Passion is a double-edged sword. I am fortunate to love my profession. But those closest to me will sometimes ask, “can we talk about something besides work?” In other words, I am a workaholic, who needs an off swtich.

You shouldn't be critical to your team at any given time. That makes you a hard dependency.

This week I stood on the beach in Cape Cod with a childhood friend, watching the waves roll in from the Atlantic. It felt wonderful. I haven’t checked work email or looked at any code for over a week. It hasn’t been easy, especially for my friend who manages a team in a deadline oriented industry. There’s guilt that your inbox is piling up or colleagues may struggle without you. But the tidal waves caused by gravity from the moon¹ remind me how small and insignificant we - and our work - actually are.

It took me a long time to realize this: you shouldn’t be critical to your team at any given time. That would make you a hard dependency, which can be a liability in software. So why would we want that in our teams?

If there should be a critical situation, either a) your colleagues call you - not the other way around or b) the team deals with it themselves and learns from any mistakes that they may make. A self-sufficient team should be the long term goal, right?

I know work is piling up. But I also know that I have a packed workload when I get back anyway. So what’s a few more emails? Just like the waves, work continues to roll on without me. And that’s OK by me.

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