Friday's Food for Thought

Do you consider yourself courageous? I don't. I seldom feel courageous and I too often feel fear. The fear is not always founded in realistic concerns either. The fear of heights, that has become more intense and even weird to me (seriously, where did it come from?!?) is based in no real event or situation that I can recall. It's just worse all the time.

I felt a little courageous when I took the job I'm in now, but it was a pretty comfortable at the same time. I was going back to something I knew well and I also felt that my previous job had done a lot to prepare me for it.

Tomorrow, I'm going to have to face my fear. I'm going to sing karaoke. Pray for me.

When do you feel courageous? Or do you?

Friday's Food for Thought

It's getting worse. Now I'm TWO days late!

Work has got me thinking about delivering and receiving feedback. I work with a few folks who get really mad when they get feedback on their work that is not what the client's want or isn't at the quality standard that we have set. I work with others who crave feedback and feel like they're not getting enough (usually because they're doing what they're supposed to and we're all too busy with the people that need corrective feedback).

I had a situation shortly after I started work at Microsoft where I did some really bad managing of a particular resource on my team. She wasn't doing her job that well, but the way I handled it was really bad. She actually complained to HR, so I had a lot of explaining to do. My manager called me into her office, outlined exactly what I had done that was a problem for HR, then talked to me about what I could do differently and what I could change about my management to completely avoid getting that far down a negative path with anyone in the first place. It was fantastic! I was so grateful that she took the time to help me instead of just telling me what a bad job I did. I learned a lot from that experience and I believe that it shaped me into a much better manager than I ever would have been without that happening. I was so grateful for the whole turn of events once I'd gotten through it.

As hard as it is to take, I'm one who really does want the corrective feedback when I do something wrong. What I wonder is, how do I help others to see that the corrective feedback might be just the thing that takes them from bad to good, or from good to great? This is my new challenge.

How do you feel about getting critical and/or constructive feedback? What makes it work for you or not? I'm really curious.

FFT Friday -- We Hope

I know it's a day late, but here it is. I've been thinking lately about how polar our political system has become and how hateful politics can sound. I think there is an element of the Right that is trying to push us farther apart, when in fact most people would consider them closer to the middle if they didn't hear so much hateful and dividing rhetoric.

Having already been thinking along those lines, I enjoyed Maira Kalman's latest post, E Pluribus Unum. It is a reminder to me of all that is good and important and historic about our political process. I wish more people understood the whole political process a lot better. It might decrease some of the hatred and fear-mongering. Or at least, it would make a lot of people less suseptible to the influence of others and help them think for themselves.

Friday FFT

It's eight years from the terrible tragedies of the 9/11 terrorists. I remember the day vividly. It was so surreal. I wake up to the radio each morning, and time it to hear the news while I'm still waking up. The news made no sense that day. I darted out of bed and turned on the TV. It made less sense. I got ready for work in a fog, not quite believing what I had heard and seen.

At work, there was a TV set up in a conference room. We wandered in and out of the conference room throughout the day, watching the news in disbelief. I cried with Gianna as we tried to process what we were seeing and hearing, still not quite ready to accept the reality of it all.

I read some of the Views of a Day in the New York Times today. It was good.

Friday Food For Thought

Did You Know...

This provided the teacher in me with plenty of food for thought. Specifically, I was thinking how important it is for all of us to learn to be good critical thinkers and problem solvers. We need to learn to be flexible and adaptable. It's important that we know facts (like learning about history and math), but the biggest impact that information will have on us is in helping us to create a framework on which we can build the problem solving and critical thinking.

Create

I've been thinking lately that I've not been putting time into some of the things that make me happy. I've just been working and going with the flow. This needs to stop. I need to be more deliberate in choosing what I do and making time for the things that matter most. I need to create more. I need to read more. I need to exercise more. All of these things make me feel good about myself and make me better at being good to others.

This is my thought for a Friday.

"All About Us is Din"

This morning, I saw a new president sworn in. The world is in economic turmoil. There is war all around. Many in the world and the nation are suffering.

We live in a great nation. We have a peaceful transition of power. The process was followed from start to finish. I don't live in fear that my vote does not count or is not counted. Men prayed at the inauguration.

Many have died for this day. We are not always right, but the constitutional republic is a beautiful thing.