Don’t try too hard.

This was the advice given to me by my colleague when I was working as an assistant network engineer. The colleague was the senior engineer and I was a fresh graduate from my polytechnic.

My boss had just signed the contract for a new IT project. I field that project was quite impossible for us to complete in the given time due to the lack of manpower that we had. Everyone in the company knew that it was a problem, but the boss didn’t see it as one. My task was to take over one element myself. I put in extra hours and overnight to get the project done. I was a newbie in the field and I was surprised that my colleagues didn’t show even a fraction of the handwork I’d put in.

We managed to complete the project on time. The senior engineer gave me a pat on the back and told me that I did well and played a huge part in the success of the project but then he told me. Sometimes when you think the project is going to fail, you should let it fail, to give the boss the sign that it cannot be done. Since the boss knows that the team could do it, he going to stress test us again. My colleagues had deliberately slackened off to send the message to the boss that we need more engineers.

In school we have to push ourselves to our max to achieve our best but doing our best in the office does not necessarily bring us any good.

And well I got promoted to a network engineer. I quit my job to serve my National service as a specialist in the Singapore air force. This advice was useful during my term in the air force.