The Stand-up Philosopher

Communication: Getting to the Point

I've always been taught that in communication, getting the the point is always best. Different mediums do have slightly different requirements, but for the most part, effectively communicating to the reader or listener the point that you'd like to get across quickly is always best. Nobody likes a preacher or politician or salesman that rambles on and on and gets nowhere.

I've always wondered if certain industries have different standards. Like many people, I have joined a few organizations that represent causes that I believe in and feel strongly enough about to support, even if just by my membership dues. I've also ended up on the mailing lists of several ministries and organizations over the years for a variety of reasons. Some I believe bought my contact information, but others I deliberately signed up for because I was interested in information or a freebie.

Do You Have Any Goals For 2009?

I used to set New Year’s Resolutions. I did about as much with them as many of you. My resolutions usually had to do with losing weight, paying off bills, or finishing college. One year, I decided to only set one resolution each year, and that resolution is more facetious than anything. Each year I set the following resolution:

• I resolve to continue doing everything the exact same way I did it last year.

That resolution is facetious because I realized the first time I did it, and each year after, that it’s impossible to live up to. Each year we learn and grow and expand our horizons. Our lives and the lives of those around us change each and every year, to the point where after another 365 days, there are many things we’re not doing anymore, or we’re not doing the same anymore.

What Am I Missing II: Silence

I ran across a post by Mark Driscoll about Silence. I should know as much as anybody what it’s like to have a steady stream of information coming in, yet for some reason I don’t feel it as a crushing weight. I read a lot of bloggers complaining about a lack of silence. For some reason, I tend to feel comfortable with a lot of information coming in at once. I subscribe to 113 blogs at present in Google Reader. Some of them are like Lifehacker and put up a lot of posts a day. A few of them haven’t put up a new post in months. I also subscribe to several podcasts through iTunes, which I sync to my iPod Touch. I find a lot of websites on the internet that I want to read and look into more. On top of it all, I seem to have new books and magazines flowing into my house faster than I can read the old ones.

How do I do it without going crazy? Good question. Perhaps it’s because I don’t have many friends and therefore have more time, but that’s not true. I have a family and a job.

Let me tell you my trick, which really doesn’t seem like it’s that tricky. I don’t let the flow of information coming in become my master. If a blog that I follow starts to get out of hand or starts to become a waste of my time, I delete the feed from Google Reader. I periodically reevaluate the podcasts I subscribe to. At one point, I had more podcasts than any human being could keep up with and I had to reevaluate which ones my time was best spent listening to. I used to love Leo LaPorte’s TWIT network, but I finally got tired of listening to them complaining about Windows Vista, plus their podcasts got longer and became more like listening to friends ramble than a panel of experts discussing pertinent tech topics. I deleted those subscriptions as they weren’t a good use of my time anymore. Other podcasts became more important to the limited time I have. I’ve had plenty of other podcasts that I stopped subscribing to.

As for my books, I just let them pile up. When I finish one, I pick another one. Sometimes I pick one up and just can’t get into it, so I put it aside and get another one. I have plenty to choose from. I dream one day of having a huge personal library like blue-blood rich people in movies have, with bookshelves all the way up the wall that require ladders to get to the top. That would be so cool.

I’ve written before that for those rare times that I don’t want to talk on the phone, I ignore calls or just shut the phone off. I don’t do that often. It’s very rare.

There are some things I just can’t do anything about. The location of my cubicle at work is an example. I have the corner cube outside the conference room and next to the door, so people walk by looking in at me all day, plus people are in the conference room and other people walk by, stop, and talk loud. I can’t do anything about that and it does drive me nuts. I also can’t do anything about traffic, and I can’t do anything about crowds. But for those “inputs” that I have control over, I keep the relationship just like that: I keep them under control,.

If you feel like the information streaming into your life is totally out of control, then get it under control. Draw some boundaries. I don’t mean push your family out of the picture, but draw some boundaries. Take some charge and responsibility for yourself. I recommend the book “Boundaries” by Cloud and Townsend if you need help in this area. The link is below, and I have also added the book to my Amazon aStore if you find that more convenient.

Career Advancement- Move up or move out?

Have you ever reached a point in a job where you feel that you've done about all that you can and it's time to either move up or move on? Have you ever found yourself in a position for which there really is no place to move up to, so you're left with the obvious conclusion that you have to move on?

 

A year ago, I wrote a post on this blog regarding my annual performance review. This past week, I had my performance review for 2007. It went about the same. Everybody got a 3. Period. When I got my Bachelor's degree, I asked my manager to see if the company would do something for me. The company's official response is "We hired you to do this job. A Bachelor's degree in IT has nothing to do with this job." Honestly, I don't believe they bothered to look at the curriculum that I took. In any case, that pretty much defines my new short-term goals for me.

 

I've had two jobs in the last nine years. On both interviews, I asked if the company had a healthy "promote from within" policy. I asked if the company was a suitable environment to plan for a long term career. It turns out that I was asking the wrong question. I should have asked "Does THIS position have a logical and reasonable career path?" Obviously, they'll tell me that they like to promote people from within, but I tend to end up in dead end positions anyway. I'm getting tired of that. Most companies seem to think a career is one of two things: find one job and do it for 40 years, or find a new job every 3-5 years. I'm not happy with either option. I would love to find a company within which I can expect to grow and rise. I'm tired of having to start over with a zero vacation balance, and I'm tired of having to make sure my family's doctors take the new insurance.

 

It's not that I haven't tried to stay with this company. I have tried very hard. A friend of mine works for the government in Washington D.C. He had a contract with my current company and a couple of Systems Analyst positions opened up. He submitted my resume to the program manager and things looked really good for me. I was obviously qualified for the position but one thing got in the way: for some reason, this program manager was TOO BUSY TO HIRE SOMEBODY FOR AN OPEN POSITION. My friend, as the customer, was demanding that somebody be hired because the open position was affecting his operations, but this guy was too busy. I kept being told that they were interested in me, but I never got a call. Eventually, the position was filled by another contractor. In the meantime, my personal requirements have changed to the point where I need to stay in south Jersey, as painful as that admission might be.

 

I've tried to move within my current organization. In 2006, an employee of another company that works on the same task as I do left. I applied for his position. I was told that it would be a conflict of interest to hire me to another company within the task, but I could help out. My company has several people on that effort. I ran into a problem though: that effort works in another office, on another network. There was no desk available for me, my company would not buy me another computer to use in that office even if there was a desk, and I couldn't get VPN access to the network to access from my current cubicle. I had a lot of fun helping out and I got an award for my help with a cash incentive, but after that I gave up. I could only help with testing but could do little with the documentation and preparation that led up to testing because I can't get on the network and carrying files back and forth an a USB stick was highly inefficient. I eventually gave up even though I really enjoyed that work and would love to have moved over to that task.

 

I tried last year to move to our Systems Engineering group. I talked to the manager in September while I was finishing my final class at the University of Phoenix. I was told once again that he was very interested in me, and would check with our Department Head and my current supervisor and would get back to me by the 1st of November. It is currently February 15, and I haven't heard anything. I see him in passing. Another guy from my group has been moved over there, but I haven't even been given the courtesy of "no". I think something is seriously wrong with a company when a manager is too darn busy to hire people, but I also see this as a serious lack of integrity and professionalism. When a manager-level employee says "I will get back to you by a certain date," should you not be able to depend on a response by that date?

 

What is all of this leading up to? Well, let's just say I'm waiting for a phone call. I've been in this position for more than three years. I've done all I can. Obviously, there is always something to learn, but for the most part I'm ready to move up or move on. I doubt anyone from my current company reads this blog, but I'll leave things vague. Let's just say that I'm waiting for a phone call from somebody who is both interested in my experience and has enough integrity to "get back by". I have also come to the conclusion that just like my previous company, when I asked this one during my job interview if they have a healthy career program, they lied to me when they said yes. I used to joke when I was in the Navy that my Navy recruiter never lied to me. I said that he left out a lot of details, but never lied to me. In this case, I'm starting to think I've been lied to. I've tried in three ways to make a career move within my company, and hit a brick wall all three times. I work in a wonderful office with wonderful people, and I truly appreciate the freedom and flexibility I've enjoyed in this position. I am able to set my own schedule. When my son Caleb stuck his hand in the car door as it was closing and I had to meet my wife in the emergency room, I literally just got up and walked out. I came back a couple of hours later and worked late that night. I didn't tell anybody and nobody asked. That kind of flexibility is priceless, but when job satisfaction isn't very high and there is NO POSSIBILITY OF ADVANCEMENT, that kind of flexibility doesn't go very far. It definitely doesn't pay the student loans for the degree that apparently has nothing to do with the position. Looking back, I took this position based on two very short term immediate goals. I needed to:

 

   
1. Make enough money to allow my wife to stay home and raise the children

 

and

 

   
1. Get out of my previous organization as quickly as possible.

 

I also hoped to move into a position from which I could expect a long and fruitful career, but the entire subject of this post is why this position did not meet that goal. It did meet the other two though.

 

Someday I may write about my previous organization and the turns that were taken that led to my decision to leave. I was hired in 1999 for what was originally a fun and fascinating technical job that over the course of 5 years changed to the point of being intolerable. A coworker of mine took a job in Iraq to get out of there. I'll leave the story hanging there for now.

 

Technorati Tags: Career,Job search

 

Labels: Goals, Leadership and Discipleship, Work

How to Handle An Argumentative Person

I recently found myself in a situation facing a person who was seemingly looking for an argument. I have my own theories as to why, but I have no specific knowledge of why this person wanted to argue with me. All I know is that before I knew what was happening, I found myself under "attack" in what should have been a safe place. I didn't know what was happening, and I lost my composure very badly. I was under a lot of strain, I was tired, and I just plain blew up in frustration at this person especially since as far as I could tell, the answer he was looking for was something we agreed on anyway. That gave him the feeling of the upper hand and he walked away believing himself to have won.

For whatever reason, some people are just looking for an argument, and you may find yourself facing down their barrel. Maybe you said something they misunderstood, maybe they didn't agree with the way you said it, or maybe they just wanted a fight and you're the last person in the room. In my experience, people wanting a fight will come at you hard and come at you fast, giving you little time to figure out what is going on and how to reply. Here are a few tips I'd like to share that you can follow when you find yourself in a similar situation against a contentious or argumentative person.

1) Never make assumptions

Never assume anything about this person, his or her philosophies, or position. Never. That was the first tactical mistake that I made in the situation I was in recently. I assumed based on the wording of the question that this person held a certain position. That prevented me from #2

2) Take time to understand the issue being argued

If necessary, keep asking "What do you mean by that?" Keep gathering information until you can repeat to the person the exact question that they are looking for an answer to. Before making any response at all, make sure that you clearly understand what is being asked or stated by the person. Often two people can use different definitions for the same word, so make sure that you understand theirs.

3) Verify any references

If part of the argument or question being put before you involves the quotation of reference material, if possibly, stop and look it up to verify a proper context. An interesting quote I've heard is "If you torture the data long enough, it will confess to anything." Make sure that any quote referenced is placed in a proper context if required.

4)Accept that there may be no way to win

Some people who are argumentative and contentious just aren't interested in settling a dispute. It's possible that you're facing a person who is just looking for a fight, not a resolution. You may have to just do the best you can and walk away, or send the person away. Pride goeth before the fall... Some incidents like this are about nothing more than pride or ego. Don't let yours get in the way.

Technorati tags: People skills, arguments, contention

Labels: Leadership and Discipleship

Where Have All The Careers Gone?

About two weeks ago, during a really bad rainstorm, our program manager came over the office intercom in a somber voice asking if everybody could come to the conference room in five minutes. He said that he had something important to put out.

My first thought was: who died? Bad rainstorm, something could have happened to somebody on the way to work, either in our office or our customer or the other company on our contract. We work in a large community. Or, could we be going through a layoff? All kinds of really bad images went through my mind that morning as I headed for the conference room.

The news was much, much better than I expected. What happened was a company Vice President resigned suddenly and unexpectedly. I barely knew the man, but during visits to our office, he always brought lunch and was very likable. He answered questions honestly and openly. Apparently, he had a dramatic influence on our program manager and department head, as well as other people who have been with this company for a while.

I've been out of work for three workdays dealing with a home improvement project that went wrong, but when I got back in today I discovered an email from somebody around the Vice President level explaining that many of them frequent meetings with people from other companies and they often get job offers from each other. That caused something to occur to me.

In my experience, modern companies really don't provide a way to advance. You get hired to do a job, but there is no career path. Normally, when a management position opens up, companies go out of the way to hire somebody from outside to fill that position. I'm sure the same problem is faced at the Vice President level. After working with a company for a few years (or many years), you may feel ready to take on more responsibility or power, and certainly you want to make more money. A 3% pay increase every year does not keep you current with the new people a company hires at a higher pay rate.

On my previous job, when our first son was born, I realized that the only way to make more money was to leave. That organization would not work with me in any way. When I turned in my two week notice and was asked what my new salary would be, I learned that they could not match the salary. I left. On my current job, once again, there really is no place to go. I like this organization, but the day will eventually come when I will want more responsibility and a 3-4% raise each year is just not keeping up with the cost of living. I will eventually have to leave.

There was a time when a man (or woman) could begin a job with a company while young, and work for that company all the way to retirement. There was somewhat of a career path, and by retirement that person could have moved up to at least mid level management.

I wonder if companies will ever again provide a career path for employees. There really is no career development either. I hate job searching. I would love to know that my company was interested in helping me progress in my career. I guess this is not to be. From what I've managed to piece together, this company doesn't have a career development program or career path for VPs either. Just as at my level, the only way to move up is to move out.

 

Technorati tags: Career, Career Path, Career Development, Advancement

Labels: Leadership and Discipleship, Misc comments

Performance Review- What A Difference Corporate Culture Makes

Last month, I had my annual Employee Performance Review. Like many companies, mine is on the 5 point system, and unless you've had lunch with the company President chances are you have been rated a 3. The funny thing is, even though I got a 3, I walked away feeling good and looking forward to another year with this company. I thought back to my last job, where every single year for five years I walked away from my performance review ticked off, red faced, and ready to find another job, yet I got pretty much the same score.

What's different? Not the industry. I work in a fairly large industry, so when I changed jobs in 2004, I basically moved across the street to work with another company on the same project in another capacity. I'm no corporate sociologist, but what I believe is different is the culture. I may not have the world's most exciting job, but I work in what is probably the best organization I've ever been with. Here we are given tremendous freedom to set our own priorities, and as long as our work gets done and our product delivered, we're pretty much left alone. Our leadership works hard to make this place fun and laid back, yet still highly performing. We consistently satisfy our customer without micro-management. It's awesome.

On my last job, I worked in a support capacity. I provided support to engineers for program testing. I worked for a subsidiary of a company that provided support to the main company, which means we were contractually obligated to take a lot of abuse and blame when things go wrong. We were under the operational management of our customer. The culture there was very negative and I was honestly happy to leave. When I got my job offer to take this job, my previous supervisor tried to make a counter-offer, but because one of my goals was to get out of that organization, I didn't bother to listen.

I had a supervisor who I believed continuously misled me on my performance reviews. When he took over, he told me that one of his criteria for promotion was to be able to work unsupervised. Shortly after that, a couple of our second shift people left and the decision was made to bring the third member to day shift to observe him because he was believed to not do a very good job. Because this left swing shift open, I was put on swing shift by myself for six weeks while this person's training was verified. Swing Shift normally required three people, and I was solo. I ran our office supporting an entire development site for six weeks single handedly, and when I told our supervisor this on my performance review to justify a higher rating, I was dismissed. Even though I'd been told that being able to operate without supervision was a criteria for promotion, once I met the objective I was told that I can't be promoted because I don't have enough time on the job.

At another point, our direct supervisor left due to frustrations with the organizational leadership. Although we had several people within the office who were highly qualified for that position, our management sought an outsider. I was forced to train my own supervisor.

Every year I would ask my manager what objectives he would like me to meet to get a higher performance rating. He would give me a list, and I would suggest more. Then I would exceed every single one of them, only to be told "That's your job. That's what we expect from you. You're getting a 3."

Being given objectives with a hope of reward, even as simple as a higher rating and then being told "Well that's your job and it's what we expect from you" was highly frustrating. It does not make an employee happy. I always wondered what was the point in setting objectives if they got me nowhere. By contrast my current organization did very well with my review. Even though I got the same rating, I was told that I'm doing a good job and my work is appreciated. I wasn't given false hope of a better review if I met certain objectives.  Managers, listen up: sometimes, a little praise and honesty can go a long way.

One of the greatest frustrations in my industry is that there is no real advancement within companies. If you want to advance, make more money, or gain more responsibilities, you pretty much have to send our resumes and find another company. I hate that. However, I am willing to stay in this position for a while longer, even though there is seemingly nowhere to go. I will stay here because they at least make me feel valued. That can be important.

Labels: Leadership and Discipleship

When Your Actions Could Affect Somebody's Career, Please Pay Attention To Detail

I walked into work this morning to find a situation that was less than pleasant. An email had been sent to me on Friday from somebody in a corporate finance office stating that I had a past due balance on my corporate American Express. The email stated that the charges appeared to be personal in nature and no expense report was filed, and my account was being closed because a fairly high balance was more than 100 days past due. Ethics was cc'ed on the email, as well as some people so far up in the chain of command that it is likely I will never meet them.

My first action was to reply to all with a statement that there must be a mistake or fraud on my account. I have not used my Amex since a trip I took last November and that bill was paid. I have seen no statements since that time. I also asked if it was corporate policy to notify Ethics without even contacting the person first. If my card were that far past due, couldn't this person have, like, called me first? Why do we even have a Global Address Book if we don't use it?

I also called the person and left a message. I like to get in early, and this person is on the "other" coast and would not be in the office for several hours. I did send the email, however, so there was a paper trail with the higher ups who had been involved by this person.

My next step was to notify my program manager. It turns out that my "chain of command" up to him is out today, and I wanted somebody in my immediate leadership to know about this issue. His advice was to call American Express, who said that my account doesn't have a balance and is currently active.

I looked more closely at this person's signature file. He apparently works for another branch of the company. I realized that I would probably have been notified by somebody within my own branch of the company if it were my account. I know there is a person in the same area as the person who emailed me with the same name as me, at least first and last, in fact with the exception of my middle initial, our corporate email addresses are identical and the area code of our phone numbers is very similar.

I opened the original email and did another reply to all with the update that my Amex account appears to be fine and I asked if this person is sure that he has contacted the right person.

When I was in Recruit Training (otherwise known as Boot Camp), our Company Commander tried to beat into our heads "Attention To Detail!" When you're dealing with other people's careers and financials, please pay attention to detail. Mistakes do happen, but as they say, almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. To "almost" get the right person for a corporate finance matter is far off the mark. I can't tell you how much paperwork I have had screwed up in the past, how much financial strain I've been put under, and how many opportunities I've missed out on because somebody "almost" did their job. Patients die in hospitals when doctors and caregivers "almost" do their jobs. Computer programs are buggy  when programmers "almost" do their job. Safety features on all kind of products fail when people "almost" do their jobs. Get the point? Almost doesn't cut it.

Labels: Misc comments

Speaking of Change

An organization that I belong to is going through a change period. One of the issues driving the change is that newer members don't quite see things the way the older members do, at least, not when it comes to publications and such. The monthly bulletin and bi-weekly magazine are going through a new format to appeal to the younger and newer members. Some of the older members aren't quite accepting it right off the cuff. Some have made the accusation of "watering down", or "dumbing down" some materials.

I wondered for a moment where I stood. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, right? But I got to thinking about organizational change. Not many people really like change. The church that my wife and I go to is also going through a large change. The building was built in the 1950s for a membership of about 100. Now we have a membership of over 300, two services, and we're busting at the seams. Something had to be done, so after much prayer a 7 acre plot of land fell in our laps and was paid off in a year. Eventually a new building will be put up on it. Some of the membership didn't like the idea of this change. But then again, it took some patience and time to get concepts like small groups and two services past the congregation. Change takes patience.

When it comes to an established membership, it's easy to say that the new members must accept the ancient traditions. Things were going along just fine, so if you don't like it, then it must be your problem. But then it occurred to me that in a lot of cases, this isn't always possible. Consider a family introducing a new baby into the household. We've had two so far. Things change fast. It's not really possible with a baby to say "Look, around here, we sleep ALL NIGHT. OK? If you don't like it, it's your problem. That's how we've always done it. You're just going to have to learn to adapt. " (I can't say I haven't tried.) A family must change for the sake of the newborn. When the next child comes along, even more change must happen, especially on the part of the older children. There's no real way to not change anything for a baby.

And so, in an organizational situation, can change be good? I think so. Some change might not work, but for the most part, when the new comes in, sometimes the old must make way.

And so, just like with my children and my church, I will stand back and see what this change might bring. It very well might be a good thing.

Labels: Misc comments

Be Nice To the Inexperienced

Yesterday afternoon I was in the middle of trying to accomplish a few things when suddenly a web page wouldn't load. Firefox gave me an "unable to connect" message. I also lost my Log Me In connection to my laptop. I saw in the lower right hand corner of Outlook a "trying to connect" message, when I realized that it wasn't one or two pages, but our office's entire connection to the outside world that had gone down. I gave it a few minutes until I realized that it wasn't going to come back up right away and went to make sure our IT guy knew that we were down. As I approached his office to tell him, he had just connected with our provider on speaker phone. We used to have all of our external IT provided by a contractor, but our company finally put together it's own IT division, so now our IT is handled by corporate. I stood in the doorway as our IT guy explained to the person on the other end of the phone our situation. The person didn't seem very clear and kept repeating questions. He finally let on that he was an intern and had only been there two weeks, and our IT guy rolled his eyes. I asked if I he minded if I had a seat as this might be good. I was dead in the water anyway.

This experience got me thinking. How many times have I been new at something, and thrown into a situation where I am seemingly expected to have been born with all knowledge necessary to handle the situation that I have been thrown into? Did I appreciate it? Of course not.

During a period of being on hold, I suggested to our IT guy that he be nice to the intern. We've all been new, and there really is only one way to learn. The next time you come across somebody who is new, please be patient with them. Offer helpful suggestions politely if you have any, but above all please just understand that the best way to learn is by doing and maybe if you're nice, this person will one day look back with gratitude on your patience in their learning cycle. It is completely unreasonable to expect a new person to know everything.

Labels: Misc comments