Clinton Bowen

Values

I think life is boring without a problem or task that is a Challenge. Challenges are rewarding to tackle and solve.
Challenges yield Learning experiences which help me Grow.
With that said, I do need time and space for a work-life Balance. I take time for myself in the mornings to prepare myself for the day.
I value Humility and Candor from others and I hope to be an example of that in day-to-day life.
Lastly, what really can be exciting for me is seeing elegance in an engineered solution.

Reflecting: I tend to think about one topic for extensive periods of time. An easy way to spot if I’m reflecting is when I mention a conversation topic from 5 minutes ago (or 5 days ago) when the conversation has progressed elsewhere. Here are some types of things I might reflect on with fun examples:
- A problem, challenge, or conjecture, e.g. “Clinton’s Delaunay Conjecture: Robert Delaunay and Boris Delaunay are related.”
- Reflect on a conversation topic, e.g. “Roman columns or Greek pillars? Discuss.”
- Ideals, dreams, and counterexamples, e.g. “One day x = y/z; will be constant time.”

When you don’t feel safe in a conversation, how does this manifest itself in your actions or affects?

Rumination: I am always my biggest critic. I set a pretty high bar for myself. Just tell me to relax. It was the best advice I got from teammates when I played college hockey.
Conflict: I sometimes avoid conflict which does not resolve the problem. Providing feedback helps.
Reservation: I can be fairly reserved until I feel comfortable. Here comfort can mean any of the following:
1. I am familiar and at ease with the individuals I am with;
2. The stated problem is clear enough and I have enough knowledge to provide feedback. Try asking me questions to spur my feedback and comfort.

I am notorious for over complicating designs. If I show you something that looks complicated, just call that out right away.
Gratitude! Okay this is personal and professional development. I have a hard time receiving and giving gratitude. I’m working on it. This is related to my rumination mentioned above.

I hope to write blog posts on these topics this year (2022).

Socratic Questioning: This can be good to use during (healthy) persuasion or other scenarios that lend themselves to good dialogue when diagraming things (e.g. system architecture)
Behavioral Science: Bringing behavioral science concepts into my day-to-day work. For example, identifying promoting and inhibiting pressures that lead into “why we do things this way”. This can also help unblock people and teams with surfacing these behaviors!
Facilitating Crit: Crit is a useful tool for project reviews and exchanging feedback amongst team members. It is used regularly in liberal arts studies and art based research. I’d like to be a practitioner and facilitator of this when working with teams on projects and share my experiences blogging about this.
Critical Pedagogy: Borrowing concepts of critical pedagogy and applying them in a professional setting; with particular focus on an organization’s cultural norms, values, and language. This one is going to be the most challenging as I am now in a very large company.
The Michelangelo Problem: Asking questions that strike at the heart of the issue. Sometimes I don’t know what questions to ask to get a better understanding of context.

“The best artist has that thought alone which is contained within the marble shell; only the sculptor’s hand can break the spell to free the figures.” - Michelangelo, Letter To His Father In Florence.

My mornings

I really value the first 30 minutes of my working day and to allow myself to focus and flow for the rest of the day. It might look like making a pot of tea, reviewing my calendar, slack, and chunking my goals/tasks for the day.
If it’s the afternoon and you’re scheduling an early morning meeting, slack or text me about it just to be sure I’m aware of it.
I’m usually online around 9am Pacific. There are going to be mornings where it’s a struggle. Pre-pandemic I would weightlift at the gym before I start my day; nowadays it’s a question of “how do I feel about going to the gym?”

1:1 Meetings

I am very open to structured 1:1 meetings. This is something I’d like to try more. Often times, my 1:1 meetings might start off structured but over time turn unstructured.
If you’re reading this, I invite you to schedule a 1:1 with me if we haven’t met already. clinton.bowen - at - ${JOB}.com.

How should people best get your attention for urgent matters outside of normal working hours?

What’s your relationship to work communication when not at work?

What are your signs that you’d prefer to not be interrupted when at work?

Slack is sync’ed to my calendar; notifications might get silenced during meetings but I’ll try to respond after the meeting is done.
Meditation events on my calendar.