This kids show isn't running smoothly. There are lots of delays for lots of reasons. I've been playing this high-flyer solve it person - as I usually do. I've been taking on a lot of side work related to the project - costumes, sets, technicals, scripts etc. My original job was simply to oversee the animation. I haven't been inside the animation studio for weeks. Now that the animations are behind a full two weeks in production the shit hit the fan, got spread about the room, and slid downwards onto my desk. And I raged. I raged against how much other stuff I was doing, how could I possibly oversee the animation as well? I raged against my animators - graduates with no industry experience for not pulling up their socks, and for behaving like kids. I wrote emails that detailed in length why is was that I was never around.
And then my boss politely pointed out that it was I who have volunteered for it all. I'd taken it on my plate. People had asked if it could be done, and I'd said yes. I'd heaped all this extra work onto myself and left myself so bogged down that I couldn't move. Then to 'escape' the pressure of the situation, I'd hived off to the berg to go shoot a documentary on dinosaurs, further adding more to my plate, and pushing everything that was on it, off to the side. I had dug myself in as deep as I could without even realizing it. Well I realized it this morning. No answer I could give could explain away that I had simply not done what I'd promised to do.
So I sat down and wrote an email (to all those who have ever recieved emails from me stop smiling) to the producers. I took full responsibility for my actions (or lack there of) and promised to make things right. But how? How now to turn the shit into compost so that I could grow a product (here ends the farmers reference). Well there has been a saying that has been banging around in my head all month: Face what's in front of you. So that is what I started to do. I made a list of everything that needed to be done and started working on it.
I haven't finished anything on that list yet, but tomorrow is another day. But what inspired me to write this post today is that I want to know this from you dear reader:
As humans we should all strive to better ourselves. As employees who are not content to plod through employment we should always seek to find innovative ways to further our company and our work, but and here's what I learned today, we must make sure we don't get lost in the innovative future plans and forget the present projects. So there must be a fine line between doing the work in front of you, and doing the planning for the future work. That's a balance I need to find, and I suspect will spend quite some time in learning.
So I hope that you take something from this, even if it's a moment relaxation that we are all dealing with other peoples compost, but that sometimes our own manure is involved, and most of the time, we're the ones causing the shit in the first place...
1 comment:
It's an easy mistake to make for several reasons. For you, I think if you were the general leading an army, you'd be telling the snipers which type of ammunition to load...and then picking up the gun yourself to do the job (while the enemy tanks outflanked you and overran your base)...
On the other hand, most people *like* to be told what to do, and they prefer when someone else takes responsibility. So you're not entirely to blame - your natural tendencies and theirs produced what psychologists call a "co-dependency" problem...
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