A Bolt from the Blue

I've seen a lot of different touch points in my profession that have formed and influenced my outlook in life. "Unexpected blessing" is how I would characterize my beginnings with our partners. Although it was a journey for which I was unprepared, it helped to shape who I am now. Working with amazing people like our partners hasn't made it difficult for me to interact with them completely. They were incredibly accommodating and friendly when I had concerns regarding the tasks at hand.

Among all the interesting things we do with our partners, I really enjoy our weekly team catch-up, where everyone shares the highlights and stumbles they had over the week, whether it was personal or professional. The benefit of this catch-up is that, once you tell your story, anyone from the team can offer their insights. If something is amusing and relatable, we can sometimes chuckle together. This allowed us to openly communicate with each other and gauge how we could improve our productivity at work.

I've only recently begun attending team meetings, but of all the highlights and stumbles I've shared, one that remains out in my mind is one I mentioned just a few weeks ago. I expressed my joy that my elder sister had returned from overseas to surprise our mother on her birthday, which is something personal. I told the team about how much fun we had at the amusement park. We started chatting about our experiences and laughed. I highlighted the merger's impact on myself at work. I discussed the lessons I learned when deduping duplicate contacts, as well as the difficulties I encountered. It wasn't easy to integrate thousands of contacts. Our partners were aware that the manual deduping process would take a while to complete. Our partner told me that after the team has resolved everything on their end, they will assist me with the contacts, which was a sigh of relief. From there, I understood how fortunate I am to be partnered with these folks who are so kind and understanding.

I think one of the most satisfying elements is having to collaborate with our partners, a bolt from the blue. I've learned a ton of new things in the brief time I've been working with them. The succeeding days that I will be working with them are something I'm excited about and something I look forward to because I know I'll learn and grow more from them.