Turning the page

For those that know me – I never half-ass anything. If a thing is worth doing, I whole-ass it, or I don’t ass it at all. Lately, it’s been a series of whole-ass introspection and reflection.

It’s amazing what you can learn about yourself if you take the time to appreciate experiences, your reflexes to those experiences, and your observations to how you behave in various situations. I’m a huge fan of self-awareness – it’s what allows me to identify the things that I need to work on to supplement the list I am provided by mentors, friends, and others that care enough about me to share their opinions. I embrace them all and do what I can to constantly level up.

The latest significant observation occurred around early-to-mid-June. It was a Wednesday. I was working another long day in a string of long days. When I’m in that headspace, I never really have an “end” in sight. My high-achieving/whole-ass’ing nature and drive to succeed doesn’t offer much in the way of a “break.” My wife popped into my office around 4:30p and she asked with a smile on her face, “Dinner with Robin and Kyle?” My reflex was to grimace and say, “Actually… I kind of need to work late tonight.” Her smile faded slightly – a thought visibly registering. Ever the supportive spouse, she is always understanding when I make this request. She paused before retreating from the doorway and she said, “I think this is the first time I’ve felt the need to ask you to consider an exit strategy,” or at least reign in my workload. A little taken aback, I paused, nodded, and said, “Ok. I’ll do that.”

My wife and I are very laid-back people. We normally don’t have strong opinions, so when one of us says something of significance and heft, that signals that one of us has one. Therefore, the other tends to yield and fall into a supporting role to the other. With her saying that, I paid attention to my reflex.

It wasn’t resistance. Which was surprising. I love what I do as a Practice Director. No day is the same and the variety of who I might work with and what I might do tends to bring a freshness to each day. It’s hard to get tired or feel a sense of boredom when you legitimately look forward to each day of work that feels less like work and getting to collaborate with friends and colleagues you like.

Like water absorbing slowly into arid soil, the thought sank in that evening. The next day, the thought was still there, saturating my thoughts. Time passed, and I decided to reflect on the situation and my reaction. I didn’t flinch. I didn’t recoil. I didn’t get defensive. I didn’t panic. I didn’t get anxious. I didn’t get combative. I didn’t get upset. I didn’t fret.

Effectively, there were no red flags or even orange flags that impeded anything. The loyalty to the people who gave me the opportunity, my team, and the colleagues that I would miss were the only substantial reasons I had to stay. There were others, but the people aspect of the situation was definitely the thing that weighed more heavily on my decision than the rest.

With that, I knew my wife was right, and that I needed to consider taking action. I thought about her words and my reaction for weeks. I reflected on previous positions over the last 11.5 years, and it really sank in.

Of that time, I’ve worked for myself about 4 years. The rest was spent at Pabian Partners, Blytheco, and Net at Work. With each employer, I started out working “normal” hours. As time went on, my drive to achieve settled in and I decided I wanted more. 8-hour days became 9. 9-hour days became 9.5. 9.5-hour days became 10 and so on until it became common that I was working 12+ hour days consistently. My drive to achieve turned into toxic productivity, and my overall mood was muted. The joy of the job stifled. The love of the consulting game dulled.

After reflecting on this, I was quickly reminded of all of the people who tried to get me to embrace work-life balance. If I began listing the names of people, you’d see that it was a significant force above, below, and beside me – all telling me to slow down and find a balance. Everyone consistently told me (from day one) that “not one single person at [company] wants you to work more than 40 hours a week. There’s nothing that’s worth that level of sacrifice – especially with a very young child. Your priority should be your wife and son.” I heard them, but I did nothing to stop.

THAT… was the inflection point during my reflection. That was my “ah ha!” moment.

When I work for others, I don’t know how to stop myself from overextending to the point that it begins impacting my health (mental, physical, and spiritual). Every person who cares about me consistently wants more for me in the way of balance; however, I’m so blinded by my pursuit of my version of “success” that I can’t be bothered to alter my course. I willingly charge downhill, blindfolded toward this “Jackass”-level stunt to “success” that I lose control.

I never would have realized that if it wasn’t for my wife and the heft or her statement prompting me to take a step back. I also realized that of the last 11.5 years, the only time I had a semblance of work-life balance was when I worked for myself.

With that, I elected to resign from my position at Net at Work as their CRM Practice Director. I gave notice on June 28th, and my last day was last Friday, August 30th. I’ll continue working with Net at Work in a much-reduced capacity, so – current customers who might be seeing this, please don’t freak out. You’re not losing me. I’ll be taking some time to recover from my string of unhealthy work-life balance decisions; however, I’ll be back soon.

To set the stage of the “next chapter,” my current trajectory is to resurrect Malik, Inc. as my full-time vehicle for consulting and solutioning around Formstack, Creatio, and integrating systems through those two platforms. I also plan on reaching out to several of you within the software space (software resellers, ISVs, etc.) to see if you have an interest in partnering. I can’t do much in the way of referrals, but I can be a strong, outsourced CRM, customer experience consultant, and systems integration resource for your customers – or you.

If you made it this far, my hope for you is just that – hope. And awareness. ??

• Hope that you’re paying attention.
• Hope that you’re taking time to practice mindfulness/self-awareness.
• Hope that you’re maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
• Hope that, if you’re not, this post encourages you to take appropriate level of action to raise awareness to those around you.
• Hope that your path to remediating your circumstance doesn’t require the significance of change as my path does.
• Hope that in some way, shape, or form – that my story has helped you.

Now... it bears stating that I will be forever grateful for the opportunities that have been given to me. To Darin Steward - you changed my life by asking me to be a CRM Consultant. That one massive risk you took completely altered the trajectory of my life from something ordinary to extraordinary. I have been able to take the opportunity you offered me and turned it into a career that I love more than anything AND can provide a life for my wife and kid that I could have only dreamed of when I was a kid. To Johnny Pabian for taking a huge risk on a CRM specialist he hoped could learn and sell an ERP solution he believes in (and is doing amazing well!). To Phil Sim for seeing something special in me, offering me a massive step up in my career to pilot Blytheco's CRM team into something new and exciting, and for the mentorship that allowed me to achieve new heights on a personal and professional level. To Alexander Solomon and Edward Solomon for giving me the opportunity to run their Creatio practice with a significant amount of autonomy. I was at Net at Work for a little shy of a year, but holy sh*t... I couldn't be more proud of what I accomplished in such a short time or how much I grew as a professional and an individual. Each of these amazing people chose to invest in me in some capacity, and I've done my best to leave each situation I started better than when I arrived. Who I am today has clear influences from each of these individuals, and my brand - as a person, professional, human (they're all one in the same to me) - has been molded by their influence as I've learned substantial lessons from each.

I am yet again turning the page, but with a confidence I've never had before. I’ll be posting more content around Formstack, Creatio, and the products I tend to create for the ecosystems I serve soon.

Take care, and I hope you're having and continue to have a great day!

Best Regards,

Basil N. Malik