My job as I knew it was gone. Relegated to ad-hoc projects and general catcher-of-the-shit-hitting-the-fan responsibilities, word got around that I might be available for "other things". You've had a substitute teacher before? How about substitute Product Owner? That's me. I'd stepped in a few times before on an array of other projects, but this was bigger. It was also with a project and brand near and dear to my heart, and something familiar during a time of...turmoil. Irresistible.
I threw my heart into it. Early mornings. Late nights. Catching up on months-worth of planning in just a few weeks. Writing new feature specs for things that didn't exist, but we definitely need; exposing all manner of dependencies and unrecognized (but necessary) scope that were met with general astonishment and frustration (to put it mildly); all while trying to keep development from mutiny and other forms of chaos. It was exhausting and felt like I was being chased by a swarm of angry bees.
I loved it. It proved to me that I was doing exactly what I want to do and find the most fulfillment in. Even though the circumstances went sour, now I was certain of what I wanted.
“We may run, walk, stumble, drive, or fly, but let us never lose sight of the reason for the journey, or miss a chance to see a rainbow on the way.” ― Gloria Gaither
My rainbow on the way? Education. Out of the start-up life of becoming a mother and with a newfound drive to find once again a love for my work, I looked for a Product Management course that would fill-in the gaps that learning on the fly leaves one with. Maybe I would use it for making a career switch. Maybe I would use it for making a life switch. One way or another, though, I was going to do something; become something.
Week 3. Journey mapping. Pick a well-known business that starts with an "A" and ends in a smile and create a journey map of the customer experience. Cool, I've done this. Let's pick an aspect of it completely out of my wheelhouse and depth, cloud services. I signed up; picked a cheeky domain name to register; and immediately started to struggle with action item 3 "Publish the first product". I'm not a developer, so I needed a no-code solution. Enter lovely Wix. Easy setup, looooved the AI enhanced stepper process walkthrough - very well done. Struggled a little bit in figuring out where the tools were for blogging, but those worked great, too, once I found them. And here we are. Thanks, Wix! (They did not pay me for this. But I wouldn't say no...)
What did I learn? The powerhouse of cloud services caters more towards larger, more established businesses, and most certainly enterprise-level. For the smaller folk like me, they lean on and work with partners (not Wix, but others in the market). It's a great place to start and learn for the future in the event I grow into proper business-hood, and will help me on that growth journey should I take it. But it proves a point that is repeated amongst the other powerhouses of today, which is that the power of the multiplier is found in partners.
Here we are. Now you're in my assignment with me. Riding the post-storm rainbow. Next is revealing all this...uh...stuff; "Confirm first booking". Who will my first reader be?
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