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Yeah. So in my work with a lot of
engineers and technology professionals, there is just so
many people who have this sense of like, hey, shouldn't there be
a little bit more to this, like more fulfilment and more
alignment with where their career is headed and the things
that they care about in their lives?
And that's the whole idea of being intentional instead of
being reactive or unintentional and just letting your life come
to you. We have this opportunity to
choose what we want to do and who we want to become, which I
think is what's most important. Hey everyone, my name is Henry
Surya Virawan and you're listening to the Technically
Journal Podcast, the show where I'll be bringing you the
greatest technical leaders, practitioners and thought
leaders in the industry to discuss about their journey,
ideas and practices that we all can learn and apply to build a
highly performing technical team and to make an impact in your
personal work. So let's dive into our journal.
Hello again, my friends and my listeners.
You're listening to the Tech Lead Journal Podcast, a podcast
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Are you tired of feeling uninspired and disengaged in
your engineering career? If so, then this episode is for
you. My guest for today's episode is
Jeff Perry, and he is back for a second episode with his latest
book, The Intentional Engineer. In this episode, Jeff uncovers
the keys to building a meaningful, fulfilling career by
cultivating more intentionality. We dive into the quiet quitting
phenomenon happening worldwide, and Jeff shares his personal
story of disengagement during a particular stage in his career.
Learn Jeff's intentional engineer model to assess your
current situation and start becoming more intentional toward
your lives and career. You will also learn the
importance of identifying your core values, the power of
mindsets, getting your career clarity, finding your genius
zones, and a few core skills you should learn for living more
intentionally. I hope you enjoy listening to
this episode and getting inspired to make changes toward
a more meaningful and fulfilling career.
Please share this with your colleagues, friends, and
communities and leave a five star rating and review on Apple
Podcasts and Spotify. So let's now go to my
conversation with Jeff. Jeff, since we last talked, so I
know that you wrote a book, so maybe tell us a little bit more
what you were up to these days. Yeah.
So writing a book is a whole process, and I did it maybe in
an atypical fashion. My had some mentors and things
that I was working with earlier this summer.
So when we're talking here, this is November of 2023.
But in the summer earlier this year, it's mentors I was talking
to. And I've been doing a lot of
this work and coaching and training and things for
engineers and technology professionals for years.
Now his mentors are like, when are you going to write a book?
And it finally clicked. And I also had an event that I
was going to and to be speaking at in a few months.
And I sort of just caught in my mind like, hey, how cool would
it be to go speak at that event, which is about 3 months away and
have my book there that I could share with people.
And there's just a lot of energy behind that.
And so I sprinted to get this done.
And from IDEA to publish was about 3 months to get this book
done. And so that that was a lot to
get that done. But it was also very fulfilling.
Something that I've been thinking about and wondering
about. Like, hey, I wanted to be an
author for a long time, and I've considered myself an author.
And then I've written dozens and dozens, hundreds of articles and
newsletters and things over the years.
And finally compiling a lot of that into a book is a labor of
love. And I and I hope that people
really enjoy it. This episode is brought to you
by Miro. As you will learn in this
episode about becoming more intentional in your engineering
career and life, one of the best ways to get more clarity is
through the power of visualizations.
Either it's about figuring out your core values, getting your
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That's three free boards@miro.com/podcast.
And now let's get back to our episode.
Well, three months to write the whole book.
I think that's really a great thing that you achieved.
I always wondered when I will write a book as well, so maybe
one day I'll try to write 1. But today, yeah, we're gonna
talk about your new book, right? So The Intentional Engineer.
So the title itself sounds interesting for me.
In the 1st place, what kind of problems do you think that
you're trying to solve by writing this book?
Yeah. So in my work with a lot of
engineers and technology professionals, there's just so
many people who have this sense of like, hey, shouldn't there be
a little bit more to this and not more?
Like, hey, I should be getting more money and more prestige and
all that. But like more fulfillment and
more alignment with where their career is headed and the things
that they care about in their lives.
And I found that so many people, when they've kind of sensed
that, they found themselves just to be sort of in kind of
survival mode or just opportunistic.
Like different roles or opportunities came their way
over the years. And they just took that and ran
with it and it gets them to a point.
And then they're like, hey, what do I really want?
Instead of letting other people dictate what they want for me?
And that's the whole idea of being intentional instead of
being reactive or unintentional and just letting your life come
to you. We have this opportunity to
choose what we want to do and who we want to become, which I
think is what's most important. Like it's the process of not
achieving certain things but becoming who we're meant to
become over the course of our lives and careers.
And it's a choice, right? And so this idea to be
intentional is a choice and a choice that all of us get to
make. You can make it once, but you
can make it every day, every week, every year of our lives.
To be intentional again and again and again, over and over.
And I hope that this book infuses some of that.
It helps people level up the way that they think about all these
things. And then obviously to take
action with intention to become who they want to become and
unleash some of their potential that might right now be laying a
little bit dormant. Yeah, I think in the past few
years, if we have learned from the journey, right, from the
pandemic and the uncertainties, you know, massive layoffs
happening everywhere, I think people start to questioning
themselves, right? What is the true thing that you
are achieving in life and work and especially like you
mentioned, right, Sometimes we didn't think about it until a
certain major event happening, like new opportunity comes, like
for example, layoff happening. You have your own story as well
that you wrote in the book. Maybe if you can share a little
bit about your own story. Yeah.
So the interesting thing about my story that kind of led me to
eventually doing what I'm doing now in the coaching and the
training work that I get to do is that a lot of things are
really good. And that's the interesting
thing, is like, sometimes you don't necessarily need to be
laid off and have some cataclysmic event or something
to sort of jar you. But a lot of things were good.
I was in a great company. I was getting paid well.
I'd had growth opportunities. I'd done a number of different
things. There were some changes that
were made that maybe weren't in line with what I really want to
do next. And so that got me to reflect
back and look at, hey, what do I really want to do it?
This isn't what I want to do. And I only could really identify
that at that time. Like, this isn't really yet, but
I don't even know what that was yet.
And so this journey of kind of finding the power of
intentionality was just kind of beginning for me.
But I did know, as I had opportunities during that time
to do some training, coaching internally, that I loved the
really human element of things rather than just focusing on the
technologies themselves, but the people behind the technology and
unleashing some of that potential.
And so my family life was good. I was comfortable.
I was getting paid well and all that stuff, but I still kind of
felt lost. And so we almost needed
sometimes give our permission to say, hey, it's OK even when
things are going well on paper, to not feel like things are
quite right for us. And that changes over time in
different stages of our lives. But it may be a a really big
catalyst moment for you. Or you might just reflect and be
like and ask yourself the questions, Am I really doing and
becoming who I want to be? And if the answer is no, then
that opens up a whole world of possibility.
Like, OK, then what? And that can be scary.
Or we can get excited about that and think about, OK, let's go
design the future of us. Yeah, I think your own story,
right, Could relate to so many people as well.
So just like what you said, right?
It doesn't have to take a major event to start questioning, you
know, about life, about Korea in general, right?
But also when you're feeling good, right?
You seem like, you know, getting paid well, you know, family
life, no issue, career wise, you're also progressing.
But I think as you also grow in age, sometimes as you get older,
right, you start questioning like, is that it?
Right? Is there something else that I
would like to do right? Is there something more
meaningful, I guess when people grow in their age?
So I think you also mentioned the statistics quoted by Gallup
in the Global Workforce report. I read it.
I think it's also intriguing, right?
Like more than half or like 55%? People are kind of like quiet
quitting, right? Even though they have a job, and
many of them also disengage. So tell us more about these
statistics, right? What do you find interesting
with that? Yeah, Gallup does this world
survey every year. And so it splits it up over the
worldwide data as well as by country or region.
And so I'm just opening up the book to grab myself.
Only 23% of people worldwide feel like they're thriving at
work. That's a sad number to me,
right? That's not even a quarter of
people feel like they're really thriving.
And it's a little bit higher in the US where I'm at.
I think it's like just over 30%, but it's still not a whole lot.
And 59% are quite quitting and 18% are actively disengaged,
right? So it's a whole bunch of people
who are unhappy with some aspect of their work.
But I think about the opportunity there for, I mean,
numbers that low, there's a huge opportunity to increase that.
And what does increasing those numbers mean?
First of all, from an individual?
Like how cool would that be for me as an individual or any one
of our listeners to move from? I'm actively disengaged to
thriving and what that means for them and their family and the
people around them and the kind of person they'll become when
they're in that space, right? So that's a cool thing.
Second of all, I believe that engineers and technology
professionals have a huge opportunity to solve some of the
biggest problems on the planet. And they are going to be more
innovative, productive, collaborative, and all those
things. When they are more engaged and
when they're in the thriving state, when they're actively
disengaged, they're certainly not really going to be doing
their best work, right? So companies, organizations have
a financial incentive to improve these numbers as well as the
employees, the individuals taking responsibility for.
How can I design my life and career in a way that I can find
an opportunity that gets me into that thriving space And that's a
Co creative experience, right? Because I don't want to pretend
like, hey, if you just go make a career change, like suddenly
grass is going to be greener on the other side.
And if you're not liking where you're at right now.
And at the same time, the organizations who are employing
people have a responsibility to create environments and cultures
where people can thrive. As well as developing people,
helping them get in touch with the things that are most
important to them and finding ways to align that with the work
that they get to do. This is a Co creative experience
and that's part of the work that I get to do now is help the
individuals and the organizations help combine that
in a way to move from kind of surviving to thriving.
Yeah, I think being engaged in work is really important to me,
right, Because we spend a lot of hours in our day, you know,
weeks to actually do our work, right.
So if we are actively disengaged, I think that will
kind of like ripple into all aspects of our life as well our
mood, you know, maybe our relationship with family and
friends. So I think really, really
crucial that we try to be more engaged in our work, right.
And sometimes we can find new jobs, but it is also very
opportunistic and there's a lot of probability that it may not
work as well. So I think being intentional
here, which we are going to discuss, what does it mean
actually to you when you say being more intentional?
Yeah. So I I shared it a little bit
earlier that being intentional is a choice.
And for me, another way to use that or a few other words that
we can talk about being intentional is deliberate,
purpose driven and all of that. When we're driven by our
intention of who we want to become and the things that are
most important to us, it drives our actions, right, to create
the outcomes that we're trying to create.
And so it's an opportunity to decide who you want to become
and decide are you willing to do what it takes to make that
happen. That's what it means to me to be
intentional. Yeah.
So I think first you have to kind of like find the purpose,
kind of like be deliberate and also importantly the take action
part, right, Because I believe all of us will have ideas, will
have our own dreams, but not many people probably take the
step to actually do the actions, which in your book you advocate
people to do some kind of activities, right.
So like being more intentional in terms of actions and maybe do
journaling. So maybe it's time for you to
probably mention a little bit about your workbook companion,
right? That you create as well, along
with the book. Yeah, so with the book that
people can get on Amazon or find more information at the
intentionalengineer.com. I also created a companion
workbook that people can use. And this is a lot bigger.
It's like full pages and you can buy an Amazon or if you purchase
a book you can get a copy of the workbook for free.
The digital copy and the whole reason I did that is a lot of
times when I'm reading books, I focus first on kind of consuming
the book, whether I'm listening to the book or just kind of
reading through the book. And I get through the book and
sometimes have completion compulsion.
I just want to get through the book, but I don't usually take
the time to actually step back and be like, hey, there are all
these activities and questions and reflections and things to do
in there and I have a whole lot of those at the end of every
chapter. I have take intentional action
section here, but I know that there's probably a whole lot of
people that won't do that just when they read the book.
And so that's the whole point of the workbook is to give people
the space. And so I open up all the
questions and the activities that are in the book and give
you space to go reflect on the questions that are asked or
reflect on or record what happened is you took the
recommended actions and or make plans to do so, whatever that
is, so that you can take the ideas and put them into practice
as you do so. So all that can be found at the
intentional engineer.com. Yeah, I find this kind of book
actually works best if you do the activities as well, right?
Not just consuming. I personally also like tend to
consume more rather than doing the activity.
But I've found that this kind of books actually work best if you
do the activities and you don't, doing reflection, pondering and
even asking questions for some of those activities, because the
feedback that you get from people will be much more useful
as well. Exactly.
So yeah, in your book you have this intentional engineer model.
I find that really interesting, if you can walk that through to
people so that they understand where they are at at the moment.
Yeah. So this model helps us
understand, like you said, where we're at in our life and career.
And you think about a ladder kind of moving up in different
rungs, but instead of a corporate ladder, like, hey, I'm
moving up in the different titles and things, it's moving
up in kind of our level of engagement and satisfaction with
our life and how that aligns with our work.
So anyway, at the very bottom on the career side, people are
usually unemployed, like there is no career that's happening at
the moment. So they're feeling overlooked,
right? So the status is unemployed, but
they're feeling overlooked. And that's typically leads to a
lot of stress and anxiety around that.
We move up and people are employed, but they're kind of in
a survival mode to where I call it surviving, usually not making
a whole lot of money, but just enough to survive.
And so they're in the state of what I call obligatory state
where they're doing what they need to, to take care of the
basic needs of life, But not much more is going on beyond
that. And then kind of the third level
is where I find a whole lot of people at in the engineering
technology space. They're in opportunistic mode
and they're being paid well, but they're disengaged.
And this is where I was when I kind of tell my story, where I
was lost and where we were just talking about some of the stats
around being disengaged. A whole lot of people, a good
majority of people in my experience are in this space
even if they are getting paid well because money doesn't
create satisfaction. You know, we all want to be paid
fairly and money can provide opportunities to do other
things, but money in itself doesn't create satisfaction.
And so the tipping point over here is move from being
opportunistic to being intentional, right.
And then this leads us into a state, this kind of 4th level
being intentional of experiencing purposeful growth.
So that purpose driven growth and opportunity perhaps
financially it often can be when we kind of step into our best
selves but also into the other areas of our life that we most
care about and that can lead us to kind of the fifth level here
is being more intentional and digging into our life's work and
being more impactful. So it goes beyond just us, me as
an individual, and how can I impact others as a leader in the
organization, as a thought leader, as a mentor, impactful
in my community and the other things and causes that I care
about. Because it goes beyond just me
and just the career and the actions and things that I'm
taking here. But what does that mean
globally? And the type of impact that I
want to have in the world then on my community and on my
family, right. And so no matter where you're
at, right, if you're all the way down at the bottom, kind of,
hey, I'm unemployed. I don't have a job right now.
I can't even think about what's next until I get something.
OK, that's fine. Let's just move up and get you
at least something. You can take care of the basics
and then you have that mental space to move to what's next.
We still want to be driven with some of that intentionality all
the way through and thinking about who we want to become, but
sometimes we need to get to a base state before we can take
the next step, and that's totally fine.
Embrace the reality of where we currently are and say, how can I
just take another step forward towards becoming who I want to
be? Yeah.
I find this model really interesting to make sense of
where we are at. Although like what you said,
right, many people may be in this position of being paid but
disengaged, right, because they are not doing the career that
aligns with who they are. And I think the tipping point is
what you mentioned being more intentional and so that you can
get purposeful growth. But I think the tipping point
normally also involves a lot of kind of like uncertainties and
risks, right, Which many people would not have made the step
because this is like a tipping point, right?
So maybe a little bit of advice here because people being paid
well, although they disengage, means they are safe, right?
They kind of like have a job, they can, you know, do other
activities they like. But sometimes the risk is
something that they don't want to take.
So tell us, maybe some advice about how to make the step to
actually go past this tipping point?
Yeah, right. So I mean, you mentioned a few
words there, the risk and the uncertainty.
And usually when we think of words like that, what comes up
as a whole lot of fear. I quote this quote in the book,
but from a psychologist by the name of Virginia Cetir.
And I love it. And I think about this all the
time, is that many people prefer the certainty of misery to the
misery of uncertainty. When I think about making a
change from what I know right now, OK, if I'm paid and
disengaged, I'm not enjoying where I'm at.
I'm not being like I'm living my best, you know, being my best
self for growing purposefully and all those things.
But the idea of changing to something else, I don't know how
that's going to work out. I know what this is like right
now, and I'm comfortable enough. Why would I change when I don't
know what that's going to look like?
Well, that sounds like digging into that certainty of misery.
And that change doesn't necessarily need to mean a
change in your job role or position, right?
That change could be a change in you, your mindset, how you
approach all of that and the relationships at work and in
your personal life, which is also feels uncomfortable and
uncertain when we try and become something different.
But something needs to change to step into that intentionality.
Instead of you saying I'm just going to stick with what I know,
this is who I am, why would I change?
And so, yeah, it's risky, right? I don't quote this, but I love
the whole concept from Brené Brown and her Daring Greatly
book. She takes that daring greatly
idea from a quote, I think from Theodore Roosevelt, if I'm not
mistaken. You know, this idea like the man
in the arena. Like, it's the man in the arena
who's trying new things, who's in the fight that has the
courage that counts, not someone who's just a spectator, right?
So are you going to be a spectator of your life, or are
you going to step into the arena, try something new and
step up to what your potential is?
Because if we just kind of sit back and rest on our laurels,
then we're probably diminishing who we can become.
And that's a sad thing in my mind.
I think all of us are, You know, I think about the ideas of like
energy, like we are full of potential energy, right?
We're full of fuel that is ready to be unleashed for goodness in
the world. And I don't want any of us to
leave without having spent that in the ways that we can.
Yeah, Thanks for clarifying that.
Being intentional doesn't mean you have to change your whole
career, right? Or do some things that totally
different than what you do. It could be a small step, small
experiments, right? The key here is being in
alignment with what you want and being more intentional, right.
And I think taking risks and, you know, embracing uncertainty
is something that we have to do anyway if we want to grow,
right. Just like when we were kids, we
learn a lot, We make a lot of mistakes, but we grow a lot as
well. Normally when we get to adults,
you know, like life becomes much more stable and we don't want to
take risks. So I think the same key message
that you bring here is to actually don't be afraid to take
the necessary steps right, as long as it's aligned with what
you want and who you want to become, right.
Which brings us to the important things first, right?
Because if we want to be intentional, you mentioned that
we need to understand our core values.
So tell us what do you mean by core values and how can we find
them? Yeah.
So core values are values and principles and traits that we
care about that we want to live by.
Some people find those that come from like a faith background or
something like that. For others, it may just be
things that they value and other people.
That's some of the ways that we can identify those things.
But I look at core values as an opportunity to be a just those
guiding principles that we make decisions on so we can identify
those. I have some activities in there
and and you can start with sort of saying like hey, what are the
traits that you really appreciate in other people?
Hey, this person is really what? Like what's the word that you
would use to describe this person that you really love and
respect? You know, make a list of those
people and what are the traits that you really respect about
them? If you really respect it and
others, it's probably something that you care about and want to
cultivate more and more in yourself.
And then we can start to whittle that down.
And I usually recommend getting to a list of three to seven.
You get too few, You know, there's not really much going
on. You get too many, you can't even
remember them. I use a group of five and I put
it into an acronym to help me remember what they are.
And so then when I'm faced with decisions or opportunities or
challenges, I can look at and remember and reflect on those
core values and say, hey, is this in line with those things
that I've declared are important to me and the values that I want
to live by? Am I going to be 100% perfect
and 100% congruent with those values?
You know, every moment of every day, if I can keep coming back
to that and keep remembering that I can keep trying to become
more and more of a person who lives by those values, then
perhaps when other people interact with me, they're going
to recognize those values in me. And I can make decisions based
on those values rather than based on some of the fears or
uncertainties or the other things that we previously talked
about. Yeah, I think these days there
are so many these kind of personality tests that can kind
of like guide you along, like how to find your traits, maybe
your values as well. I personally like the strengths
Finder, right? So you can get the top five or
whatever, then the strengths that you can find from there.
But to me the most important thing is not just identifying
those values, but you use them to actually make decisions,
right? Because sometimes we kind of
like take for granted, OK, this is who we are, but we kind of
like forget what are the values, but we make decision based on
maybe a compulsion, right, Like taking at that moment what is
most important at that time, but doesn't necessary align with
your values. So like identifying this value,
I think it's really important but then you have to use that
and making decisions, especially the big major decisions like
changing career or you know, changing the kind of lifestyle
that you want to have after values, the next important thing
in your book you mentioned about mindsets.
So tell us what is the most important thing about mindset
that we have to cultivate? Yeah, mindsets.
I get really excited about the power of mindsets.
And it's our thought patterns and our beliefs that drive our
actions, which then drive our results, right.
And so we often, when we're trying to make a change in our
life, like, hey, if I have a health goal and I want to lose
some weight or I want to be able to lift a certain manner, I want
to run a race at a certain pace or whatever, that is, right?
Our natural tendency is to prescribe, OK, what are all the
things we need to do differently, right?
I'm gonna need to go on this diet or I need to do this
particular training program or whatever that is, right?
And those are good things to do, Like we need to take actions
like that. But you know, we're coming up on
a new year heading into 2024 here pretty soon.
And you know, the data on like New Year's resolutions isn't
very good. It's like I think less than 10%
of people follow through on resolutions.
And why is that? I think is because we only are
looking at the behaviors that we want to do and not thinking
about our mindsets and our beliefs about ourselves as we
enter into that. Because what we believe about
ourselves and the world and the people around us, our mindsets,
Dr., those actions. And so I say mindset fuels
behavior and behavior fuels results, right.
And so probably the most common mindset that most people would
be familiar with is the growth mindset versus a fixed mindset
popularized by Carol Dweck, famous Ted Talk, and a book
called Mindset. So just this idea like, hey, do
I think I'm fixed? And do I think other people are
fixed? Like, this is who I am and this
is who I'm always going to be. If so, then that's going to
compress my view of what's possible, right, and compress
the actions that I might take or not take, because I don't think
I can really change and grow in significant ways.
But if instead I look at for the growth, I'm going to take some
of those risks, I'm going to see the opportunity for growth in
those, whether or not the outcome I was looking for
happens. I can see that I am changing.
I am growing, I am becoming who I want to become.
And I can expect that of you, Henry, or anyone else that I'm
talking to. I can see that in my children.
I can see that in my spouse. I can see that in the people in
my community and those that I work with, right.
When I can see they have the opportunity, the potential to
grow well, that changes how I focus on my own growth.
It also changes the expectations and the view I have of other
people in really significant ways as well.
But if I'm fixed, you know, I'm going to really compress that.
And so there's a whole lot that goes into how do we identify
what are those mindsets that might be holding us back.
There's some suggestions in the book on how to do that and to
almost use the scientific method to say, hey, I have assumptions
or beliefs or mindsets that I'm holding on to right now.
Can I move through scientific method, run experiments to
collect data to prove or disprove that belief that might
not be serving me right now? And if I can show what data
engineers are going to like this, that's not true, that
starts to diminish that belief and that mindset's power over me
because I can see the evidence right?
And we do that over and over again.
And then we start to change in more meaningful ways.
And not just the actions are changing, but that more
fundamental mindset and our thinking patterns changes as
well, and more sustainable ways. Yeah, like you mentioned about
experiments, right. So I think what some called also
scientific method or hypothesis driven, right.
I think that is really crucial if you want to change mindset.
I don't think we can just totally change it overnight,
right. So we have to go through certain
steps, especially the limiting beliefs that we have, right, the
limiting mindset. So that normally takes time.
That takes a lot of evidence as well.
Like we show we prove that actually it doesn't work as what
we thought and then maybe we can start changing our mindset
slowly. And I love the way that you
mentioned about mindset actually feels behavior and also feels
the results right. But many people actually starts
from the behaviors first. Like we think that let's say we
want to get fit, right, we just do the activities and afterwards
we can get fit right. But I think like just what James
Clear mentioned as well, right, We need to start from our
identity or mindset in your case and then those will kind of like
power of habit and then change our results as a result of that.
I think that's really powerful. And that's a beautiful way to
look at it, right? Because this identity and and
the cool thing about embracing that identity piece is like,
that's what's really true about us.
Like that's what's true about who we are and our potential,
right? Instead of only focusing on
looking at the past and what we've done in the past, right.
But we start to embrace the truth because that those
limiting beliefs are untruths, right?
And so it's almost the idea that the truth shall set you free.
When we can embrace the truth about ourselves and that
potential that we have to grow and become and embrace those
identities, and we act from that place and beautiful things
happen. Yeah.
Apart from the growth mindset that you mentioned in the book,
I find that the other mindset that you mentioned are the
outward mindset versus the inward mindset.
I think that's also important for you to share maybe the
audience. Yeah, Learning about this
mindset was actually kind of my first foray into really digging
into mindsets. I was teaching workshops on this
topic that comes from work of the Arbinger Institute, which is
a leadership and culture firm based out of Utah.
And we've got a number of books that people can go check out.
And it was life changing for me years ago.
This was 2017 when I was first introduced to it.
Of all the mindsets that I'm aware of, you can look at a
number of them. This is the one that's most kind
of personal relationship driven and how I see other people,
right? So just to characterize it very
quickly, if I have and when I have an inward mindset, I see
other people that I interact with as objects.
I objectify them and that doesn't usually happen in great
ways, but I can see them as like vehicles, just like, hey, they
are the path for me to accomplish my goals and I just
need to use them right. I can see them as obstacles in
my way that I need to get them out of the way or kind of
irrelevancies. Like I don't care about them, I
just, I'm going to dismiss them and what not.
None of those ways are helpful with how we view the fellow
humans on this walk of life, right?
And it usually doesn't tend towards great collaboration,
innovation and things in an organization or team either in
the workplace. And so if instead we can embrace
the outward mindset to get outside of ourselves and see,
OK, what do others care about and need and what are their
challenges and opportunities that they're focused on.
That doesn't mean I need to put others before me at every stage.
But I can take those into account and seek to understand
where they're coming from and what they care about.
And take that into account with the actions that I take and the
ways that I focus on which really improves that that
collaboration and innovation and the quality of those
relationships that we have. Because then they can sense, you
know we can all sense if people are just using US or or trying
to get us out of the way versus do they really care about us.
So we can invite that and other people as we attempt to take
that approach. And we've probably all had the
experience where a leader that we've really cared about or a Co
worker who was been really great to us has really given us that
feeling that they really care about us and that invites us to
kind of reciprocate that with them as well.
And so this is life changing. I had one client in particular
who worked on this and he's like, hey, I'm making these
changes. I haven't even thought about
this. I'm just like coming to work and
just doing my work and put my head down, he said.
I feel like I'm becoming a better human and that was a cool
experience for someone to say that because that's a it's a
beautiful thing, Absolutely. I want us all to think about how
can we be better humans on this planet.
Yeah, I find that really interesting, especially as you
get more intentional, right, in your, you know, your decisions
and being who you are, right. To get actually more motivated
by the outward things, right. The people that you mentioned.
Because there's just so many things that can get better if we
work together with other people, right.
Especially if you're in leadership, right?
Like people call this like servant leadership Or I also
have your friend as well, Ryan Gottfriedson, right.
So he has this topic, vertical development, where leaders have
to think more about others. So I think all these are kind of
like aligned together. And I really like this concept,
especially for leaders as well, right, Because you need to start
thinking about other people, not just about yourself.
Absolutely. So let's move on.
After we identify our core values, we change our kind of
like our mindset slowly, right? The next thing, if you say that
we want to become intentional is to get career clarity.
Maybe we have discussed a little bit why it is important, but
maybe if you can get a gist like why do we need to get career
clarity to become more intentional?
Yeah. So I mean, they go hand in hand,
the idea of getting clarity and being intentional, because
getting clarity is like getting clear on what you want to be
when you grow up and the things that you care about in your
career as it aligns with your life.
I mean, intentional is deciding to do that, but it's not just
what you want, but it's why you want it, right.
So also tapping into those deeper levels of motivation that
are driving the actions and the things that we care about.
So just some of the ideas around this couple metaphors that I
think are helpful. One is to think about career
clarity. It's not like this magical
treasure map where, hey, here's my goal.
X marks the spot, right? And I just need to follow the
map and I'm going to get there. But like, one way is to think of
like a North Star, like a guiding light that you know
doesn't really change much but can guide us.
Our directions, our paths may be a little bit windy, and that's
fine. Like, things are going to
change. It's not just going to be a
straight linear path. We get exactly to where we want
to, but we can always see that light that's unchanging.
And as we make decisions, hey, is that leading me towards that
direction? Cuz the opportunities and
challenges are gonna come. We can't foresee all that,
right? But having that light as a guide
and the other thing is to have a set of filters, right?
So as we make decisions, whether those core values and the other
things that we care about from a career standpoint for some
people like where do you want to live and remote or in person
work or the type of role that you really like to do or do you
want to travel or not? Is it more focused on product or
people or the technology and like all those different mixed
thing. And some of those things will
change. But over time, we can get clear
on those things that we can use those as filters to say, hey,
that's not really in line with the things that are important to
me in my career at this point that are going to help me take
the next level of growth I can use as a filter, say, hey, does
that meet the criteria? No, let's let that stop.
And I don't need to consider that anymore and if it does,
then let's continue to explore that or design with intention
towards that. And so couple different ways of
guiding light or the filter. But again, it's all trying to
help us be intentional with the decisions that we make at each
stage of our lives and their careers.
Yeah. Again, I don't not to repeat,
right, but I think career is like where we spend most of our
days, right? Our life in fact.
So I think the thing that you mentioned right, we should
decide what we want, but also why we want it, right?
Because sometimes when given career opportunities, sometimes
like we can't just choose like, OK, we want all the career
opportunities we want, right. They are kind of like limited
and it's contextual and time based as well, right.
So sometimes getting career clarity will help us guide in
making those career decisions that we want to take.
And it doesn't have to be, you know, changing company, right?
But it also can be changing roles or changing skill sets,
changing experience or maybe changing mentors as well, right?
So I think getting this clarity really important if you want to
be more intentional. Absolutely.
Yeah, as part of this career clarity as well, you also
advocate people to find their genius zones or identify the
genius zones. We kind of like covered it
before in the previous episode, but I think I'd like you to also
maybe kind of like repeat. What do you mean by genius
zones? How can people find them?
Yeah, so this is a really exciting topic for me, too.
If I was to recommend one book on the subject, it'd be The Big
Leap by Gay Hendrix. But it's just like these
different levels, right? So we think about a zone of
incompetence, like, hey, I'm not very good at something, and next
level, a zone of competence. Like, hey, I can do this and I
can do this breathably well. And then a lot of us get to a
Zone of Excellence, like, hey, and really, quite good at this.
But a Genius Zone is something that's even one more level of
uniqueness where perhaps I'm one of the few people in the world
that do it this way. And it's a combination of
perhaps innate skills or traits about us, experiences that we've
had and skills that we've built over the course of our life and
career. And when you, when you look at
that that way, then diving into our Genius zones and if we can
live more of our lives there, we think about like the 8020
principle, like Genius zone work is absolutely that 20% that
provides the biggest level of result because that's where
we're living our where we're doing our best work.
It's not just where we are most productive and where we have the
most impact, but also where we find the most satisfaction and
enjoyment and engagement in our work.
It's really fun to be living in a genius zone because it's
synonymous with being in the zone or being in a state of
flow, usually. And where a level of skill rises
to the challenge that is there from research.
Flow comes from research by the guy by the name of me, Holly.
Chic set me Holly. If I'm pronouncing that right,
we passed away a year or two ago.
But anyway, but just the idea like, hey, where can I do my
absolute best work? Can I find ways to identify
that? What is it about that that let's
me do that? Is it the environment?
Is it the work itself? Is the people you know getting
clarity on that? And then can I find ways to be
in that more often? Can I shift some of the ways
that I work now in my environment, look for
opportunity to take on projects or other things in my current
work or find a role that aligns with that even more to produce
more impact, to be more intentional, you're going to be
more engaged and all those other things that we're looking for.
Yeah, the genius zones you mentioned, right?
It could be a combination of talent, experience, skill sets
that we learn along the way, right?
The true insights that I find when I read this part is
actually to find the activities or the skill set or the job that
kind of like brings you into the state of flow, right?
Where people say that you completely lose track of time,
right? You just feel that you are more
energized, more results, more productivity.
But I find that not many people actually experience this kind of
flow in their day-to-day work. Maybe not so much also about the
work itself, but also about disruption, maybe also about
business, right? Maybe also about the bosses that
they work with. So is there a way to actually
kind of like help people align more with their genius zones
without being affected by all these things?
Yeah. So I mean, the first thing,
obviously is identifying what those genius zones are like.
How do you get in a state of flow?
So reflecting on when have you ever been in that state?
And that can be in a work setting, but maybe it's in a
personal life. You've got a hobby or a sport
for some people playing music or whatever that is.
Like, where are you in a state of flow and looking at what is
the environment that creates that?
For some people, it's being around people, for some people
it's sharing that with other people.
For some people, it's an alone, singular experience.
And by the way, we want to find those places inside and outside
of our work experience. Like I was talking to a client
the other day. Like, hey, he really loves
riding motorcycles, right? And riding a motorcycle and on
curvy roads is this great example of him having to be
fully present in the moment. And he loves it because he can't
get distracted by other things around him.
He has to do that otherwise there's a safety factor there,
right. And that's outside of his work.
But he sees some of the ways that that corresponds with some
of the ways that he works like hey, how can I get fully present
in some of the things. And he looks at you know
opportunities and situations where he is has big challenge
that challenges that he rises to and he's an experienced and
accomplished leader. And so he loves to bring people
along that ride and find those cross functional relationships
and bring people together towards creating something new.
Not just maintaining something that gets him in a state of
excitement, passion driven, taking on a challenge that
excites him rather than discourages him.
And so he's able to find ways to do that.
Now he also finds ways to communicate with his leaders and
the other team members about how he organizes his work to do that
best. So he's not in constant
interruptions, you know, need to turn off notifications and
things and set some boundaries in your personal, professional
life. All those things that helps you
live that. But no one can take
responsibility for that more than you can right now.
We all need to own our our own approach to these things.
Yeah. So I think environment you
mentioned, it's really critical as well try to shape your
environment such that you can also get this state of flow
right, could be you know, turning off notifications,
setting up deep work in your schedule and things like that.
So definitely that would help as well.
So after we done all this, right, I think you also
mentioned as part of the last chapter in your book a few
skills that we have to probably kind of like hone as well in
order to become more intentional.
Maybe if you can cover just one or two.
What are the important skills that we also need to be aware of
to become much better intentional?
Yeah. So the last chapter is a little
different than the rest and then focused on skills rather than
kind of big principles. But two that I'll focus on
because I think they're most related, one is communication.
Communication is kind of an art and how we communicate with
people and not just the words that we say, but we're talking
about mindsets earlier. But the way that we believe
about other people has a huge impact on the results and how
we're going to be able to work with people.
And that's critical at any stage of your career, right?
I'm going to communicate differently with someone in a
different role, with someone in a different level.
I'm going to communicate differently with an executive
that I'm not peer right and understanding how to
contextually communicate the right things and the right
moment in the right way is very important and not
all-encompassing in the book, but just more of a call to say,
hey, this is something that's important for you to learn and
grow and and improve on. Now the other thing as far as
like hey, we're not just trying to build intentional careers,
you're trying to build intentional lives.
And the research bears out that the most important by far
indicator of someone having a satisfactory or satisfying life
is the quality of their relationships and increases
health outcomes, increases joy, happiness, satisfaction, all
those things is a quality of relationships.
And it's not just like romantic relationship, it's friendships,
it's Co workers, it's family, it's neighbors, it's everything.
And so to live a great life we need to deepen, strengthen and
develop core relationships in our lives.
And doing so, it's going to help us become who we want to become.
And those best friendships are the ones that you know to think
about the things that we don't need to get anything out of
someone, that they're just there to be friends and we just care
about them for the sake of enjoying their company.
And so, do you have relationships like that right
now? If so, almost as much as
anything else is important to try and find those people that
you want to spend some time with, and cultivate those
relationships in meaningful ways.
Really beautiful, the way that you mention it, right?
Like relationship, don't forget. Like being intentional doesn't
mean all about you, right? But also like finding the
meaningful true relationship that you also want to have in
your life, right? Not just the peers in your
colleagues in your company, right?
But also like friends outside of work and also in your family,
right? I think that's really important.
Apart from communication and relationship, you also mentioned
about power of accountability and also giving feedback.
I suggest people to read themselves in the book because I
think All in all right, the book covers like how we can become
much more intentional and truly at the end, right, become more
fulfilled and happy in our life. So I think please check out the
book by Jeff. So as we reach the end of our
conversation, Jeff, I asked you this question last time, which I
called the three technical leadership wisdom.
I will ask you one more time, let's see if you can get the
same answer like previously or you kind of like change a little
bit with your new book as well. Yeah, it's probably different.
I don't know what I said last time.
I didn't go back and review it. But here's what I'll say today,
#1 here. We've been harping on this.
Our whole conversation is to be intentional.
You get to decide who you want to become in your life and your
career. No one else does.
And so take that opportunity to decide.
Take the actions to become who you want to become #2 is.
Don't try and go it alone, right?
We need to embrace those relationships, get help from
others. Life is not meant to be a
solitary experience, right? So embrace those professional
and those personal relationships that can help us enjoy a great
life and also that can support us through the good times and
the bad times that that will go through life to live the life we
want to live. And three is find ways to invest
in yourself. When you think about finances,
usually we're talking about what's the investment, what's my
return on investment, all these things, Absolutely.
The best investment you can ever make is an investment in you,
and that can be investment in time.
That can be investment in money to get help or resources that
can help you become who you want to become in these ways in
education and coaching, mentoring, or other programs or
other things that might be helpful for you, but absolutely
investing yourself in intentional ways.
Lovely. I think you kind of like recap
the whole thing about being intentional engineer, right.
So I think thanks again, Jeff, for being on this show and also
share about your new book. So I read the book as well as
preparation for this podcast. I find it really interesting.
I also wrote the foreword for the book.
Thanks for giving me the opportunity.
So I think I'll just ask people to go check it out and read the
books, which I find really, really useful.
So thanks again, Jeff for being here.
Yeah, thanks so much for your support, Henry.
And if people want to go learn more, they can find me at
jeff-perry.com or go find more information on the book at the
Intentional engineer.com. Thank you for listening to this
episode and for staying right until the end.
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