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Hey Subscriber First Name,

You check the weather before you leave the house. A quick look at your phone, a decision about whether to take a coat, and out the door. We do it without thinking. But I can't tell you the last time I checked my own forecast before walking into a room full of people.

Last week I wrote about the heat on a project and how shared pressure can pull a team together or break it apart. I'm staying with the temperature this week, but turning it inward. Because before you can read the heat on a project, you have to be able to read your own.

You have an internal thermometer. It's always running, always measuring how you're doing, and at any moment it's telling you something. The problem is most of us never look at it. We push through the day, react to whatever lands, and only check in with ourselves once something has already gone wrong. By then the reading is in the red and the damage is done.

So, honestly. Right now, do you know where your thermometer sits? Do you know what makes it rise? Do you know what your breaking point feels like before you reach it?

Most PMs I know, myself included for a long time, couldn't answer those questions clearly. We're trained to monitor everything on the project, the risks, the budget, the schedule, the stakeholders. But we rarely monitor ourselves with the same discipline. And yet, your internal state affects every decision you make, every conversation you have, and every reaction you give. A PM running hot makes different calls than a PM at a steady temperature. And usually, those calls are worse.

Dr Julie Smith writes in Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before about how your body gives you signals long before your mind catches up. Sleep starts slipping. You become shorter with people than you normally would. Small things that wouldn't usually bother you start landing differently. You feel a constant low hum of tension that you can't quite place. These are your thermometer readings, and they're telling you something important. The question is whether you're paying attention.

Here's what I've learned about my own thermometer over the years. My temperature rises when I feel like I'm carrying too much without support. When decisions are being made around me that I can't influence but will be held accountable for. When I'm in back-to-back meetings for days without any time to think. When I haven't had a proper conversation with someone outside of work in over a week. Those are my triggers, and knowing them means I can usually catch the rise before it becomes a problem.

Yours will be different. But the principle is the same. Once you know what moves your needle, you can start managing it before it manages you.

There's a sweet spot on that thermometer, and it's worth knowing where yours sits. It's the level of pressure that's just beyond comfortable. Not so light that you're bored, not so heavy that you're overwhelmed. Just enough stretch to keep you sharp and growing. That's the reading where you feel engaged and alive, where your best work tends to happen.

Too far below that sweet spot and your thermometer drops. You're comfortable but disengaged. The work feels meaningless. You start going through the motions. Too far above it and your thermometer spikes. You're anxious, reactive, and making decisions from a place of survival rather than strategy. Neither extreme serves you or your project.

The PMs who sustain high performance over years are the ones who develop a feel for their own temperature. They know when they're in the sweet spot and they protect it. They know when they're running too hot and they take action before it becomes a crisis. They know when they've gone too cold and they seek out the challenge that brings the energy back.

Finding that sweet spot is personal. For some people it's a big complex programme with high stakes and fast pace. For others it's a smaller project with depth and autonomy. There's no right answer. The right answer is whatever keeps your thermometer in the range where you're sharp, engaged, and doing your best thinking.

So here's what I'd encourage you to do. Start paying attention. Not to the project dashboard, you already do that. Pay attention to yourself with the same rigour. Notice when your sleep changes. Notice when your patience shortens. Notice when you stop enjoying the work. Those are readings. They're telling you your temperature is shifting, and if you catch it early, you can adjust before it reaches a point where recovery takes weeks instead of days.

You look after your project every single day. Make sure you're looking after the person running it too.

MAKING IT HAPPEN: Your Weekly Strategy

This week, check your thermometer. Write down three things: what is my temperature right now (honestly, on a scale of comfortable to burning out), what has caused it to move in the last month, and what would bring it back to the sweet spot? Keep the answers somewhere you can revisit. Do this check once a month and you'll start to see patterns. The earlier you spot the shift, the easier it is to adjust. The PMs who burn out are rarely the ones who saw it coming. They're the ones who never checked.

CHEAT SHEETS

The free cheat sheet library is here. I'll keep adding to it. Save the link and grab whatever helps.

If this one landed, forward it to a PM who's been running hot for a while and hasn't stopped to check in with themselves. Sometimes the most important reading on the project is the one you take on yourself.

bilaljamil.com | Newsletter archive | Hit reply and tell me where your thermometer is at right now. I read every one.

Have a great week and speak soon, 

Bilal