The Second Shift
The invisible work of managing yourself after the visible work is already done.
Trey Robinson
There is the work other people can see. Then there is the second shift.
The second shift is the reconstruction. It is the hour spent reconstructing a conversation you already survived. It is the list you write after the list. It is the body coming down from a room that required you to look easy.
People praise output. They rarely inventory the cost of producing it with a nervous system that does not clock out when the meeting ends.
I learned to look finished. Looking finished is not the same thing as being done.