The Value of Writing: A Journey

Why did I decide to write?

Yeah, I guess it’s a bit of story time now but I promise it won’t be long. It all started when I received the feedback from a very senior manager of mine, who suggested that I write down a detailed growth plan for my next 2 years. This seemed as a simple task as getting the requirements from my level and next level, listing those in a document and providing evidence of how I’m currently checking boxes there and my plans to fulfill requirements was not yet fulfilling.

Writing a Plan

When I decided to focus and started writting the document I didn’t know much where to start so I decided to start by writting why I was doing it. This ended up being around a 20 pages document where I told my story at the company, my previous accomplishments, where I was heading and my strategy to get there. I ended up going into details of projects that were algined with my goals, future team structures, a strategy plan not only for me but for the whole organisation. I was able to identify bottlenecks in my career and growth and some things that I was doing that were not very valuable to me.

I was surprised about the results and how much clarity it brought me. I then learned the value of writting strategical documents for your organisation but also for you. So decided to do the same exercise for my personal life. I started writting a document about me, my past experiences and where I would like to be in the next couple of years. I listed the important things for me and things that I wanted to dedicate time to and energy. Honestly I don’t often go back to the document to do a recurrent check in on how well I’m doing all if. I personally don’t think that this is where the value of the exercise is. What I learned at that moment is that writting is an amazing exercise that forces you to put your thoughts together, be coherend, develop a vision for the future and make sure that whatever you do it’s in your best interest.

Removing The Fog

It’s easy to go days, months and years on cruise mode and not think if most of the things you do everyday is aligned with your values and principles. Life is distracting and we have plenty of enterteinment and motivation to always say “one day at a time”. While I do agree that it is important to live one day at a time, to not be overwhelmed by anxiety and thinking about how you’re gonna solve that big problem the next day, I also think it’s really important to dedicate time and think about the future. Well, that’s easier said then done. I don’t know how to sit and think about the future.

But that’s the whole point of writting and what I learned. I learned that by writting I forced myself to think about every next move for the next big period of time. And as I said before, I don’t go back to that document all the time. But I now have a summary of next 5 years in my mind that I didn’t have before. And I can still once a year review what I wrote to make sure that, after looking to the big picture, I’m coherent.

Here I Am

So yes, that’s why I decided to write. I’m gonna use this as an opportunity not only for me to share my primarily professional experience and tips with others but also to make sure that I am actually learning from what I do. If I have nothing to write about, what is it that I learned in the past months and years? It’s a good sanity check on my career. Also many of the challenges and problems I solve are not new and special to me. Many others are going through the same situations, so who knows, maybe there’s something I have to say that will help one out.

I made a conscious decision of not using any type of AI to help me structure my writting because this is not about generating content, to me. This is about me digging into my thoughts and making some sense of all of them. It’s a self-knowledge and developing process.

See you in my next post :)