I'm working! That old prayer comes to mind. My lack of serenity, courage and wisdom comes to mind. Of course, I am 23. People love asking me how old I am. Is it my face? I guess I do look kind of young. I was surprised at how much politics people talk about at work. There's always that guy who checks the GBP-EUR exchange rate as a matter of habit, right? Just look at it go. I give away as little of my opinion as I can. Not used to that. Talk less, smile more. I could do with smiling more. How do you stay above office politics, hubski? How do you compartmentalise everything that might distract you from your work that is not work?
I make sure I am busy. I have enough work to do each day, that I spend little time on other things. (Like Hubski.) Keep up the pace. If you are busy, then people will interrupt you less. Drink water. Water keeps you hydrated, it makes you get up and go to the bathroom every hour or two (which is good for your body), and it doesn't take time to make, so you don't get caught chatting uselessly around the coffee maker. (Also, life is better without coffee.) Let people be wrong. I hear people talking about shit they know nothing about, and spouting wrong information. Usually gossiping or pontificating on topics that they do not have any expertise in. That's ok. They can be wrong. You don't need to correct them, or engage them. Focus on your work. Headphones. Many people wear headphones at work all the time, which is counter-productive. Wearing them all the time means people just interrupt them any time they want to. I wear headphones only when I need to focus or can't be disturbed. People learn the difference. "Hang on. He's got his headphones on. We can ask him about this stuff later." (I may not even have anything playing. Just have the headphones on to deflect distractions, or simply to lower the ambient volume.) Reduce. Be "less" while at work. The people I give my "all" to, are the people I love. The people at work see a guy who is always happy, always working, and someone who gets shit done. They only get the work side of me. They know a bit of my life outside of work, but not much. They just see this happy, productive dude. By reducing or limiting my profile at work, it gives people fewer reasons to engage me in non-work stuff. So I don't have to listen to their fantasy football rosters, or their kid's play, or whatever. But since I am the happy, productive guy, I get called into all the cool projects, too, because I have proven that I am fun to work with, and I get shit done. That's my formula for not getting sucked into distractions. Interestingly, this is also my formula for not bringing my work home. The moment I step out the front door of my building, work is GONE from my head. And I don't think about it again until I am commuting to work the next morning, and planning out my day. How do you stay above office politics, hubski? How do you compartmentalise everything that might distract you from your work that is not work?
Thank you. These are some really good suggestions. Regarding keeping busy, I still haven't nailed this. But I find that not having tasks that totally fill my day really fuck me up emotionally way more than I thought it would. The killer thing for me right now is if the people above me are busy on some urgent task and there's nothing on JIRA for me to do. I am going to keep a list of tasks that aren't on the current sprint that I can work on in the absence of anything else. Not sure if this is the right way to do things (we're using Scrum, this is something I would love to change but almost definitely cannot). Getting pretty tired of coffee. The stuff from the machine tastes alright but when it becomes part of the everyday routine it loses its charm. What's the point? I know too many people who have got digestive problems from drinking too much of the stuff. Also addiction. Headphones, yes good call. Sometimes the office is loud and that's a good time for it otherwise they're not needed. I really love the idea of being "less" while at work. I just got back from visiting my friends back home and I got a bit emotional because I hadn't been around people who were showing so much love and attention to each other in so long. So I'd put that at the "all" end of the spectrum. I'll remember them when I'm stressing out at work.
This is also a great time to learn about other things that may be tangential to your current job, but might be useful in the future. For example, if you are working with SQL databases in your job right now, start learning Hadoop. Or look into NoSQL databases, in general. That way, when someone comes up against a database problem in the future, you could mention that maybe a NoSQL solution would work, and mention Hadoop. Or, another team might be looking for Hadoop people, and you - being already inside the company, familiar with the people and the systems, etc - mention that you have been doing some research on it, and stood up and instance on your home computer to try it out... and suddenly another team is possibly looking to hire you away, and train you on this more cutting-edge database technology. Sticking with the idea you might work with SQL databases, another option could be to start playing with Tableau, which is brilliant for doing data visualizations. And there is a free version at public.tableau.com. So when someone needs to visualize some data, you could drop it into Tableau, munge it around a little, and produce some really brilliant charts. So yeah... look just outside the area/thing you are working on. What is connected to it? What interests you there? Do a little research on those things. Figure out if you like them, and get some familiarity with the tools. As a fairly new person to the workforce, you may not be aware of how important incumbency is. Already working there gets you 90% of the way to any other job in the company, really. It is HARD to hire new people, and is fraught with wasted time, frustration, and bureaucracy. In addition, nobody is productive for their first three months as they try to figure out how to work within a new company's structure, and with their tools, people, etc. It is way easier to hire someone away from another team. So if you are already working there, know their implementation of JIRA, and are producing good work, then your lateral possibilities within the company are HUGE. And if I need to hire someone, and I can go talk to two or three other managers you have worked for, and they give you a good reference, then I REALLY want you on my team. Someone who has been around on a few teams, and has been productive, is way more valuable to their next team, too. There are some insights from a hiring manager's perspective. I hope they are useful! I am going to keep a list of tasks that aren't on the current sprint that I can work on in the absence of anything else.
Oh yeah I love doing tangential reading. We have scope at my job to integrate new technologies / ways of doing things into our work. Much more than in larger companies. Most of the stuff we work with goes through that route (someone reads about it during lunch / at home, they think of a way to include it in our product, they persuade the rest of the team to get onboard).