Side projects as pressure valves, not escape plans

One of the things I miss most in senior roles is not speed or novelty, it's decision ownership.

In most full-time roles, especially leadership ones, decisions are shared by design. They're shaped by context, constraints, regulation, other people's priorities, and the need to bring others with you. That's the right thing for the job. It's also quietly exhausting in a way that's hard to name.

Every so often, I need to make a decision that is mine alone. Not because I think I'll make a better one, but because I want to feel the weight of it landing somewhere definite.

That's where side projects come in for me.

Not as a plan to leave. Not as a rehearsal for a startup. Not as a way to escape a job I don't like. I actually enjoy my work. I care about it a lot. But being a CTO in a competitive, regulated industry means a large part of my time is spent on things that matter deeply without being especially energising.

Policy writing and reviews. Due diligence. Audits and accreditations. Building confidence with customers and partners. Writing strategies, plans, decks that need to stand up to scrutiny from multiple angles.

It's good work, but it's very detail-heavy, and that kind of work drains me faster than I expect. Over time, the pressure doesn't show up as stress so much as accumulation. Thoughts stack up. Decisions linger. Ideas don't quite go away.

For a long time, I thought side projects were supposed to counterbalance that by becoming something bigger. A path out. A future option. Something with momentum.

But that framing always added its own pressure.

What's worked better for me is thinking of side projects as pressure valves. A way to let excess thinking escape without needing it to turn into anything else.

In a fairly normal week, that looks simple. A few hours, often at the weekend. Sitting down with a clear intention to finish something small and make it real. Something I can use myself. Something that exists because I decided it should, not because it passed a review or aligned with a roadmap.

Getting started can still be hard. I procrastinate. I find reasons not to open the laptop. Other times, especially when there's momentum, I can't wait to get stuck in. When I stop, there's usually a strong sense of achievement and a familiar nervousness about putting it out there. A bit of fear about what people will think, but not enough to stop me.

Right now, that pressure valve shows up in a few concrete ways.

Sidewrks is where I put unfinished thinking in public. It's a place to gather my projects, but more importantly it keeps me honest. It gives me somewhere to say, each week, "this is what I'm working through right now," without pretending it's all neatly resolved.

rcordr is intentionally small. A very basic, free iOS app that's rough around the edges. I pick it up and put it down without guilt. I use it every day, almost like a habit tracker, and that's enough for now. It doesn't need to justify its existence beyond that.

I also keep decision logs on buildonrecord.com. Notes about why something was decided, not just what was decided. I try to update them weekly, but more importantly when something significant happens. Writing them down stops decisions bouncing around in my head. Once they're externalised, they lose a lot of their weight.

The biggest change hasn't been the projects themselves, but the expectations I've deliberately removed.

I'm not expecting revenue. I'm not expecting traction. I'm not expecting these things to turn into something transformational, either for the world or for me. They don't need to be polished. They don't need to scale. They just need to exist.

That shift has brought a lot of relief.

Publishing something and talking about it publicly is still uncomfortable, but it's a good kind of discomfort. When people in my community engage or encourage, it reinforces that small, honest work has value even when it's not going anywhere in particular.

I don't know where these projects lead, and I'm trying not to rush to answer that.

For now, they're doing exactly what I need them to do. They give my thinking somewhere to land. They let a bit of pressure out. And they make it easier to show up fully to the work that already matters.

That feels like enough for this moment.