This is a kick-off of a new series of article that will be more personal, more opinionated around things that I experience in my life. It is always hard to give one opinion without heading to some misunderstanding. I will try to give my view on some topics that are not really related to the analytics or consulting work.
It will be going a step deeper than my philosophical posts. There, I always try to relate to our work with either data or consulting. Most of the time, the thoughts that you get from your experience are your own but it may happen that other people have passed through these ideas and have some feedback to give.
I started this blog as a way for me to learn and share what I learned along the way. This is no different because experience may be something that you can share. However, in these kind of article, I am actually not trying to improve a specific skill but to grow as a whole. To be able to explain myself clearly, I would need to first really understand what I want to say. Putting words to your thoughts is a nice exercise that many have realized before. It gives perspective to your thoughts and a new angle. While writing them, I may not always agree with them…
During this series, I hope to not shock anyone in a bad way and hopefully my opinion will be reflected correctly. The biggest challenge or fear that I have when expressing my thoughts or opinions is the misunderstanding that could come from the ideas shared. English not being my mother tongue, I hope to not miss to say some nuances that would look obvious to me but not to the reader.
I think that this exercise is helpful in that way that I should start really considering my words more carefully than when I am discussing a technical topics. This require extra caution, a type of caution that you may find when socializing with new people.
I know that for some people, social interactions are hard because you cannot be blank about the topic, you should be careful of your words and consider feeling and empathy in your discussion.
As I lived in the US for some time, I probably already improved in that area. Contrary to many developers that I know, I look comfortable when socializing.
Am I ? Of course, not, very few people are. Many people look comfortable but very few really are.
My curiosity to (very) different topics really help me there, I can find topic of discussion with many people pretty easily. I have knowledge of some sort in many area (Sports, Music, Movie, Animals, etc…) and I do have genuine interest into learning lots of things. Always looking to improve my whole being, my interest have very few limits.
However, these discussions are often very superficial in these social events and the deep questions are often let to other time but these time never really come.
This series is to create these times now. To discuss topics that you never have time to discuss when meeting people, or with very few people. To go deeper in the discussions that you barely surface normally.
It may be that most of the people are not interested to go deeper in these topics but I may also be wrong and the interest is here already, some people are just waiting for someone to start the discussion. I am here to start this discussion.
In a way, this will also serve as personal notes for me, my future self being able to re-read my thoughts and probably my opinion, evolving with time, will change and my conversation, not waiting for anyone will be for me against myself.
At the end of the day, I am always looking forward to be convinced that I am wrong. Getting pushed to understand you are wrong is proving that you can improve and, even if it can be painful, it is by this way that you can grow.
What could be better than to be defeated by myself ?