LA trip, Fluevogs, Cixin Liu
Nov. 2nd, 2019 09:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flexagonI went to LA (the Venice part of LA, if you know the area) and that was a first for me. My hotel was a 20-minute walk to the office, along Venice beach, which I'm told is peak SoCal and is certainly peak something. I've never seen a beach so wide and nice, or so many people living outside in tents (I wasn't sketched out by the latter at all, just amazed at a place whose benevolent weather allows it). I looked at sunsets over the ocean, and walked with a few others to Muscle Beach just to hang from the rings there and say we did it. Was going to have dinner with my ex Smitten, but she flaked on me.
I also cried a lot, missed about half the summit because I was having intense 1:1s instead, and probably figured out a huge part of why my skip-level director is so unhappy with me. Also expressed my own unhappiness and sporadic desire to leave the team, which I have now promised not to do until after Q1 2020, and I don't know if I'm doing the right thing. Because the situation is, uh, evolved enough that I can basically stay and rip certain aspects of the team apart myself, or I can walk away and let it fall apart behind me, and both make me cry because this thing is the major work of the last seven years of my life. I built an org that was good, and then the environment changed and (I feel like) my work is largely invalidated. Except for that little detail where I got paid a lot, which does matter.
I did figure out one major thing I've been doing very wrong, which is a) good, because I can fix it, and b) TERRIBLE because a fair set of people knew I was doing it wrong but none of them freaking told me what I was supposed to be doing. A note to my management chain: when I'm leading people and I put them in a new role, I fucking well guide them and give them New Role 101. My own leadership did not do that for me, I flat-out guessed wrong (twice) and only at this summit did someone -- not in my own chain, but someone I trust -- give me the "explain like I'm five" version of the thing: how to work with PMs as an eng lead. Which apparently most people learn how to do before L7 but was entirely new to me. It was one of those nightmare moments when things clicked into focus. I'd been getting weird feedback I didn't understand at all (me, passive?) but that makes sense as a delta between what I had been doing and what I was expected to do. So there was this whole cascade of clarity, horror, embarrassment and white-hot anger.
For some unimaginable reason they did not drop my calibration score for the past 6 months. I was expecting it, and, frankly, if I'm lacking an expected skill for my role/level, it would have made sense. But they didn't, so I had an ultra-weird performance review in which the score was good but the words were all about changes I'm expected to make. I won't even go into all the good things I've been doing -- I'm sure you believe me there are some.
Now for a broader observation: the level I'm at objectively sucks. It's very much halfway between two better-understood levels, and I know three women at my level, in my office, with my score. All of us are blazingly unhappy. So some of this is baked in, and can't be helped. The obvious solution is to get to the next level but I don't even want to anymore, and the other one is to lower my expectations. Or at least go back to first principles: my career has already gotten me the one thing I wanted most out of it. The rest is extra credit. As it happens, I'm going to spend my next six months playing hard for that extra credit, but maybe I'll be able to keep some perspective as I do that? We'll see.
Work did bring a litter of kittens to the office last week, and also gave me a flower (an insane rainbow-colored rose) so there was that, too: the bizarre and occasionally delightful perks.
For my fellow Fluevoggers, a shout-out to the new Soft Rock lace-up platform boot. Yes, I know they're weird. They're weird and 100% me, they have the right toe-box shape (same as the Axe 2.0 and at least one other pair that I have), and they give a nice ankle snuggle. I am going to wear these puppies with EVERYTHING.
I also spent a few days inserting my nose into the Dark Forest trilogy, aka Remembrance of Earth's Past, by Cixin Liu. It started off slowly, but each book went faster than the last and, damn, I love it when the world ends. Not every science fiction author has the nerve, but nerve is not Cixin's problem. And reading is good for me.
I also watched a lecture on the biological underpinnings of religiosity. Some of it is stuff I was familiar with, but not all. For instance, I hadn't noticed that the four most typical focuses of OCD are also the four most typical focuses of religious rituals: in particular the cleansing of the body, ritualized preparation/consumption of food, entering and exiting places (typically churches; many folks with OCD have trouble with doorways); and numbers/numerology, like things coming in threes and tens. There is also a form of epilepsy (temporal lobe epilepsy) whose giveaway symptom is extreme interest in religion and philosophy, along with a reduced sense of humor and a manic desire to write... wow. Kind of gives you an idea how religious tracts and books might get written in the first place.
heisenbug is now officially more stressed about work than I am, or at least surpassed me for a while earlier this week, so that's a thing.
I also cried a lot, missed about half the summit because I was having intense 1:1s instead, and probably figured out a huge part of why my skip-level director is so unhappy with me. Also expressed my own unhappiness and sporadic desire to leave the team, which I have now promised not to do until after Q1 2020, and I don't know if I'm doing the right thing. Because the situation is, uh, evolved enough that I can basically stay and rip certain aspects of the team apart myself, or I can walk away and let it fall apart behind me, and both make me cry because this thing is the major work of the last seven years of my life. I built an org that was good, and then the environment changed and (I feel like) my work is largely invalidated. Except for that little detail where I got paid a lot, which does matter.
I did figure out one major thing I've been doing very wrong, which is a) good, because I can fix it, and b) TERRIBLE because a fair set of people knew I was doing it wrong but none of them freaking told me what I was supposed to be doing. A note to my management chain: when I'm leading people and I put them in a new role, I fucking well guide them and give them New Role 101. My own leadership did not do that for me, I flat-out guessed wrong (twice) and only at this summit did someone -- not in my own chain, but someone I trust -- give me the "explain like I'm five" version of the thing: how to work with PMs as an eng lead. Which apparently most people learn how to do before L7 but was entirely new to me. It was one of those nightmare moments when things clicked into focus. I'd been getting weird feedback I didn't understand at all (me, passive?) but that makes sense as a delta between what I had been doing and what I was expected to do. So there was this whole cascade of clarity, horror, embarrassment and white-hot anger.
For some unimaginable reason they did not drop my calibration score for the past 6 months. I was expecting it, and, frankly, if I'm lacking an expected skill for my role/level, it would have made sense. But they didn't, so I had an ultra-weird performance review in which the score was good but the words were all about changes I'm expected to make. I won't even go into all the good things I've been doing -- I'm sure you believe me there are some.
Now for a broader observation: the level I'm at objectively sucks. It's very much halfway between two better-understood levels, and I know three women at my level, in my office, with my score. All of us are blazingly unhappy. So some of this is baked in, and can't be helped. The obvious solution is to get to the next level but I don't even want to anymore, and the other one is to lower my expectations. Or at least go back to first principles: my career has already gotten me the one thing I wanted most out of it. The rest is extra credit. As it happens, I'm going to spend my next six months playing hard for that extra credit, but maybe I'll be able to keep some perspective as I do that? We'll see.
Work did bring a litter of kittens to the office last week, and also gave me a flower (an insane rainbow-colored rose) so there was that, too: the bizarre and occasionally delightful perks.
For my fellow Fluevoggers, a shout-out to the new Soft Rock lace-up platform boot. Yes, I know they're weird. They're weird and 100% me, they have the right toe-box shape (same as the Axe 2.0 and at least one other pair that I have), and they give a nice ankle snuggle. I am going to wear these puppies with EVERYTHING.
I also spent a few days inserting my nose into the Dark Forest trilogy, aka Remembrance of Earth's Past, by Cixin Liu. It started off slowly, but each book went faster than the last and, damn, I love it when the world ends. Not every science fiction author has the nerve, but nerve is not Cixin's problem. And reading is good for me.
I also watched a lecture on the biological underpinnings of religiosity. Some of it is stuff I was familiar with, but not all. For instance, I hadn't noticed that the four most typical focuses of OCD are also the four most typical focuses of religious rituals: in particular the cleansing of the body, ritualized preparation/consumption of food, entering and exiting places (typically churches; many folks with OCD have trouble with doorways); and numbers/numerology, like things coming in threes and tens. There is also a form of epilepsy (temporal lobe epilepsy) whose giveaway symptom is extreme interest in religion and philosophy, along with a reduced sense of humor and a manic desire to write... wow. Kind of gives you an idea how religious tracts and books might get written in the first place.
heisenbug is now officially more stressed about work than I am, or at least surpassed me for a while earlier this week, so that's a thing.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-04 02:23 am (UTC)Not sure if it would help but the "I have these two choices and they are both terrible" suggests to me a meeting with one wine-maker, if you ever meet with him, because he's really good at talking me out of the boxes me and my brain stick myself in. I have cornered him for an hour and a half in the past two weeks - hurrah for senior mentory folk.
Also this so can be helped with better management. When I have spoons I'm totally going to work with them on this. In the meantime I keep spinning between suggesting we have an all female L7 brainstorming group, or an all female L7 bitch fest, because there's one that might be helpful and there's the one that the angry Motyl feels like doing. Heh.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-08 04:00 am (UTC)Yesterday I headed into a short meeting with our lead PM. I wanted to acknowledge that I'd been overly distant from the PMs in the past, get confirmation that my current, much more involved engagement with his subordinate had the right meeting structure, and see what meetings he himself wanted to attend. And his response was basically "Oh, you have fucked up so much more than just the PMs. Everyone has problems with you. What is your evidence that PMs are the area you should focus on?" I had a list of reasons which I told him, he actually bought it and thought that made sense, but then went on to spend the next hour telling me how much I suck -- emphasis mainly on my feeling/expressing the wrong emotions, or not enough of the right emotions, and having "bad vibes". But near the end he also managed to accuse me of potentially getting my entire PA in a privacy mess, by saying "no" to too many projects over the years(!). Years he wasn't even around for. So, that escalated quickly.
After spending a day sobbing about that, I found out that the guy was just denied promo (not enough stuff had launched -- yes, the new stuff is not launching yet, true) and hadn't told me about it, or even that he'd been up. So at least I know why his frustration is happening now, when I thought things were improving. But still, wtf.
I'm in for the bitchfest.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-14 02:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-11-15 05:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-11-15 10:13 pm (UTC)He is the only person to have remained a solid mentor for me through twelve years of career development. It actually kind of makes me tear up. I can likely never repay him. But damn, if I ever somehow had the chance...!
no subject
Date: 2019-11-15 11:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-11-17 01:31 am (UTC)I know pay-forward is the only way, and it's certainly enough for me when I see the people I've helped turning around to help others. Still, if a dragon ever needed slaying or something, I'd be there!
no subject
Date: 2019-11-04 03:22 am (UTC)I hope the air was OK for you, what with SoCal burning down and such.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-04 01:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-11-08 03:23 am (UTC)Books I find dark tend to be more human-scale: ones like Geek Love, The Wasp Factory, A Choir of Ill Children.
no subject
Date: 2019-11-04 04:18 pm (UTC)It's very interesting to me to hear about such a structured work place. Everywhere that I've worked had no room for advancement, (for anybody) and most of the time, there haven't even been very solid details of what my role is / expectations. It sounds like there's at least some solid ground under your feet, even when you're in a bad spot.
Hope you find a way out of the middle place, or at least it gets more comfortable now that you have the information you need.
The religion video looks interesting. The topic reminds me of that induced religious experience experiment from a few years back. where they were using magnets to make people think they were visited by jesus/other religious figures.