A path in the woods

Struggling a bit this evening on what to babble on about today.  Don’t want to go to the political well again (lord knows there will be more than enough opportunity and material to work with.)  I recently heard a quote on TV that said “You have to keep doing what you’re great at.”  It is a simple common sense notion that should be a simple path to follow.  I have always found it difficult find, let alone follow that path.

I grew up being the smart kid in school.  I never needed to try very hard.  Classes, other than spelling, all came very easy.  That continue throughout school all the way to college.  Even when things got a little hard, I could still rely on my wits (and a bit of scrambling) to get by.  I never really found an academic pursuit that I loved (I suppose if I loved it I would be forced to try harder.)  My professional career was a bee lie path toward trading.  Everything I learned led me in that direction.  Then, shortly before the financial crisis, I got my shot on the largest trading desk that no-one had ever heard of.  We were a small group, led and dominated by a bigger than life figure who was also the best trader I have ever known.  The problem was, the team didn’t really want me there at a time when the team was struggling.  As a result, I got no guidance and little, if any training.  I made my own mistakes as well by not becoming closer to some of the key people on the desk I should have.  Couple mis-steps and I was quickly discounted and all but dismissed.  I was on the merry go round but I missed the brass ring.

I followed that time with a long stint as the resident expert and leader of a group of very smart people in an Audit group.  It was the best ring side seat for the meltdown of the financial markets that anyone could have hoped for.  I was in the room the day we wrote down a book of CDO’s basically wiping out $10 billion dollar over the course of an afternoon.  Throughout the crisis, I went from asset class to asset class documenting the downward spiral.  It got to a point that the numbers and the money involved was all meaningless (billion here, few hundred million there.) All the time while I was in the center of it all, I was never “the guy.”  I may have been the brains, the analyst, but never the leader driving change.  And in the back of my head, I sort of knew it.  Again, enough to get by, or even excel, but not enough to be great.  A brief stop in a Risk role too close to my trading background and I ended up where I am today. 

Again, I am in a role where, I can honestly say, I know more than anyone around me without a bit of arrogance.  I am constantly reminded of the quote from Keith Obberman from ESPN; “At some point in your career you reach the point where you look around the table and realize that no-one knows any more than you do.”  That I the table I find myself today.  That would seem then to be the path, right?  Some days it sure doesn’t feel like it.  You have to keep doing what your great at… what if you are very very good but can’t seem to find great.  Is that still the right path or are you just lost in the woods?