SCRIPT CHECK · 60 SECONDS
Five quick questions show how often it appears, how believable it feels, and what it makes you avoid. You’ll get one private next step.
This is not a diagnosis and there is no pass or fail. It measures the current frequency, credibility, and behavioral cost of “Everyone remembers me as the outage guy”, including the private rule underneath it: My name is attached to every failure, permanently. The system broke, but the narrative has filed it under my identity instead of under the conditions that caused it. Each incident is proof. Each mention is a permanent mark on what I'm…
QUIET
“Everyone remembers me as the outage guy” appears, but it rarely gets the final say. Keep this line available for higher-pressure moments: “The system failed through conditions I didn't control alone. I'm a contributor, not the root cause.”
PRESENT
“Everyone remembers me as the outage guy” wins some small decisions before you catch it. Your useful interruption is: “A postmortem is about the system. My name in it is context, not a conviction.”
ACTIVE
“Everyone remembers me as the outage guy” is shaping action often enough to deserve a deliberate counterexample. Start privately and concretely: Open the incident channel. Find one incident with your name. Read only the system failure section—the actual root cause. Notice whether the cause is something you alone decided to do, or a condition that existed. Write down the condition. Close the document.
DOMINANT
Right now, “Everyone remembers me as the outage guy” is steering many of the moments you measured. That is a pattern reading, not a diagnosis or character verdict. Begin with one reversible receipt: Open the incident channel. Find one incident with your name. Read only the system failure section—the actual root cause. Notice whether the cause is something you alone decided to do, or a condition that existed. Write down the condition. Close the document.