The Relationship Between Personal Identity and Work : Ornela Vasiliauskaite

Ornela Vasiliauskaite (0:04)

Shaping yourself in relationship with someone else, be it work or be it other people, it doesn't go away the fact that we live and are interacting with others, and that does influence us. But if you can create that base for you to be yourself, to make your own mind, to make your choices, to provide those choices, to set the boundaries, I think that gives tremendous both freedom and you don't lose that energy unconsciously. Another aspect that I think good architects have is not trying to force a structure in the environment that doesn't fit. So it's also this organic adaptability to the environment, where as an architect to think how this building or this software or something else that you build is encompassed in the broader environment or something that surrounds you.

Nisha Joshi (1:00)

This is The Delivery Space Podcast. Whether you're interested in software delivery, business change or transformation, we have some great content lined up for you. We launch into different areas of delivery and bring you insights and experience that you won't get from a book. Welcome, I'm Nisha and this is our episode on the relationship between personal identity and work. And today, I have a very good friend of mine, Ornela Vasiliauskaite, to discuss this. Ornela, how are you?

Ornela Vasiliauskaite (1:37)

Hi, Nisha. It's so good to be here. We have been planning this for a while, so I'm delighted to finally be in your podcast. And thank you. I am doing great.

Nisha Joshi (1:47)

I know you're doing great. And I also know why you're doing great, Ornela. It's amazing because you have this pre-holiday glow, like all the most wonderful things I can think about over the next couple of weeks are gonna happen to me. So yeah, I wish you a very happy holiday.

Ornela Vasiliauskaite (2:03)

And I think it's not only the holiday glow. We took our time to pick up the topic. It's really nice that it has some time to sit with me. So even then today, before coming to the podcast, I was reflecting on the question, on the theme. I realized that I am right now in the position where I actually think I discovered some sort of nugget or fishdom on the theme. So I think it comes in a very, very good time as well.

Nisha Joshi (2:30)

Oh, brilliant. Yeah, I love that. When you're allowed to have that topic that we're going to discuss, so as you said, sit with you for a little while, so you can explore all the different types of angles to it. That's the most important thing. Ornela, can you give our listeners an introduction to yourself so they can get to know you?

Ornela Vasiliauskaite (2:51)

My name is Ornela. My current role is an Agile coach. I work at this wonderful company called Vinted. Vinted is on a mission to make a second-hand first-choice worldwide. Here, I help software development teams, product development teams to make the most of their time and their energy at work, be it for process optimization, solving some specific challenges they may have, personal and interpersonal communication and relationships. So it's a little bit of a playground of mine where I can explore. Again, as you said in your podcast, The Delivery Space. So that's what I'm doing in the organization that I am at.

Nisha Joshi (3:33)

And you're loving it because every time I speak to you, there are new challenges that you're taking on, different things that present themselves, which kind of test you in terms of your range as an Agile coach. And I know you bring a lot of behavioral science, neuroscience, and those elements into your work as well, right?

Ornela Vasiliauskaite (3:53)

My passion is to really understand things to the core of it. All of these different aspects, I take influence from various fields and they just help me to understand how people are at work, how work happens, how do we think about the outcomes and outputs of our works in a deeper level. The topic that we chose for today is something that has been my ongoing journey for a really long time. It's not to dig into what's around me, but to dig into what's inside me. And we talked about this briefly before we start recording, that this is an ongoing journey that we always learn, always grow, always mature throughout our lives. And I think this theme is very fascinating as a personal growth journey.

Nisha Joshi (4:39)

The label says, Agile Coach for you, and it has done for me in some roles. In other roles, the label has said something else, right? The Scrum Master, Delivery Manager, et cetera, et cetera. What are you when you're not that?