They don’t know I’m dead and my ghost is holding on.
Nina Simone
First heard of Nina Simone in her song “Don’t You Pay Them No Mind.” Then watched the documentary “What Happened, Miss Simone?“
It’s now complete — all of the objectives I’ve gotten onto my notes. Now comes the challenging part of putting it together — connecting the dots — making sense of it all.
I’ll probably start making outlines and bullet points and eventually some framework for my first six months and beyond at Avaloq.
After four long days, I’ve finally met with the team exclusively. It’s surprising to even recognize some of the musical artists and bands that they like. Whew! I’m not too far off. So in a Venn diagram, you could see our circles nudged a bit together in this regard. I consider myself to be a kuya millennial both in age and role, anyway.
📻 🎸 🤘
They are a tight-knit group. As one of them said, “Gel naman kami.” I understood it as “they are already gelled together as a solid team”. In my mind I could imagine the gooey green mutagen ooze (sans Ninja Turtles) binding them together. It’s a good thing that it’s not Elmer’s Glue because if it were, where could I snugly fit in?
Next week, I’m ready to roll up my sleeves and get my hands dirty!
Today, the team and I had a smaller group of meet and greet along with our chapter lead who was directly leading the team before I came along. It was funny that suddenly, everyone’s device camera started malfunctioning when it was one’s turn to speak. Glad I took a bath today that I was able to show myself!
Relax. Have fun at work. Really enjoy the work that you do.
Oh yes. That’s what the head of design said to me during our one-on-one. But that was the last thing that he said. Prior that were all his good-natured wishes for the Manila design team.
I feel great about this new journey!
One by one, I’ve been filling in the blanks of my objectives in my first six months at Avaloq. I’ve already met with my line manager. Tomorrow, with my functional manager and chapter lead.
Today, I met everyone in the design team — my team in Manila and everyone else across the globe.
It is a challenging road ahead, indeed — especially that I still need to digest everything that has been handed down to me.
This is only the beginning.
Today was sweltering, still. I had the morning onboarding at the balcony where the wind was gushing — and it was far better. During the afternoon, the sun was creeping in so I went back inside the home office.
Let me just synthesize some of the memorable things that blotted in my mind during Minco Domingo’s (managing director of Avaloq PH) welcome message this morning:
Of course, these are my interpretation of the signal as it reached me.
Nevertheless, it gives me a glimpse of how the Manila headquarters is being led — and it’s in tune with some of my professional values.
All good, day 2!
I said to a colleague that I felt like I’ve been with Avaloq for more than a year now because of the size of my email inbox. On day 1.
But whoever said that email inboxes couldn’t receive mails on the first day, right? A third of it were warm welcome from my fellow designers in Manila and Zürich.
Excitement fills my mind when I think about what I could learn from them and what I, on the other hand, could impart in the process of collaboration.
I hit the “RSVP” button like a madman. And boy, my calendar for the week magically colored themselves.
And all this is a good thing to quickly embed the organization’s nature in my DNA — and this will enable me to fit in their culture.
