Etiquette

No technical stuff here today...let's call it a focus on the soft skills.

Been pondering this one for some time now. I wanted to add some of it to a recent post, but ultimately left it out.

How to Take Compliments
I've struggled with this one myself at times. Someone says something very nice to me and I'll hem and haw. It feels...embarrassing. Maybe I don't really deserve it? Am I conceited to accept this? Etc.

I try to accept the compliment, when given now, with grace. "Thank you, I appreciate that." instead of deflecting the attention away (from myself, as I'm wont to do).

Here's 8 easy steps...

1. Understand what deflecting a compliment is really about
2. Think about taking a compliment as an exercise in being assertive
3. See accepting a compliment as a compliment in itself
4. Decide how you'd like to take the compliment
5. Smile
6. If you suspect that the sincerity of the compliment is questionable or the compliment is confusing, you might want to open up an opportunity to explore it
7. Return a compliment later
8. Give credit where credit is due - I like this one. I usually have a lot of help at work and I try to make sure that others are included, if not by the complimentor then at least by me. I'm sure it has something to do with playing a lot of team sports growing up too.

How to Say You're Sorry
I dislike but-monkeys. What is a but-monkey? Someone who says something like, "I am sorry for what I did, but..." - the ellipsis could be something like, "you brought this on yourself" or "you did x, y and z." This isn't an apology. Say you are sorry and don't make excuses, period. I have become good at apologizing. I'm not sure that's a good thing as it implies I've made a lot of mistakes. Well, guess what? I have made mistakes in my life. Whether I realize it immediately or some time in the future, I do my best to accept responsibility and apologize.

The most common cause of failure in an apology--or an apology altogether avoided--is the offender's pride. It's a fear of shame. To apologize, you have to acknowledge that you made a mistake. You have to admit that you failed to live up to values like sensitivity, thoughtfulness, faithfulness, fairness, and honesty. This is an admission that our own self-concept, our story about ourself, is flawed. To honestly admit what you did and show regret may stir a profound experience of shame, a public exposure of weakness. Such an admission is especially difficult to bear when there was some degree of intention behind the wrongdoing.

I had one more but it seems to have escaped me at the moment.

Random Thoughts: #22

I haven't written much lately, six months in fact. Just trying to get my life in order...priorities.

Strangely, traffic to the site has increased during that time. I would think that any post during this period would slightly increase traffic. Nope. Opposite effect.

I like traffic (only child, I need attention), but it's not why I do any of this. If that were the case, I wouldn't post at midnight on Saturday. Anyway, amusing.

Here's a random video for you: Larry Smith - Why you will fail to have a great career



I have this really strange fascination with this one, Cheap Flights with subtitles



Finally this one which I have watched every other day (it seems) for the past 4 months: Jeb Corliss " Grinding The Crack"



If you made it this far. I'm sorry.

Real Time BI with Kevin & Stewart

I was lucky enough to be invited to participate on the inauglural [sic] episode of Real Time BI with Kevin & Stewart. Believe it or not, I managed not to curse during the entire episode!

On Consulting

I've been thinking about this for quite some time now. 2+ years ago I joined a small, boutique consulting shop that focused on OBIEE. If you've been around her for any length of time, that 2+ years is a lifetime for me.

I've had the pleasure of meeting quite a few, very skilled, Oracle people over the last few years. I've shared beers with them and I've been able to pick their brain...a lot.

I ask questions, lots of them. Both my parents were journalists and boy did they ask a lot of questions. Wasn't the best thing, especially when I hit those teenage years (leave me alone!), but I can look back now and appreciate what they passed on to me.

I guess I'll go through my thoughts, pros and cons, of consulting. Fill in the blanks where necessary in the form of comments.

Cons

Let's start with the bad stuff, maybe that means you'll stick around to hear the good stuff below.

1. Travel - This is both pro and con in my opinion. If you have a family, especially young children, travel is not fun. If you don't like to fly on airplanes, it's not fun. If you don't like living out of a suitcase, it's not fun. If you like coaching your son's baseball team, it's not fun. If you like having a schedule of any sort, it's not fun. I miss my family when I am gone.
2. Food - Again, will be on both lists. If you try to watch what you eat, it's not easy to do while traveling. You have to work pretty hard to find good, healthy food while traveling. Sometimes it's just too easy to eat whatever is easiest. Heck, your tired from traveling, just make it easy. Easy <> Healthy.
3. Exercise - It's incredibly tough to get into a groove when you travel a lot. You have to go out of your way, at times, to find either a decent running trail or decent gym equipment. Not easy.
4. Benefits - No company provided health insurance. No time off. No sick days. If you aren't working, you aren't getting paid. If you suck at time management, like I do, this can be quite painful.
5. The Hourly Wage - Pay is down there as a pro, as it should be. The part that I hate, is that if you aren't careful, you'll begin to think of all of your time as time you aren't billing. That ain't healthy. I think I've finally broken this mindset, but it wasn't easy.

Pros

Pros are easier.

1. Pay - You get paid by the hour. I prefer this to the salaried positions...I would work upwards of 65 to 70 hours a week as a salaried employee. I'd end up making like $3 per hour. Blah. That sucks.
2. Travel - If you like to travel, you'll get to do lots of it. I traveled a fair amount when I was a kid, I enjoy it (except the plane part, transporter technology needs to be invented soon). The first year with this consulting company included quite a bit of travel. I was a platinum member (75+ nights) at Marriott. I will be losing that status shortly as I have only traveled one time in the past 18 months for work.
3. People - It should be no surprise that I like people. Well, with consulting, you get to meet a lot of new people from all over. I was a military brat, moved 8 times before I graduated high school, I really enjoy meeting new people.
4. Problem Solving - I'll call this the AskTom effect. I have no doubt that Mr. Kyte was a pretty smart fellow prior to starting up that little site, but I think that forcing yourself to answer approximately 10 questions a day, has increased his breadth of knowledge by an order of magnitude. Granted, many of the questions he could probably answer of the top of his head, but...a big but, he constantly provides examples for those easy ones. And what about the hard ones? He answers those too. How often are you asked questions that test your knowledge limit in your particular area of expertise? He does that on a regular basis. I think the same goes for consulting, only on a smaller scale.
   
   Each and every client you go to has their own unique set of challenges. Things you wouldn't otherwise see if you stayed at one place your entire career. I believe you learn a lot more than the average person if you spend time in consulting simply because of those unique challenges.
   
   Here's another example. Cary Millsap estimates that he went to client sites about 35 times a year, for 10 years, during the 1990's. That's 350 different environments, different challenges all of them. Do you think that has had an impact on his knowledge and experience? I certainly do. I'll say the same thing about Mr. Millsap, he was a smart guy before doing all that, but I argue that it made him that much better at what he does/did.
   
   As does consulting in general.
   
   I've been through a few jobs in the past few years. Each job I learned something new. I was exposed to different problems. It made me better at what I did.
   
   The beauty of consulting, is that now I don't have to "change" jobs every now and then, I just get new clients. It is possibly one of the reasons I stayed in Gainesville, FL for so long, I got to stay in one place but everyone else came and went (it's a college town for those that don't know, a very transient population).

So, in summary, I really love the problem solving aspects of travel. Being paid for the time you actually work is a bonus, but there are trade-offs. I'm not sure I'll do this forever...I think it would be awesome to be at a job for years on end where you know everything about the business. I just don't see that in my very near future.