Out with the old, in with the new …

As someone who has never moved from her home town and who has worked in the same place for 18 years, it can be argued that I have not undergone much change. If I add the multinational environment to the mix, however, I can say that every five or six year, by virtue of my leadership changing I am invited to a somewhat forced change myself.

I am not sure what is more challenging: the fact that I am in the same company, same country, same environment and prompted to change when I don’t necessarily feel like it, or the fact that not many pay attention to the changing cycle of someone who is not new to the organisation. There is so much done to support people who sail in an out of the organisation but not much (if anything) to help the “stayers”get acclimatised with the new environment being formed around them.

At times I feel like a piece of the logistics, like a cog in the machine (to use a Seth Godin term). Interchangeable. I have been in the same place for 18 years and for various reasons, I cannot move on. The place I am in right now (and I don’t mean this geographically) has prompted my passion into a halt. I am looking back and realising that I have put 100% of my life and passion into projects that are seen by people walking in as “not good” “crappy” or “obsolete”. And I do get the value of the fresh eyes and the amazing opportunity that lies in the beginner’s mindset. After all, I strive to keep these for as long as I can, daily.

Having put my heart and sweat into these projects, knowing their history and the reasoning behind each of them, every such consideration hurts. Even while knowing they are not made with ill intentions.

My predicament is therefore quite complicated: how do I continue to pour my heart and soul into the projects I am asked to do every day, while knowing that down the road, in a year, or three, or five, someone is going to look at them and think they are fit to be discarded and may not even be shy enough not to say this to my face?