It has been a great week. And for me that means I learned something as I try to do every week – every day is too aggressive for me. It has been a week of reflection and hard work; of gratitude and perspective.
I was reminded today that I don’t work around your Average Joe. I am, instead, surrounded by people composed of a different constitution and people that see the world through a different lense. I am surrounded by … the very people I always wanted to be surrounded by.
I am surrounded by a group of people that don’t always agree but who are always willing to professionally debate the merits of all sides of the argument in order to find the right solution. I am reminded the right solution rarely fits the square peg into the square hole. Moreover, the right solution often demands a new structure to contain it – new processes to facilitate it and new models to explain it.
I guess I was not made that way and I know I was not raised that way = status quo is not meant for me. I identify when Pam says “culture eat’s strategy for lunch”. I get that. It still rocks my very being to this day. The “customer has the right to be unreasonable”. That is a cultural icon that I am happy to live beneath. And “who do we hire to do the hard stuff” compels a different calling. That sounds heroic. Let me be clear – we are not the guys with courage that run towards the sounds of chaos and disaster to save the life of a stranger. Those are the heroes.
But we are indeed marching to the beat of a different calling. We don’t do the “race to the bottom”. You can fall gracefully and win that race.
It’s been a good day, because I got my perspective changed today. Thank you Alan.