2020 Retrospective

Man proposes, God disposes.

That perfectly sums up 2020.

I had several plans in 2020 but like all of us, had to change them due to the pandemic. I fell short of my goal of writing one blog per month due to various reasons, but if I learnt anything in 2020, it is to be grateful for what we have. Am grateful that I was able to publish 7 blogs, one of them was published on PMI’s website, and my GHC submission was accepted.  

I wanted to take a few minutes to summarize my key lessons learnt in 2020.

1. Being TPMs we are supposed to make sure we are executing against goals and meeting them. With the pandemic, everyone was impacted in a different way and it was a delicate balance between holding people accountable and being empathetic to each one’s unique situation. Due to the meeting fatigue, I stopped investing the time in informal chats. This reduced my motivation and belonging. I realized it very soon and fixed it. Investing the time in building the relationships remotely, despite the meeting fatigue, went a long way.

2. Analysis paralysis – I spent a lot of time researching on 3 topics that I wanted to blog about, took lot of notes but never got around to writing the blogs as I wanted to do more research. Lesson learnt – Time box the amount of time spent researching a particular topic and then write the blog. Do not let perfect become the enemy of good.

3. I was working on a program for ~1.5 years and was looking to move to a different team since I became too complacent. I was all set to move to a different team. The program I was working on suddenly became a company priority with expanded scope. I decided to stay on because it seemed like a better move.  I communicated my decision to stay on and started regretting it the next day as the reasons why I wanted to move in the first place did not change. I chugged along for a couple of months, but my motivation level was not the same. I did not want to go back and ask for a change again. I just decided to move on to another opportunity that came along. Big lesson learnt – When you decide to make a change to a different team/program/company carefully evaluate the underlying reasons for wanting the change and go for it. If the underlying reasons don’t change, stick to your decision.

That’s it for now. My goal for 2021 is to write 10 blogs.

Ending this with hopes and prayers that 2021 will be a better year for all of us!