And I'm off!

Hooray!  I just signed my first contract!  I think this self-employed thing might just work!!!!  Fingers crossed!

Vision

My dad once told me that vision is seeing what others don't, then putting in the hard work to make it happen.  He told me this after we had taken a garage that was completely filled with stuff and cleaned and worked and organized for days until we were able to put both cars in it.  The example is pretty mundane, but the statement seems true whether it is simply a very junky garage or starting a brand new company.

As many of you know, I have had many managers, mentors, and advisors, and most of them were truly amazing people with incredible strengths.  They all had their weaknesses too, but when I think of most of them, it is the strengths I remember.  It reminds me of how my dad still quotes his mentor, Charlie Pope, all the time.  Surely Mr. Pope had flaws?  But not the way my dad remembers him.  Pieces of wisdom get passed down, I think, from good mentor to good mentor, and there even seems to be much to be learned from the bad managers as well, especially in their examples of what not to do.

Today I am trying to channel the best traits of one of my managers/mentors.  He was actually in charge of our whole division, and I reported into him whenever my actual bosses left.  (Since I probably should have been reporting to a director instead of a VP, he was way above my paygrade.)  Two of the things he did spectacularly well were leading with vision and inspiring others, and he shared some of his thoughts one day when I was setting up my new group. (Yes, I mean the one that just got disbanded, but still--it was awesome for about two years).

Anyway, he taught me how to make a map.  For the map, you start by visualizing where you want to be, where you want your group to be, all the traits that you want to see in the new organization, what it does, how it functions, what it is, what it isn't, and write it all down.  I really enjoy basking in the happiness and beauty of the vision.

Then, you have to switch gears and take a hard-hearted assessment of where you are, where your organization is, what are the strengths and the weaknesses, and write those down too.  He said he wouldn't show me an example because he took this part seriously, and he felt it was inappropriate to share.  Maybe there were bad words? :)

Then, you take a look at each item, where you are and where you want to go, and you make a step-by-step to-do list by quarter with each step bringing you closer to the goal.  The idea is so simple, so obvious once you say it out loud, but how many people take the time and find the courage to do it?  It's really hard to be dream dreams and write them done.  It's really hard to be that self-critical. It's so much easier to just bop along, being busy, making task lists, then checking them off.  But without the map, how do you know which thing is important?  Which thing is actually getting you where you want to go and which are distractions?  So my task for the day, maybe the week, is to make a map.

The best thing about the map is looking at it after time has passed to see where you were and how you created change.

When I started this post, I thought I would brainstorm the vision here, for all the world to see, but keep the current state--along with the bad words--to myself.  But as I sit here, I find that it's too private, too delicate, too un-baked, and I am not ready to share, even to my close friends, even figuring that nobody makes it this far down the blog.  Too scary.  So I'll pop back in to my private world, but I'll let you know how it goes.  Wish me luck!

Limbo

It's been a good week.  I took the frantic (manic?) energy from the last post and coasted through this one.  I went to DC on Sunday to review small business grant applications for the NIH, which is always fun.  I met lots of new folks and hung out with Charlotte, one of my dear friends with Rice.  We wandered all over the mall under a full moon, trying to figure out where the new MLK memorial and the bathrooms were.  We found both of them.  :)

The MLK memorial is truly beautiful and inspiring.  It certainly helped to keep things in perspective.  I remain one of the luckiest people on the planet, and that's no joke.

I set up my home office, and it is truly a lovely place to work.  It's hard to get the true sense of the loveliness and energy from the photo below, but imagine music playing and the windows open with the ocean breezes coming though.

Now I just need to figure out what to do with myself.  Technically I am still employed until March 15, which makes it a little awkward to start networking in a serious way.  "Hello, Doc.  I'd like to help you out.  Technically I can't talk to you about this concept for another two weeks, but just thought I'd get in touch."  So that doesn't work. I can, however, make plans and maps and budgets, which is something that I enjoy.  But I also find it exhausting.  I can make it until about lunch, then I need to find something less cognitively challenging to do.  I remember that I had a similar trouble in grad school as well, although less so in post-doc.  My poor brain is probably just so enfeebled from attending back-to-back meetings for so many years that it just can't think that long.  I guess I will just have to work to get it back in shape along with the rest of me.

Have a wonderful weekend!