Category: Work

Over my career I’ve written one specification book. It was by “accident” – my firm had taken a TI project for the city, and and even though we had not planned on putting together a spec book, when a client like that asks for one, you do it.

Furthermore our usual 3rd party spec writer was overloaded so it fell back on us. So I compiled the sections, had an epic editing session with my boss to edit all the selections and then handed off the chicken scratch to an intern to do the edits.

Fast forward a year and a half later and I have now reviewed about ten spec books, four of which are massive tomes for major new structures.

Day to day, you just don’t know what experience will be absolutely crucial to your future self. But you can tackle unfamiliar tasks with gusto. Most of the time I’m certain it will fade into memory, but occasionally you’ll be very grateful you did.

One of my biggest weakness is that I’m awful at stopping and thinking.

I adore discrete tasks, knocking each of them out of the park, one at a time. Even better, just string them all along and I’ll never have to think.

How does I force oneself to pause, and make sure the bigger picture is in alignment?

I used to do a regular visit to the coffee shop on fridays for contemplation. But between two kids at home, and knowing too many folks as a regular, I’ve kind of lost that routine.

In theory this blog maybe could fill that role, but it is also a discrete task in the morning as well.

Is there a way to chop of thinking about big picture items into discrete tasks that can then get put on a TTD list?

I think I should try…

As I’ve mentioned before, I typically write my posts about four weeks in advance. So this scheduled date marks one year since I changed jobs.

So far so good.

My honeymoon phase is over, but I’m still enjoying the work. That said, I usually don’t get antsy till year two or three, so I’m not sure if this is going to be a long term career ending job (assuming they want to keep me around!).

I am still enjoying the higher rate of pay, even if it’s only numbers on a page since our lifestyle hasn’t changed one whit. It has been fun to work on some different tasks, some of it is just gratuitous paper pushing as to be expected in a government job, but I feel that I have been also been adding legitimate value to the projects. It has also been a privilege to work with multiple firms in the valley, networking on steroids.

But the biggest benefit has been the regularity of the work itself. My previous firm was always on medium alert with regular fire drills. Even though they were generally small issues on a short deadline, it was a continuous drain on one’s psyche to never know what surprise would be around the corner. It was bad enough to make me hesitant about scheduling lunch with people outside the company.

The other way this change has manifested is in this blog. When you are always on the edge of catastrophe, there isn’t the slack to create a regular habit in the morning. This gig with the state has allowed me to create a morning routine, at least as much as one can with two small kids in the household.

So on to the next year. The next couple years are going to be dominated by the construction of the education building on Nevada State College. It’s a little daunting, but I’ve got a good team, and these things don’t build themselves, so I might as well lead the charge!

Seth Godin recently wrote a great blog post Investing in Slack.

Most of my mistakes as an experienced architect have been due to a lack of slack.

Corners get cut when moving fast on that adrenaline rush of a looming deadline.

When corners are cut, regrettable mistakes happen.

Unforeseeable errors are an unpleasant fact of the profession, but regrettable mistakes gnaw at your soul. Just give us a couple more hours!

The hard part is managing a project is getting the slack before we need it.

We went to a concert by pianist Dr. Spencer Baker the other day, and aside from the great music, I was struck by the fact that he played most of his pieces from memory.

It made me think of our own work, and the vast quantity of information that we shove into our memory banks.

While I am in a good good lucrative profession, I can’t help but feel that musicians are on the right track.

If one is going to waste their brain on something, memorize some art!

Its disorienting when you’ve been grinding on projects and all the sudden the last immediate deadline has been crossed.

I have a couple long term projects that have been in the back of my head, but it was not easy to suddenly shift gears and start working on them.

I’d like to figure out my own Google 20% rule (did it ever really exist?), where I don’t ever really drop a long term project even as I douse the immediate fires around me.

Maybe it’s time to reread that Essentialism book, even though it is packed with its share of fluff.

I have a standard habit in the morning, writing the blog is followed by testing my blood pressure followed by a exercise.

It had developed organically but crystalized as a set pattern after reading section in Atomic Habits about stringing together good habits so one leads directly into the next one.

But this morning I broke rhythm and checked email first, and then facebook and now I’m having a hard time spinning up to do the usual.

Rhythm and habits have an interesting way of working both ways. Hopefully this entry will get me back on track.

A couple months ago, I jumped into a task and put together a spreadsheet template, only to find out it had been done before.

Oops.

In my feeble defense it had been a hectic week, and I didn’t think to ask because of my frazzled mind.

Not very convincing.

There is a line between being proactive and wasting time with duplicative efforts.

I need to slow down and breathe more.

I have a deadline coming up in three weeks.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, I typically wake up and write an entry on this post and then exercise for a little bit. So when do I decided to break the habit and focus on getting this deadline met?

While work isn’t everything, it is important enough to temporarily override personal habits and patterns.

And the hard part of getting the old habit back up and running again.

It’s not easy.

Sometimes you have to poke and prod a little. Not fun.

Maybe even a little unpleasant.

But I guess that’s the job.

You’re gonna be living in it soon.