The Process is the Reward
Hey!
Welcome back to another week of musings.
I’m writing after a weekend trip for my brother's wedding. Not so much resting, but a beautiful ceremony. I was 20-something hours in Guatemala, which was so fast that I had no time to relax.
Hope you had a restorative weekend, though!
Was this forwarded to you? You can subscribe here!
Things I enjoyed in the past week
Any time I travel, I re-read this book: Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of “Latino”*
TBM 383: Maximizers vs. Focusers is a good read on two types of leaders at a company.
I was hearing this interview with Casey Neistat about creative economy.
He mentioned the process is the reward. And I've been thinking that it's also my approach to work. It's good to be paid well, and have security, the rest of the reward, for me, has come with stepping into projects, learning and delivering them.
failure and learning
One of the side effects of always taking unknown or big tasks has been failing at many things.
Gladly I've been in situations where being open and upfront about any issues has gotten me more people invested into delivering a project or task. Learning from a lot of people as I go forward. Other times people complementing areas where I'm lacking.
on the small
On the flip side, we all have these tasks that we must do but are not as interesting as the big rocks.
I try to make the process rewarding through things like involving other into brainstorming sessions, or think about benefits of delivering the task.
the process evolves
Over time, as we grow up in the ladder, the process will change shape.
At the beginning it looked like having understandable code, functional tests, efficient code reviews. Now it looks more like making decisions and being accountable for them, or providing clarity to teams so that they're able to execute efficiently.
the recursiveness of the process
Like I mentioned, the process evolves as we become more senior, or get promoted to more senior roles.
But that itself is a process that becomes rewarding. I recall when moving from senior developer to staff engineer I would revert to coding tasks in times of "identify crisis".
Learning from these failures, getting mentors, or a coaches, conversing with peers make us learn better as we step up.
what you bring to the table
The main thing that has made the process rewarding has been knowing what I bring to the table and what I want out of my career.
If you're in to maximize titles, money, or complex projects, shareholder value, etc have that clear, it will make it easier to know what to do next, if your time at your current employer is over, or it's time to fund your own company, etc.
As with anything we embark on, remember to feel excited about it!
Your turn!
Have you thought about your process? Is it rewarding? Or never thought about it, and focus more on the task at hand? Let me know your thoughts by replying to this email.
Happy coding!
website | twitter | github | linkedin | mastodon | among others