Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

The message to a person should be the same as the message about a person.

What I say to a person is the same as what I say about a person. At least it should be. In other words, I say the same thing when the person is in the room as when the person is not. Furthermore, I do it in a way that everyone knows it.

It is too easy to say, “If the person were here I would say the same thing to their face.”

Fine. If that is true, that person should be here, now, while I am talking. If that person is not here, I don’t talk about them. “But I have hired you to evaluate that person.” Fine, let’s find a way to do this right. Until we find a way to do it right, we won’t do it wrong.

Sometimes it is difficult to be an adult and a manager at the same time.

by Dwayne Phillips

Please don’t ask job seekers to do something for you. That is work that has monetary value. we all know what it is to give someone money before they do their job…bribery.

The recruiter or hiring manager asks, “Please write a one-page essay (short computer program, simple design, webpage for fictitious company, etc.) and submit it before the interview so we have something to discuss.”

That is a simple request. That is a good request. Let’s see your work. Let’s evaluate the merits of your work. No problem, right?

Well, producing this small piece of work will take my time, talent, and energy. Those are worth money. Hence, this small piece of work is worth money, maybe $100. “You are telling me that if I don’t give you $100, you will not interview me.”

“Oh, no, please don’t interpret it that way…”

“Well, how should I interpret it?”

Silence follows and all that. “This is what we always do. We never have anyone balk at this.”

Employers, work for free as a prerequisite to an interview or something is a BRIBE. Don’t ask for bribes.

“But how will we evaluate job seekers?” That is your situation, not mine. You have professionals who do this. Ask them.

by Dwayne Phillips

Employers often ask job seekers for stolen property. Please don’t do that.

It happens frequently. The employer’s recruiter or hiring manager asks the job seeker, “Can you show us some source code (proposals, web pages, white papers, designs, etc.) that you’ve done previously?”

That’s an innocent request. That’s a good request. Let’s see your work. Surely you have pride in your work. We hire on merits. Show us your merits.

One problem is that work done for a prior employer was created under the pay of that employer. That prior employer owns that work. Hence, if I gave it to you I would be giving you something owned by that prior employer. I er uh guess that would be stolen property. Are you in the habit of dealing in stolen property?

“Oh no no no,” is the reply. “We just want to see your work. Surely, you have designed the next-generation gadget in your spare time at home, right?” I reply, “Well, no I haven’t as I don’t have the $200K design package at home.”

Folks, when I am unemployed I am unemployed. I don’t have copies of work I did for a prior employer. That would be theft and make me a thief. Do you often hire thieves? And when I am unemployed I spend my time seeking employment. I don’t write software (proposals, books, designs, web pages) all day and put them on Github for your benefit.

Please understand intellectual property and who owns what. Please don’t ask me for stolen property.

by Dwayne Phillips

Customers don’t want long—or any—explanations. Simply tell the customer how we will make the situation right.

Another month, another bad experience with customer service. The details are not important. I paid for a service, the provider made a mess of things, I heard dozens of reasons why the situation went wrong. I don’t care about the internal workings of the provider. I only care about one thing:

make it right

I am a provider at work. I work to satisfy a customer 40 hours a week. I better do better.

Simple statements:

• We made a mess.
• This is wrong.
• Here is how we will make this right.

Simple statements. Why are they so hard to state?

by Dwayne Phillips

I like to improve. I find most persons like to improve. Let’s do better with less effort and less time. Pretty good goal, but how do we reach that without stomping on persons?

Process improvement. I like that. Lots of persons I know dislike it. Why? Don’t we all want to do more and better with less effort and time leaving us with more time and energy for other things?

I find that those persons who dislike improvement do so because they have been trampled in prior improvement efforts. Try these questions:

• What did we do then?
• What have we learned?
• What do we do now?

Try to ask in that order.

by Dwayne Phillips

When reviewing a thing, we use the same basic principles: Review the product, not the person. Praise the person, not the product.

We review products daily. No, not just writing a review of the iPhone or Instagram, but all the little “products” that take us from a concept to a final product. Here is an idea—that is a product that we review. Here is a test—that is a product that we review. Here is a sales pitch—that is a product that we review.

We use the same basic principles:

1. Review the product, not the person
2. Praise the person, not the product

It is easy to confuse these. Take care. We can always get another product. The same is not true for the person.

by Dwayne Phillips

The Sticky Note exemplifies the temporary idea. Nothing is a useful and, at the same time, as benign as a temporary idea.

I guess you aren’t supposed to write about Sticky Notes. They are temporary by nature.

Hmm, temporary. Temporary things seem to ease the fears of many even though these many don’t realize it.

It is easy to catch an idea. And because it is scribbled on a temporary little note, it is easy to throw such an idea forward. If it is a bad idea, and hey, we all have bad ideas, it won’t hurt too much because it didn’t cost much to catch and throw it.

People seem to accept and discuss temporary ideas. Ideas chiseled in stone, however, are not so acceptable. They can hurt and they won’t go away. This simple little friendly little Sticky Note, well, that one comes and goes and doesn’t hurt. Perhaps we’ll consider it a little more and, who knows, even use it.

by Dwayne Phillips

Jumping from one thing to the next may appear to be a lack of focus when it really is a lack of foresight.

We’re working on this great thing. It took longer than we thought to build it. As we came close to finishing, rats, we quit because we realized that this great thing was overcome by events. The world had moved on to something else, and this great thing wasn’t relevant.

BUT WAIT. WOW!  A new idea. We are working on this great thing. Repeat the loop infinitely.

Is this a lack of focus? We jump from one thing to the next without ever finishing anything.

by Dwayne Phillips

How I define my goals has a large affect on how I perceive my successes and failures. It also affects how I see others in their efforts.

Define my goals. When I reach them, I am a success. How many people do we know who are successes? There is a key to how we define our goals.

“My goal is to sell 1,000 of my books.”

Stated another way, that goal is, “My goal is to have 1,000 people each buy a copy of my book.”

I cannot accomplish that. That requires 1,000 other people—who I do not control—to do something for me so that I am a success.

The goal should be within my control. Let’s try these goals:

1. “My goal is to write a first draft of a book.”
2. “My goal is to revise my first draft of a book.”
3. “My goal is to put my book on an online sales platform.”
4. “My goal is to post ads for my book on a social media site.”

All these goals are in my power to achieve. No one outside of my control is involved in any of these. I would be a success at least four times. How many people do you know who can claim that?

I think defining goals as things within my power alone to achieve is a worthwhile exercise. If you manage the efforts of others, trying defining your goals or expectations for them in a like manner.

by Dwayne Phillips

I can’t seem to think of the right questions at the right time. There are a couple of questions that I can always ask to compensate.

I sit with someone trying to learn something from them. I ask; they answer, and we repeat. Our time together ends.

Fifteen minutes later, after we have parted company, it hits me—the three questions I should have asked while we were conversing. Too late.

There is some old saying about growing too soon old and too late smart (someone even wrote a book with that title, imagine that). The brilliant ideas come too late. Why is that so? Why can’t I…?

There are a few things I can do to compensate for my all-too-late realizations. I can always ask one or two questions. These include:

(1) May I come back later with questions that come to mind as I consider this conversation?

and

(2) What questions do you expect me to ask now?

and then to toss in a few mind-bending ones…

• What is the question you expected me to ask that I didn’t ask?
• What is the question you want me to ask that I didn’t ask?
• What is the question you didn’t want me to ask that I didn’t ask?

I suppose the list of extra questions is longer than given here. Still, numbers (1) and (2) should be printed in the heading of all lists of questions that I take to a question-and-answer session. Now, why didn’t I think of this back in 198x….