Why do Professors LOVE Busywork?

I think it’s about time I bitch about how much I hate busywork. Actually, this seems to be a recurring, talking about things that I hate but… such is life. So, you’re paying $10-20 thousand a year to “learn” at your average university, only to discover that this learning wasn’t really learning at all – the professors were handing you piles of busywork with no real goal other than to make it seem like you’re actually doing something. Sometimes I feel like I’ve learned more by reading Wikipedia articles and watching the History Channel… and those are free.

Whatever happened to learning things that are worthwhile that you can take outside of the class? You’re forced to sit through 4 years of school to gain a degree that only serves as a mechanism to get your foot in the door and in actuality teaches you little to none about your chosen profession. I’ve learned a hundred times more outside of the classroom than in it… maybe it’s time to bring learning back into the classroom? Step it up, profs. Stop the busywork. After all, I am helping pay your salary…

This is not to say ALL professors operate like this, but I feel a vast majority do. Hell, most professors = epic fail. What do you think?

Do Your Comments Add Value?

One of my biggest pet peeves is when people comment just for the sake of commenting. I hate it. It’s like when you try to stimulate conversation with someone and they add no value to it by saying “haha” or “k”. Responses to blogs that bring no new perspective to the table really irk me, though. You have people that tend to comment just to comment – that’s fine and all, but at least bring some new argument, perspective, or something worthwhile to the table. Don’t spew out something long and convoluted that only serves to confuse potential readers. I understand the need to get your name out there but… add some value, start a conversation.

value
–noun
1. relative worth, merit, or importance

Before you comment on a blog, Facebook, or Twitter, ask yourself a few things:

1) Why?
2) Why should others read it or respond to it?
Is my comment interesting enough to spur conversation further?
3) Where’s the value?
Is it funny, informative, etc?

What Motivates You?

A huge, huge problem I’ve been having over the course of the last 8 weeks at school is finding a reliable source of motivation – I’ve done less than stellar on my exams, slacked, and been an all around bum. Totally odd behavior for me (well, maybe some of my friends will disagree…). I had no motivation to speak of. I couldn’t find it. I lacked will to do things well. I lacked desire to write. I lost my muse. Days had become monotonous, waking at 9:35 and making it to my <sarcasm> favorite class by 10:00 (Quantitative Business Analysis… too much fun) </sarcasm>. It was a mix of a blah feeling and a general disinterest for bland and uninteresting required coursework for my major.

However, yesterday, things seemed to change. My outlook started lookin’ a little brighter again. Had a great workout, one of the best I’ve had in a long time. Put it all in perspective really. If I keep attacking all my tasks like I do the gym (4 days a week), I can accomplish anything. I can push through the apparent writers block, the lack of motivation, and the dislike for humanity in general I’ve had the last quarter. If this was a week ago, I’d be sleeping instead of producing content which I’ve been too lazy to touch since the summer. Reach your breaking point. Re-evaluate your motivation. Go.

What motivates you?

3 Ways the World Cup is like the Business World (via ScheySalesCentre’s Blog)

I was given the honor of guest blogging on The Sales Centre @ OU’s blog last week. I’ve re-posted it here for convenience.

I apologize for not updating this blog as frequently as I have in the past, I’ve been trying to figure out exactly what I want to accomplish with this blog. More to come very soon!

—–

1. Poor Planning = Poor Results I’ve mentioned this in a prior blog post of mine, but it really rings true in the World Cup and business as a whole. If you don’t plan effectively, you’ll find yourself lost, confused, and showing little to no results for whatever effort you’ve put in. When pitching an idea to OU and TSC alum Bob Fenner, he reacted… not as favorably as I thought he might. He only had one question for me: what are your goals with th … Read More

via ScheySalesCentre's Blog

What’s Wrong with Simplicity?

A recent criticism I received of some of my graphic design work is that it’s too… simple. But, what I can’t wrap my head around is – why would you make anything more complicated than it needs to be? What’s wrong with simplicity and minimalism in not only design, but in other facets of life? I’ll always go by the old adage “keep it simple, stupid“.

If there’s too much going on in your life, simplify it. Simplify your tasks. Simplify your goals. If you get too complicated, you risk being caught in a web of complexity that will impede any progress you want to see on your goals. This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t rise to the challenge and go above and beyond; the opposite, in fact. The human race has an odd tendency to view life in a far more complicated manner than it ever should be.

Keep it simple. Don’t listen to criticism for the sake of criticism. You’ll see success.

“Love, live life, proceed, progress.” – Lil Wayne (didn’t think you’d be seeing wisdom from him, did you?)

Show Some Love

To start off, I don’t mean romantic love – I mean showing love. If someone does something good, worthy of praise, the best option is to show them love and appreciation for what they do. However, this “love movement” is almost entirely lost in some groups – not with the purpose to offend, but because it’s simply overlooked. People tend to under-appreciate the workings of other people; it’s just human nature.

But, we can work to make things better, to show people appreciation, to show that what they do matters and dramatically and dynamically affects you as a person. It’s as simple as a RT on Twitter, comment on Facebook, or a short e-mail. People are fueled by praise and recognition, humble or not. People that are shown love will always produce better work, and I don’t think I need to provide droves of numbers and data to prove that.

RTs, tweets in general, and other public comments (I believe) will yield greater results in attitude and overall atmosphere. Not only will people feel a greater pride in the work you are showing love for, but others on the outside will have the opportunity to see that these people are worthy of their attention.

So, today, I challenge you: if you see someone doing great work, show them some love. Tweets, RTs, Facebook comments, e-mails, whatever; if they are doing a great job, make it known. Show some love.

Twitter Adds Ability to Follow Yourself (Satire)

In response to Facebook adding the ability to like your own comments, Twitter has done the unthinkable: they’ve added the ability to follow yourself. This was done to attract more Facebook users into the vast Twitterverse by increasing the amount of useless things users can do to give the user some feeling of “interactivity”. This came as a shock to many Twitter users (or “Tweeps”), who’ve seen rapidly increasing fail whale sightings while surfing the world wide web.

Onlookers of the ongoing feud between Facebook and Twitter have speculated that soon enough, Facebook will implement the much clamored for idea to add yourself as a friend, opening up a virtual world of what “could be” in social media.

</satire>

Facebook adds the ability to “like” your own comments on your own statuses? What purpose does this serve, exactly? I think some people will argue that this advances something-or-other regarding social media, but I believe the opposite – it’s a blatant, further degeneration of Facebook.

Facebook is a sinking ship! All aboard the fail whale into the Twitterverse!

That’s another thing I hate – the term “Twitterverse”. Another term I hate even more? “Tweeps”. Stop using it. I don’t want to be your “Tweep”… I’m not even sure if I fully grasp what that means.

As for now, I’m weaning off Facebook – gonna keep ridin’ the fail whale.

Thanks to Austin Hutchison for the idea for this post – make sure to visit his blog @ http://blog.austinhutchison.com

3 Ways World of Warcraft Can Help Social Media & Business Understanding

For roughly 3 years between my sophomore and senior years of high school, World of Warcraft (WoW for short) wasn’t simply a game – it was my life. To help hit this point home, when I quit, my level 70 Dwarf Hunter had about 50 days played on it. That’s 1200 hours of me physically being at the computer (at least I didn’t make myself seem like a total loser </sarcasm>). But, much like Twitter, WoW required some pretty simple, yet demanding things in order to truly succeed.

1. Relationship Building & Networking

Towards the latter end of your leveling days, 70 was the max level at the time, you almost HAD to find a decent group of individuals that you could tolerate, but more importantly could tolerate you. If no one on your server liked you (you were pompous, ridiculous, etc), the ability for you to find this group of individuals (a guild) was slim to none. You needed this group to foster in the ability to raid in the end-game, or basically continue playing after you’ve hit the maximum level. If you weren’t good at networking, you were effectively dust in the wind – even more so if you weren’t good at your role. World of Warcraft has several networking features, including but not limited to:

• Friends Lists – ability to add people you like to a list and see if they are online or offline.
• Groups – ability to get in a small group in order to tackle obstacles you can’t do solo.
• Raids – ability to get in a large group (of up to 40) in order to overcome more difficult obstacles.
• Guilds – ability to be included in a group of individuals that shares a specific chat channel (guild chat), where you can talk, network, plan raids, etc.

Just like in social media, networking is the lifeblood. If you can’t connect, you will fail (or, in the case of WoW, become bored and quit).

2. 7 P’s and Strategy

In the end-game, WoW is very strategy intensive on the occasional raid boss. Some of them require very specific strategy and timing, or else the rate of failure is high. For instance, one boss, Chromaggus in the Molten Core raid instance, required to be tranquilized (or tranq’d) by a hunter, or he would enrage and go into a frenzy, greatly increasing his damage output and putting your chance of survival very low.

This is similar to the social media/business spheres – without strategy, your likelihood of failure is great. This is very much like the 7 P’s – Prior Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance. You prepare piss poor, your results are piss poor. It’s as simple as that. If you do plan properly, your guild or business could see success against a raid boss, like these guys:

3. Recruiting & Maintaining Guild Members (or Employees)

In end-game raid situations, the guild/raid leader is effectively the employer, whereas all the guild/raid members are employees. If you do what the raid leader says (assuming they’re not a complete moron), you will achieve GREAT SUCCESS! If not, prepare to do pretty awful. Anyways, in order to constantly see raid progression without significant time sinks and road blocks, a constant flow of new blood is necessary. Employers must look for the next, best, and greatest talent in order to achieve success. If people couldn’t perform their duties well in raids and refused to fix it, they would be replaced by someone more willing to do the work. If you were willing to do the work, you would consistently raid and be rewarded in rare armor, weapons, etc. It’s really a difference between looking like a total bum or looking like you’re the shit (virtually, of course).

Do you want to be a badass, or do you want to be a bum? The choice is yours.

Listen (Better Business by Creeping)

Keep an ear to the ground.

This is of course an idiom meaning “pay attention to what’s happening around you/pay attention to rumors“. Your greatest enemy in social media can also be your greatest ally – the open forum (Facebook, Twitter, etc). If you’re not doing well in social media spheres, it’s easy as hell to figure out why. All you have to do is creep. Creeping consists of following updates on groups (and individuals, but that’s a bit stalker-esque), not interacting with it/them, and taking note of what they say. For all intents and purposes, it’s like producing a poll about your products; however, you don’t have to goad people into answering. They’ve already answered without you even producing the question. Of course, you must at some point supplement these with polls to truly get a grasp on the direction your market is heading. The search boxes on Twitter and Facebook are officially your best friend and companion.

Happy creeping.

(image obtained via scientificamerican.com)

Networking? 3 Things I’ve Learned

Do you network effectively? I know I’m not the best at it, and it’s something I’ve struggled with – but it’s something I’m working on. These are three quick bits I’ve picked up over the last couple months that have been invaluable to me in the quest for an ever-expanding network, to be that one-in-one-thousand that knows more people than any person rightfully should.

1) Don’t sit on the sidelines.
When you’re in a networking situation, don’t stick solely to those you know and feel most comfortable around. I know a lot of people tend to beat this extremely vague and general rule into the ground, but it’s incredibly important and vital that you follow it.

2) Continually open doors for everyone.
One would logically be lead to believe that those you’ve known for a long while would be the most likely to open doors for you. However, in reality this tends to work out in the opposite manner. Those we know the least tend to open the most doors for us. I think this seemingly broken and illogical system can be repaired if you continually find and open doors for old friends and acquaintances alike. Stay frosty and don’t be overcome by the status quo (and it’s so easy to get lazy in the summer).

3) “It’s not who you know, it’s who knows you.”
In any industry, it’s great that you know a lot of people – you can ask favors, yada yada. However, if people know you and recognize you, they are more likely to do business with you. For example, if you were a soccer coach and you had two choices of uniform suppliers for your team – Nike or Diadora – which would you choose? I’m goin’ with Nike. It’s all about brand recognition baby, whether the brand is personal or a company. If people know you and like what you offer, business will be simple.

(obtained via cis.cornell.edu)

Does anyone have anything to add?