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Defining My Work Self
Aug 01, 2008
This may come across as a down post but I promise, that is not how I feel as I am writing it. Maybe I need to work on expressing myself a bit better. We'll see.
Our new department admin wrote today and asked us to provide our time off for the month of July in an Excel spreadsheet which was different from the Word doc we had been providing previously. Christine, being ever diligent, had already sent it along to the old administrative assistant in the old format. She forwarded that document to the new admin and received a note back that she would like it in Excel next time.
I totally see both their points and am on the fence about it all. It isn't like Christine will have to fill it out in duplicate every month from now on and the new admin accepted it this month but requested the new format going forward. So it really didn't hurt either person much this month, there is a common understanding moving forward. The reason I told you all that is because Christine had a great quote that kind of went along with a thought I have been having for a while. "man, we gotta get out of corporate life. when i'm on my deathbed i don't want to think back proudly on all of the forms i filled out."
Like I said, that probably sounds more bleak than it is intended. But it is an interesting perspective on how I could be defined by my job. "Oh there's carl, he's a great worker, his spreadsheets are flawless!" OK, that is hyperbole. But how far is it from "Carl did a great job at cutting 4 hours off the process of changing the color of our links in a course?" Or "Carl provided the insight we needed to create an authoring tool which saved us 12 man-hours and a few thousand dollars per course"? Obviously there is value in the latter two but is it how I want to define the accomplishments of my life?
Each night I've been reading a few stories from What Should I Do with My Life by Po Bronson. I want to feel fulfilled and am trying to figure out what that means in less abstract terms. I've refined myself a lot in the last 8-10 months and I don't know what that means for my current position/career. I have seen progress in my job as of late and am optimistic the job will develop into something for which I truly have passion once again, something which has been lacking of late. I have identified the problem, addressed it with my manager, and now we are working towards 'fixing' it, so really, I am pretty optimistic.
Another factor is that a fellow volunteer at the BLC is leaving to work for the Clinton Foundation (Bill, not George) in Africa, where he will estimate the number of HIV and malaria doses needed for the population so they can get a better price for them. It kind of makes my job seem worthless, though I know there is genuine good to what I do.
Maybe this is just who I have been and will always be, optimistic but not satisfied. Which isn't a necessarily bad way to be. I've learned to make it work for me in other areas of my life so maybe this is the next extension. That thought made me smile! So anyhow. Again, I don't feel bad about any of this, they are just the thoughts which rattle around in my mind. I have a good job and do good work but am I making the most out of my abilities?
Thanks for the voice of acknowledgment that I am not alone in this, even among my circle of friends. I have heard from a a few others individually who have said the same and it does make me feel better to know my struggle is not my own.
That book has given me a lot to chew on. He is, to this point, not making a case for any decision being right or wrong, which is exactly what the book should be. He's telling stories of people who made a move and are happy and those who made a move and are not, or started the change but didn't follow through for various reasons. So it has become more fodder for thought, something I do incredibly well on my own. I want to make sure I'm not just making a change for the sake of change but also be certain I am not letting fear and the path of least resistance hold me in place.
It's also worth noting that he draws a line between the decision of what one 'should' do with his/her life with what one 'wants' to do with their life. The two are not necessarily one in the same.
Yeah, I have some of the same thoughts sometimes about corporate life…. we are all just kogs in the machine.
However, we can take the morally valueless widgets we make (code/labor/wages) and then exchange them for something of moral value (food for the hungry, HIV/malaria treatment, and other charities). I talked to a very interesting woman at the food bank of Central Iowa one day years ago, and she said she would rather have some one donate a days wages then to volunteer one day. The reason being is that charities get a lot more value out of $100-$300 dollars then they get out of a person volunteering.
That isn’t to say that volunteering isn’t needed, and doesn’t provide value…. It does, and a lot of value at that. It is more to state that a seemingly morally valueless job can produce something of good, and a lot of good at that.
Money won’t solve all the worlds problems, but money in the right charities can help a lot!
Just one way that I am able to mitigate some of the struggles with this issue/question.
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I struggle with a lot of these same questions everyday. Don't have a ton of insight offer but wanted to let you know there are others out there thinking along your same train of thought.