Sometimes I feel like certain people were put on this earth just to test my patience. You probably know the feeling.
A meeting that goes in circles.
A colleague who challenges every idea.
Someone who moves slower than you want, or faster than you’re comfortable with. It’s easy to think these people get in the way of progress. But lately I’ve been wondering if they’re part of the progress. In The Art of Happiness at Work, the authors explain that patience isn’t learned in peaceful moments, it’s learned in difficulty. The people who frustrate us are often our real teachers. That’s hard to accept in the moment, especially in a high-pressure environment like software.
When you’re juggling deadlines, dependencies, and competing priorities, patience can feel like indulgence. But I’ve noticed that impatience rarely speeds things up, it just adds tension. As leaders, when we lose patience, we stop seeing clearly.
We make quick judgments about people or outcomes before the full picture has time to emerge. And because software work is complex, cause and effect never cleanly aligned, our impatience can leave others feeling unfairly judged. Patience isn’t about ignoring problems or tolerating poor performance. It’s about creating enough space for understanding before action.
It’s what lets us separate behaviour from intent, noise from signal, friction from growth. I still fail the patience test often.
But on the days I manage to pass, when I pause long enough to listen, breathe, and see what’s really going on, the work feels lighter. So do the relationships. And that, I think, is the quiet link between patience and happiness:
neither is found in ease, but in how we meet the moments that test us most. Until next time,
Dermot
The Messy Middle. ✉️ Enjoying The Messy Middle?
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