People Who Matter

As I was fixin' to shut down my computer at work today, I got an e-mail that made me sad. One of my favorite work colleagues has resigned.

There are very few people whose resignations would make such a powerful impact on my day. This person's kindness, patience and general professional values made him one of my favorite internal customers. He challenged me, believed in me, pushed me to try things I didn't think I could do. He was affirming when affirmation was called for, and corrected me when I needed correction. I like to think I made his life a little easier for the last year, and maybe I did, since he sent me a note apart from any general announcement to 'everybody'.

I love my job, and I enjoy working with a number of my "internal customers" who respect my skills and praise my work. But I'll still miss this one engineer who did so much to make me -- an outsider in so many senses of the word -- feel like a valuable member of his team.

The oil industry is booming, and we're suffering, like many companies, with painful losses of good people to customers, competitors, startups & consultants. Seems this fella is going to do consulting. He will be great; he's a brilliant guy. I hope it makes him happy & affords him some time to enjoy the sunshine.