Articles

Articles

When you let the work carry you forward

Negative feedback is valuable. Especially for systems to remain in balance. To reduce fluctuations in the output. A negative feedback is a self-regulatory system. But you need to add energy to keep the process going. In positive feedback systems, triggered process continues by itself and even releases energy.

The dynamics of work are similar. Sometimes, our work is draining our energy and we can only move forward if we put more and more energy into it. But sometimes it is the opposite. Once we get into the flow-of-work, it is as if the work itself gains momentum, pulling us along and energising us. Isn’t this kind of work is what we all look for?

A good flow-of-work can turn into a virtuous circle. Positive experience motivating us to take the next task with ease. Helps us get better at our work. Adds fluency and brings mastery over time. But if you feel stuck-in-the-work, demotivation occupies the mind-space. More likely you tend to procrastinate. Leading you to lose more and look for interventions. More burden on the system.

Attempts to trick with pay-backs, rewards and reinforcements are short-term-fixes. Nothing like a positive-feedback-loop. When work itself becomes rewarding, the dynamics of motivation and reward become self-sustainable. This propels the whole process forward. Feels like you are on auto-pilot.

If you want to help yourself or someone around you with positive-feedback, praise the work. Quality of the impact and the magic it creates. Not the person. Then you are letting the work to carry you forward. Helps people develop a true-growth-mindset. Else, the person might get stuck with the self-image. They might do everything to protect that image and develop a fixed-mindset. Instead of producing more good work and becoming better at it.

Using feedback as a growth tool is as essential as using it for balance.

What’s your way of using the feedback-tool?

1

What do you fear the most in your line of work?

Every work has its own risks and rewards. Risks outweigh the rewards in tough times. The ones that are pivotal. That’s when fear takes centre stage. What you fear the most decides how well you perform in tough situations. This defines the areas of work that you defend the most. You tend to believe that you should prepare a lot more better for this situation. This is where you insure the most or break fast. Do you know what you fear the most in your line of work?

Some of this is job-related. Common for most people in that line of work. Job-related-training and worker policies tend to take care of these in the best-way-possible. Like that for a cop, a soldier, a doctor, a lawyer. But most hurting ones are personal. They tend to be contextual. Something very pertinent to the company culture and your own view-of-the-self.

Fear of failure, Embarrassment, Underperformance, Rejection, Transfers, Confrontation, Loss-of-position and Isolation. These make it to the list of top fears for most of the tech-workers. Each one adopt their own defence mechanisms. Perception of consequences lead people to either hide-behind-something or perform-better-than-expected.

When you know what is your biggest fear, face it. Dancing-with-fear is more fun than hiding or running-away from it. Former leads to strength and better performance over time. Those who get this right, top the list of achievers. Watch and learn from those in your set-up. You will know what works and how to make it work in that context.

Companies face this with what-if-scenarios, plan-A-B-C structures, succession-plans and other insurance mechanisms. At an individual level, you have to device your own method. Coaches and courses help. Portfolio of skills and experiences are useful. Start with small experiments, with focus forward. But, practice well with the best.

Find what you fear the most in your line of work and prepare to dance-with-it. That’s the better-way-out than jumping-ship and living with its ghost.

How do you make technology for good?

Technology is never neutral. It is not easy to say that tech-is-for-good. Tech needs constant updates, replacements and care! In the hunt for new and cool tech, old tech suffers. So are folks stuck with old tech. Every upgrade makes the entire investment useless. New ones do not guarantee better-experience. If you are building tech how do you make-it-good and for-good?

Tech also has negative counts on equality, transparency and accountability aspects. The divide-in-society, the new fear-of-losing-out, and immersive-addictive-isolation are tech-enabled.

Earlier, companies taught people to make plans for regular-maintenance, periodic-updates and planned-upgrades. Backing it with warranties, maintenance-contracts and buy-back-schemes. Now, they are re-wiring the practice, one-device-at-a-time.

It was fascinating to show our products to our families and friends. Recommending our products with pride was part of being an Engineer. They lasted well over two-three-decades. Every time someone came-back with a part-request after a decade, we were happy to treat them with care. Customer loyalty was beyond reward-point-system.

Now with so much advancements, tools and techniques, why can’t we make tech last longer than before? If we can increase the outreach of care and life-span of people with tech, why not tech itself? Can’t tech be good for itself?

That’s the question for every tech person. If you introduce yourself as a technology person, think twice. Are you making something good for good or tinkering for good? Every line of code you write, every design marking you go-ahead-with, has a mark on this world. The amount of digital-dust we are creating is unimaginable. Where is this headed and what will it do? Who’ll clean this mess and the mess it creates? Environmental enthusiasts soon will find a new topic to pursue. Before that, it is up-to the responsible tech people, to be good.

Tech for good requires a set of fundamental guiding principles. Some of them include – Practice Essentialism. Adopt responsible-design-practices. Focus on effectiveness. Kill-short-cuts and patch-works.

Make your own tech-work-manifesto. Live by it. Pass-it-on. Make-it-a-cult. Take-an-oath when you start your work to be making-tech-for-good. May be, good-tech follows.

What is your tech-work-manifesto?