Shoot Sessions

While it's only been three weeks since I properly stepped away from the Ivory Tower of Academia to start my new job in the infamous Private Sector, it's already apparent what the biggest differentiator will be between the two worlds: Shoot Sessions (aka Communication).

To be fair, I've always loved the solitude associated with academic work. Interference from others was minimal, apart from the odd group meeting here and there. The project was solely mine to handle and while the responsibility does befall you alone, it also gives greater flexibility in terms of the pace, timing and structuring of your approach. And then of course, there's the somewhat romantic notion of the lone brain stewing on a problem for hours on end, kicked back in slacks on a swivel chair behind a messy desk, surrounded by hundreds of reference books and a dozen empty tea-cups. And at least the delusion of grandeur.

These last three weeks, I have had to adjust both pace and methodology. I need to constantly force myself to consult colleagues when I get stuck on a problem, rather than simply engrossing myself in its solution for however long it takes me to figure it out. In the Private Sector and especially Consultancy, time matters. If an hour isn't billable to a client, it's technically an hour wasted. So efficiency is of the essence.

We have regular "Shoot Sessions" at work. Moments in which you and your colleagues sit down together for a few minutes to check the progress of the project, realign the recent ideas and basically brainstorm about the next few steps. This is an entirely new concept to me. I'm used to going off on my own, work out ideas to the finishing stages and only then presenting them to the Prof for feedback. These sessions happened once a month at university. Here, they occur several times a day. And I think it's brilliant. Simply looking at how quickly ideas evolve and take on different shapes because of the continued fresh input from several different angles... it's amazing how much can be done in a short space of time.

I feel like a wild horse at times, in that I need to be reeled back in from my enthusiasm to go on little solitary explorations at every stumbling block I encounter. Academics have days, weeks, even months, to explore concepts and ideas. To get to grips with new things and to go off on random tangents. What I am learning now, is focus. Efficiency. And I think this will be a highly valuable tool to acquire. I am in awe of the efficiency of my work colleagues. And while I would love to retain my random exploratory quests in my private life, I seriously hope my work mind will become as efficient as theirs is.

PS: A Shoot session incidentally is nothing less than a bit of a Brain Storm sesh, and a wee bird's informed me that in the UK it is now no longer PC to talk about "brain storms" as they might be considered somewhat insulting to Epileptic patients. The term "Brain Storm" is to be replaced by the term "Thought Shower". Talk about passive vocabulary.