Summary – Associate

Anybody here actually hate their job say “Yes” 🙂 I know the feeling. The fact is we are not hating the job every single day. It’s just that on some days, the idea of quitting our job and do our dream job can comes to mind. And it is tempting.

But a job is still a job. Who’s to say that when we quit and do our dream job, we will not suffer the same hate feeling sooner or later. So what we can do is to try to find a way to be in love with what job we are having now.

This is what I do.

I searched my heart for the one thing that I really enjoy. One that I can do 24 hours a day without realizing it’s already 24 hours.

Upon checking, I realize that one of the things that I enjoy is playing games. Not any kind of games, specifically Role Playing Game. For those who has no idea of role playing game, it is basically a game where you play a character in the game. And you start with a mission for your ultimate goals and as the story folds you encounter a lot of adventure, mini mission, upgrade level etc.

Still clueless? No problem. Let me explain further. When I’m bored or starting to dislike working, I will imagine that I am the character in the game. And that with completing all the mini task, I am gaining experience point. I can actually see the point being added (Of course in my imagination)

Sometimes I was assigned by my manager to negotiate with the worker’s union on some matters. I quickly get into my game mode. And with every successful negotiation, I imagine 1 point of Communication Skill is added to my stats 🙂 I’m sure those who play RPG game will understand.

I don’t know about you, but this alone will help me get through some tough day.

You too can do just the same. If the thing you enjoy the most is gardening, and you’re working as human resource manager. Try imagining your workers are like plant. You need to give them attention and all the right nutrition for them to grow. When they do grow into a more efficient worker, take the time to enjoy your success.

– Disclaimer –
This method may not work for everyone. But try away, maybe you can further expand it to cater yours 🙂

– I wonder –
What are the thing you enjoyed the most? The thing that you will lose track of time the minute you started on it.

———- Personal Note ———-
I have to make it clear that I don’t hate my job. It’s just sometimes, I feel like quiting my job and maybe start blogging professionally. 🙂 Anyone hiring?

In an interview, if you were asked “What’s your experience?”. How would you answer? “I have 10 years of variety of experience”? or “I have 10 years of repeated experience”?

10 years of repeated experience is most probably the answer for majority of us. We worked for 10 years but all the while we are doing the same thing. This can be equally aplied not only to working but also to hobbies or interest.

It’s true that repeating the same work may give us that “skilled” factor. We will become specialist in what we do. We will then be so good in what we do, that it is no longer a challenge to the mind.

Our mind is like a child, always asking question and always wants a challenge. I even heard that one of the suspected reason Alzheimer cases in old people is when we are not challenging our mind consistently.

What I’m trying to say here is just to introduce something new to our life. It can be weekly or monthly but please try something new. For example,

1) Try cooking
There’s a saying that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomache. And guess what? the same goes to woman 🙂 Who hates good food?

2) Look for new things to do when travelling
Most people just travel to see the beautiful scenery. Why not you make it compulsary for you to do one unique thing when you travel. For example, you travel to Place A, maybe you do rock climbing there, then you travel to Place B, you learn how to fish squid (Mencandat)

3) Learn to play an instrument (3 songs)
I actually did this. I learn to play exactly 3 songs on guitar. When you are in presence of strangers, and you were asked to play the guitar, you can immediately play that 3 songs and people will see you now as the man who play guitar 🙂 But you will have to stop when the 3 songs are over

4) Check what’s the new buzz
Everyday there are new things being introduced. In the internet, there are thousands new things everyday. Check what everyone is highlighting. For example, twitter. I read all over the net about how twitter is the next blog, so I tried it out. I may not be as active in it but at least now I know what it’s all about. For those who’s on twitter, please follow me here.

Let’s get to know each other. I will only be able to tweet after work, so please excuse me sometimes when I’m not there 🙂

5) Make strange new friend.
Everyone can make friends. Why don’t you challenge youself to make friends with people who have nothing in common with you. Try to befriend lawyers, or engineers, or beggars, Just imagine the experience they can share with you.

6) Try other jobs
Why not one day you just go for an interview at the local mall for a promoter job. When you are accepted to work, just take a day off from your current job and go to work at the place. You’ll be working there for one whole day. And since you are not going to be paid (since you just work for one day), it is important that you take all the experience you can get from that one day job. Mingle around. Believe me, you will have a more profound respect for the people working as a promoter later on.

7) Do social experiment
I watched “Patch Adam” once played by Robin William. In that movie, Adam is doing an experiment to check how to connect to people on a deeper level. He hang himself upside down from a tree and surprised a pedestrian saying “Hello”. He consider the experiment a success if the pedestrian look back and smile. Of course it’s a success.

My point exactly, try to come up with experiment of your own. Learn more about life. It is actually fun. 🙂 An example of experiment you can do is maybe to ask for help from strangers. See how many will help a stranger.

/end list
I can go on and on about the list of things. But I try to keep the post as short and simple as possible. So there they are. Care to try?

– I wonder –
Do you have any other methods to make your day different?

———- Personal Note ———–
I know some people dislike him, but I really love watching movie played by Robin William. There are almost all thought provoking and creatively done. My favorite would be the Bicentennial Man, where a unique robot try to find a way to be more human 🙂

Summary – Conflict management

Previously I asked your opinion on how a simple imagination of seeing yourself from a third person view can help solve marital problem. And today I will try to explain that claim.

But first, can I ask? Do you able to picture looking at yourself from another point of view? I mean visually. Seeing yourself smiling while reading on the net, or humming your favorite song, It is a very enlightening feeling.

So what does this have to do with solving problem? Especially marital ones?

This is actually the basis of “Conflict Management” practised all around the world, seriously. I actually learn this during my years of studying. Not that they specifically teached you to start closing your eyes when a conflict arises and imagine. That one is all me :).

By conflict, I am referring to an argument between two person about a matter. One thing about argument or conflict is that everyone wants to be a winner and will not accept anything less. For example, arguing about how to do a job assigned. You may have your way and you think that would be the best way to approach it. Your colleaue however disagree. He think his method is by far better and you should agree with him.

Can you guess what will happen if the both of you are equally stubborn? Yes, the argument will last eternity.

This is how conflict management solve the problem.

1) Stop arguing
Literally, you must stop arguing to solve the problem. Both of you. It’s very hard to review the problem when all we do is defending our own view. Just sit down,

2) Attack the problem, not anything else.
Believe it or not, this is where all conflict starts. Yes, people can be so unproffesional sometimes.

It may first start like addressing the problem first, Let me give you an example. There is a machine in my mill (true example) that has been having problem. The bearing kept on breaking and this cost a lot of money, about $5000. And the manager obviously asked what happened.

The supervisor immediately blame the maintenance team, by saying that they did not do proper work when installing. The maintenance team however claim that the supervisor is tempering with the machine and spoil it.

What the supervisor and the foreman should do is to stop pointing fingers and look at how to solve the problem. If only they can see themselves from another point of view, they will see how silly the argument since that personal attack argument cannot have practical solution.

A practical solution would be that from now on, anytime the maintenance team work on the installation, an engineer and the supervisor will be present to help. Also measures will be taken to stop any tempering of the machine, like locks etc.

That goes the same with marital argument. Husband and wife arguing. Both are equally egoistic and will argue to the death just to defend that ego. Maybe the wife want a maid to help her with the housework. However the husband feels that the wife is just trying to order him around by making him do this and that, so instead of agreeing to find her a maid, he just ignore the request entirely.

The actual problem is not the husband’s ego. It is actually the fact that the housework is steadily increasing in number and the wife doesn’t have the time to work on those. In the end, the wife find herself a maid just to show the husband she’s right. And the husband obviously don’t like it. So the argument will continue on, despite the problem has already been solved.

Conclusion – Most of the time, when we argue, there is always a high possibility that the argument will turn to personal attack. This should never happen. A problem is a problem. It will never be solved by attacking other people.

The textbook method of conflict management is actually to take a step backward and view the problem as a wall located in between the two people arguing. The objective should always be to break the wall instead of hurting the two people.

———— Personal Note ————
I know, it is harder to do than to talk about it. People especially during argument will do their best to win. Still, I have to consistently guide my supervisor and foreman to work together as a team instead of trying to kill each other. 🙂

It’s 2 am and I just got home from the hospital. As you probably know, the mrs is now in her 8 month of pregnancy. Yesterday (That’s “just now” for me when I wrote this), the unborn baby had made very few movement, and according to the doctors, I should bring her immediately to the hospital if the total number of movement is less than 10 in 12 hours.

So I brought her to the hospital, and after a lengthy checkup, the little one started kicking again.. I can now smile again 🙂 Only God knows how worried I was.

Anyway, forgive me for not able to write up a post for the day. Very tired, and can’t think that straight anyway. Good night everyone. I’ll see you tomorrow

p.s. I still owe you an explanation of the assignment given. No worry 🙂