Wow, I can’t believe it’s a 100 already! Thank you for all your positive feedback, and I truly hope these posts have been helpful, reassuring, and “one more point of view” that helps.
Every day I learn something that inspires me, depresses me, humbles me, and motivates me.
Here’s to the journey.
Stanford neurosurgeon Paul Kalanithi died March 9th of lung cancer at the age of 37. So many things about his situation made him unique: being a doctor, being diagnosed with metastatic lung cancer, being a new father. But most importantly, the kind of man he was.
In his article, “Before I Go“, he leaves this message for his infant daughter:
“When you come to one of the many moments in life when you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more, but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.”
Work is important. But it’s not what’s most important.
Obvious right? Of course you’d do the right thing. No one comes into work saying, “Today, I’m going to do the WRONG thing!”. No one intends to the wrong thing. So why am I saying this? Why am I ranking it number 1?
Without this, all the other lessons on the list are not important. Because without this, it’s like building a tower on a bad foundation. You might not see the issues today, or tomorrow. But eventually, it will catch up with you. Because if you concede on certain issues now, you’ll keep conceding. You might not get found out, so you’ll think it’s ok to do. But at some point, you’ll have crossed the line without even realizing you did. So the key is to recognize when you’re getting too close to the line…. So here are the rationalizations I have heard when you get too close to the line.
So as you get more senior in an organization, you get asked to host different “get to know you sessions” for people to sign up and attend. I would hold these with the people who had signed up, but it was hard to get the conversation going and connect with people.
I had created a “Lessons Learned…and still learning” list for fun, and one day I decided to use it in these sessions. I handed out a copy to all the participants, gave them a few minutes to read it, and opened it up for questions. Anything was fair game. I did this at site visits, with different levels, across different businesses. The conversations were lively, people were curious, and I found that it made the session go by quickly.
What surprised me was how many people came up to me later and thanked me. They liked my stories, confessed to having the one pager on their cubicle wall, one person gave a copy to her boyfriend, asked when the next version of “Lessons Learned” was going to be published. I started thinking…”Maybe there’s something here.”
So I decided to start this blog with all my lessons learned. Things that stayed with me throughout a 25+ year career in financial services. Things that might help you.
I don’t have all the answers, but at the very least, reading these will offer you a different point of view. At the end of the day, it’s ultimately your decision. But sometimes it’s good to hear about someone else’s experiences and know you’re not alone.
Enjoy!