Next Practices

I’ve been thinking lately about the unexpected path that has led to my current work role.  As I’ve shared before, I love what I do and am very fortunate to get to work with the great people on my team.

If I step back, though, and look at a big timeline of what has transpired over the years to get me to this place, it wasn’t always positive, happy occurrences that led to the next turning point.  Sometimes I had to go down a path originally unplanned and unwanted in order for it all to turn out as it has.

For example, I would not have sought out another department to transfer to in 2011 if the department I was in at that time had given me the ability to concentrate on that major part of my role which needed all – not just some – of my attention.  Likewise, I would not have joined that previous department in 2009 if I had been completely happy with the management of the department I had served from 2003-2009.  Going further back, I would not have come to my current company in 2003 or the previous company I worked for briefly in 2003 if the market for contract trainers in my area of specialty hadn’t dried up between 2001 and 2003.  And the market for people with my certifications would not have dried up if Microsoft had not changed the rules allowing unqualified trainers not certified in the subjects to teach them anyway.

So, in hindsight, there has been a somewhat consistent pattern of events that at the time were very unpleasant and that forced me to look for and walk through other doors.  Yet, without any one of those negative circumstances happening right when it did, there is no way I would be in the fortunate place I am today, doing what I love with wonderful people.

That gives me hope for the next time I seem boxed in by unpleasant circumstances.  Chances are good that – even though I might not recognize it in the present – I will eventually see a bigger picture of how it all worked out for good.

Leap year lesson #229 is Enough left turns may still get you to the right place.