“Speak your truth quietly and clearly” – Desiderata, Max Ehrmann
Part 1 – A Beautiful Morning…
That morning started like any other. Indiana F Potter, or “Indy” got to work, made himself a cup of coffee, mumbled hello to anyone he could not avoid eye contact with and headed right to his desk. Given a choice, Indy preferred to be in his inner world of concepts and ideas. Especially at the start of a day, he got his energy by reflecting inwards, rather than interacting with others. Indy started catching up on what was going on in the world, moving on next to his mail and then started to plan out his day.There was a loud sound of laughter from the hallways, announcing the arrival of Estelle Jones. Estelle could kick up the energy level of the whole office just by her presence. She loved interacting with others and stopped to talk with most people on the way to her desk – cracking jokes, asking questions, sharing news. By the time she dropped off her bag and headed to the cafeteria, she was surrounded by an excited group of colleagues, talking about all that had happened since the last time they met. As she spoke to her friends, Estelle could find her energy levels rise and she was charged up to begin an exciting new day of work.
By the time Indy finished reading the news, the chatter from the cafeteria had subsided, and he knew Estelle and her group were back at their desks. A steady flow of e-mails, im’s and phone calls coursed through the veins of the office. Indy took a long, satisfying sip of his coffee and smiled at the calming silence. All was well with the world 🙂
Almost.
Within moments, there was an ominous series of “You’ve Got Mail” dings across the office and everyone knew an urgent message had been broadcast to the entire team. Indy checked his mail and noticed a high importance message from the Boss. Fire Drill! There was a $3M deal on the line. All that the customer wanted was to port their software onto a different operating system and add a few enhancements. And they wanted a hard commitment by evening. Revenues being what they were, this was a juicy opportunity that the company just could not walk away from. So, the Boss wanted a quick assessment with an effort estimate, schedule, impact and risks on the table within 2 hours.
2 Hours? Indy was surprised and raised his eye brows. That was unusual. Unusually generous. The Boss seemed to be mellowing a little after the 360 degree feedback 🙂 A few months ago, they would have gotten 30 minutes.
Read Part 2 – The Rapid Response!
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