Generalist with a background in software development.
Relaunching my career after a 9 year parenting career break.
Investigating career paths to transition from software development to operations/project management and build career capital.
Learning useful skills; socializing, leadership, scrum, agile, cloud computing, kanban.
One company. You are right about too many eggs in one basket. I’m expanding my search to more companies and focusing on operations roles.
I learned recently my resume is too generic, not targeted enough to the roles and needs quantifiable accomplishments.
I’m updating...Thank you.
How do you manage participants who fear being judged and may be afraid to interact with the group?
The last 18 months I have applied to 9+- roles at a company I am very interested in and received rejections for 6 roles. 4 roles are under review. I reached out to a recruiter and he said the hiring managers expressed no interest to interview me. Should I stop applying at that company? I am afraid I may be annoying the recruiters if continue to apply to their jobs after so many rejections. What do you think?
I find your comments fun and authentic. I like your approach to voicing your concern that you don’t know something and it helps filter good managers.
“The goal of interviews is not to pass them (that’s the wrong goal, I claim). The goals I recommend are:
Reducing uncertainty regarding what places will accept you. (so you should get many rejections, it’s by-design, otherwise you’re not searching well)”
I get very anxious the closer I am to interview day. I am researching how to get really good and started doing mock interviews to practice.
Shifting to reducing uncertainty/research vs passing seems helpful.
What systems could be designed to mitigate risks of people taking advantage of others? What about spreading the knowledge of how we are influenced? With this knowledge, we can recognize these behaviors and turn off our auto pilots so we can defend ourselves from bad actors. Or will that knowledge being widespread lead to some people using this knowledge to do more damage?
“I have lots of goals. I have a goal of improving the world. I have a goal of enjoying time with my children. I have a goal of being a good spouse. I have a goal of feeling connected in my friendships and community. Those are all fine goals, but they’re not the same.” This post is one of my favorite articles in the EA program. Written in clear, easy to understand language and goes straight to how I feel. I have confusing emotions about doing the most good.
Having clear and separate goals sounds helpful. Using some resources to go to a movies or meet a friend for coffee is ok. I am having a tougher time deciding whether to stop donating to areas that are close to me. Should I stop donating money in Haiti and instead donate more to high impact areas? This is a tough choice and I am still struggling with deciding.
fold dance community sounds wonderful and fun :)
I saw what seemed like potential communities over the years “soccer club, improv comedy club, local toastmasters” but I was afraid… to be myself, being judged, making a fool of me, worried about being liked… so I passed. Here I am now in EA giving it a shot. I may go to the improv comedy mtgs soon. According to Hari’s “Lost connections” finding a community is very important; we social animals and don’t do well in loneliness.
“Growing up, it felt like the message I got from society was: one person just can’t do much.”
I relate and it’s sad how often I hear people say that. I was reading Hari’s “Lost Connections” when I had a Big aha moment; I thought I need to find my tribe, a community. That investigation led me to eventually find this community. I am floored by how many people are exploring ways to do good better.
I found this article helpful. I noticed some of the career paths I am considering are listed in your “Organization building, running, and boosting” aptitudes” skills group. You helped me in my career path investigation. I am learning there is a strong correlation with the careers at the top of that list. This helps me expand my search and not box myself into a narrow list of choices.
I enjoyed reading your notes. Some things I really like about your notes:
Seeing evidence that EA welcomes critique and disagreements
your notes reinforce encourage me to be cautious of agreeing with others because of my ‘people pleasing’ trait.
Your courage to speak freely and openly about your beliefs; feels very refreshing, authentic and inspiring
I am new to EA. I have never been in a community of so many people working for similar goals. One of the biggest attractions of EA is the possibility of using my career to do more good. Before EA I had no concrete or better plan how to go about doing good better.
One of my concerns and uncertainty is my motive. Am I here to do good or for self-serving reasons? Does the idea of “doing good ” and others seeing me do good what motivates me? Am I unconciously fooling myself? Not sure. I hope to resolve more uncertainties with time exploring and learning.
I find your summary and examples helpful. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Here’s another examples from chatgpt I found useful:
“Consider the belief that “regular exercise contributes to better health.” This belief is connected to sensory experiences and anticipations. If someone adheres to a regular exercise routine, they may anticipate improved well-being, increased energy levels, and positive changes in their physical condition. The belief is grounded in empirical evidence and aligns with sensory experiences related to the benefits of exercise.
On the other hand, imagine a belief like “wearing a specific color underwear guarantees good health.” This belief lacks a connection to sensory experience and does not provide meaningful anticipations. It is a “floating” belief because it lacks empirical support and doesn’t contribute to a realistic understanding of the factors influencing health. In the context of the article, the focus is on promoting beliefs that are firmly grounded in sensory experiences and contribute to accurate predictions and understanding.”
“One of the nice things about operations management is that it is often just a mindset, a way of looking at things, and an attitude that makes a person competent.[18] You should always be thinking about how to increase the efficiency of systems ”
This mindset seems a strength that i believed was a weird quirk. I tend to notice and want to experiment ways to improve or automate systems.
“I also want to note that one difficulty with learning this is understanding the applicability if you haven’t had relevant experiences… It is hard to understand how Six Sigma or Kanban or Queuing Theory might be useful without sufficient context.”
This point helps me look at my past experiences in a more positive light. The years I worked in 3-6 month waterfall development projects seem inefficient and wasteful. We could have solved and prevented many more problems with SCRUM, ex better team collaboration, getting user feedback sooner and adapting to change.
These experiences help me see the learning’s potential more clear than I may have before experiencing the inneficincy of waterfall.
I didn’t undertand this article on the first read. I had trouble understanding and spent two days coming back to this article. I wasn’t sure what was wrong. Did I not like the writing; is it too complicated; a topic I am not interested in?
After using ChatGPT to clarify parts of the articles I arrived at this conclusion: I believe the writing is too complicated for me to extract the author’s message in a single reading. I expected the articles of Intro to EA to be easier to understand.
I see the connection between beliefs and anticipation now but I am not sure if I fully understand this yet.
“If you start off disagreeing with someone then change your mind, that can be hard to admit, but we think that should be celebrated.”
This is hard and scary to do depending on the situation. I am starting to notice more when I change my mind and how it feels.
Here’s updated links to these tests:
IPIP-NEO
https://drj.virtualave.net/IPIP/index.html
HEXACO
https://survey.ucalgary.ca/jfe/form/SV_0icFBjWwyHvJOfA
Thank you for this post on how to acquire these skills and experience. I am considering transitioning to ops. I did not see many of my innate skills as skills until I started reading this post and some of the comments. I saw my strengths and skills as peculiar things, habits, personality traits (sometimes annoying to my friends, wife and kids ). This post is very empowering :)
I found your input valuable. Thank you!
I found the updated links:
IPIP-NEO
https://drj.virtualave.net/IPIP/index.html
HEXACO
https://survey.ucalgary.ca/jfe/form/SV_0icFBjWwyHvJOfA
I never thought of that lol. I am curious about the kind of video games people in ops like.