I breathed deeply before opening the Zoom meeting. I tried rewriting my notes so many times, it felt like an inescapable mess.
After the small talk passed, he asked “so, what did you want to talk about today?”
“Well,” I hesitate, knowing I’ll get sucked in, “I don’t know if I need any action on this, but I just wanted to let you know that I’ve been feeling like I’ve had no choice but to work overtime lately, but…”
I go on in what feels like one long, breathy sentence. About how my family’s needs have chewed up so much of my time at work, and there was nothing I could do about it. About how the business shifting its focus from one thing to the next left me with the short end of the stick. About how I had lost my confidence in myself, lost my motivation, my drive.
But of course, what I say is not so clear as that. It all comes out in one ramble with caveats and parenthesis, additions and footnotes. I cannot be so unprofessional as to be blunt.
“So, okay,” he responds. “Let’s leave family out of the equation. How long does it take you to write user stories on average?”
I freeze. How can I respond to such a question that throws away my experience? How can I calculate a number for him when all I have are my words?
“That’s not the problem,” I restate. “I create stories, and then the backlog changes. Design tells me it’s not ready yet. Engineering might tell me the same thing. We might receive a last-minute change of requirements, it’s…”
My voice trails off. I notice a shifting of eyes within him. I do not know what it is about his expression, perhaps his eyes narrowing, his mouth slightly agape, a large, silent sigh accumulating within him. But I am convinced, this is the moment I have lost his respect.
“Okay, Paul,” he says, “I’m going to tell you something. You need to get next sprint ready. And you need to get it ready today.”