In technology along with continuous learning, there is one more important thing to build and that is your professional identity. Following are the three tools that can help you to build your professional identity:
- Sprinting
- Shipping
- Storytelling
Sprinting : Set Habits Not Targets !
Run fast and don’t worry that ground isn’t perfect.
Sprinting is all about running fast over a short duration. While sprinting it’s not just about completing your stories or Jira tickets, but it’s all about incrementally building the product. Take sprinting as a tool (or framework) to demonstrate your consistency and discipline and that will help you to build your identity.
Now when you show this consistency and discipline in building the product, you are setting your habits and habits hire us forever and take us higher where as targets tame us and leave us clueless after we achieve them. so set habits not targets. More we get the habits right, the closer we get to the targets.
Shipping: Collision between your work and the outside world !
Productivity only comes with Shipping(.)
There is no such thing called productivity if it doesn’t involve shipping. In technology the products that we build never gets finished, they keep evolving with time but the only thing that defines the success is continuous shipping. So ship always and then build your identity with it !
So what is Shipping. I was reading a book and came across this one line definition of shipping.
Shipping is the collision between your work and the outside world.
which is true. For example, when I hit the publish button on my blog, my contents (& my thoughts) will collide with the outside world. It is shipping for me. When you roll out a new feature in your product line, your work collides with your users. It is shipping for you.
So it is super important to ship your art. The discipline of shipping is essential in building confidence and trust with your customers.
Storytelling: Impact of your little thoughts !
Amplify your little thoughts before they disappear.
Storytelling is a tool for human connection and an art of interaction. If your storytelling causes someone to change his mind, then your little thoughts are amplifying their impact.
With storytelling you not only build credibility for your ideas, or for your thoughts, but also you build your professional identity with it.
Thanks for connecting and reading !
-Sumit Sihag
