The Sacred Why Behind Our Work: Reclaiming Purpose in Tech's Fast Lane

A story about remembering what matters most

Last year, as an internal coach at my former employer, I was on a coaching call with a senior architect. She'd reached out because she felt stuck—technically brilliant, steadily moving up in her responsibilities, but feeling increasingly disconnected from her work.

"I used to love solving problems," she told me, her voice carrying that particular exhaustion I recognized too well. "But now it feels like I'm just optimizing metrics. Revenue up 23%, user engagement climbing, technical debt piling up... but when did we stop talking about the people our code actually serves?"