Why my mom taught me the important lessons for my career

"My mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her." -- George Washington

Long before I heard about the term sustainability, my mom was teaching me the importance of recycling bags and containers and turning off lights and water faucets when not in use. Well before I understood what empathy was, my mom taught me that I could learn something valuable from each and everyone that I met. As a true team player, my mom modeled for me the importance of rolling up one's sleeves, working as hard or harder than everyone else, not being focused on who gets the credit, working well with other people, and always finding ways to contribute positively to other people's lives. In this blog, I explore how my mom has, indeed, offered me some of the most valuable lessons to succeed in my career.

My mother has been a wonderful example of unconditional love, demonstrating the resilience needed to raise children. She was always the first to rise, laboring tirelessly to ensure the family was well-fed, clothed and supported in all our endeavors. I don’t think I ever heard my mom say that raising kids was a lot of work. She just always put in her 100% percent, whether it was the delicious handmade meals we always found on the table and eventually came to expect as her signature or the consistent love and adoration of her children. Similar to a mindset required when raising kids, she modeled for me how important it was to roll with the punches, stay flexible, keep pushing forward and never say never.

So much of that patience is what I have found useful in my career. In so many teams, I have been expected to jump in and take on additional roles, whether it was to fill a Human Resources role the company was unwilling to staff or wear multiple hats because the company simply took too long to find key person replacements. Though my mother might not have realized it, her energy and enthusiasm to be the backbone of our family created a template of strength for me so I would go on to take on large challenges at work, take on multiple responsibilities selflessly, and understand that the value of excellent execution.

I am often reminded that as much as projects go well, some days you have to work through frustrating aspects - execution takes twice as much of the planned effort, resources are modest, team members aren’t collaborating effectively, or simply, the grind consumes so much time. As women in operations and finance, our work often keeps organization glued together, improves teamwork and ensures forward motion. It is also the work that is least visible but also the most exhausting. Thanks to my mom’s example, who often labored heavily behind the scenes without many accolades, I know what it means to go all-in.

"There is always something valuable that you can learn from each and every person that you meet." -- Meera Sridharan

My mom is also a chef extraordinaire. While in childhood this simply meant that every meal was delicious, as I grew older I came to appreciate keenly how much effort and dedication that went into each meal. As I grew older, and took cooking lessons from my mom, we often ended up fighting, because she would insist that the seasoning be exactly right, and the timing of the various steps be very specific. My cooking was haphazard and impatient. Slowly, as I grew older, I noticed that the instructions were essentially guidance to pay attention to the language of cooking and to be mindful of the ways in which different vegetables responded to water and heat. It was equally important to have the ingredients ready so that if you needed to fry certain things together their flavors would blend correctly and you could time those steps right.

While cooking is an exercise in mindfulness, it has also taught me an important life lesson. What looks easy often isn’t and to really learn a skill, you have to be able to empty out your mind to accept the guidance that can really help you excel. While I practice my mom’s recipes with more panache now, what she taught me about cooking has also worked in aspects around collaboration and project management. Getting the ingredients ready is often akin to sharing group objectives and getting everyone agreed to the overall objective at hand. Blending the ingredients feels similar to getting team members to collaborate and to enrich the life of the project. The hope is that the sum is greater than that of the parts. Well timed project management ensures that the steps are coordinated well, and the outcome is always kept in mind. As I have become more skilled, I now understand how nuances in flavors affect the final taste. A little extra ginger and you have a bit more flavor here. Fewer lesser onions and it’s a milder outcome. Similarly when you lead teams, you wield strengths of a team member to influence outcomes, and sometimes you help facilitate negotiations to change direction on an outcome. When you get to the end, the end product is always a version of ensuring the various steps were timed sufficiently and that there is adequate creativity and enough content! Indeed, while every meal might have only seemed that to my mom, she has taught me to pay attention.

Coverpage on my Karatasi Brand Notebook of Amma's Recipes! #mom'srecipes

In the town where I grew up, my mom was a very active socialite. She was part of at least four different language groups with monthly meet-ups. Often my dad would joke that he was known as her husband. I remember her being very outgoing in groups and really interested in how she was perceived. While she was not very demanding, she tremendously enjoyed being around people and it showed. People would often seek out her attention and our home was always ringing with phone calls. In a career setting, this would be networking. From my mom, I learnt that it matters that you know your community and that you invest time to engage with them specifically for the pleasure of knowing them. My mom cared about people and to this day she remembers the birthdays of almost hundred plus people she met over the years. Her loving nature stood out to us and it was the fabric of our family. When I have worked in teams, I try to recommend events for everyone to get together to celebrate key milestones. It is easy to forget how important this is but as a manager I have tried to remember that people and our experiences together are a key ingredient of joy.

My biggest inheritance from my mom is her constant reminder to me to work hard and not slack off. Being a late bloomer in school and always ready to just chill, my mom worried constantly about my falling behind and not fulfilling my potential. She would wake in the wee hours of the morning to ensure I was able to put in the extra few hours before any given exam. When I really struggled with high school math, she ensured that I got special help on a one on one basis to ensure that I would be successful during my final year. It was her belief in me and a lesson in practice makes perfect that taught me some of the most valuable lessons to embrace a growth mindset. As a finance professional in a fast evolving world, I am constantly challenged to grasp the nuances of challenging business and finance concepts. The lessons my mom imparted remind me to push a little bit harder each day to be self-driven. Though my mom gave up her nascent career as we children demanded more of her time, she instilled the foundational values of leadership, management, and perseverance that now allow me to succeed professionally.

Never afraid to try new things! #bebold

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