URGENT: When Everything at Work Was Urgent, Until Nothing Else Was Left

Why I Wrote This
What URGENT Is About
The Story Behind the Story
Who This Book Is For
Get Your Copy

Why I Wrote This

For years, I've helped organizations build secure, scalable infrastructure while maintaining velocity. I've implemented DevSecOps pipelines, platform engineering systems, and cloud architectures that enable teams to "move fast."

But I've also watched what happens when "move fast" becomes "burn out."

I've seen brilliant engineers work 80-hour weeks to meet arbitrary deadlines. I've watched talented leaders sacrifice their health, relationships, and sanity for the next promotion. I've witnessed the quiet catastrophe of people who climbed the ladder only to realize they'd leaned it against the wrong wall.

The technical blog posts I write here help organizations solve infrastructure problems. But there's another story that needed to be told—the human story of what it costs to always be "on."

That's why I wrote URGENT.

What URGENT Is About

Alex Morgan has it all: the dream job at a mission-driven tech company, the promotion to Senior Product Manager, the six-figure salary. The work feels important. The CEO is inspiring. The team is brilliant.

But every email is marked URGENT. Every meeting is critical. Every deadline is do-or-die.

The marriage to Sam is struggling, but it can wait. Mom's cancer diagnosis is serious, but work is urgent. When younger sibling Jordan calls desperate for help, Alex is too busy being "urgent" at work.

URGENT is a raw, unflinching novel about the cost of always being "on" and the relationships that crumble while we chase the next promotion. Through Alex's journey from ambitious professional to burned-out shell to someone trying to piece together what remains, it captures the breathless pace of modern work life and the quiet catastrophe of realizing you prioritized everything except what mattered.

By the time the divorce papers arrive and Alex finally sits in that hospital room seeing what was missed, years have been lost. Some things can be rebuilt. Others are gone forever.

The Story Behind the Story

This isn't autobiography, but it's built from truth.

I've been the person who missed family dinners for "urgent" work emails. I've taken calls during vacations because a client needed something immediately. I've watched colleagues sacrifice marriages, health, and relationships on the altar of productivity.

In the tech industry, we celebrate hustle culture. We glorify the all-nighters, the weekend deploys, the "whatever it takes" mentality. We build systems that let teams move faster—and faster—and faster.

But we rarely talk about what we're moving away from.

The Urgent Culture

Everything in corporate life is urgent:

The Slack message at 11 PM
The "quick sync" that derails your afternoon
The weekend "emergency" that wasn't really an emergency
The vacation where you never truly disconnect
The promotion that requires just a little more sacrifice

And the insidious part? It feels important. The work matters. The mission is real. The team depends on you. So you answer the email, take the call, skip the dinner.

Until one day you look up and realize: everything at work was urgent, but nothing else got that same priority.

What I Learned

After years in this industry—building the infrastructure that enables "always on" culture—I've learned some hard truths:

Urgent rarely means important - Most "urgent" work isn't actually urgent. It's just loud.
You can't get time back - You can rebuild your career, but you can't recover the years you missed with family.
The golden handcuffs are real - The salary, the title, the prestige—they make it hard to walk away even when you know you should.
Burnout is cumulative - It's not one all-nighter that breaks you. It's a thousand small sacrifices over years.
Companies will always need more - There is no finish line. No amount of productivity satisfies the system.

Who This Book Is For

URGENT is for anyone who's ever:

Missed a family dinner for a work email
Chosen a meeting over a moment that mattered
Felt trapped by their own success
Wondered if the promotion was worth the cost
Realized too late what they sacrificed for "urgent"

It's for the product manager who works through weekends.

It's for the engineer who can't disconnect from Slack.

It's for the executive who climbed the ladder and doesn't recognize themselves anymore.

It's for anyone who's looked at their calendar and wondered: when did I lose my life to my job?

This Isn't a Self-Help Book

URGENT doesn't offer easy answers or five-step frameworks. It's a novel—a story about one person's journey through the seduction of corporate success, the devastation of burnout, and the painful work of trying to rebuild what was lost.

Some things in the story can be rebuilt. Others are gone forever. That's the truth of it.

But there's also hope. Not the toxic positivity kind. The real kind—the acknowledgment that you can choose differently, starting now.

The Technical and the Human

I'll keep writing technical content here. The blog posts about platform engineering, DevSecOps, and cloud infrastructure serve a real need. Organizations genuinely need help building better systems.

But I also believe we need to talk about the human cost of those systems.

We need to ask: Are we building infrastructure that enables sustainable work, or are we building infrastructure that enables unsustainable hustle?

Are we solving the right problems, or are we optimizing the wrong things?

URGENT is my attempt to tell that story—not with frameworks and best practices, but with fiction that captures the lived experience of modern work culture.

Get Your Copy

URGENT is available now on Amazon Kindle.

📖 Get URGENT on Amazon

Paperback coming soon.

What's Next

I'm not abandoning technical consulting or this blog. Tech Blend will continue helping enterprises build secure, scalable infrastructure.

But I'm also committed to writing about the intersection of technology and human flourishing—the things we build, and what they cost us.

If URGENT resonates with you, I'd love to hear your story. Email me at sales@techblendconsult.io or connect with me on the platforms below.

And if you've ever felt trapped by your own ambition, overwhelmed by "urgent" culture, or wondered if there's a better way—I hope this story speaks to you.

"Everything at work was urgent. Until nothing else was left."

URGENT - Available now on Amazon Kindle

Work With Us

Tech Blend Consulting still helps enterprises build infrastructure that enables velocity without sacrificing security or sanity.

If your organization needs help with:

Platform engineering that empowers developers sustainably
DevSecOps practices that reduce toil and burnout
Cloud infrastructure that scales without breaking teams
Building a healthier engineering culture alongside technical systems

Get in touch: sales@techblendconsult.io

Let's build systems that serve humans, not the other way around.