I’ve spent a bit of time over the last few days thinking about how 2012 went for me and whilst it’s a tough thing for me to say, if I’m being brutally honest I’m struggling to feel good about it.
When I looked back on 2011 it felt great to write that post. There was a ton of good stuff to be proud of and I felt like my life really took a significant step forward in many areas. It sucks, but I just can’t feel the same way about 2012.
It’s definitely time for some serious reflection. I’m determined to ensure 2013 represents a big step forward for me and I have some thoughts about areas of focus and how I will approach goal setting differently so keep an eye out for a post on that.
For the time being, below are some thoughts about 2012 (it’s not all bad!):
What went well?
Jagex – I achieved some significant things at Jagex in 2012 and when I look back at the year I feel proud of many things. I can’t go into much detail for confidentiality reasons however I can say that I did a lot of work on Jagex’s overall priorities as a studio and also worked very closely with the RuneScape team to pull off some tricky stuff with some very good results. I consider some of the things I did in 2012 at Jagex to be important career highlights to date.
Leaving Jagex – I left Jagex at the end of October and it was absolutely the right decision. I love the company and the people, however professionally it was without doubt the right thing for me. I’m glad I made the decision to leave and since then I have been involved in some very interesting stuff – more on that in 2013 
Writing – I wrote quite a lot in 2012 and became much more confident in both writing and promoting the things I wrote – particularly towards the end of the year where I wrote roughly a post per week in the last quarter. A few of these post were received really well too. Promoting from within vs. hiring from the outside, Why Rapid Promotion can be the Worst Thing for your Career and Brevity – the most underrated skill were particularly well read and shared.
Confidence – I’ve grown in confidence a lot, particularly professionally. I used to have quite a lot of self doubt (most wouldn’t notice this as I used to just ignore it and push on), however the more things I become involved with the more I realize I have a natural skill of being able to make sense of situations and work with a team to define the right path forward, lead and execute well. I’ve now done it very successfully in many different types of situations and also with different people and as a result I’m much more confident in the value I bring.
Public speaking
This really was quite a break through. I used to hate it. I would dread speaking events and would worry about it for days, sometimes weeks before an event. Through lots of practice and understanding that preparation is the key for me, I have grown to not hate it and in some cases I have even looked forward to it. Speaking in front of approx. 500 people for 5-10 mins was a big milestone for me.
What didn’t go well?
I’m actually not going to spend much time laying out what didn’t go well because it’s annoying to write and I would rather focus on how to make 2013 a better year for me.
Quickly though, I struggled with setting goals and priorities at times, drifted away from minimalism and living within my means and continued to neglect my health and fitness. I also lack things I am passionate about in my personal life as I prioritised my work over virtually everything else. Lastly, I just found it hard to relax, spend time recharging and enjoying life. I will definitely think hard about these areas in 2013.
This hasn’t really been a fun post to write, but it was important to write it. I will be spending some time over the next day or so thinking about how to approach 2013. I definitely need to go about things a little differently as whilst 2012 has some good bits in it, I felt I could have done much better.
