Yup I have realized that too, it's just two faces of the same coin. I have also found out that what I really WANT to do is usually not something I'm good at.
For example I consider myself good at being a middle man between backend and analyst (I work as a data engineer in between) because none has the time and interest to communicate with each other -- so I usually took up the initiative and clear up things. I also work in small companies where people are expected to wear multiple hats, so no one gets their toes stepped on. But oh how I HATE that part of the job. How I want to get into some low level programming which is further from the "stakeholders" and the scope is larger than two weeks! Then I did a bit of low level projects and found myself not really good at what I want to do -- at least not good enough to even think about applying for such a job where everyone has done projects left and right when they were in schools. The mental doesn't help either. I might be able to be more productive if I don't need to work or/and don't have a family, but I can get rid of none.
> being a middle man between backend and analyst (I work as a data engineer in between) because none has the time and interest to communicate with each other -- so I usually took up the initiative and clear up things. I also work in small companies where people are expected to wear multiple hats, so no one gets their toes stepped on.
Just curious if you have ever felt that it's hard to demonstrate your value to the organization if you're a "glue" guy like that. (I have also worked in several small companies, but only as a partner or an executive.)
I've found that the older and more experienced I get, the more specificity I want in how the value I provide will be measured.
> Just curious if you have ever felt that it's hard to demonstrate your value to the organization if you're a "glue" guy like that. (I have also worked in several small companies, but only as a partner or an executive.)
I'm probably the outlier who don't care too much about showing my value to my employer as long as they pay me. Somehow getting appreciation (whether true-hearted or not) is not a huge motivation to me. The reason I moved forward with this role was because miscommunication or zero-communication bogged down my work and created potential hazards in the maintenance phase. I'd like to remove those obstacles so I stepped forward to clean it up. I always protect myself by ccing everyone and try to reduce my responsibility in all of these -- because it is not clean cut who should do this communication type of work.
> The reason I moved forward with this role was because miscommunication or zero-communication bogged down my work and created potential hazards in the maintenance phase. I'd like to remove those obstacles so I stepped forward to clean it up.
Are you me? I'm a systems thinker and I, too, have to stop and analyze workflows and try to "fix" things. Probably why I ended up in process/management consulting.
For example I consider myself good at being a middle man between backend and analyst (I work as a data engineer in between) because none has the time and interest to communicate with each other -- so I usually took up the initiative and clear up things. I also work in small companies where people are expected to wear multiple hats, so no one gets their toes stepped on. But oh how I HATE that part of the job. How I want to get into some low level programming which is further from the "stakeholders" and the scope is larger than two weeks! Then I did a bit of low level projects and found myself not really good at what I want to do -- at least not good enough to even think about applying for such a job where everyone has done projects left and right when they were in schools. The mental doesn't help either. I might be able to be more productive if I don't need to work or/and don't have a family, but I can get rid of none.