerberg. I, of course, understand that it carries some other implications when applied to Facebook scale –not to mention the impact on users or society–, but for me it's always been about action. Calculated action, of course. If there's something you want to explore, do it. Do it now. Something might break, yeah, but the thing about broken things is that they can be fixed. Or you can always take a step back with a new lesson learned. But you actually did something and something changed. Maybe you learn that there's better ways to do it now that you understand whatever you did from this new perspective. Maybe you were right all the way.

Again, this doesn't apply to reckless ideas. I wouldn't suggest you try it as an adrenaline junkie... But changing the look of an Excel dashboard? By all means go for it, right? Is there a data point that could be represented differently? Go for it. Is the dashboard ugly and you want to make it pretty? Go for it. Someone might not like it. Someone else might say you finally fixed something that scratched their brain for longer than it should have. Who doesn't like understanding something better? Something prettier? Well...

Not everyone likes change

It doesn't come for free. There's always friction. There's always a little bit of pride. There's always fear of change. And moving past that is the key to improve.

And, trust me, I'd like to get into greater detail, but there are times when you've got to recognize that some battles are lost not because you cannot win them, but because there's people that simply do not want to fight them. It's not that they don't like change. It's that they don't see the need for change. Why break something that's already broken? At least, that's how I feel they see it.

Unfortunately, for me and my team, we're told there's no need for change. Things apparently have been working, to a certain degree that's enough for them, so there's no need to invest time and resources on improvements, even if we want them. Even if we need them. And that's how this ends.

Even if you lose, try to win

As with most things, I've tried to learn something out of this: There's always a weight to being heavy lifters. It's something that weights us down but often don't recognize. It's the curse and the blessing of being as I am. As some of you are, too.

We always want to carry more.

We're lifters. We'll become strong to rise to the occasion. And we'll always win. Even if I couldn't carry this weight, I know now how to get a better grip. Next time I'll move this mfer like feathers. And I do it because there's another saying that's engraved in my heart:

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

— Often attributed to Albert Einstein, but most likely originated from writer Rita Mae Brown in her 1983 book Sudden Death.

Until the next one!