The Extended Work Week

I’m Baaaaccckkkkkk!!!

So I realize I haven’t written in a while. Given my original purpose for doing this blog there shouldn’t be any missing gaps and I really have no valid excuses. It’s been really busy at work with this being the last month of the quarter I have a LOT going on.  In the last few weeks that I haven’t blogged, I have managed to piss of my manager, break some software, become disillusioned at a wedding, and learn a ton of new stuff through all of the heartache J

Pissing off my manager

This is a long and short story. Basically, I haven’t been doing what I’ve been asked.  What I’ve been asked to do is take ownership of the pricing business process and learn what each individual team member contributes. Unfortunately, I know nothing about pricing, am clueless about how to go about getting this data, and lastly I never quite figured out how to even start (more on this later).

Let me put some perspective of my feelings (yeah, mushy stuff) via an analogy:

Say you were tasked by ‘The Guru’ to build a gigantic sky scraper. You were told what the dimensions should be and where the building would be placed, but that is all the information you were provided.  So you get started on your task and after a few weeks you still haven’t finished. The Guru comes along and says ‘hey, why isn’t this finished yet? I asked you to get working on this.’ So you provide some updates and list some challenges and the guru goes off. Couple weeks later the guru comes back and you still haven’t finished, in fact you really maybe have just finished up with the foundation and the guru gets a little more frustrated and says ‘what is going on, why isn’t this finished yet you idiot?’ Again you provide more insight and the guru says nothing and just says ok and leaves.  A few weeks later the guru comes back and you’ve started building but some walls are messed up, there are some broken windows and the building looks pretty unstable. The Guru says “what the f$%^ have you been doing you dumb a#$?!! I told you to build me a building exactly the way I want it!!! I could do this all by myself with ease and know exactly where to start, who to talk to, and how to make everything fit!! But you clearly are an unintelligent idiot of a loser who likes to f#$% everything all up!!”

In a nut shell, this is how I feel that I have been managed to this point, and that is, managed without much mentoring.  I’m not sure that I can really blame this on my manager because the time I need doesn’t really fit into the manager’s busy time frame. So what do I do? I struggle, and not just a little, I struggle a lot. It’s painful, it’s frustrating, it’s challenging, it’s angering, and definitely anti-motivational. 

BUT… this has led to some amazing growth and I have learned more through all of this then I have in quite some time. It’s allowed me to take the time and use all of the pain to my benefit in learning what I can do to become better at work. Hopefully, this will only continue and I can get better at this as I go along.

Other Things

I’ve decided to just leave it at this for the week, this is enough writing for one sit and you can always plan on more coming next week. Next week, I will try to focus on my personal struggle with presenting confidently.

Stay tuned,

-Ding to the le

Precision Q and A

Class Time
This week I was afforded an opportunity to attend a one day class with my team that took a deep dive into asking and answering precise questions.  The class was great, and I learned some new concepts I had never given thought to before. Many times throughout the day, I imagined I wouldn't remember much from the full day class and that the new information would probably be lost over the next few weeks.  Having chewed on this thought during the course work, I wasn't the least bit surprised to find the conclusion at the end of the day included a mention to the affect of:  Don't to try to remember every detail but instead focus on a few key areas to improve on. Writing these areas will surely help right?! ... RIGHT!!!

My Points of Focus:
As a result, I narrowed my learning to 3 main points. This includes:
    1.) Keep Questions Simple
    2.) Put answers into Bullet/Number format when possible
    3.) Preparation is Vital!!!

SIMPLE Questions
I don't have a mnemonic for the word SIMPLE yet, but I think that would be great, so some day when I crank out my own PQ&A class, I will come up with something for my new word.  But back to the topic at hand, simple questions are straight forward and singular.  This means that questions should not span multiple parts and allows for a single question that can be expanded upon later.  Unfortunately, this only works well if the person answering the questions sticks to the question at hand.  So along with this aspect is learning to interrupt another person when necessary to get back on track.  This is important in reaching the needed information without looping through a set of other points that aren't necessary.  As the old saying goes, "keep it simple stupid".

Using Bullets
Turns out using bullets is useful in writing AND in conversation.  It is useful because it helps the listener to mentally prepare for what you are about to tell them. For example, say I am going to have you bake a cake.  I could do it one of two ways:
    a.) Baking a cake:  Get a recipe, find the ingredients, make cake batter, bake the cake, frost the cake, enjoy
    b.) 6 Easy Steps to Bake a cake:
        1.) OBTAIN recipe
        2.) COMPILE ingredients
        3.) MIX cake ingredients
        4.) BAKE cake in oven
        5.) FROST cake
        6.) ENJOY

Now in looking at these two options, you may already have forgotten everything you just read, but you probably remember that there were 6 steps which is a much better start than the jumbled mess from the first example.

Preparation is VITAL
This wasn't actually an emphasis of the course and wasn't really even a part of the course at all.  Instead this is my own addition because what I realized throughout the day is that real precision questioning and answering involves knowing your audience, what you are talking about, and to whom you are talking. In order to compile all this information, you need to prepare, and you need to do it adequately.

One of the best preparation methods is to Practice, Practice, Practice. Whether you are giving a presentation, or asking questions at a presentation, the more you practice and prepare the more respected you will be. Instead of asking ill timed or unadvised questions, or perhaps answering a question to hastily, pause for a second to compile your words intelligently and in turn your thoughts will come out clear and precise instead of in a clumped chunky spew fashion.  In keeping with the lameness of the rest of my blog.... Practice Makes Perfect!!!

Spouting off nonsense once a week...
-Dingle McT