S2 E7: MARCUS UDOKANG

Tracie Edwards:

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Traceability podcast. I'm your host, Tracie Edwards, and today, I feel so fortunate to have Marcus Udokang with us from Calgary. Marcus is a project manager, business analyst, mentor, speaker, writer and career coach. Marcus, thank you so much for being with us today.

Marcus Udokang:

You're very much welcome.

Tracie Edwards:

So, how we usually start out here is, we kind of go back to the very beginning of your career and ask how did you get your start in business analysis and project management?

Marcus Udokang:

Well, I guess you could say I stumbled upon the BA role rather, semi-accidentally, like a few BAs and PMs do. But in the beginning, let me see, becoming a BA really wasn't intentional from the beginning. It became that way over time and there was this sort of gradual move into the role using, I think, business analyst skills that have just been developed over time. So initially, I had this passion at university to become an English teacher, of all things, so that's why my BA degree is in English, because that's what I went to study.

Marcus Udokang:

Now my last year of university, the internet was up and coming so I hopped on the bandwagon, so to speak, and I started learning coding. internet coding, web development. And that started at the university computer club. I was part of a university computer club and that's kind of what sparked the interest. And after university, I started working for a very small upstart company within the city that I lived in and it was a basic help desk support kind of job. Now afterwards, I slowly moved into application support, but I think after doing that, it sort of helped me feel a bit more comfortable realizing that this is what I wanted to do. At my last year at university I had a bit of a web development job on campus as well. So that sort of helped the impetus as well.

Marcus Udokang:

Now after a few months working with this particular company outside of university, I decided I was going to go to college. Because I already had a degree and I really didn't want to do a Master's degree. So let me go to college. So I went off to Seneca College in Toronto and I studied computer networking. It was supposed to be a two year program and after my first year of college, what do I do? I end up getting a job with IBM, big blue. Now this is long before Google and long before Facebook and all these guys never existed. The biggest of the biggest, that was IBM, Dell maybe. So here I was, working with the biggest of biggest. I felt on cloud nine. They hired me, initially, as a web developer/business analyst kind of thing. And I must confess, I never looked back since. I've been fully employed, practically every day since then.

Marcus Udokang:

Now I should mention that my earlier jobs didn't really necessarily have the title of business analyst, but many of the skillsets we had to use were business analyst skillsets. And i think there was a lot of growing, obviously, from that point onward. And I found that I was a pretty good business analyst and mainly because of two things. One, I think I was pretty good at communicating. This English degree was coming in handy. And also, I think I was able to be that conduit. That communication skill allowed me to be this good conduit between the end users of technology and the developers, you know those techy guys. I could kind of speak a bit of both languages so I could be that intermediary between the two. Which is really, I think, at the core of what a BA is all about.

Marcus Udokang:

So the passion for becoming a business analyst has sort of just continued to grow since then. Many years later, project management came into it. Reason being, I had worked with project managers in different projects along the years and I felt that I wanted to grow and to embrace something else. Being a project manager seemed like a natural fit.

Tracie Edwards:

Yeah. I think, as you say, many BAs sort of have a way of becoming business analysts because of it's sort of in front of them and there's something in their personality that they gravitate to it. Sort of some natural gift or something. Yours being communication. Was there anything else as far as software projects that really sort of lit something up in you?

Marcus Udokang:

I think it was the internet. It was the onslaught of the internet because prior to the internet, those computer languages that you were learning if you wanted to go into IT, it was Fortran, COBOL, all this really deep stuff. You had to be a hardcore techy to do that stuff. That wasn't really my focal point. I needed that rep to be able to put one foot on some techy stuff and one foot on the communication side. And when internet came in, learning things like HTML and CGI and Java didn't seem as complex as Fortran or COBOL or any of those. Nobody uses these languages any more, but at the time I'd spend 16 hours a day, one summer, I couldn't find a summer job as a student, I would spend 16 hours a day teaching myself Java, HTML and CGI and all that kind of stuff. So I think that was also the interest in it. Being able to say, how is a graphic rendered? What does a GIF mean? What's a JPEG? Dealing with millions of colors versus 256.

Marcus Udokang:

All this stuff intrigued me. It seems like a thing in the past, we don't really think about these things any more, but at that time this was really up and coming. So I think it was the interest in technology, the fact that very few people had internet cards built into their laptops or their desktops. Desktops were the big thing. And so one of the companies I worked for, as I said, it was a help desk, helping people troubleshoot some of these internet technical issues, which again, it's something nobody really worries about these days. All this stuff intrigued me. Fiber optic cabling. How do you get cables into a house, so on and so forth. So I was intrigued. And of course, the Macintosh was up and coming. Many people had Macs that weren't compatible with the internet. But PCs you could just slip in a card, what they call PCMIA cards, ISA cards, something like that. So they were a bit more scalable I guess.

Marcus Udokang:

Then of course Macs became bigger and better. Not just the physical attraction of the Mac, but all of the sophisticated things you could do. It was a far cry from what I had learned as a kid using Mac Paint or Mac Draw and all that basic stuff. Now it was, there were larger screens, they were all in color and programs are much more sophisticated. So all of this technology stuff seemed intriguing to me. That's what made it attractive, I guess, too.

Tracie Edwards:

That's interesting. I never sort of looked at it that way. I, personally, did not have any technology interest coming up in school and that kind of thing. There really weren't computer classes, computers were not ubiquitous in homes and that kind of thing. So I wonder, if to some extent, sort of the cool things that started happening with technology were one of the things that continued to kind of keep me there just as technology advanced and got more exciting and stuff.

Tracie Edwards:

So, you're a BA and was there something sort of going on with you where you wanted to make a leap to project management? Was there any dissatisfaction with business analysis?

Marcus Udokang:

No. I think it was just a growth process. You get to a point where you're doing the same thing over and over again. You grow, you grow, you grow and then you realize, I kind of want a change. So that was part of it and also I think as a business analyst, you're really just involved with a ... you've got your own little boundaries. You don't have to worry about the strategy. You don't have to worry about pre-project planning, not so much. Maybe you're not even writing business cases, not involved with the chart, not involved with executives. So to get to that level, you either become this involved senior business analyst or a full fledged project manager where, you can see now, everything and everyone. You're not just working on your own little job. You need to see all the other jobs. You need to see what quality assurance is doing and these days, what the product owner is doing if you're in [inaudible 00:09:33] what the product manager is doing.

Marcus Udokang:

And of course, you have to deal, maybe, with a project manager office. So there's all these different facets. I think it's like being in a kitchen as a cook or being a conductor of an orchestra. You're not just playing one instrument, you have to know and listen to all the other instruments for you to be able to bring everyone, cohesively, together to create that goal or that objective of your project. Which I thought was a different step. It's much more mature step, I think, in one's career.

Tracie Edwards:

Yeah. I agree and I have felt some of the same things where you get to a point where you just think, "I'm kind of tired of working on tactical things, doing the same thing over again and I want to have a larger view." What are maybe some tips that you would give to other folks who maybe kind of feeling that, and what are some things they could be looking for, or what are some tips for further discovery for them?

Marcus Udokang:

I think when you're working as a business analyst, you have to be able to understand how to ask the right questions. As a project manager, you're having other people tell you what it is they do and you're prioritizing those tasks and so on. But as a business analyst, you're getting deeper into the woods, so to speak. You have to ask yourself, do I need to reevaluate my skills at this particular stage? Do I need a course or a certificate to upgrade my skills? So I think as a BA, you really have to ask yourself, if I'm going to become a greater BA, if I don't want to have this analysis paralysis sort of thing, maybe it's time to reevaluate my skills. Maybe I need a certificate, maybe I need to go back to university. Maybe I need to upgrade my skills somehow. Maybe your employer will allow you. So that's one key.

Marcus Udokang:

I think you have to constantly be asking yourself, when I'm on a project, are we aligned to the strategic objectives of the company, that type of thing. Because the one big thing I think a lot of BAs get is pushback. They go to study all these rules about how to become a great BA, you get into a project and you find, nobody wants to listen to me. Nobody wants my opinions. We're not following the rules that I studied at school. What's going on? Now there's a fancy point that maybe you didn't learn in school. Are you aligning your ideas, your questions, to your stakeholders? Are you appealing to your stakeholders, really? Are you aligning your ideas to the strategic objectives of the company?

Marcus Udokang:

Maybe you're saying to yourself, well another thing too, is the blame game. Don't play the blame game. I'm not responsible for this, management won't approve this document, I can't get funding for that. The only reason why is because maybe you need to seek some degree of clarity or purpose on your project. Maybe you need to better understand your business area. So I would say, as a BA, try and understand the organization, try to understand the business area that you're working in. What are their objectives? Is it for profit? Is it legal or regulatory requirement? Is it innovation? Is it ROI? What are the important drivers for the decision-makers, for those stakeholders. Try to find out what those are. I think if you incorporate those into your initiatives then I think you have an easier way of getting buy in. Make sure you find a champion for your cause. Someone who can fight for you and all of a sudden when you start communicating in a more effective way, giving them what they want, voila. All of a sudden you get people on your side. I think that's a skill that takes a while, a lot of new BAs may not realize that.

Tracie Edwards:

I think it takes a certain degree of maturity in a career, emotional and political.

Marcus Udokang:

That's the key.

Tracie Edwards:

Project maturity.

Marcus Udokang:

That's the key. What I found as a BA, was all about clearly accountabilities, boundaries and accountabilities. You might say, I'm going to fix everything now. I know how it’s done. And guess what guys? We are going to do it this way. Yeah right. See where that takes you. You live and learn.

Tracie Edwards:

So speaking of sort of finding champions, mentoring is a big thing these days, being mentors and being mentored. What was it like for you mentoring in your career and is that something that helped you grow your career more successfully?

Marcus Udokang:

Yeah, I think so. You’ve always got to get mentors and some might be formal, some might be informal, some might be coworkers. I think that's sort of the informal type. I’ve learned a lot from coworkers and then there’s been a lot more formal mentors. But I think in my time, a lot of the learning came from informal, from the coworkers themselves. You learn a few key things, let me give you an example. Change is everywhere. You might think it’s automatic that when you're in IT that you’ll automatically adapt to change but that's not necessarily the case. A lot of people in any job kind of get comfortable. I have asked the question to even coworkers, hey you're really good at programming, why don’t you take yourself further? They say, well because I'm comfortable here. Well that's not the word you want to hear in IT. Learn to adapt to change. I'm not just talking about change in management, I'm talking about being open to ideas from other people. So that's the key, change is everywhere and learn to adapt. That's going to be the key to success.

Marcus Udokang:

So that's one key thing I’ve learned from mentors. The other is, knowing that there is always different alternatives to solve a problem. And what I mean by that is, it’s not just you that's going to be trying to solve a problem, it’s you and a group of other people. And again, you’ve got to be open to engaging with those people to try and solve those problems. So that's the second one. Because, I think a lot of BAs are introverts. I certainly am a bit. And I was even more so and I wanted to be in a smaller room and solve the problem myself. I don’t think that's going to work in a corporate environment. If you're a consultant maybe, but even then you still have to engage other people. So knowing that there’s different solutions to a problem and knowing that it’s not just you solving it, other people are too.

Marcus Udokang:

The third thing, that I’ve learned from mentors, there’s always a way to excel or grow. Whether that is Linearly or laterally or vertically, I guess. A lot of people think I'm just going to grow upward, but not necessarily. You can grow, I think, in a lateral way too. That's the third. The fourth thing is, surround yourself with people who will motivate and inspire you to become a better version of yourself. And I say that because there’s a lot of naysayers out there. It doesn’t matter where you work, there’s naysayers. He took more vacation than I did. What the hell do you know or whatever. Try to ignore them. In the best way to ignore them is to put yourself in and around people who will motivate you and keep you moving to become bigger and better. So that’s the fourth thing.

Marcus Udokang:

Fifth thing, you’ve got to be a lifelong learner. Here I am as old as I am, and I’m taking an MBA in IT. Who would have thought? But you got to keep doing it because, especially in IT, things change so frequently. And I would say the last but not least, would be, learn to give back to your community. And they say this whole heartedly because you get to a certain point where you’re more or less established and you want to be able to help those who are in need. And what I mean is some thing like a scholarship fund. So what I did at Seneca College, where I went, and McMaster University, my alma mater, is I opened up a scholarship. And it’s not a lot of money but each year I help fund it and I get letters, in fact I just received last week, a thank you letter from one of the recipients of the scholarship. So it’s nice to feel that you’re helping other people because you know how tough it was when you came up. These are some things I learned from mentors of mine.

Tracie Edwards:

I definitely agree on all those points and there’s so much to unpack there. Going back to your first point about how we can often be introverts. And it occurs to me, when you and I started out as BAs, we were alone in a cubicle somewhere writing these big enormous documents and designing all these things that we thought were so cool. But the world is not like that anymore and so you bring up a great point there, especially in companies, but especially as we are now more than ever working in agile style environments, we need to be so much more collaborative with people. Can you maybe provide some tips on ways to engage an agile team when we may be a little more introverted and a little less thrilled to swarm?

Marcus Udokang:

Well first of all, I haven’t seen 100% agile, I’ve only seen hybrid. So there’s a bit of mix of both, waterfall and agile or scrum or whatever it be. I think that agile is just a miniaturized version of your waterfall. Some people might tell me that I’m wrong about that but essentially instead of writing a large document, say a business review document, it’s smaller now. It’s just the points that you need to be able to solve within the next two weeks, that type of thing. Or month or however long your sprint is. And yes, you’re engaging with people and you’re testing, but you’re doing pretty much the same thing you did you’re just more focused, you’re more concentrated. So there might be a time when you can go to your cubicle for a few minutes, a few minutes not a few days, and actually that brings me to a funny point. I remember working at IBM and I saw someone in a cubicle and they said they had been in that cubicle for 11 years. I thought, oh my God. But I don’t think you ever see that again.

Marcus Udokang:

So I’d say you have to build trust. Build trust between not just your coworkers, but your stakeholders. There’s a few ways you can do that, but I think you can start off by giving short term results. Results in the short term for those quick wins. To gain that trust slowly over time instead of waiting to be able to give something to someone. In an agile environment it’s even easier to do that because you have to come up with short wins. So I think agile has just made it easier to do that and the reason why you want to build this trust is because it builds sort of meaningful engagement. It enables you to get things done so much more efficiently, so much more quickly. And I think, also, try to identify those stakeholders early on in the project. Get the stakeholders to start talking to one another and these two things, get them involved early, get them talking, enables you to resolve issues early in your project instead of waiting until it’s too late.

Marcus Udokang:

[00:22:24] I think, also, you have to learn to listen. You’ve got two ears and one mouth. So that means, listen more and talk less. Although now I’m talking more. In a work environment I’d say listen more because then you can start to figure out who does what, why, where and how through listening. You don’t need to ask so many questions in the beginning.

Marcus Udokang:

Manage expectations. And what I mean by that is, clarify these expectations throughout the project just so there’s no misunderstanding. Because this is what can cause problems later on. I’d say communicate with your stakeholders in different ways. There’s different channels of communication. What I mean by this is, some stakeholders might prefer email. Some stakeholders might prefer a phone call. Some might prefer face-to-face. Some might prefer more details than others. Understand how to get your point across to your stakeholders in the best way possible, in the way that they prefer not the way that you prefer.

Marcus Udokang:

So I think these are some ways you can engage stakeholders. These tactics really sort of help you to safely engage them. Some stakeholders or even managers might be more litigious, they might want to fine tooth comb. Others might be, maybe your manager is a micromanager, who knows. But when you start building this degree of trust I think they tend to lay back a little bit and go yeah yeah yeah Marcus is a go to guy, let’s go ask him. Just leave him for a day or so, he’ll figure it out because he usually does. So I think you want to build that trust and you want them to give you some degree of latitude to do what it is you need to do, in the time you need to get it done. So I think those are a few ways but you’ve got to build those relationships with your stakeholders or else nothing will get done on the project.

Tracie Edwards:

It occurs to me, maybe a little tip for folks out there, as we are doing our stakeholder analysis, as BAs we often are leaving it to the RACI matrix with our stakeholder analysis. But you bring up a great point about there are other things we should include in our stakeholder analysis such as, what’s your communication preference, that kind of thing. So I think a great point there. So back to folks that inspire us, I find that very interesting because I think often we miss opportunities to allow people to inspire us. It occurs to me that I have participated in an employee resource group this week, a Women in Tech event and I found it to be very inspiring. Especially as we are introverted sometimes as BAs, we may think we don’t need to sort of be part of the ERG, part of the group events and be putting ourselves out there. What are maybe some additional things you would recommend, as far as putting ourselves into a position to be inspired?

Marcus Udokang:

[00:26:09]Sometimes joining in some activities that your office might have. I was always in the habit of saying, absolutely no, that’s not for me. But that’s all part of coming out of your shell. So you don’t have to be introverted all the time. And if you engage with people, even at the getting your coffee, so to speak, that’s someway that you can create that relationship so that when you need something from someone, it will be pretty easy to get it. In fact, sometimes they may even just give you stuff without you asking and that makes it even easier. Just as and example, how many times have you had a contractor come into the office and decide to create a meeting with four or five people and says, listen I’m here to create [inaudible 00:26:59] diagram, just as an argument. Can you guys give me some information? And everyone at the table says, I don’t know, I don’t know. You need to ask yourself if you don’t know then why are you working here? Obviously they know, they’re not going to give you the information because you haven’t created a relationship with them yet.

Marcus Udokang:

You want them to just easily say, I’m kind of having this problem today. Did you see about this business process diagram? Business process diagram, I thought I had to make one from scratch. Oh no we’ve got it stored. Where is it? It’s on the shared drive. Shared drive? No one told me there was a shared drive. I’d say if there are any small events, get to know people. You can start with an icebreaker, find out what they like. If they like golf or something, how was the game yesterday? How was the golf game? Did you play on the weekend? Just that two or three minute of intro might just break that ice and they’ll bring down some barriers or borders and just start to talk to you. So that’s something I would say.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:28:05]I think that’s so important, especially in the world that we have lived in for most of the last year. Putting ourselves in positions to be inspired has been even more important and that has often meant being on Zoom a little longer than we might prefer, attending a few virtual events and that kind of thing. What are some things you’ve done this past year to kind of network a little more creatively?

Marcus Udokang:

[00:28:40]I’ve been on LinkedIn much more frequently. I created a YouTube podcast channel, that’s one way to get to know people. In fact, I’d highly recommend anyone to go ahead and do it. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be a big thing, it could be a small thing. Create a meet up group. Sometimes, meet up groups, you have to pay for them. If you don’t want to, maybe the organization you work with will pay for a meet up group if you can convince the powers to be that it’s an important thing. Oh it’s COVID, this will give us an avenue to be able to communicate more effectively off hours or on weekends. They might just pay whatever it is, $30 a month or whatever the fee is.

Marcus Udokang:

I think another thing is, going out of my way to make sure that I get to know people. And a lot of that has come from meeting them online. One fellow I ended up calling up, I just said, listen I want to talk about mentorship. Can you meet a half an hour next week sometime to chat? And what do you know, that guy ended up on my YouTube channel. Before you know it, it’s not to say that these things are going to create a job for you, it’s not to say that these guys are going to put your name out further, but I think what it does is it helps you engage a bit more than you would frequently do so in an office setting. It’s a different way of communicating And it’s still keeping those connections growing overtime because you never know when you’re going to need or want someone to help you out.

Marcus Udokang:

[00:30:18] As a good example, I’ve had people on my YouTube show that I went to elementary school with. That’s how much I keep in contact with these guys. Folks I’ve worked with in the past, 15 years ago, folks I went to university with, I’ve had them on my show. So you never know. Keep those connections. Thank goodness we’ve got the Internet to help us do that. Imagine during the Spanish flu in 1918, how are you going to do that? Or when we had Polio in the 1950s and you were stuck at home. How are you going to do that? Technology has helped us once again. I think there’s always avenues. Another thing is, Toastmasters, I joined Toastmasters. I wasn’t in that before but yeah I’ve been in it about a year and same thing, I needed to talk to people.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:31:14]So just a little bit of a tangent for a minute, how has Toastmasters been virtually? Because I have attended a few Toastmaster sessions myself before, and so how has that been virtually?

Marcus Udokang:

[00:31:30]When I joined they were already virtual so I don’t know how it used to be before, I haven’t the faintest clue. Just from stories people tell me. But when I joined, it was 10 or 20 people on this call and you realize after a while there’s a format. There’s a format, there’s a structure in place so everyone has a chance to speak, which is good. It’s not everyone haphazardly speaking. I liked it so much that I ended up getting on calls in other parts of the world on Toastmasters in South Africa, Toastmasters in China, Toastmasters in Switzerland. I just couldn’t stop. This became addicting. So that’s the advantage. I made more friends around the world with Toastmasters than I did with LinkedIn.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:32:17]That is fantastic. It’s my experience with Toastmasters here, it was an in person, everyone sort of gathered around a little table at someone’s organization, kind of thing. I have been inspired so I’m going to check out Toastmasters again to see if there’s perhaps some virtual ones available and I have a couple of people to reach out to that I know I’ve been associated with it. I’m writing a note to myself right now about Toastmasters.

Marcus Udokang:

[00:32:56]I was going to say, too, I’ve heard in Lethbridge, Alberta, small little dinky town south of me, they’ve got a fledgling club. It was floundering, the members were leaving. So they needed to get more members and what did they do? They went around the world. Now, most of their members are from all over the world on Toastmasters. I went to a Toastmasters in upper state New York, I attended one online, and there was some guy calling in from Dubai, there was another guy in Spain. I thought, this is amazing. So ... COVID obviously is a bad thing, but I think what it’s done, I’d hate to say it’s been an advantage, I think technology has been an advantage during a negative time in our life. There was a time where Toastmasters went hybrid in October, November of last year. So we were having half online and half in house, but it was hard. We had to wear masks, we had to be a certain distance from each other and we couldn’t have the podium, we had to have a computer with a camera.

Marcus Udokang:

It just wasn’t the same, I was told, as pre-COVID. What happened in November is we had to go back to 100% online. So from what I’ve heard, some clubs will stay online, some will go back in house after COVID is over, and some might go the hybrid way. But I think what it has done, not just with Toastmasters, with many things, look at the online conferences. There’s one in Australia coming up that’s now half online ... because no one's allowed into Australia or out of Australia right now.

Marcus Udokang:

So for people who are in Australia they can attend. But for those around can do presentations as well. I’ve gone to some IIBA events or PMI events and they’ve said, up until COVID nobody would want to present in our event because they would have to come in at 6:00. It would be a one hour commute for them and another one hour commute home, nobody wanted the hassle during traffic. Well guess what, with COVID, we’ve got more people, we are now booked for the next six months. So in a sense, the social media has brought people closer during trying times. That’s what I feel. And that’s the same with Toastmasters.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:35:32]Moral of the story there is there are plenty of ways to put yourself in a position to be inspired these days that doesn’t necessarily equate to being in person. And there are lots of different formats. So as we sort of begin to wrap up today, I just wanted to see what’s coming up for you next? I know you’ve got your YouTube podcast channel, but what other stuff is interesting and will you be exploring?

Marcus Udokang:

[00:36:04]I’ve got a lot of stuff on the plate. I want to write a book, that’s on the plate. I want to get a course online. It doesn’t matter, it could be Coursera, could be LinkedIn learning, something. I wanted to get one or two courses on that. That’s in the bonfire, so to speak. I’m finishing off my MBA, that’s keeping me very busy. That’s priority number one right now with work. And Toastmasters, I just got to be an area director for Toastmasters so that will keep me busy throughout the year as well. So I’ve got a lot on my plate in addition to the regular reading and keeping up and communicating on LinkedIn with people. So I think I’ve got my hands full for at least another year, at least.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:36:48]Good. Because we all need more to do.

Marcus Udokang:

[00:36:52]Don’t get too busy to the point where you’re burnt out and you’re sleeping in until noon because I stayed up until five in the morning before. You just burn out.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:37:05]So what are some of your tips for avoiding burn out? Because I think, even as we are all trying to hustle and put ourselves in good situations, yes there could be potential for a burn out. What are some recommendations there?

Marcus Udokang:

[00:37:24]I hate to say it because I don’t obey all these rules, but I have to say try to have a cut off time. 10PM or nine PM is your cut off time, you’re going to bed. In my place, you may hear some piano noises in the background, I’ve got piano playing in the middle of the day here and I can’t think. I can’t function. So sometimes you want to get up at one in the morning and just work until nine or 10 in the morning and that’s your day. The problem is, you’ve got meetings in the middle of the day to, so you have to coordinate.

Marcus Udokang:

But I would say have a cut off time. In my case, I need seven or eight hours of sleep otherwise I feel groggy, I feel tired, I can’t function. Get your sleep, have a cut off time. By all means, I’ve got my trusty grapefruit here. I’ve got my trusty tea here, you can see the Toastmasters cup. I’ve got my hot water as well. So I lock myself in my room and no one’s coming in. I’ve got my fruits here, so I’ve got all the food I need beside me. I shut my door and I lock it, no one’s coming in, no one’s going out until I get my work done for the day. That would be one way.

Tracie Edwards:

[00:38:41] You make a good point though, with some of the items you have with you. As far as overall physical health, doing what we need to do to maintain that. Fueling ourselves properly and all of those good things.

Marcus Udokang:

Yeah. Because you know those young folks, they can go all day without food. If I don't get my nutrients I get groggy and tired and miserable. I can't function.

Tracie Edwards:

Right there with you. So, well this has just been such a delight for me to be able to visit with you tonight. And thank you so much for your time. And for those of you, our listeners, if there was anything in particular that resonated with you tonight or during this conversation, please shoot me an email. It's Tracie@traceabilitypodcast.com. Or look for me or for Marcus on LinkedIn and we'd be happy to connect with you and serve some tips. So Marcus, thank you again for your time today. Really appreciate it.

Marcus Udokang:

You're very welcome. Fabulous show you've got. Keep up the good work.

Tracie Edwards:

Glad you liked it and so grateful to have you today.