‘Wow, lucky people’
‘I should also become a Business
Analyst. Their life is so easy and relaxed’
‘So early? Kabhi toh kaam kar
liya karo yaar…’
‘Aish hain’
…
…
…
…
Almost about to complete 9 years
of professional life as a Business Analyst and these comments have become a
part of my professional life. To be precise, after I became a Mother, Working
Mother that is.
If I pack my bags and leave
office by 6:30 PM IST, I get to hear all of the above comments, taunts, unfulfilled
wishes of how beautiful my life is. Is it that beautiful? On face of it, yes.
But once I reach home after driving in mad traffic for 45 mins, I almost
immediately have to get on the calls. Sometimes for mere 30 minutes, sometimes
for continuous 2 hours; while my three year old daughter at times bang my door,
simply coz she wants to meet me and hug me after many hours. Then I play with
her. If possible, feed her one of the meals of her day. Prepare hot chapatis to
have dinner with the family. Clean up the room. Make her drink milk while
narrating one story after the other. Make her go to sleep. Finally, again
picking up my laptop to sometimes finish off my pending work, sometimes to get
on a call with my US team working well past mid night.
So, should I wear my daily calendar
when I am leaving the office at 6:30 PM? And where do I mention on that
wearable calendar that I almost ruined my Diwali vacations when I visited my
hometown after 2.5 years and yet ended up with puffed eyes since I enjoyed during the day and worked during
late nights?
I refrain from dropping any mails
or replying to any of them during those late India hours unless it is required.
But if I do, next day, people label me as a SHOW OFF. Sometimes I feel like explaining them for why I dropped that mail so late in the night instead of waiting for the morning. But then I am like, what the hell? They have already decided that I was showing off and they won't understand the reason. So, I just leave it there. I am not answerable to any of them. They call it an easy life. I call it a Balancing Act. My company is not paying
me thousands of rupees monthly to reach office at 11 and leave at 6:30. They
are paying me for the quality of work that I do.
I remember one such incident. Normally,
when I get lot of things on my plate, I have a habit of preparing a prioritized
To-Do list and start working on them one by one and marking them off my list.
On one fine day, I spent 10 minutes to prepare my To-Do list and found out that
almost all the items have the deadline of TODAY. So, I decided that I am going
to focus on finishing them off. I had no tea. Did not call my mother, as I
usually do. Took minimal breaks and by 5:45 PM felt proud of myself that I had
cleared off all those items from my list. Took a 15 minutes relaxed break to talk
to my colleague-cum-friend and by 6:00 PM I decided to leave the office. While
I covered the mere 50-100 meters of distance from my desk till the lift, I
encountered 5 of my colleagues who sarcastically pointed out that I had a
great, easy going and enjoyable life that I am leaving my office at 6 and I was
like: ‘Yes Idiots. I can leave at 6
because I planned my day well, completed my work and no one is dependent on my
physical presence in the office. You, on the other hand, are wasting your
unplanned day by taking multiple un-required breaks, having that extra sugary
tea and goofing around’.
If I leave by 6:30 and then login
at midnight, it’s not out of choice. It’s out of my circumstances. I have a
small kid to take care of, who meets me after a gap of 7 to 8 hours. Believe
me, I am not just a typist who writes some stories. I am a professional business
analyst, who thinks, analyzes and writes the technical document, named as User
Stories. If you think that I create that junk document in mere 15 minutes, I
challenge you to create that JUNK document with the same quality for me.
Quality is the word. Yes, your life is tough. So is mine. The grass always look
greener on the other side.
Such comments once is fine. Twice
is okay. Thrice can still be ignored. But not every day. And what are YOU
expecting? Are you my boss? Is your work being affected if I leave early? If
yes, raise that concern to my manager or to me. I can correct that but don’t
expect me to sit in the office till late in the night just because of you, your
targets, your unplanned day and your incomplete work. That’s your problem. Not
mine. Every such irresponsible comment or taunt kills me. For God’s sake, my
parents had spent lakhs of money on my education and I can proudly say that I have
burnt the midnight oil to grasp that knowledge and get a job for myself. Never
ever have any of my managers called me to complain that I am not doing my work
well. On the contrary, have always got the best of compliments for my work from
the fraternity. Then how can leaving early be a problem for you or for me? If I
sit in the office and take calls from there and then leave for home at 8 or 9
PM, does that mark me a better employee? How? I fail to understand that logic
simply because we have virtual meetings. When all the people on the call can
practically take it from anywhere, how does taking it from office makes me a
better or hard working employee?
Your role is difficult, so is
mine. Yours might be more difficult than mine but that doesn’t make my role
easy. It’s just a tad bit easier. And I guarantee that if you plan it better
and be more disciplined, you can also complete your work well within time and leave
EARLY. You might be gauged on the hard skills of coding and testing. I am
gauged on the soft skills of writing stories and communicating and managing.
You miss a line of code or a test case, you are questioned and grilled. I miss
an important communication or miss an acceptance criteria in my story, I am
questioned and grilled. You decide to work hard to get a hike or a promotion. I
do a balancing act to continue the work that I love and get hugs from my
daughter.
Keep feeling jealous but don’t
pour that out on me…
