Rajesh Mehar wrote:
"Fifteen more years has also given me some perspective on the importance of
doing *work you believe has enduring value*, and of the need for down time
to keep work from being the force driving you."
@Bruce: This is really interesting stuff for me. Could you write a little
bit about how you decided what work would have enduring value? Do you also
think about the magnitude of impact your work has/will have? How do you
measure value and impact?
I would like to claim that I studied my values and principles and then
went out to find something that matched. That's elegant, but pretty
improbable in this random world.
What happened is that in 1974 I joined a historical society with the
peculiarly broad stance of studying heraldry, genealogy, chivlary,
nobility, and ancient and medieval history (up to about 1700). The
Augustan Society, <http://augustansociety.org>, in case anyone cares,
was run by an autodidact with holographic memory and an insatiable
appetite for work and study.
Long story short, he died in 2006 from an entirely curable condition,
leaving the organization without it's primary engine. It took over a
year, but they realized that between my wife and I, we had all the
skills needed to run the place. I'm an expert in heraldry, have a degree
in history, and a background in non-profit management and magazine
publishing. My wife is a bookkeeper and genealogist. They asked us to
take over, "A couple of days a week," and we foolishly agreed.
It's been tough to follow a legend. As Gracian wrote, "To equal a
predecessor, one must have twice their worth." That I ain't got, but I
do have a much better grasp of technology. My predecessor thought "high
tech" meant electric typewriters. I'm running a network of six Linux
boxes and a couple of Windoze machines, plus a bank of laser printers
that let us publish our magazines in-house and do all but the binding on
our books.
Over the past seven years, these "couple of days a week" have grown to
the point where I'm now deliberately limiting my time and telling the
Board that they have to pick which programs get left behind.
The problems notwithstanding, the job is a terrific challenge to me in a
number of facets, and I like to think it's keeping my brain active and
growing in new directions.
No, it's not a social services agency, but then I never did fancy
addressing symptoms while the disease is ignored. Feed the poor? There
will always be poor. Better to work on the system that permits such
large income discrepancies, to pick just one example.
As for the "magnitude and impact" of this work, well, it's primary
magnitude and impact are upon me. I'm not saying I have selfish motives
(though I'm sure that plays a part), I'm saying that some of the work
being done by the organization is important, if only in an academic
sense, and the magnitude is dependent not on the nature of the work or
my efforts, but the number of people I can convince to help.
As a result, I'm not terribly interested in measuring such things. What
I am interested in is the impact the work has on me, on my own growth
and development, and on leaving a lasting record of scholarship for
others to build upon, just as the giants whose shoulders I muddy with my
boots did for me.
I am not saying that the part-time job I just left was without value.
Any time you can work for a Fortune 50 company who lets you see how the
system works, you can't help but learn things. When that company is
Disney, those are some pretty fun and interesting things, too. My
observations of the operations at a single-site employer with 68,000
workers and exceedingly high customer expectations have been
fascinating, especially when you consider that the company considers its
primary purpose (after keeping stockholders happy) is to "manufacture
happiness". Leads to some very interesting customer service techniques!
But I've about sucked that teat dry, and my role as a hotel lobby clerk
has evolved over the past decade from helping my guests have the most
fun they can during their vacation to serving as an IT tech support
agent with no training and intermittant second-line backup on a very
flaky and rapidly evolving system. It's not "Dilbert", it's more "User
Friendly" <http://ars.userfriendly.org>.
Add to the mix a diagnosis of carpal tunnel syndrome that cropped up
early this year, and standing up at a keyboard for eight hours at a time
no longer seemed wise.
Finally, the company itself urged me to retire. After 15 years of
service and age 55, you can retire with full benefits. These benefits
don't include a pension or health coverage (they were available to
part-timers, but weren't good enough to bother). They do include free
admission to the theme parks, discounts from 20% to 75% on food,
merchandise, hotels, cruises, and access to a number of fun activities.
You need to live near Walt Disney World and love the product for these
to have any value, but for me they do. Continuing to work would only
risk that I'd make some mistake and get fired, losing it all, which
wasn't balanced by the pittance they paid me.
I think I had some significant impact at Disney; I know I helped a lot
of people enjoy their holidays. Even for those who don't see theme parks
as an essential part of their lives, knowing that such places exist has
value in itself. Not to mention that having participated in the employee
stock purchase program at 20% of my pay for a decade and a half, I now
own more shares than some members of the board of directors -- which is
part of why I can retire without adjusting my lifestyle.
Sorry, probably more than any of you wanted to know, but this is the
week for me to contemplate this stuff, and your reading is helpful.
Cheers,
Bruce
