Like a lot of people things have changed.  I got laid off as part of a corporate clean up in my 50s and was content to settle into retirement but after a year of puttering around the farm decided to get back into it.  Well partially at least.  I opted to not go full time employee but embrace the gig economy so to speak. Much easier to do when the kids are done school and the mortgage is paid.

It is at times frustrating not having a regular schedule but then again my corporate life was fairly chaotic and subject to the whims of customers and executives.  I do seem to be able to slot in a wider variety of things during the week but most importantly life comes before work in this new equation.

I do not envy those starting out in these uncertain times but I do understand their angst seeing it at home with our children, all adults now, who have a view of work and the world I did not.  I am certain my parents had similar views when I was partying away my young adulthood.

In the end the path I took to get here is not open to replotting and in most likely where I am is the happiest I have been in any iteration of the multiverse but as I can’t see across them just yet I will have to be content with this one..

later

I am not a great blogger.. I tend to spend far more of my time in real life.  I have been focussed on entertaining family and guests over the new year, working on the farm and trying to make life as normal as possible during covid.

We have been lucky here in Thailand.  We had some hard lock downs early and benefitted from keeping the spread down and being able to move internally.  Yeah we had some oops moment as people were allowed to sneak across the border bringing the infection rates higher,  some people decided that it was safe to travel even though they hung out with people who were tested positive.

We have been hit hard on tourism which was a much bigger impact than expected.  As I travel around I see more and more small businesses  being shut down and put up for sale.  A lot of pain and suffering across the board.  We had a terrible return for the marian plum last year.  Even though we got over 2000 kilos we didn’t cover half the operating costs as we harvested right in the middle of the lock down and the market dried up.  But fortunately this year things are opened up and we are moving online.

So even though this is written already a month into the new year I will try to write with more regularity.

later

R

I have been working for over thirty years, and I am still learning plenty about myself every day.  It may sound odd but in general I like to keep to myself and would rather not deal with people.

But you get older and realise you can’t be the kid wonder technical guru for every (well maybe some can but I certainly couldn’t) so you made the move to management.

For me it is work.  Hard work.  I have little patience normally but you have to practice like everything.

I still remember getting on a call with my team when of them had become very excited after their development training we had sent them on.  They figured out that basically I am an introvert but learned to overcome that with time and energy.  Some the team members who didn’t go on the training didn’t buy it but I was open enough to share with them why that was right and how it shows you can learn just about any skill.

So back to managing.  I often have more of a challenging managing up of late.  I enjoy coaching and mentoring and love it when the lights come on in the team and they get to figuring stuff out.  I am almost happy to spend the extra effort to let them nut it out for themselves.

Conversely I tend to lose it with those higher up the chain of command which at times has put me in the penalty box for acting.  Fortunately I had some good managers who put me onto a great coach who help me learn how to manage that fairly obvious contempt.

So I guess the point of this snippet is that we are who we are but managing our reactions, learning new skills can help us in our careers and get things done.  We are who we are… this is not about being something else just tempering the outlying behaviors.

So if that’s you and you have someone on your team that needs to learn how to manage themselves help them out.  It can turn one of your challenges into a productive resource.

later