"When silence hides something deeper"
I remember what it felt like to go quiet. Early in my career, I often found myself stuck, not just on the work, but in my own head. Everyone around me seemed to get things faster. They spoke with confidence. They pair programmed with ease. I felt like I was always two steps behind, faking it just well enough to avoid detection. It wasn’t laziness. I was working hard. But my progress was slow and full of self-doubt. I didn’t ask for help because I didn’t want to confirm what I already feared, that I wasn’t good enough to be here. Agile made it worse. All that visibility. Daily stand-ups. Tickets moving (or not moving) across the board. It felt like a spotlight I hadn’t earned. So I tried to disappear into the work. Keep my head down. Say as little as possible. Silence became a survival strategy. When you’re in that place, it’s easy to mistake a check-in for an accusation. The moment someone notices you’ve gone quiet, shame kicks in. And if the person asking holds power, it can feel like everything you feared is finally being confirmed. But now, from the other side, I see it differently. It’s not micromanagement to notice when someone goes quiet. It’s management. It’s care. It’s the willingness to lean into discomfort, yours and theirs, because silence might be hiding something deeper. I wish my managers had understood that back then. I wish they’d known how hard it was to speak up when I was scared I didn’t belong. I wish they’d helped me build comfort in the uncertainty, instead of waiting for me to say I needed help. Because I didn’t know how. Until next time, ✉️ Enjoying The Messy Middle? If someone sent this email your way and you’d like to get it direct, you can sign up here. |