Why You? Why Now? (v2020)
Happy 2020.
Writing is my favorite thinking tool. At the beginning of 2020, I would like to use this post to reset my new origin.
Why You? Why Now?
Back to my old days as a design student in Design Academy Eindhoven (DAE), “Why you? Why now?” are like the fundamental two questions for every design student. These answers (supposed to) help designers develop personal career, choose design questions, decide life priorities, focus on the right path.
Compared with European societies, Taiwan is a place with a monotonous definition of success, i.e., find a stable job, get married, have at least one kid, force your kid to find a steady job, and so on.
As a Taiwanese, I think I have been trained to reshape myself to fit into the social expectation rather than seeking for every possibility without losing myself. Even I am 36, I still feel like bringing myself into a whole piece still needs more years.
Another thing I have learned from design is the importance of iterating ideas by prototyping. Since I am not able to answer these questions well in the design school, I chose to give myself a bit more iterations. Five years after my grad from design school, I feel a bit more confident about my answers.
“Why you? Why now?” becomes a souvenir, a nightmare, or a reminder of my every life decisions, e.g., career decision.
Some of My Recent Career Decisions
0. Career
My definition of career involves a mixed relationship between life and work; especially nowadays, we have even longer working hours and the need for continuous learning. For me, a career is a tool to explore the outside world. Plus, I hope to use my career to discover my inside world better.
1. Living with Cross-disciplinary
I believe cross-disciplinary is the means to help me understand how to make a successful, sustainable business.
These years I have been a software developer, designer, project manager, and product manager. For the next job, I would like to try to be a business developer. Since I have gained sufficient experience in how to do things right, I would like to know more about how to define the right things.
2. Choosing Industry
Life in Europe helps me to concreate the idea that we are living in a globalization world. To be more specific, the whole world is a team, and each country has its strengths and weaknesses. The strength can be natural born, or after years of investment in thinking, methodology, system, education, or industry.
Due to my computer science background, I think I will still stick with the high-tech industry until my retirement because it is what Taiwan owns a bit of competition.
I am not so sure about the software industry in Taiwan now. Due to the almost zero cost of reproduction, software is about the winner takes it all (in a global sense). I assume that software serves the globe might be the right topic for a place full of capital, e.g., U.S. and China. The rest of the country can only find a niche path.
3. Not Being a Boss
After years in start-up, I think I am not so keen on being a boss. “Boss” is just the guy be responsible for stockholders and laws. I am more comfortable to be a team memeber and focus on the mission at my hand. I can even have annual leaves!
Also, I am not so in to be a freelancer. I realized freelancers usually have a separate mission from the whole project. In other words, as a freelancer, it is more challenging to help the client to define the right thing (at least in Taiwan).
