This week my son ended his baseball career after 13 years of playing the game through spring, summer, and fall. Our high school does a nice job with the senior recognition ceremony. It includes a lap around the infield to shake hands and hug the freshman, JV, and returning Varsity players. Then the player meets his family and walks to shake hands with the coaches while a player bio is read over the PA system. Next, a recorded message from the senior is played over the PA system. It’s a message the player leaves for their teammates, coaches, and family. The ceremony ends with each player making one final baseball toss to a family member.
Our school has a volunteer photographer who no longer has a son that plays baseball (8 years removed). He goes to every game home and away. He arrives before the game to take warmup photos and stays until the end. Then he posts probably 900-1,000 photos of each game online for parents and family to download. All of this free of charge. He takes pictures of other high school sports as well.
At the end of the year, I was talking to him about the love of the game. Obviously he wants to find ways to stay around game long after his son was a player. It’s personal to him. He told me that taking photographs at the games fills a need in his life. It’s an outlet for a hobby. But on top of that, he told me,
“Taking pictures during the game allows me to find new spaces with different views.”
He is energized by seeing a game from different angles than what a fan sees in the bleachers. He sees the facial expressions of the boys, their body language, the dugout conversations, and even the silly moments. He often captures angles of a play that reveal new insights. His photos capture technique that can be used for instruction and learning. He is constantly probing for new angles and thinking about how to position himself for a different look.
Having an inquisitive nature to find new spaces with different views at work is a trait we all need but few exhibit. In IT and Operations, most attention is given to creating repeatable and predictable processes. Employees are focused on improving efficiencies by incrementally reducing lead times and delivering work faster starting from the same processes. Thinking about different views if often left for the process engineers or visionaries.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Just like my friend taking pictures of a game, we can all look for new spaces and different views. But it requires that we fully engage with the subject matter of our work. It means getting out of our box and thinking about the customer, the equipment, the service, and the people from different angles. It means getting out of our offices and cubes to experience the business from another place. It means using the telephone to hear a customer or colleague instead of emailing them. My friend has to move around to take pictures of the game. He searches for places to stand and examines the view. He takes photos and then examines the results before adjusting to the next angle. That’s the rush of the experience and the involvement with the subject matter. If we aren’t excited about our jobs and careers to do this then it could be we are playing the wrong game.
Go find your new space. Stretch out!
Onward and upward!