Lessons Learned this Week - Feb. 24, 2017

I’ve always wanted to try to capture one or two things I’ve learned or am learning each week and make a habit of writing it down. Scheduling the time to do such has been the challenge, but I am committed to trying.

This week I’ve been trying to move a bunch of projects off my plate that have been sitting there for too long. It’s the norm for this time of year, but I’m tired of looking at them on my project list. So there’s been a lot of work done of projects I maintain, rather than new development. So here’s a couple things that caught my interest:

• Moving you Google Page Speed score is time-consuming. I spent a day, and only saw a net gain of 2 on mobile and 10 on desktop. This is an on-going project to see if I can get our home page’s score higher.

• I ran across this lightning talk from Jason Mayden, former Global Design Director for Jordan Brand. Good stuff on leading yourself and exceeding society’s expectations. I’m not the target audience here, but it resonates.

• I find myself continuing to be challenged by the idea of Taco Bell Programming. I’ve built my career on my ability to provide the organization with what they need, with never considering the ramifications of building such highly customized tools. Has the business benefitted, sure. Have I or the person after me? Probably not. As the dev and project manager, how do I help the business/organization make the shift. That’s a post for another day.

• Running through my head the last few weeks has been the question, “does hard-work pay off?”. Normally, I’d say yes, but I’m learning that sometimes in life it just doesn’t. However, it was so good to catch up with my brother, Starkey, today. He’s a reminder that hard work and big dreams can pay off. Still blown away that we were able to sit down and share a meal. Hopefully it’s not another 10 years before we do so again.