Wrong but useful. Working @Twitter, tweeting about data science and people management.
"Wait, it's all her views?" 
"Always has been"
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Being able to say no is an important skill for a senior IC, who CAN do a lot of things but still shouldn't do them, for many many reasons. Saying no was a game changing skill for me as an IC, and when I began my people management career, I was determined to teach it to my team
In the grand scheme of things, I did an alright job of this. I had a feel for the beats and lifecycles of DS work and I'd lived through the stages career growth as a DS IC. Essentially, I had a strong sense of where DS adds value so I could tell what was worth saying no to
The problem was, I didn't have this intuition or experience with manager-specific skills. I was nervous and eager to seem competent and important. Taking on more responsibility and more ICs felt like growth, so I agreed to do work and manage people when I had no business to
Sometimes it was because I was too junior a manager to have that kind of skill, sometimes it was because it wasn't something a DS manager should be doing in the first place. In both cases, it left me feeling totally ragged and burnt out
I still think I'm bad at this--at saying no as a manager. The former type of saying no is getting easier, but the latter is an area where I have a lot of growth ahead of me
Early in my career, my time felt infinite. That's partly because I had less going on in my early to mid 20's, but it's also because the choices I made about how to spend my working hours primarily only affected me
Now, I need to have the discipline to keep in check my pragmatic impulses ("no one else is solving this problem, so maybe I should!") or curious inclinations ("wow, I'd love an excuse to learn about this!"). There's a lot more potential for the negative consequences to cascade
Responsibilities I neglect today because I'm spread to thin can affect my directs, my xfn partners, and even me in a future week where I budgeted very little wiggle room time. It's no way to live, much less get ahead
Awareness is the first step, but I've still gotta put in a lot of reps
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