What is the best way to recover from a poor decision?

Shared today (2/15/2011) on the Writing Mafia group in LinkedIn.

- Recover from a poor decision starts with – Recognize that it is a poor decision. That clears up, in my experience, most of the issues – moving from denial to corrective action.
- Then, learn from it. Great insights and great experience comes directly from poor decisions. Or, the old summary statement – we may learn more from our many failures than from our handful of success.
- Bigger picture thinking – there are many more failures in our lives than successes. I believe that a crisis has two elements – danger and opportunity. It is what we do with a crisis, e.g., a poor decision, that is critical. Hence, avoid the danger and develop the opportunity.
- Share the results. This at the very least builds a life-story that is compelling (real), is supportive of others, and develops our character.

20110109 How to be Out of Touch with Reality

I came across this posting on LinkedIn today (1/9/11), by a connection of mine – Jennifer Rai. I would never question her sincerity. However, this quote just struck me as so misleading, I am prompted to write about it.

“Failure doesn’t mean you are a failure it just means you haven’t succeeded yet.” ~Robert H. Schuller

What little I know about Mr. Schuller, includes a large dose of noting his being well known as a positive thinker. He may think as positively as he may like, but this quote is simply not correct – he has blatantly ignored a generally accepted dictionary practice – words mean what they mean – it is not acceptable, reasonable, or logical to redefine them on a whim – however good that redefinition may seem at first reading.

This firstly reminds me of the salesmen treating each and every rejection where a prospective client rejected a sales pitch by saying no toward purchasing a product or service. Whatever the reason or means, the client is right – no means no. Get over it. Sales folk do get over it. In general they refuse to acknowledge that this no is both a personal, professional, and product oriented rejection. They rebound by distorting the facts that they haven’t succeeded yet. Great mental gymnastics, but a distortion of reality. A no is not the end of the world, but it is a failure.

I suppose that is why I am not in sales – I recognize failure all too well and easily. Rejection is real, especially when it is in the context of being primarily personal. It hurts, and frankly is meant to hurt by the perpetrators – rejection is acutely personal and deliberate. Yes, it is what is done next that is important – the key for me to recognize that a failure has occurred – and then move on. It is in the moving on where I connect, albeit in an exceptionally small and with greatly reserved manner with Mr. Schuller, with whom I definitely do not identify.

I wrote the following comment to Jennifer Rai:

Something is wrong here; we are ignoring the definitions for failure: 1. The condition or fact of not achieving the desired end or ends: the failure of an experiment. 2. One that fails: a failure at one’s career. Very common. 3. The condition or fact of being insufficient or falling short: a crop failure. 4. A cessation of proper functioning or performance: a power failure. 5. Nonperformance of what is requested or expected; omission: failure to report a change of address. 6. The act or fact of failing to pass a course, test, or assignment. 7. A decline in strength or effectiveness. 8. The act or fact of becoming bankrupt or insolvent.

Some elaborating remarks may be helpful:

- Experiments are excellent illustrations of failure. Experiments are exceptionally time, labor, and equipment intensive undertakings. In general, experiments fail much more frequently than they succeed. Even when they appear to succeed, ideally an independent repeat of the experiment may indicate the first success was a fluke. Due diligent and intellectual honesty are necessary to fully air the failure. Absence to air the failure may cause an exceptional waste of resources by others. I would suggest that airing failures be embraced by would be professionals.

- A career failure is a most common event. This may manifest as the death of a vision, all the way to clearly seeing incomplete, if indeed incompetent thinking. The earlier these are exposed as failures, the better off we all should be. As devastating as failures are, acknowledgment of them as failures clears the way for improvements. Furthermore, failures are not guaranteed precursors to success – they are singular events, but much must change if success is even feasible after a failure.

- Falling short, in truth is an exceptionally common condition. We all fall short. As noted above, what we do about this is most critical. Changes must accompany failure. Missing the mark is another synonym expression. I have tried bow and arrow in my youth – failure was a characteristic of that experience – yes, I missed the mark. And the target completely!

- I like the illustration of a power failure. We had a power failure during the summer of 2010 of the transformer in our electrical service entrance at home. The corrective action was removing and replacing the transformer.

- The next item addresses acts of commission or omission. The corrective action is to make the necessary and sufficient changes.

- School work is an immediate illustration in my thinking triggered by the next element of the definition. In my education, geography studies were not my strong suite. I started out well and then failed. That failure was a source of encouragement to me to have a life-long interest in such matters – most recently enjoying listening to presentations on travel, geography, history, culture, and language – to name a few. It was my weakness in geography that encouraged my continuing study of this subject. The starting point was recognition of that deficiency and my demonstrated incompetence.

- Decline in strength and effectiveness. One observation is physical strength decays with age. I have zero interest and ability today to run in track and field events nor run in cross-country meets. Yep, that is a failure, no problem. The fact that I used to be very good in those areas is of no consequence.

- The act or fact of becoming bankrupt or insolvent is a failure. Those of us in transition know and realize this very well. Toward that end, we recognized the imminent possibility of those conditions of failure and continue to exercise correct process to mitigate against same.

My conclusion is embrace failure, we are all failures, but do not become stuck in failure. Avoid mental gymnastics – failure is a common condition of life. Recognize same and move on – and, success in our own strength is not guaranteed by any means. We will all be better by and because of failure.

Return on Investment Metric – By asking a question

Concerning end of interview questions, one that I have used and that was well received is:

Do you have the necessary and sufficient information and insights from this discussion that will enable you to appropriately move forward?

I have fine tuned this question to meet the context of the interview. However, each and every time that I have used this question the answer has been – Yes.

Yes, in this context, is that the interviewer is both comfortable and committed to move forward. The implication is that if that is their verbalized mindset, then this maximizes the likelihood for a positive sent of continuing in the process actions.

My opinion is this is the singular objective of an interview – get the client committed to act. This sets them up to be mentally engaged, morally committed, professionally in agreement, and process oriented.

This should be a win-win for all of the stakeholders in this staffing process.

Not a bad return on investment for asking a professional question, don’t you agree?

Networking Vice Relationships?

I have been reading a bit today and came across an article on “It’s Time to Stop Networking”, by Hank Blank.

He had a posting that showed up on Laguna Niguel Connectors, via LinkedIn.

I read his posting and essentially agree with the concept that he wrote about – but, don’t forget he networks all the time and has, per his article, almost 10,000 contacts in his iPhone.

For comparison, I have under 340 in my cell phone.

Not in the same league!

His nuggets are seeding, pruning, and harvesting.

That brings me to this note – on relationships.

For the sake of being overt – I am equating building relationships with building friendships.

I have a very simple concept – I am not humanly able to maintain exceptionally close relationships with a large number of people concurrently.

However, I am able to continue to reach out to people regularly, and that without limit.

Between these two bounds – the very close and the very large, is the connection between networking and relationships.

And by extension, the answer to the above question – networking vice relationships?

That is a small way is an encouragement – balance!

Keep networking and building relationships – this process will balance out in the long run.

Metrics on LinkedIn and Associated Matters of Job Search Strategy

As an exercise toward developing meaningful metrics for those in transition, I revisited the subject of LinkedIn groups and subgroups.

I am confident that you are well aware of the LinkedIn application’s limit on the maximum number of groups that one may belong to concurrently. What has not been well discussed is the matter of subgroups to those groups. My experience to date shows no maximum for subgroups.

My current assortment of groups (50) and subgroups (18) for a total of 68.

These are spread into the present self-identified categories of:

- Professional membership association.
- Affinity organization.
- Professional interest.
- Prior client.
- Networking group.
- Academic alumni organization.
- Prior business association.
- Prior employer.

My membership in these groups/subgroups is not balanced by count, nor would I suggest it to be so balanced. What this does show is developing a strategy for LinkedIn group activity is possible and may be customized for each user of that application without undo effort, using this mindset as a point of departure.

I have an informal process in place by which I continually review my memberships, based on elements, such as becoming aware of new groups that I am interested in joining, if only for a little while, vice groups that lag in activity and are eventually culled from my involvement. My involvement has included participating in discussions, answering questions, and in general – being a commenter along the way.

Through it all, I try to continue to build professional relationships though those activities. As I as not in the public eye as much as you are, my professional growth rate is slower. Nevertheless, I am approaching as I write the threshold of 500 such connections. Of course, it is not about the number but the quality of the online relationship – which for the most part remains high. I am far from being an official LinkedIn LION – LinkedIn open net worker, but I do try to be open for such connection and ongoing communications.

In any event, this represents some, and not all, of what I have recently doing to create “draw”. The key objective is to seek professional employment – and to move beyond transition.

Questions, Puzzles, and Ambiguity

I came across a discussion group yesterday (9/4/10) that included three questions that were in the opinion of that discussion’s author correlated with our problem solving abilities – say a few generations ago compared with today.

For brevity, one was on profit or loss in buying stocks, secondly related to the productivity of hens with their eggs, and thirdly answering the question of how many people are in a gathering when all shake hands with each other – 66-handshakes being given.

The matter of stocks centered on whether percentage gains and losses were stated compared to the basis or compared to latest market value.

The second regarding chickens centered on production rates where mixed fractions of chickens produced mixed fractions of eggs in mixed fractions of days and then how many chickens are needed to meet a production goal some days later.

The third question hinged on definition of a handshake count mechanism. Such as, if I shake your hand does that count as you shaking my hand? Sounds silly, but only exactly 12 in room will get you to 66-handshakes if this unspecified count mechanism is assumed.

My observations are:

These are questions with more than one answer possible, depending on assumptions made by the problem solver.

Each such set of answers to the puzzle are explainable given the approach of the problem solver.

My general claim is we are not willing to simply state that these questions deal with ambiguity, and leave it there as a waste of time to continue.

In a sense, this stuff in my opinion appeals to the mindset of those who have to figure it out. Some of us view this as a curiosity and immediately move on. Then there may be those who waste some time on these puzzles to see if there is really any insights to be gained.

I suppose I am in the third court. Yes, some insights were gained, but was it worth the time to think it through and make note of it?

My answer is no.

Opinion: Incidentally, our problem solving abilities haven’t materially changed over the years. We just don’t invest as much time in these pursuits than I noted earlier in my life, say, where people routinely filled in crossword puzzles while out in public, using an ink pen. I always used ink, as pencil didn’t show well on the newsprint. Smile….

Network-attached storage

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network-attached_storage

I have found that the Wikipedia URL noted above has a straight forward discussion on network-attached storage.

International Traffic in Arms Regulations

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITAR

I have found that the Wikipedia URL noted above has a fairly succinct article on International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR).

Value of Excellence

In my review of certain LinkedIn groups, Kathryn Bingham on Defense and

Aerospace Connections initiated a discussion with this topic – define the value of excellence (accessed 4/16/10).

Although I did not post a comment to that discussion, I am addressing herein three questions raised in her posting.

Individuals and companies frequently profess excellence as a personal or corporate value.

What does this mean to you and your organization?

Character – doing what one ought not what one wants.

What barriers exist to performing to / delivering excellence?

Character development is a life-long pursuit; no one every arrives. It is the only endeavor that I know of that can’t be blocked by either circumstances or another person.

What metrics enable measurement of excellence?

For character – there is one – conscience. If one has a clear conscience, that is the measure. If one has a guilty conscience or worst yet a seared one, excellence is precluded.

How would you motivate and improve on the continuum of excellence at your company?

Simply put, work on building character into all aspects of the organization.

Hope on Loan

I recently read some postings to a blog – wherein the thesis there appears to center upon the word “pain” associated with a professional job search.

After some contemplation, I opted not to post the following comment to that discussion. The reason for this is simple – I am not interested in stirring someone up, but rather desire to address a collateral matter, one not I think within the scope of that blog thread.

Taking a cue from that other blog thread, I am writing to the prompt triggered therein.

Namely, keying on some words:

- Self-esteem – I do not like this perfectly good word and would never apply it to my self. Frankly, I am not interested in feeling good, but rather prefer to do what I ought to do, not what I want to do.

- Worthlessness – I have never thought of my self-as worthless. Never is a strong word, I know that. Down and tired mentally physically -
yes. But I know that I have great value. This is a truth not a feeling. None of us are worthless.

- Role – Yes, we have problems in fulfilling a role. However, none of us have to struggle to be in a role. Roles are facts, not performances. Now, if we are not fulfilling our role, or our trying to fulfill the role of someone else, that is a different matter. What role are you in? Then, what are the responsibilities and obligations of that role? Then, fulfill the responsibilities and meet the obligations.

- Failure – I am process oriented. If the process is correct, the outcomes are beyond our control. Hence, when things go wrong in a process, the outcome was not what we expected, but we should never incorrectly subsume unexpected outcomes and ascribe those unexpected outcomes to ourselves and think intrinsically that we are failures!

- Shame – If habitually we are doing as we ought, therein there is no shame. In the work context – if we always, habitually, look for work (short-hand for our process) – therein there is no shame. This is factual. Shame creeps in at the emotional level. The idea is if the facts are right (think process is right) there is never any shame. Hence, if this is true, then forcibly kick the emotion of shame in the teeth – kill it and move on! If the process is not right – there is no excuse – there are more things going on then than just shame. Hence, may it stick. Get with the program – this is a clue card that the person is doing as they want, not as they ought. If the changes aren’t made, don’t worry, the shame will come back, again and again.

- Self-respect – This is a collateral benefit, not an objective. The self-respect comes from being right and doing right. If one is at core righteous – the rest follows as a result. If one is at core not righteous – no mental gymnastics will get us there. That is what a conscience is for. If you and I don’t have an active conscience – get with the program – it is seared (cooked overdone).

- Demoralized – I expect to be from time to time perhaps kicked down, but never out of the game – that is circumstances. But that does not define me. Ask the question, what defines you? If the answer is not immediately forthcoming, that too is a clue card.

- Lethargy – Being tired is one thing, not acting as one ought is another. If one is tired, take a nap or get a good nights sleep. Then, get up and get moving!

Summary statement: These are some thoughts, organized around a collection of key words. This note is far from being a complete set of thoughts or even being even an organized set of thoughts. If this note seems to be confusing or heavy handed, the reader has missed the point entirely. This is intended to be strong encouragement, that addresses matters common to all of us. If we are showing signs of struggling, that is a fantastic indication that the resolution of these matters is near at hand – hope is extended to you and to me. If we don’t have that richest kind of hope, have a little loan of mine – no interest charged, it’s free. Disappointment is 100% curable. That is a great deal!!