Eugene Park
Director of Information Technology
Pacific Gas and Electric Company
San Francisco, California

Pacific Gas and Electric Co. is one of the largest combination natural gas and electric companies in the United States, serving 15 million people in a 70,000-square-mile service area in northern and central California. As I.T. Director, Eugene Park and the 125 people who work under him are responsible for creating and maintaining the whole core routing system for all customer service support activities—everything from account resolution to service outages to customer contacts through the company’s website.

LifeChasers: How did you decide on I.T. as a career?

Park: I’m a true computer geek! I’ve been playing with computers since grade school, even though they weren’t very prevalent back then. In college I studied computer design and electrical engineering and never looked back.

LifeChasers: You’ve been on a very fast track for someone your age. Where does God fit in?

Park: My faith is very important to me, so everything I do is based on where I feel God is leading me. It’s always a little “dangerous” to try to figure out what God is thinking. But I try to sort out whether I’m where God wants me to be today, and long-term—say, if I’m looking at a new position--to ask if this the next step in what He has been preparing me to do.

LifeChasers: You’re in a very high stress job. What the biggest spiritual challenge you face?

Park: Not neglecting God and important spiritual practices that keep my faith strong. The things that are easiest to “schedule over” are prayer, Bible study and time alone with God. I wrongly see it as “my time” to give up if I want to.

I have unspoken hierarchies of what can get “scheduled over.” The top tier is “my” time (where, in my faulty thinking, I only have to answer to me), the second tier is family time, where I know those closest to me (like my wife, who is the most grace- giving person in the world) will forgive me if I disappoint them, and then everyone else comes after that. Too frequently I just don’t think about the long-term effects of my actions until I end up in a dry spell with God or those I love.

LifeChasers: What is the “fruit” of those dry spells, apart from the obvious—that it’s no way to live a satisfying life.

Park: I end up having a much tougher time finding the balance between managing my work and my team and managing my life. My tendency toward workaholism gets worse and I start to micro-manage. I stop feeling confident that I will be able to do what God has asked me to do, that He will help me do it, and that I can trust others to do what I’ve tasked them to do. But, the truth is that, given what’s on my plate, micro managing is not a sustainable strategy.

LifeChasers: So what do you do about it?

Park: If I admit the truth to God (which he already knows) and confess that I’m not doing such a good job of managing my like, it’s amazing how He sends people and circumstances to help me get back on track. For example, I recently heard a well-known Christian businessman describe his ongoing struggle with making work an idol. It encouraged me to know that I’m not the only one who struggles with this. It may be a life-long battle, but I don’t need to feel defeated by it. Just a couple days ago an old childhood friend called out of the blue to ask if I’d consider being his accountability partner--for our mutual benefit. It was just another reminder that God really does care about my life and wants to help me get it right if I will let Him.