Just over a week ago I was in an accident. A SUV smashed me into a garage wall - breaking both legs, one wrist, and creating massive contusions from my ankles up through my back. I went into a wall – cartoon style.
Here’s what it taught me about lead qualification.
Kidding.
Today’s episode is actually about two things:
Information Flow
How adaptable your team is when an “unknown” unknown comes for your plans.
I’m very lucky. It could have turned out so much worse. Until very, very recently, I’ve never broken a major bone, never ridden in an ambulance, never experienced the traumatic shock associated with major and multiple injuries.
…To See What Condition My Condition was In.
Now back home recovering, I still couldn’t give you a great breakdown of what they did to patch me up despite every person along the way telling me what what was about to happen. For example, I have eight sets of stitches in my right leg and a cored out tibia with a metal rod in it. However, my left leg is also broken – somewhere, but is weight bearing – still no idea where or what that means. I’ve got another week before I see what’s underneath my wrapped up left wrist and how many holes they put in to fix it. I’m also not sure what’s hurting or bruised due to surgery or the incident.
I mean I get it. Doctors and nurses are making their rounds, trying to help everyone the best they can, but little time to actually spend doing it. Clearly, there was no “make sure we catch-up patient with what we did or are doing and show him where we installed the USB-C port” checklist.
If I wasn’t on 7 different kinds of meds at the time, I would have found it funny that no vertical is off-limits from poor customer communication and coordination. When everyone is doing something important but no one know why or how it all fits together: That’s not great.
The night porter tasked with inexplicably changing my room at 3:30 in the AM one night was very nice. She said she basically moves people around all night – no idea the logic behind it though. I promised her 5-stars on Yelp.
Anyway, at my first follow-up visit I’m bringing a list of questions and grabbing better “before” and “after” images. And yes, of course one of them is “How to I extend my new southpaw Wolverine claws?”
No Plan Survives the First Contact with the Car
While all this was going on, I managed to have a few zoom meetings (camera off), a media interview, do some email follow-ups, make a few contract revisions, and a work on a few rounds of collaborative edits to various project documents and art files. I even managed to get some code written.
I do want to be clear here that this was INSANE. I am not here to promote toxic productivity.
I did things as I could. There’s only so much laying around to be done in the hospital. I did get word to my teams. They stepped up, covered other meetings, got follow-ups back to partners, and we pushed out everything else that we could. That’s what’s supposed to happen.
I’m fortunate be surrounded by people with genuine – and not just superficial – concern for each other these days. This is how to build and support sustainable companies. They can handle chaos being thrown at it and come out even stronger. Those with “work above people” mindsets: Don’t.
Side note: Trying to do cmd+option+shift+V on a laptop keyboard with a massively wrapped up left-hand is comedy gold.
10 days in and other than “work from couch” vs “work from desk,” I’m back in the groove, with actually a few more optimizations to my workflows due to all my misadventure.
It's amazing what benefits that the need for sudden improvisation can create.
Stay safe and let’s catch-up. You never know what tomorrow will bring.
Recently
Screen: “The Pitt” (HBO Max). I thought it’d be funny to finally start watching the show while stuck in the hospital. I regret nothing.
Music: “Colorado” (Quaker City Night Hawks).
Purchase: Mini Foldable Lint Brushes (Amazon) - Dog fur is out of control right now. On top of having big versions, I got a pack of these small brushes for in the cars, backpacks, etc.