Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Success can lead to failure. Sometimes great success can lead to great failure. See, e.g., Facebook.

There must be two social media companies out there named “Facebook.” There is this social media site called Facebook that many of my friends and relatives use. They show photos of the kids and the new babies and the new-baby-is-coming reveal party and such. I have found persons who were my high school classmates. Wow, they have changed, and so have I, and they love their grandkids like crazy just like me.

That Facebook is great. They hit on something there to let us all find one another and share our lives. Good stuff.

Then there is another Facebook company I read about in the news. They rigged they last presidential election by showing, of all things, advertisements. They show “fake news.” It seems that fake news is the stuff I used to see at the checkout counter of the grocery store, you know, some famous woman had an alien baby or someone was dating Princess Di and Marylin Monroe at the same time. All that was silly and adults knew the difference back then.

And this second Facebook has really rich people running the company. The really rich people, however, always seem to be in trouble. Is it fake news that the rest of us love to read about really rich people who are always in trouble? That is why we used to watch the TV show “Dallas” way back when we used to watch TV shows on TV.

And this second Facebook has these really rich people running the company appearing before Congress and all the European Parliaments and such and saying, “Let me get back to you on that,” even though the questions were, “Is it raining outside? Do I need my umbrella?”

Is it possible that the two Facebook companies are one in the same? Is it possible that the Facebook that allows me to find they guy who played trombone next to me in the  marching band is the same Facebook where the CEO is appearing before Congress without any sweat glands?

Is it possible that Facebook succeeded so much that the persons in charge became too rich too fast and weren’t able to handle the fame and fortune at a young age and…well, we know what happens in those cases.

There must be some older, not-as-really-rich persons sitting at Facebook close to those famous, really rich Facebook executives who made too much money too fast at too young an age. If you are one of those, please, please talk to the others.

Please ask them to stay out of trouble and not cause the collapse of Facebook. I do enjoy seeing how a former trombone player from the Loranger Wolfpack Marching Band is loving his grandkids and still playing the guitar.

by Dwayne Phillips

What do you write on Christmas Eve that hasn’t already been written and read?

I wish for you today the same things I wish for you everyday. Some of them are:

• You are rested so you can enjoy just about everything else to its fullest
• The same goes for being fed, clothed, and having access to shelter from the elements
• You are with someone with whom you can converse, because all this is easier if there is a fellow passenger

Not very complicated, is it? Sometimes we make it needlessly so.

by Dwayne Phillips

It isn’t easy to admit that I lack knowledge for something that “I should know.” Most people are like me in this respect. How can I “help” without looking over their shoulder?

“Maybe if you did it that way instead of this way,” said the eager, wanting-to-be-helpful person standing behind me and looking over my shoulder.

Why can’t these people simply go away. Don’t they know that I don’t want them standing behind me, looking over my shoulder, and telling me how the world should be?

The situation is completely different, however, when I am trying to “help” someone else do whatever it is they are doing. They simply don’t have the benefit of my experience and I am happy to share and all things will be better in the world when they listen to me and …

and I am looking over their shoulder and I don’t understand it when they react the same way I react

Yet, there is a point when we all need someone to show us a better way. How can we do that without looking over their shoulder.

Some things to avoid saying:

• Let me HELP you
• Why are you doing that?
• I know how to do this (it’s obvious you don’t)

Some things that are a little more acceptable:

• I was stuck on this a few days ago, it was frustrating
• I never understood this and I still don’t really understand it now, but I saw something that worked
• I hate it when that happens, too.

Shift from YOU (you’re obviously wrong and you obviously need HELP)

to

I (I don’t know it all, I stumbled lots of times, I was blessed to find something that worked better for me).

by Dwayne Phillips

“I always seem to break the machine.” I hear students say this…frequently.

Reframe: I am earnestly doing my job. I try harder than most other persons. I am not sleep-walking through the day. I push the performance of my tools.

I want to work with these persons, the ones who always seem to break the machine.

by Dwayne Phillips

Some of the best advice I ever heard and heeded is simply, “Don’t try too hard.”

Writing. Studying. Researching. Don’t try too hard.

Writing: let it come out of you. When you hit a difficult spot, type “this is a difficult spot, come back later.” Done. Now keep banging away on the keyboard.

Studying: look at the material. Look at it again. Read it silently. Read it aloud. Walk around the room while reciting it. Got it. Time to stop.

Researching: set a time box. I have one hour to research this topic, and that is it. Go through it; take the notes—I’m done. It is all right in front of me.

Great concepts are right in front of me. Squeezing them in my mind doesn’t make them greater. They aren’t lumps of coal that my mind can crush into diamonds. Simply take it, hold it, recite it. There. Done. That was easier than expected. It is usually easier than I expect it to be.

When I am struggling with an idea, and I am having a day of clarity, I tell myself, “You are trying too hard.” I relax. The idea is there in its simplicity and utility.

Hmmm, simplicity and utility. Perhaps there is something with that duo.

by Dwayne Phillips

Choose to learn. We all pay the tuition, but we may not all get the education.

I guess many school teachers and government employees and just plain folks never say this to themselves. I always did, but perhaps that explained my mediocre career in government service. I was too inquisitive, too exploratory, too consumed by keeping pace with technology to pay attention to the political maneuvers inside the supposedly apolitical civil service.

There are days when I regret how I learned daily. There are more days when I don’t regret it. I suppose we all have choices all days. I encourage the managers and non-managers out there to notice and things that may be important, and learn about them.

by Dwayne Phillips

We each have a reputation, something about us that others “know.” What is it? What do I want it to be?

I go to a coffee shop on Saturday mornings to view the Internet and write blog posts. On a recent Saturday I found car keys in the bathroom (shows how old I am as I still call them “car keys” instead of “fob.”)

I suspected, correctly so, that they belonged to one of the runners who frequent the place on Saturday morning as I do. They run a while at daybreak and then come into the coffee shop for breakfast and conversation. They change clothes in the bathroom and are the most likely to leave keys on the baby changing table.

I took they keys to their table and a man claimed them. They were surprised that I guessed one of them owned the keys. One of them asked, “Do we have a reputation?”

Well, yes, you do. Well, yes, we all do.

Hmmm, what is our reputation? What is my reputation? As much as I would like to deny it, I have one here in the coffee shop. I have one at work. I have one at home and everywhere else. What do I want it to be?

by Dwayne Phillips

Simple desires for the workplace.

Years ago, a wise old man once told me, “The workplace should be pleasant and profitable.”

He worked in a commercial business. No profits, no business, no jobs. Profits were necessary. Also necessary, in his experience, was that the workplace be pleasant. If it wasn’t pleasant, people would go elsewhere. No people, no work, no workplace. Simple.

I worked in government for 28 years. Profit was not for us. I substituted another “p” word. Non-profit work should be pleasant and productive. It is easy to goof off in many non-profit jobs. Enough non-productive work eventually catches up with the most non-profitable of the non-profits—even government.

These little sayings aren’t complicated. Perhaps that is how I have always remembered them. Please consider them for your workplace.

by Dwayne Phillips

In the age of the temporary job, the portfolio becomes important to us all.

For most of my life, I heard of the artist’s portfolio—the collected works of an artist. Well, welcome to the age of everyone-is-an-artist. Everyone needs a portfolio to show potential employers. Wikipedia has a few definitions of portfolio that I like.

This age of everyone-is-an-artist causes me to change a few things in my life. These include:

1. accept that I need a portfolio
2. keep my portfolio in mind as I do everything
3. how can this work be part of my portfolio?
4. put my work into my portfolio
5. keep my portfolio organized, i.e., keep my work organized
6. keep my portfolio available
7. do all my work knowing that potential employers will see it

Item 7 can be frightening. EVERYTHING I do will be seen by others. Yikes. Perhaps I should focus on each task a little better and produce high-quality work all the time—especially when I find the task to be mundane.

by Dwayne Phillips

Sometimes—make that almost all the time—the path from the problem to the solution is winding.

“We had a problem; we solved it. Let me describe how we found and implemented the solution.”—a satisfied problem solver.

Ah, nothing more satisfied than a problem solver just after solving a problem. Listen carefully. They will tell you a tale, probably a tall, tall, i.e., not quite true, tale of how they thought a moment and pushed straight through to the solution.

Solutions to problems, i.e., problems whose solution is worthy of a problem solver, rarely come straight. There are fits and starts (what’s a fit?), mistakes, incorrect assumptions, restarts (no re-fits), misdirection, misunderstanding, mis-this-and-that before reaching the solution.

This is normal. Do not panic, do not punish, and do not hold reviews to learn how to make a straight line.

This is why we do agile development. In that, we try to shrink problems to two (four, six, eight, whatever) weeks. The winding is reduced to those time boxes. Hence, the deviation from the mythical straight path is reduced.

Straight paths are for tall tales and myths. Winding paths are for adults in the real world. Choose the path according to your situation.