Losing the fizz

21st July 2009

The title is not about beer but about an article on the blog of Eric Karjaluoto. It is a good one and I recommend you go and read it. It talks about the typical cycle of a new job that is started with enthusiasm which gradually wears out due to various reasons. So far I didn't have to worry about the team I have been working with. However, my current job is different and I am worried about my team losing interest. This can happen due to a number of reasons, some I am aware of, others I am not.

One of the reason I feel people may get bored is underemployment - a situation where you get a person working on something that doesn't requires his or her skills and can be done by anyone with less experience/education/skills/knowledge. For the issues I am facing, it is very important to have a right mix of people in the team so most of the people are working on something appropriate to their skill levels most of the time but this is easier said than done, especially in a smaller team.