I heard some advice that asked “what would you do if you knew you were going to fail?” and then to do that.
It was really liberating to make me think of things that were interesting and valuable to me and also to be frugal with others resources.
So it helps me prepare for failure and so when it occurs to just keep doing it. Come in the next day and do some more.
It also helps me have a really long horizon on work so that every day is sort of like planting a few seeds for a plant that no one likes.
Mediocrity can be perfectly fine if it’s accretive. It’s the churn that stalls us out. Making marginal improvements every day is actually wonderful.
If I’m truly locked into a terrible situation and I have no creative freedom, I just try to focus on the art of the mundane task. I once worked in tech support and we were super rigid and it was kind of boring. I spent time trying to understand the patterns in customers calls and needs, because I had to be on calls, I worked the “credit backlog” by correcting customer issues where they had emailed and recorded an error. It was super boring, but let me find common features that caused the need for credit. And just knowing that made the calls a little more tolerable.
It’s basic advice, I know, but just having a mindset that I’ll always come into work lets me keep going when a company fails. Or more likely, I completely bomb a presentation or don’t get a job.
Also helps that I know my own failures better than anyone else and I’ve found that what I see as a failure is invisible to others.
It was really liberating to make me think of things that were interesting and valuable to me and also to be frugal with others resources.
So it helps me prepare for failure and so when it occurs to just keep doing it. Come in the next day and do some more.
It also helps me have a really long horizon on work so that every day is sort of like planting a few seeds for a plant that no one likes.
Mediocrity can be perfectly fine if it’s accretive. It’s the churn that stalls us out. Making marginal improvements every day is actually wonderful.
If I’m truly locked into a terrible situation and I have no creative freedom, I just try to focus on the art of the mundane task. I once worked in tech support and we were super rigid and it was kind of boring. I spent time trying to understand the patterns in customers calls and needs, because I had to be on calls, I worked the “credit backlog” by correcting customer issues where they had emailed and recorded an error. It was super boring, but let me find common features that caused the need for credit. And just knowing that made the calls a little more tolerable.
It’s basic advice, I know, but just having a mindset that I’ll always come into work lets me keep going when a company fails. Or more likely, I completely bomb a presentation or don’t get a job.
Also helps that I know my own failures better than anyone else and I’ve found that what I see as a failure is invisible to others.