As the night draws in, Christmas draws ever closer and the year 2024 comes speeding to a close, I thought that for the first time I would take some time to reflect on the year.

The role-r-coaster

This year was certainly a year with some twists and turns. I started with one role, survived a drastic management re-org to eventually land in the new role of Deputy CTO and somehow just about managed to figure out what that role actually meant. I spent more time writing product documents and writing code than I had done before, I spent more time talking to customers this year than I had done for several years and overall I’m pleased with the progress. There was a moment where it was glibly described as “Harry Potter let out from under the stairs” and I have to agree that for a while it certainly felt that way. It has been the case in every time in my career journey I have found myself going through the typical periods of “Yes I can do this!”, “Wait, do what? What is this job?” and “Ok, maybe I sorta get this now”. As the year ends I’m phasing into the later.

The words

I wrote lots of words this year including RFP documents (one document of >100k in fact), product service descriptions and strategy documents but not as many on this site as I would have liked. I started the year writing these little weekly snapshots of my week in my Obsidian vault which by April turned into the /weeknotes that you find here and that I’ve been writing now for 38 weeks. I wrote only 7 blog posts, which frankly isn’t enough and I certainly want to do better at this. Looking at the 20 blog post ideas I have listed in my Todoist, ideas and the blinking cursor aren’t the problem. It is, as always, time and energy that are the problem.

I have learnt a lot from writing though. I have learnt that I do have my own voice, I’ve learnt that I could be better at the technical skill of writing such as simplifying my writing and thinking about the audience. I have also learnt that I love writing, no matter the form, and that if I am comfortable and get my environment correct then I can write large volumes of words in sort spaces of time. From the weeknotes I have learnt that I produce a lot of things to make other people’s life easier - be that words or code and that I consume a lot of content (more than I produce). Most of all I have learnt that I should continue to write in public like this more because being able to reflect on what I have done, in words, here in public as I have done this week is really valuable and something I think I will find more interesting as the years pass.

The walking

I had this moment of realisation half-way through the year that I had abandoned working at my desk, preferring the comfort of the sofa. This was mostly due to the type of work I was doing at the time (it’s where I am writing from now) but that it meant that my already sedentary lifestyle was getting worse. I was averaging about 4000 steps per day, but with some days being less than 1000. I knew this wasn’t good, in the short or the long-term, so I took the plunge and after about a week of research invested in a walking treadmill. I wrote about the details of this on the blogpost in May but I moved my chair out of the way, forcing myself to use it on every internal call and it’s increased my step average to about 12k during the weekdays and almost 10k/day overall. This has been the first step (pun intended) of me focusing a bit more on my health. I expect this to continue.

The stats

Given that everyone these days is posting their “wrapped” from every single app that supports it, I thought it might be interesting for me to post a few stats here of my own:

What’s next?

(1) More listening and learning

I really want to make sure I see everyone one at work more consistently and that I get more F2F time with people. I also want to make sure I’m getting out to more of the big vendor events and that I’m F2F with customers more. Listening breeds ideas, ideas mean writing, writing builds context which helps people form solutions. I’m getting the idea now that if I focus on that flow of that, then I might find a new way to be better at what I do.

(2) More reading

I want to get that to at least 8 books a year. This is still low by many people’s standards, but I read a lot of other material so often find it difficult to find the time to read fiction. I really want to read a bit more fiction this year, it keeps my brain active while also giving it time to breathe and process other ideas.

(3) Better fitness routine

Ok, I’m doing the walking. Great. Now in 2025 I need to focus on the strength training, nothing massive just 10-20 minutes per day. I’m focusing on this because it’s the thing that’s going to be most important as I age. I’m not focusing on too much or too long per-day. The habit is more important at this stage. Too much and I might be done of the new year’s resolution exercise junkies who stop around late Feb. Not me though, my habit stacking this year has proven to me that little and often is the key.

(4) More writing here

Finally, I need to calve out the time to write at least one proper post per-month. That mean’s a calendar block, a schedule, making more notes of ideas as they come up and getting through that backlog of 20 ideas. Maybe even stop watching too much TV so that I can squeeze in some time in the evening.

Well I hope some of this has been useful to you and if not - well I have plenty more to come in 2025.