Day 31 – I am a Wartime Consigliere*

This is really a blog about how much I love my job.  For those of you that don’t know what I do, I am a Program Manager for a super cool product made by a super cool company that I’m not going to name in this particular blog just in case it breaks some weird, unknown rule and I get dooced.   

I will start by answering the question: What does being a “Program Manager “ mean anyway?  Well, I think it means different things at different companies.  Even within those companies, it means different things for different people.  For me, in its simplest definition, it means that I am charged with ensuring that we ship on time.  I define this as helping my team by solving problems as quickly as possible so that they can focus on and complete their work.  Some of the things I do every day are identifying and mitigating risks, identifying and removing impediments on the folks trying to code and test our software, harassing people to get information on risks, harassing people to get information on impediments and generally moving things along.  It’s my job to set up the project schedule.  It’s my job to know and report the status of things.  It’s my job to remind people of their deadlines…and of course harass them if they are not meeting their deadlines.  It’s my job to coordinate with all of the other teams that we are dependent upon, or are dependent upon us, for a successful release.

Basically, it is my job to know all the things.

One of my co-workers recently told me I was bossy, or rather he told me that he told his boss I was bossy.  This is hilarious for a few reasons.

• Because it is true.
• Just one?  Really?  I would have thought they would have come out of the wood work by now.  Clearly, I need to up my game. 
• When I was digging into the definition of Program Management at my company, I told Joel that it seemed like a job where I got paid to tell people their business.  His response: “Wow, that’s something you’ve been training for your whole life.  You’ll be perfect!”

All that said there are the parts of my job which I kick ass at and there are the parts of my job for which I can only make myself strive for mediocrity.  For example, I know that I need to document all the things, but in the grand scheme of dealing with emergencies those types of tasks always move to the end of my To-Do list.  I keep up as best as I can, but by definition emergencies are a higher priority…and dear god do I love a fire drill.   I thrive under pressure.  I think I get bored with normal things like work-life balance, reasonable deadlines and manageable workloads.  I’m not one of those people that can have one thing to work on which doesn’t need to be finished for two weeks.  It bores me to tears. However, give me five critical things that are all “my highest priority” and tell me that I have two weeks to pull that shit together?  I’m excited…enthralled…exhilarated. 

This is probably why “thinkers” frustrate me.  I have a hard time relating to data driven people.  Why talk to death about the details when you can just formulate a plan, execute and adjust as you go?  Adapting is kind of my thing, so I guess the reason that I love fire drills is that they require constant adaptation due to new information, problems, solutions, etc.  I am at my best when I have to put myself in the adapt/adjust/execute loop.

Suffice to say the job keeps me on my toes.  It was actually awkward to type the sentence about one thing to do for two weeks because that hasn’t happened since I started.  I have an endless To-Do list that I can pull from in what folks in my position would consider “down time”.  What makes me giggle about that is that for most other jobs, our down time would probably still be considered a fire drill.   But, it works for me.  I have my days where I feel like I’m shit at what I do, but I also have the days that I feel on top of the world.  Also, I have an amazing team that I love working with every day; so in the end that makes it all worthwhile.  I love it when a plan comes together, and not just because I’m paid to.

*If you do not have any idea what this means, shame on you.  Educate yourself immediately!