Black people included

Buckets, puzzles, recipes, pitches and snags.

2010-11-23T11:31:00.000-08:00

I've mentioned that I worked as a consultant before. Really the job that I performed was to do quick research on certain topics and give my customers ideas to choose from.

I had quite a bit of experience with computers to draw on, but when you work in any tech field there is always going to be something new to learn.

Buckets:

I call a bucket anything that needs filling in my life. Sometimes I fill my own buckets. Sometimes I fill other people's buckets. A housewife might need to have meals ready. A construction work might need to buy a tool. Fresh towels, clean clothes, coffee and sugar in the cupboard, the money for an Internet connection ready to pay the bill. The trash is getting full (to use a literal bucket).

I have a bucket for charity. I have a bucket for my weekly rent. If I'm lucky I have pre-defined buckets to fill at work.

Recipes:

Sometimes buckets are simple to fill and only require the most basic of recipes like clearing off a desk or counter top. Getting ready in the morning when I wake up isn't very complex either, just a series of steps. A clean bathroom is a bit more complex. There are different places that need cleaning and each one takes a recipe, a specific set of instructions that build up your know-how.

Working in Information Technology you find that there are a number of big hairy problems thrown at you in different shapes, varieties and velocities at any given time. People can't get online. Someone has a virus. Someone else wants remote connectivity to their desktop at work. Someone wants a collaborative e-mail environment set up for their workforce.

Recipes should also include the tools that you need.

Puzzles:

I'm sure everyone is familiar with what a problem is. A pipe burst in the cellar. A bill collector calls. You forgot the baby's bottle at home. Your excise tax is due. Your neighbor put a fence three feet within the zone of your property. Tension with a loved one.

My role as a computer tech has been for much of my life a series of other people's problems thrown at me. I didn't resent that, I looked forward to it. These have always been puzzles for me more than problems.

To solve these puzzles I took two steps. First, I got a list of what buckets needed to be filled. Even if I didn't make a physical list on a piece of paper, I still had to know what they were. If I had not addressed this particular problem before, I would check on the Internet and see if someone else had to get ideas about what to do. After finding a potential solution I would pitch it to my customer and talk over the pros and cons. If they agreed, I would implement the recipe or "solution".

Tip: bad ingredients for recipes include disappointment and blame in order to reach objectives. Avoid these ingredients like the plague.

Snags:

Snags are present in everyone's lives. Even if the snag isn't yours, sometimes other people around you have snags that affect you. I define a snag as something that I don't have the ability to achieve on my own (or in some cases, haven't looked at objectively enough to create a recipe for).

A snag is where someone gets stuck. For one reason or another someone can't satisfy something that they either want or need to get done.

From my personal experience, I've always wanted to go on a vacation that I wanted to go on (rather than tagging along with someone else who's going somewhere I don't have much interest in). I simply haven't known how to address that problem. Frankly, I haven't ever had much interest in marching off in disgust in order to make it happen in spite of others.

Some people say that it is the words that we use that define our outlook in life. I find that only partially true. When someone is upset, relaying those emotions have distinct words. If you resent something, you resent it. There's no ifs, ands, ors, or buts about it. If you're upset, you're upset. Saying that you're "mildly distressed" is only going to delay the problem. You either resent something or you don't.

But when it comes to directions that you are going to take, when you are defining your approach to a given situation, changing the words you use has the power to get you un-snagged.

I said I simply haven't known how to address that problem. I think the issue here is that you can't address a problem. In and of itself if you call something a problem, you're calling it something that you don't want, and if you don't want something the last thing you want to do is be patient enough to look at it.

You'll likely only want to make your problem someone else's problem.

So what if my problem isn't a problem, but a puzzle? A puzzle that I can make buckets for? Buckets that I define that need filling? One bucket might be a place to put money aside for the vacation. Another bucket might be the ideas that I have for the places I'd like to go. Makes sense to me.

Now what I have isn't a problem, but a puzzle, and a recipe to fill some buckets.

I've had neck pain for the past few years. There are two common recipes for this. 1.) Go to the doctor, get prescription or therapy, repeat. 2.) Visit a chiropractor.

I did that a couple of times and it didn't do squat for me. Instead of taking the regular recipes over and over again, I found a series of simple stretches, and practiced some different posture techniques. I had to suffer through it, which wasn't pleasant at all, but I came through it.

Do you know how many recipes I had to try? About a thousand, but now I have just what I need to keep my neck and shoulder pain at bay. Three posture instructions I tell myself and three quick and easy stretches that take no more than fifteen seconds. That's my recipe.

Pitches:

There are some buckets that can't be filled by you. Sometimes you don't have the money. Sometimes you would have to learn an entirely different trade. In any case, someone else has to fill a bucket for you in order to get you out of a snag.

You're going to have to make a pitch -- unless you're going the mercenary route (which I don't advise).

It's a baseball metaphor. And you can throw all sorts of pitches.

In baseball the goal of a pitch is to strike out the batter. The goal for our pitches however have to do with us BOTH getting to first base. It's an exchange, a barter, a fair deal. It's a dance of figuring out which buckets you need filled and which buckets I need filled.

How many situations do you think you could un-snag with that philosophy?

Lets say for instance that I don't know how to build a website. How can I get that to happen? I can do all the reading and work on my own or I can get someone else to help. In order to do that I have to come up with a pitch, a recipe for sort of partnership.

The pitch needs to define the parts people are going to play. It is a partnership after all. Who is going to fill which needs? Are additional people going to be needed in order to satisfy other requirements?

In video games, it's easy. The roles are predefined. In World of Warcraft and many other role playing games you need a tank (someone to take the damage while you defeat the monster), a ranged attacker (someone who stands off at a distance to throw high-damage attacks), a healer (to keep everyone alive), and a berserker (for dealing damage when there are multiple assailants). That isn't a spot on description, but it's a decent example of pre-defined roles laid out by some game makers.

In most life situations, you'll need to follow someone else's example or come up with these roles on your own by looking at the variety of puzzles that you have in your life or business situation.

Games develop when people are stuck, competitions on the same team, making goals further off if reachable at all. What you need to figure out is who is getting stuck, where they are getting stuck, and determine what recipe is going to get that situation flowing again.

Identifying The Grind.

2010-11-14T11:10:00.000-08:00

The bathroom is dirty again. I'm going to have to clean it. Again.

It didn't dawn on me that The Grind was the very label that most of the rest of society uses to define the unpleasant repetitive tasks that we are left to do in our daily lives.

These tasks aren't altogether unrewarding. Grinding (as it has been dubbed by video game players) yields us access to things in both video games and real life.

I know intuitively that I've neglected to look at this aspect of my life -- for most of my life.

Grinding (see the wikipedia definition) in my recent favorite free video game, The Lord of the Rings Online has dealt mostly with hunting wild animals and gathering ore in the forests of the surrounding areas, gathering their pelts and furs, and then returning to workbenches and furnaces to craft tailored items. I chose a hunter class for the character.

In the game, as I repeat these tasks, I gain experience in that given craft. If I make more cloaks, I get experience toward my Tailoring mastery, I come closer to being an expert in the craft. This makes it possible for me to make, for example, more extravagant clothing and padded armor.

In other words, my daily back-and-forth of gathering stuff and tailoring it to my needs increases my know-how, and my know-how is where I become a master, an expert, the best at doing a particular thing.

Life isn't much different, but The Grind in life doesn't have an avatar that runs without food and water. While my online character might roar when in battle, my physical persona would feel pain and like to rest a lot more often than my level sixteen dwarf needs to (which is never).

Is anyone on the planet bored of cleaning the bathroom? I get that way, apathetic. Fortunately for me I currently live in a rooming house, so while I still have to watch the messes that I make, I don't have to worry about the thorough cleanings that someone who owns their own home might. All I have to be concerned about is my room, and since I can't have company due to the rules of this place, I don't even have that motivation to keep it tidy.

Laundry is another grind. Sometimes I wonder if The Grind is a term created from sharpening axes and refining wheat, or if it's more of a matter of what people do with their teeth when they have to do laundry again this week.

I mention laundry as an example because I don't mind it. I like doing laundry. I don't like carrying my clothes four blocks to a laundromat, but I really don't mind swapping the clothes in and out of the machines or folding them when they are dry.

I used to hate folding laundry.

I didn't know how to fold shirts well, but after a few pointers I straightened up and was able to take my time enough with it that I could breath through folding laundry. It became a cathartic exercise, releasing. Maybe even zen-like. I made conversation with the ladies at the laundromat and got their pointers. I asked a few questions. I tried a few methods.

I can't tell you how many years I refused to ask others how to do something I was having trouble with. Homework to housework, I assumed it was entirely my responsibility to know how to do everything on my own. Rare it was that I would find a soul who showed me how to do anything. I usually gave up.

But life doesn't have to be like that. If there is anything you need to know how to do, there is always someone around somewhere who can help you figure out how. If you are in a place where there is no one who can show you how to do something, find another place where someone does.

There are many ways that a person can address The Grind, but primarily, most importantly I think the message I would like to convey about the difficulties of The Grind is this: there is always a way to do it without anyone involved having to become emotionally or physically depleted.

Contests of value

2010-11-12T19:18:00.000-08:00

One man can call another man devoid of skills and that man may or may not be lying. In other words, you can call me unskilled in a particular discipline and you might be accurate. When it comes to sewing, for instance, I'm just no good at it.

This doesn't seem to be that much of a problem for me. Specifically, if you would tell me that my skills as a troubleshooter in technical support were shoddy, you would be a liar. I'm one of the best software troubleshooters on the planet. That isn't a matter of competition. I just am.

A person's value though, that's a different topic. It might seem like it's the same thing, to be unskilled versus someone making a claim that another human being is not valuable enough to keep around.

Every human being is valuable enough to keep around. Even a mass-murderer, if imprisoned, is still capable of contributing to society. Even if it's just knitting.

One could debate that the cost of the man's imprisonment wouldn't be covered by his humane labor, but that might be the crux of it.

The question becomes this: when does one man have a right to call another man a disappointment? That is where the question of a person's value comes in to play.

No man can be a disappointment to anyone other than those he is responsible for. Those are questions for God to answer. No man can measure the struggle in another man's heart -- or a woman's (with except rare exceptions by maybe Jesus and Mohammad or Buddha).

There are things to appreciate about any human being.

Take the glass is half full versus the glass is half empty, a metaphor often used to determine one's outlook to situations on a regular basis. The insinuation (as I intuitively gather) is that this means that I am either a negative or positive person at the time.

In the same regard, contests of value can be used in much the same way. One can try and sway the opinion of people to look at a person's value as the half empty glass, convince others that the person devoid of value. One could also attempt to have everyone look only at the positive attributes of an individual.

A bad contest, but one that most people have seen I suspect, if they've been to public school in the past few decades.

Contests are everywhere from sweepstakes to marathons. There's nothing wrong with contests in general. People work hard to be the best at something and they want some recognition for it. Nothing wrong with recognizing people for their hard work and applied talents. I don't see anything wrong with raising awareness of a product though the buzz of a giveaway.

But when it comes to the value of human life, there is no contest. There is no knowledge of what a person will achieve in their life. There is no knowledge of how a person has been wronged unless you have been wronged in the same fashion.

It's a matter of resources and agendas as a goal, but much more subtle than threats and intimidation. Someone might simply try and work harder than me in order to prove he should be more valued.

I myself have been subconsciously attracted to the idea that if I knew more than others about getting computers to work that I would be somehow rewarded.

Don't get me wrong. Knowing how to do what it is that I do is a good thing. A good thing. But it's a matter of struggle, of reason why I should be accepted over another human being.

If I were a famous man: a movie star, the president, a quarterback for a famous football team and I said that my life is worth no more than yours, would that be relieving? Would it make it easier for us to be friends? Would you heart loosen it's grip on the necessity of trying to be something that you are not?

In any regard. I am not a famous man, and I am not a rich man. I keep the bonds I have with those that I love the best I can. I try and learn skills and employ them in manners that offer me both reward and relief. I am fair to others and myself as best I can be, to the limits of my humanity.

These limits, these reasonable places where our commitments stop reaching, are often the reason that these contests of value take place. Because when you are made to work harder and faster than you are capable of, when you are beyond your limits, your human heart has no recourse but to try and find blame.

I have no need to be more than myself. I appreciate about life what I appreciate. You appreciate about life what you appreciate.

Often people get confused there, I think, where people's appreciations become mixed. Keyword coming up here: when people's appreciation become mixed, not knowing what they truly enjoy about life, these appreciations become a matter of value, then developing a contest over it.

Rather than a one-to-one connection, appreciation turns into a tool of bartering.

I will qualify this.

My vanilla ice cream has fallen victim to this time and time again. In fact my vanilla ice cream has been so shamed that I feel like less than a person to admit that I love it. It's been suggested that my poor vanilla ice cream has no flavor at all. A travesty.

The best flavor? It hasn't been decided yet. It's a moving target. It's somewhere between velvet hazelnut frappuccino and lemon raspberry gingerbread.

Those sound pretty great actually. And if those flavors are ever made, I'll be sure and try them. But the point of this is not to make your mouth water. The point I'm trying to make is that favoritism is what becomes a matter of value for contests.

Per quart I would have to guess that these ice creams are probably the same amount of money. So the value that I'm talking about here isn't summed up in dollars and change. It's the kudos. And what flavors get which kudos.

I have to ask. When was the last time you actually tried to taste vanilla? I don't mean put vanilla in your stomach. I mean taste it. That is where the appreciation is.

Don't get me wrong. I know flavors get boring. Day in, day out, vanilla. I get it. Who wants vanilla all the time? I'm not saying that you're supposed to like vanilla all the time.

The right sneakers: Air Jordan's, I have to admit, I love the freaking sneakers. All I can afford is New Balances. They work well enough. But the contest? The contest tells us that only Air Jordan's will do.

But that is where the contest of value is: the attributes of things. Where they came from. Who made them. What color they are. Is it a gay color? Is it a boring flavor. Does it send the right message?

As I sat in the middle of a value-contest today (one that I won't remark on due to the highly sensitive nature of these contests -- hence why I used ice cream) I asked myself this question: why do I feel so threatened by these contests of value?

I came up with the answer. I don't feel safe within them. It isn't because I'm incapable of competing. I am of a decent enough build. I have my hair. My teeth look okay. I could buy some different clothes. I can throw a decent right. I could use hurtful wit to make other people feel bad. I could intimidate people who are friends with pretty girls.

But for who? For what? For someone who loves my contest winnings? Someone who loves my trophies and not me as a person?

Is that person going to take care of me when I'm sick? Are they going to give a shit if someone I love dies? Would that person be my partner in our common struggles or someone who only wants to show me off?

The only reason these contests hold power over people is because they contain intrinsically the power to gloat. Gloating is a large piece of the least important material on the planet.

Compare winner and loser with the word brother or sister. With the word friend. How about with fellow human being. Instinctively when these things are paired, the contests seem to shut down, moral fortitude kicks in. But to have these things removed and to have only the contests of value to drive one towards more for you life, how do they end?

These contests not only contain the power to gloat at the end of the race, but the unerring ability to eventually evolve violence and abandonment, even murder.

Take inner city folk. I'm one of them presently. In these parts the most people have to look forward to is welfare and food stamps (and pantries). People are suffocated for both resources and dignity.

People don't have the money to fix their teeth: they are shamed. People don't have the money for the right sneakers: they are shamed. People don't have the money for food: they are forced to food pantries and food stamps (which face it, is commonly also given shame). People don't have the strength to carry things from point A to point B so they use a shopping cart: they are shamed. People don't have transportation so they buy a SCOOTER: they are shamed.

And amidst all these shames, amidst all these hardships that one has to endure, throw on top of the the gloating of the "haves". Those who think it looks "silly" that people are on scooters. The people who are doing the shaming. The people who have won the value contests.

Couple that with the pressure of being the right kind of anything.

Here is the fundamental hypocrisy that I find in these attitudes. Any of these people who put another nail in these situations has never had to go through the same struggle.

I've stated before in this blog that it is necessary to have support in order to thrive, and I suspect that most of the people who will read ever read this blog have the support that the people I'm talking about don't have.

You have some sort of an Internet connection. You have (or had) parents who cared about you and passed down the values of their heritage. You've had some sort of an education where it's been more important to learn than to prove you aren't fit to be the Rudolph of the school, the scapegoat of angst, the sacrifice for our inadequacies.

If I had to wager, I'd put my money that that is what we are all afraid of at our core. That we are the ones who are going to be outcast, shamed, un-needed, deserving of being offed.

Our tailored suits might cover it. A BMW might provide a temporary place to hide. A good education might provide a safe vantage point to throw rocks from for a while. Having taken advantage of a good opportunity might even breed the illusion that everyone has them available (as not all people can meet the same opportunities that someone else did -- unless they are supposed to have the same valued attributes, I suppose).

These things build up. Tensions rise from the contests of value. Parents hold out a carrot for their kids. "Hey, if you're more like this, I might actually invest in you."

Children see that the guys on the football team are more admired by the pretty girls. So what's more important? Sports or education?

Television shows young ladies that it's more important to be thin than healthy. Young men too.

Triple fruit sorbet or vanilla ice cream? Vans, Chucks, or Air Jordan's? Electric scooter or Harley? Can I get away with just riding a bicycle?

The right stuff. That is what these contests are calling for. Smoke weed or not smoke weed? Drop acid or not drop acid? Drive recklessly or not drive recklessly? Get a loud radio to harass every living person within three blocks or not use a loud radio to harass every living person within three blocks?

Permission gets drawn from the attributes that others place value in, rather than from the guidance of our fathers, our mothers, our teachers.

None of these contests of value will ever tell you what things mean to you. The trading market of the perfect attributes of people and things will never get you to happiness. They will never build an unbreakable bond with another human being. They will never, ever tell you what you find important about life.

These contests encourage people to believe they are failures. Because they use shopping carts and scooters to alleviate their burdens. Because you love a girl for her commitment to the needs of others but everyone else thinks she's worthless because she won't conform. Because you have a preference for vanilla ice cream.

Someday people are going to smell the coffee for themselves rather than for their acceptance. Someday people are going to wake up and realize that the price of a good cigar is precisely the amount of money you paid for the one that you like. Someday people are going to realize that it is these contests of value that create the need to punish people with what they deserve.

Someday people are going to figure it out.

No matter how much others will try and convince us otherwise, no matter how badly the unappreciated want to shame others to get what they want, people will eventually stop being afraid of not meeting the standards of value contests and come to grips with this one simple fact:

We are all worth the same.

Race. Is it a competition or a cooperation?

2010-03-18T07:11:00.000-07:00

What does it mean to be a member of a race? There are a few.

There's a rat race. There's the human race. There are the difference ethnic races.

It's the meaning that the word holds that gives me pause. Are we competing?

The word race means to me that there are different kinds of people in the world. We look different. Remove deodorant and we would probably all smell different.

What bothers me the most about the word race is that it seems all too often that instead of defining differences in order to appreciate different strengths and areas where others can use assistance, it's used to create sentiments of disappointment.

What is a racist? Am I a racist? I'm not sure if that question is so easy to answer. Do I contribute to racism? I'm sure I have accidentally, at one point or another, because I spoke without thinking first.

It's difficult to resist being a racist. There are so many mocking sentiments about other types of people that it can be difficult to find where I truly stand.

Does being a man mean I need to find some way to be superior or does it mean I need to find a way to be more useful?

People take it personally when I choose not to be a member of their clique.

With African Americans living in the United States, I think the situation is even more complex than this. A lot of African Americans are poor. Their heritage has been nearly obliterated by slavery. What has not been restored through personal struggles and prosperity?

Someone decided that the word race is to imply different lineage, different ancestry. It apparently caught on. But does the meaning of the word reflect what is in people's hearts? That's my question.

Is another type of person something to get ahead of?

Taking a walk: Location, location, location.

2010-03-02T08:09:00.001-08:00

The market is a very general term. Based on context it can mean a single building where goods are sold or it can mean the entire network of transactions between business entities.

I've been doing a great deal of walking lately. I've been looking at every proprietorship I can get my eyes on and asking questions about these businesses. Where do they get their stock? What makes their products alluring to me? Why would I want to buy something from them? I wonder how much their rent is. Where do they get customers from? Do any of these business owners have problems they might pay to have resolved? How did they get their start? What buildings would I want to buy in this area if I had the money? Where is the most foot traffic?

It's an old business adage I've heard repeated my entire life. What are the three most important things about business? Answer: Location, location, location. When it comes to business they say this is the most important thing.

My observations lead me to believe this is because different locations have different potential traffic passing by that is going to stop and buy something. There are simply more chances that your product or service will be noticed.

People travel from point A to point B. If you are in the midst of that, you're the most likely to get your products or services noticed.

Where are the customers already traveling? I have portion of my personal website dedicated to energy drinks. I used to have 300+ visitors per day. How likely would I have been able to turn those visits into selling them energy drinks online? Fairly possible I'd say. I created an informational site and put advertising on it. What I didn't think to do was to offer the sale of cases of energy drinks. Nor did I think to create variety cases for sale. I probably should have.

Perhaps that's still a possibility for me.

Customers are also centered around semi-monopolistic companies (meaning companies with a diverse product offering in a particular genre). What if I could market to all of Verizon's customers? Or how about all the people in a particular union?

Where is the watering hole for the customers you want and how can you get near their path to get noticed? Is it a particular website? The chamber of commerce? How about a skating rink? An interstate on-ramp? Someone's home page when they start their browser? A weather report on television? A forum? The entrance to an industrial park? A local user group? A college?

How about a vendor your customers use that is not a direct competitor of yours?

What I've been looking at the most is foot traffic in my city and which businesses prosper from it.

When you don't have traffic (foot, car, or web) to rely on, another marketing principle is the "vertical market". How I was introduced to this business concept is a little different from what I've read. (The definition of a vertical market is not the same in economic text books).

Here is the difference between a regular product or service and one tailored to a "niche market" (I like niche better than vertical. I'm not sure why that term stuck in my head all these years). You could make a DVD player and market it to the consumer - the entire consumer marketplace. You could otherwise make a DVD player that is made specifically for mounting in SUV's.

If you made a DVD player strictly for SUV's, you are going to have less advertising overhead because you're only marketing to SUV manufacturers (or after-market consumers) rather than all people who might by a DVD player.

These smaller markets are typically where one can find business to do with little to no competition. That's why finding a niche is so important. You can get a head start before anyone else shows up rather than compete with others for a share.

I can make web sites for everyone or I can make websites for sporting goods stores. These niche markets are much easier to prepare for because customer requests and complaints are going to be less diverse. You're also going to have a more intimate knowledge of your customers' operational needs. It's a more focused area to work in. If you are not fond of getting tired out, I suggest preparing for niches you are interested in.

Think about your skills and open up the yellow pages. You'll probably think of two or three niches in about five minutes just by looking at how these businesses are grouped.

If I were a computer person (which I am), my best bet would probably be to get familiar with the most profitable businesses in my area and get on the phone with someone who works there to ask them what problems they face that I could help get acquainted with -- even offering to work for free in order to get familiar with their needs on a trial basis.

How would that sound if you were a business owner? I need customers so I'll work for you for free for three hours in order to get you as a client. No obligations. Does that sound like a fair deal?

That three hours I spend with them can help me pitch an even better deal for the next customer with similar problems in the market. It will get me acquainted with their software and operational needs. Most of all it will let me know almost immediately what is bothering them the most about their computers.

And knowing what computer problems a customer has (as a computer guy) is pure gold when it comes to preparing options to make pitches to customers in a niche market.

Two planning approaches

2010-02-25T14:54:00.000-08:00

It could be said another way. It could be said there are two types of gains: short-term and long-term.

When it comes to creating initiatives though, I can only see two options as far as putting my effort into things. Making a fast buck or making a steady buck.

Both require an investment.

As an example, let's take our flag guy who made out by predicting what was going to happen after the 9-11 attacks. He invested in flags, after watching the last time the nation took a hit and what the reaction in the market was. That would be a major success in short term gains as it provided him with a temporary monopoly due to flag availability. He also had the previous experience of watching what happened the last time flags were scarce in the US after a previous tragedy. (Note: when it comes to profiting off of the hardships of others, I'm definitely not a fan.).

In another example, one might continually prepare to make a better pizza in hopes of having it available on command or making awesome pastry. Creating a platform of skills to offer customers on demand. Learning how to write music; that takes some investment.

The difference between to the two seems to be where the investment takes place. The short score would be investing time in watching the reactions of markets so one is prepared for the next lucrative event. The long term score would be to create better foundations for customer offerings, like learning a trade to gain employment but instead creating a way to be ready for your customers.

The risks seem different too. While our flag entrepreneur risks a lot of up front money by purchasing all kinds of flags, the baker risks his vested time in hopes of learning what he must in order to stay afloat.

Next up: Either that "taking a walk" idea I mentioned in the last post or "building the system". I'm not sure which yet.

The principle of regular availability.

2010-02-23T10:08:00.000-08:00

I worked at a pizza take-out restaurant in my late teens and early twenties. While this was a virtual gold-mine for a number of business concepts for me personally, there is one situation that the owner faced that I would like to bring up.

Lunch.

We typically opened at 4pm, on time to prepare food items for the dinner rush. Delivery drivers would flock in the door at 5pm and get ready to make their deliveries. The phones would start ringing.

The owner had taken to showing up much earlier than 4pm. He told me that he was getting calls earlier in the day from some of the local businesses asking for lunch orders. Unfortunately, nothing was prepared. The pizza oven was off. There were no drivers. He had to apologize to them.

I believe when it came to one day where there were five or six people who called asking, he was really interested in the prospect of more orders.

He decided to open at 11am for a few weeks. He did this on and off for a few months. When he would prepare early he wouldn't get any orders. Then later when he would be early but not prepare for lunch, he would get callers asking if he was open.

He was perplexed and he asked me the question. Was it worth it? I had no idea at the time.

Enter Taco Bell. Are they open late? Do you know for sure?

The truth of the matter is that not all Taco Bells are open until 2. I suppose the individual franchise owners decided against it for money's sake so they stopped the 2am advertising to substitute the phrase "Open Late".

I contrasted the ideas between the pizza restaurant owner and Taco Bell. The times were different, but the principle seemed to be the same.

When it's lunch time, who is open? When it's 12pm on a Sunday, who is open?

If I were back at that pizza restaurant I would have said to him, open at 11am. Then market to the businesses and wait. If they know you are open, they are going to get tired of what they eat for lunch eventually and give you a try.

So years later I have an answer for my friend by drawing this conclusion: It isn't so much about whether or not people are going to order for lunch. The real question is, are you an available option for lunch when they are going to eventually order?

That pizza restaurant owner eventually sold the business, but I wish I had known then what I know now. Those customers he turned away would probably not call back even though he had opened. If it were me, I would have started to open the doors at 11am and then delivered one free small cheese pizza, a coupon for another free small cheese (delivered to get them over the hurdle of ordering from us as a habit), and then given them discounts based on individual orders and bulk orders.

Why do people order as a group for lunch? Why do they order alone? How are you going to get new customers over the hump of habit in order to order from you?

People need to learn through experience or advertising that you are available to services their needs. And giving people better options for their lunches would have been a great way to get those folks coming back again and again.

My advice? Really look at the business opportunity and ask more than one or two questions. Then be prepared for what you are going to offer. Then learn to be the best at it.

The question becomes, how do you find what you want to do? How will you know if it's something that you're going to be bored of in just a few months and not want to do it anymore?

Answer: You go for a walk and check some stuff out.

The master document

2010-02-10T07:29:00.001-08:00

I've always been a huge fan of documents. I love maps. I've got a simple map to share that I'm pretty jazzed about. It is an off-shoot of David Allen's Getting Things Done audiobook.

I'm a huge fan of mentors. Mentors in any form when it comes to doing anything. My heroes are the people who inspire me to do things I thought I could never do. David Allen is definitely a mentor of mine. I'm not sure if I can say hero, but his methods are very helpful.

Creative and aspiring minds have difficulty being organized. I noticed this in my mother (who was a floral designer and a painter) and just about any graphic design person or artist I've ever met. Creative people like to talk about stuff, a lot of different things in as many ways as possible. They like to consider all sorts of possibilities.

An annoying byproduct of this is disorganization.

I'm a creative as well, if a tired out one. What I can't train myself to do is to follow David Allen's method exactly but I found something that works just for me, a method for "Getting things done" that isn't as exact as the process that is described in David Allen's book.

What I have done is created a master list. It is a list of goals, projects, and resources. It's my home base, my starting point. It's not perfect, but it's inspired me to be more productive, so I would like to share.

I have a whiteboard that I purchased for $35 at a recycling center. You can get all sorts of interesting things at your local city or town's recycling center. I highly recommend checking one out and asking if they open their doors to the public. I'm not talking about the city dump. I mean the place that typically located in the city industrial park.

On this whiteboard, I made a simple list of what I mentioned above. Goals, resources, and projects. I've also put a few important people on the list.

Simply stated, it is a list with the next thing I'm going to do attached to each list item.

I'm really, really broke so the first item I have on the list is the word "Pantry". Since I have to rely on this for food some weeks, it's good to keep it in mind. There are a number of locations in the city of Fall River where you can get bags of food for free as well as visit to get a hot meal. Since most of them only do this once a week, planning ahead for which one I'm going to visit is usually necessary.

What follows is a full example of my list. Including what would be embarrassing for me if you shared it with your friends. If you're anything like me, your intuitive fingers are going to take a look at my life plans to judge where I'm at in comparison to you. Not a problem. But be gentle with the bragging if you please.

-----------------------------

Pantry - Salvation Army - what days? (need photo id, and mail 4 proof of address 508-679-7900)
7-11 - [nothing to add here but the next time I'm working] Saturday, 2pm
[Friend name] - Propose web app idea
Back account - $50 [current balance]
Temp CC - Review/activate [someone gave me a gift card I need to activate]
Food stamps - make a list for grocery store, plan a ride (current balance could go here too)
Web work
- customer1 - get in touch and ask if any work is needed
- customer2 - waiting on returned email
- customer3 - waiting on returned email
Advertising money
- Pick a subject for long tail article on site
- Write more articles on managing domains for blog
- Sketch out a new layout for rating system on site
Typing job online? - Create a folder to gather costs and options
Stacks of papers - pick up one item and carry it to it's final resting place.
Excise tax letter - plan a trip to DMV to discuss / pay.
Housing paperwork - prep rest of questions / call to review.

-----------------------------

What I have done is to name different projects, people, resources, and ideas (dreams!). Any thing that generates worry or stress can be added to this.

David Allen has a complete system for managing everything when it comes to projects. Unfortunately, my creative/expressive side doesn't gel with the rigidity of that system. I need something that is more fluid. So this is my master list beta test.

What I did first was to list my resources. Bank accounts and places where I know I have money in case I need it. I also listed employers or projects that make money because money is a fairly important topic when it comes to living, no? These aren't exactly projects, but they help me keep a pulse on my finances (as limited as those may be currently). Simply an account balance in some cases.

Do you have any gift cards or coupons that you really want to use but they seem to expire on you? Why not add those to your master list? Every time you have a worry that bothers you, why not list it? You can add a "next simple action" to it any time you like, and you'll be looking at it every day. Any time you feel stress about something you don't know what to do about, you can make an entry on the list.

What? List my worries instead of let them haunt me at random? What fun would that be? I'm being a little facetious. I'm pretty sure no one likes to worry. It doesn't feel good.

Getting Things Done has an entire review system and a complete evaluation method for each actionable thing that comes into your personal world. I don't want an entire review system. I want that incorporated directly in my one-pager. It also stresses the importance of the next step, however I don't want the next step to be what I'm looking for all the time. I don't want to create the next step on the fly all the time. I want to create those next steps from my master document. A list of ten to twenty things that I'm updating constantly so I always know where I am and what I'm doing next.

I've experimented my entire life with different documents and lists to help me manage my life and help give me control over what I'm doing without nailing me to specific requirements of how to do a particular thing. Budgets are one thing, writing down a balance sheet to tell me what I'm going to spend on what and when. Writing down a plan for an upcoming event is another thing. I have a template for working with projects, but it is only useful for the project manager to keep a finger on each of the sub-projects that are being performed. It's not a personal master doc like this is.

A general attitude I've been handed most of my life is that I have to do something quickly, with disregard for others in order to get anything done -- and that I might as well face that fact sooner rather than later. Problem is, I'm really very stubborn. No matter how dependent I've been on an income, I have never subscribed to that attitude. I refuse. And that mentality makes me rush, thereby rushing others. I don't hate anything more in life than being rushed. I'd be a hypocrite to pressure other people with it.

I do it my way, at my own speed, or someone's going to be doing it themselves no matter how much they bitch or tell me I won't be accepted by the same life committees that they have found refuge in.

Relaxed control is what David Allen sold me in Getting Things Done but it was unachievable to me because the system is too complete. I have the need to search other avenues for myself because it feels to me like something is missing on the human level (for me) in that system.

I'm not criticizing. His system is amazing, well thought out, and probably very useful to a great number of people. It was also useful for me to learn that system as best I could in order to come up with a modification of it to better suit my own needs.

This one document is my every day thing. Both my anchor and my compass. It's small enough to keep things simple but very versatile because I can change what the next step is any time I want to (hence never losing room for my creative desires). I'm never holding on to the last step trying to figure out where to go. I'm only looking for step one. Did someone sing a song about that?

I'm guessing that's control: Always looking at things for the first step, and ditching everything else.

A great way not to get tired out.

So my list can be a snapshot of my entire life. While I've written it on a whiteboard so I can easily read it and save paper, I think I'm going to make it into a paper version so I can bring it with me.

It also works for incubation. Things I simply can't or don't want to decide on right now I can put in my list to think about to act on another time (especially if it isn't the most important thing to work on right now). Little things and big things alike fit in my list. Everything that bugs me or something that I really want to accomplish.

I'm going to stick with this method for a while and see how it works out for me.

Two new sources of income this week.

2010-02-07T09:16:00.000-08:00

Do you have a skill that you love? I love typing, even when it is not an act of expression. I love typing just for the pure skill of duplicating words.

A friend showed me an online community called Mechanical Turk. While I am financially without, this looked like a good option.

If you are interested in reviews (they are not all good), give Google a workout. I plan on trying out a few tasks from the pool of available work in the next few days. What I got from the reviews is that I will probably make less than minimum wage, but that's fine by me. I can learn more about the computer market just by immersing myself in something different.

What I would watch out for with Mechanical Turk are the offers to fill out surveys. I would stick to the $.01-$.03 tasks (which are repeatable). The offers of $5 and more are largely scams.

The other source of income that I found, while not an entrepreneurial endeavor, matches my personal skills and needs perfectly.

Transcription. There are a number of companies that allow flexible hours and decent pay (the $18/hour range). There are financial, medical, and closed captioned jobs that I found that are currently hiring.

I'm definitely going to check out Mechanical Turk for a few extra bucks. I'll post back with results.

Neither of these jobs are probably going to get me praise from my fellow computer geeks, but what it will get me is more money.

Separating responsibilities

2010-01-31T15:43:00.000-08:00

Have you every constantly been nagged that you need to look at something when you know that it's really not your job to look at it?

That's what a responsibility is. Who needs to be looking at what. And the more poorly this is assigned, the more it's going to tear at people's guts.

How much of management is distinguishing who's job it is to look at what?

How big of a clusterfuck are you going to have (pardon the language) if it's everyone's job to look at everything?

You can make the responsibility of looking at something and make sure it's taken care of, but if you don't assign someone who's willing, capable, and authoritative to do it (without passing it off to someone else to complete), you're wasting everyone's time.

Not much more to say there.

Finding where you fit in the market

2010-01-27T15:32:00.000-08:00

This is my last blog post. I'll go into editing after this to clean up some of the logic and ideas that I have, but I'm spent. This is the last piece I have in the business prosperity puzzle.

Here's the advice: don't push your ideas into market. Instead, map it. Find a comfortable place in it that you know makes money and set something up. Repeat.

Entrepreneurs are not mystical animals. They are not gods. But they are smart. What they know that most of us don't is that there is a difference between good work and work that makes money.

Where to find this money is by mapping the market and finding where you can fit. Least amount of work for the most amount of profit. This is a great start.

I spent years trying to build perfect websites. You know what I did wrong? I shouldn't have tried to make a perfect anything. I should have made an attempt where I know money was. I should have followed in the footsteps of the people who've made the money and done it as legit as I could (as in, make what I do useful).

These opportunites to set up an operation, even if you are a single person can be found in any market. There is always room. People in any market are frustrated. People who search the Internet still can't find what they're looking for at the first shot. I suspect the Internet will take a long time before every piece of information is readily available so there is still plenty of room.

It's knowing where to start looking. Is the money on the Internet found by working for someone else or by doing advertising and making conversions? I worked for a year or so as a computer tech for auto body shops. Do I know a single thing that most of these places need that I make a profit from?

The next logical step is, how do you map the market? List the players in the market. Read about anything you can that involves them. Find out who makes money and how. Work for someone to understand the traditional departments of business and talk to these people. Speak with people in accounting, billing and collections, sales, support. Pay attention to the people who make money and understand how things work. Learn anything and everything you can about it. Don't chase wild gooses.

Did you know you can get a practically brand new computer if you stay in contact with the recycling centers? I'm talking forty dollars for a complete computer system. No joke. Don't tell anyone I told you that. You'll muscle in on other people's territory, but it is a resource, and I'm sharing. Think you could turn that into a profit with a minimal amount of elbow grease? I'm sure I could.

I'm a computer person, but finding a niche by mapping the market isn't limited to that. Here's another computer niche. People know how to clean out viruses, but how many people know how to remove spyware completely? Not many. People are paying the computer techs nearly $400 to clean this stuff off -- the price of a new computer! Think you could turn that into a profit with a few options for the customer and little learned know-how?

You set up just one system that works and pulls enough of a profit, and you've got yourself something to build on. This is where you first create jobs for yourself. Then when you're ready for it, the creation of jobs for others.

Don't get carried away with know it all. Just find what you can turn into bucks without having to learn everything. Spend more time reading and mapping more than anything.

Take a criminal mind for a moment. Understand that in order to make a score, systems have to be mapped out. Ever seen the movie Ocean's Eleven? They had to understand the security systems and timing. This is also a form of map making. It's a system exploitation.

I know this is delicate to mention, but did you know there was a man who ordered six million American flags the day the planes hit the twin towers on 9-11? This man knew the entire nation would be in mourning. He knew we would run out of flags. He called China and ordered their production. In a month's time there were no more flags to be found, you know the ones that people were hanging from their car windows? By the time people realized that the flags were out of stock, the orders were backlogged and they had to wait. Only this guy had flags. Six million of them. I can only guess how much money he made out of the deal. This goes to show that even though businesses can be established, they are necessarily watching the market and knowing what they need out of it. This guy made a mint.

He knew where people, specifically retailers were going to be stuck. He was ready for it. If you map the market you can do all sorts of things like this. What if you knew what the big toy was that was coming this Christmas? Could you profit from that?

I'm not talking about making these strategies permanent. I'm talking about knowing the market and finding the money from them by looking, reading, and understanding how other people make money.

I have another one. Hosting services. Do you know of a way that you can get about five hundred customers for hosting? I do. Want me to tell you? Perhaps we should be business partners :)

Know the market by making map. Don't worry if your own personal brainchild doesn't make it. Your own personal brainchild is probably a thing of perfection. Don't focus on what's perfect or what will get you street cred. Map the money. Know what people are going to pay for. Know when they are going to pay it. Know why they are going to pay it. That is what will make you successful. That, and knowing the ins and outs of paying taxes and keeping business agreements as manageable as possible.

Don't go generic and ask what I would pay for. Go with what you know or have an interest in. If you are going to be an entrepreneur, you can't be a manager first. You have to be a money finder first, then a manager. In fact, let someone else be a manager. Focus on finding the money and making jobs that are profitable. You do that first, and you're going to be golden.

I've made at least three dozen jobs for myself since the creation of this blog. Not a one of them has made enough money because my approach has been wrong. I've thought that I need to be a "great web designer" or a "great programmer" or a "smart SEO professional".

I don't. All I need to know are the steps that are going to bring in the cash. That is the biggest stumbling block I've see with people who's amazing brain children are in their way.

You have to let go of the dream that will get you cred in order to get the dream that will get you money. That's what is going to get you nice ride. That is what will get your families out of terribleness. And all it takes is mapping and knowing a few steps.

A lot of it is on the Internet for free, for your reading.

All I need to know are what things that I can do that are going to bring in the cash. I can let the people who work for me be the best at what they do. Another business philosophy that was handed down to me by an entrepreneur (he learned it as a teen-ager on an elevator from another entrepreneur). You don't have to have it all up top. You just have to have it on tap.

Most of the romantics out there think that if they are the most admired, they win. I'm a romantic. I've believed my entire life that if I work hard for others I will find my way to success. I haven't and that is not how I found what's starting to work for me.

I made maps. I dropped my magnificent ideas and stuck to the basics of both making maps of the market for myself and making money where there's money to be made with the least amount of know-how on my part.

Don't guess where the success is at. If you build it, will they come? Who the fuck knows. I don't. I know that if I make a page based on keywords that aren't highly targeted by others I might make some cash and get a better website out of the deal. That I know. That's what I'm going to do to make some money. I know that if I write articles about the same topic as my affiliate site I can get free links to my website. That, I know.

If I build a grandiose site that has all the bells and whistles is it going to make money? I have a hunch that some of my site ideas might based on how others have made money, but it's too much risk and too much overhead for me. I'm broke. I need the cash in hand as soon as possible and I need to get more of it as quickly as I can set it up.

Read about, talk about and map a market. Find an untapped piece where there isn't much work. Get someone who's good at something and treat them fairl. Set up something simple to fit the need. Then revise it.

Who is going to pay money (who has it and who is willing)? When is someone going to pay the money (under what circumstances is there a need)? What do you need to set up in order to make your product or service available when the right circumstances occur.

In a very general sense, one might think, "Oh, well I have an open phone line so my customers can call and ask for anything." This creates both a problem and an opportunity. The problem it can create is that you'll get side-tracked from profitable work (however if you create and provide ready options and provide training for it, this shouldn't be a problem). The opportunity it makes is that you can create the options as profitable ones for future customers (another small piece of the market), or have someone to refer the work to so the customer isn't frustrated. Either way, the customer is satisfied so they aren't adding up strikes against you to find another provider.

That would work for someone who already has customers and is established but it doesn't address finding an initial product or service and it does't address where to find customers if you don't have them yet.

How did the man who purchased the flags know exactly when to move and order six million flags without fear? He knew what his customer were going to want. He knew where the retailers and wholesalers were going to be slow. In short, he knew. He wasn't guessing or experimenting. I'm sure it was a risk on some level, but he had already witnessed other tragedies and how people had reacted to them. He wasn't concerned about how much esteem he was going to get for a job well done.

That has to mark the primary difference between worker and entrepreneur. Do you want to be a great anything? If you want to be anything other than a money-finder then you probably don't want to be an entrepreneur. Instead you might try the arts or having your own station of responsibility and command within a company.

I believe I mentioned above that entrepreneurs are not unicorns. Nor is their knowledge or methods a mystery. They are simply in a different mode than the rest of us.

Most people want to be proud of their profession, esteemed by what role they have won in life. As an example, I was terribly fond of the idea of being a web programmer. A web master! That sounded like the end-all be-all job for me when I was younger. It was the coolest thing I'd ever heard of and I wanted to be it.

Unfortunately being the holder of a cool title is on the other side of the dividing line of being an entrepreneur.

The entrepreneur knows the market so that he or she knows what decisions to make based on what they are 98% sure is going to make money.

Point is, these are entirely different modes of thinking when doing either one. The entrepreneur will be looking at the least amount of payout for the most amount of income while the web programmer is going to look for the best offering and perhaps even trying to focus on how awesome his product is for clout rather than cash.

Which is more important? Clout or cash? I can tell you from the standpoint of someone who has very little presently that having a source of income is more important. I can add my clout later. What I need is a viable system of making cash.

That doesn't mean that I'm going to be an opportunist to create unfair deals with people. I just have to put money and the creation of profitable jobs ahead of people looking to me as a mentor of technology.

You want to find the clout? Be as student of implementations. You want the cash, be a student of the market and practice making jobs that make money not twelve steps down the road, but two or three steps down the road. Don't over-complicate for clout thinking that will bring the cash. How good you are at something doens't necessarily equate to dollar-signs.

You want to set up your own portion of a business under another entrepreneur? Show him or her you know how the dollar signs are going to match up but more importantly, show them how few steps are involved to get this money and work on getting the billion-step projects better mapped out when there is an opportunity for them.

What is you purpose in life? Do you want to be the best at something or do you want to find money and set up systems to make that money so you can create places for others?

Which comes first?

If you want to be the best at something than continue to look for being the very best implementer of certain kinds of work.

If you want a cycle that will create more and more systems for yourself that is going to bring in more profits (and you have passions galore that often interfere with that), you need to widen your search and diminish your efforts. Let the people you will eventually hire be the best at what they do and to keep on eye on aspects of your business. That's what you pay them for.

A breakdown of skills

2010-01-22T11:41:00.000-08:00

We're animals. That fact alludes a lot of folks. The distinction between human and animal seems to be presented as if we aren't animals at all. But we are.

We are animals that are able to use tools. We have intelligence and insights. We operate on beliefs, what we can be proud of, things we are attracted to, a desire to find relief for pains, and by using our habits. Am I missing anything?

What really gives human beings the edge over other animals is that we can create and use our own skills as we see fit.

As I can understand it, there are two parts that comprise the essence of a skill. Knowledge is one. The other is habit. "Knowing how" to do something and having the habit to carry it out are two different things.

So how does one create a new habit without banging one's head up against the wall? Pace. Going slowly. But mostly really looking at what I'm doing before I act. Not biting off more than I can chew when it comes to actually doing work. (When it comes to dreaming, dream BIG! When it comes to execution, take one little piece at a time).

I took a summer and learned to juggle when I was twelve years old. I can juggle with two balls in one hand or three balls in both hands. I've become talented at it. But turning my knowledge of juggling (which was from a book I received one Christmas with three sand-filled bags) and getting my hands to work how I wanted them to, took time. It took almost the entire summer, truth be told.

I really couldn't go more slowly because I can't modify gravity at will. The ball is going to fall. My hand needs to be there. Then my hand needs to throw the ball in the correct direction. My other hand will need to catch it and repeat the process.

A great trick that the book taught me was that if I learned to juggle two balls with one hand, the process would become easier. The habit/mechanism of catch and release in a controlled manner was built more easily with only two balls. So I learned how to juggle with each hand independently first. Each hand knew how to juggle two balls. When I got that straight, I put those skills together and sure enough it worked like a charm. With relatively few mistakes I was able to juggle three balls.

My point? Speed is a factor. Rushing myself doesn't give me the entire skill. What I get instead is stress. In this case the stress is caused because I'm telling myself to do something without having the habit to back it up. When I look at things as I'm doing them and take my time, the skill building process is like magic.

And no stress. Did I mention no stress?

You can rush through things if you want to. That is certainly one way of learning and it can be really useful when you have a good vision of where you want to be. It will stress you the hell out and you'll hate having to return to it if it is repetitive, but it does work at least in the short term.

I've also noticed that separating work into different phases is of huge benefit to me personally. Making the process slightly longer so that my habits aren't intertwined relieves stress. Like getting everything out of the dish washer first and then putting it away.

I can multitask. I can react to four or five things going on at once if I'm familiar with the situations and have made decisions like them in the past.

Put the dishes away changed from "put the dishes away!" to "put away the utensils" + "get both drawers of the washer emptied onto the counters" + "put the plates away" + "put the glasses away" + "put the bowls away" + "put the pans away" + "put the tupperware away" + "now take a look at the dishes in the sink".

Broken down into the components, this is much like writing programs for computers. Don't over-complicate and overburden a single function for the sake of speed (or in the human sense, habit). Just make a new, simple one.

I'm going to mention David Allen again from Getting Things Done. One thing he mentions in his work is that you can't do a project. You can only do actions that are related to that project. Is emptying the dishwasher a project? I would say no but considering how reluctant people are to do it, or do it and end up doing it shoddily, I think that might be wrong.

Am I splitting hairs? I'm trying not to. Really what I'm trying to offer here is the principle that I while I capable of reacting to more than one thing at a time I'm not really able to decide on more than one thing at a time.

All I'm trying to convey is how helpful it is for me to just look at something small that is a part of needs to be done and choosing one of the steps to perform. I can start anywhere I want. I can stop and then start all over again.

Perhaps I'm writing now to folks who have problems with motivation as I have had, or people who hate their jobs because they're stressed out. I'm just figuring out that just because my passions to do things are spent, it doesn't mean they're spent forever. I just need to start over again. A fresh look, a new beginning.

Anthony Robbins, a motivational speaker, mentions in his works that the mind (or brain) is a magnificent computer. The questions that you ask are what your brain will try to answer. It will constantly try to answer the questions that you've asked. If you ask yourself why you're not fit for something you'll get an answer. If you ask yourself instead how you are going to do something, you'll get that answer eventually too. So how much is the key to your prosperity simply asking the right questions?

Most of your life and attitudes are reflections of the questions that you ask yourself.

Me personally, I'm going to look at what's in front me. Then I'm going to think about my options. Then I'm going to do work in the way that I envision rather than how I've been told it needs to be done. I'm going to make sure it's the first step and not the first fifteen steps that I'm working on.

I've always been very good at focusing on customer, boss or peer satisfaction. What I have not been good at is working in a manner that will keep me level and rational. I stress myself out by working on too many things at once that have multiple steps to them to show that I'm 'accomplishing' something. Doing it this way, I've never become an expert of any skill in my technological crafts. I've simply done passable work in each aspect of it.

While this has helped me make friends by helping to meet common goals, it has never led me to prosperity. While these people will return to me for help again, I will always be learning something new across a diverse range of topics rather than first establishing myself as someone who can do a particular thing (or creating a particular thing) and marketing it.

The former method will be rewarding in the short term. The second method is how the successful do it. They know what they can do. They take a risk occasionally when the probabilities are high there will be a payout.

Looking at things. Really looking at what is in front of you can help with two things. You can slow down one habit in order to break it, or you can speed up another that you want to keep. It also helps with that feeling of being on auto-pilot.

If you truly want to wake up all you have to do is look at things that are right in front of you.

When you just look at what needs to be done before you tell yourself what needs to be done (big trick here!), isn't that simply being more honest with yourself? Doesn't that remove any games you might playing with yourself in the situation? Won't it stop you from reacting on automatic and instead get you to think about what you're going to do next?

Incidentally, by using this method not only do I rock at cleaning the kitchen, but I don't feel any reluctance at going back to it in order to clean it again.

Imagine picking up a guitar. You can have the greatest song in the world in your head, but unless you learn chord progressions, scales, and theory (knowlege) and practice how your hands maneuver the guitar (habits) you're going to get frustrated, stressed.

Imagine martial arts. You can 'know' every block and strike in the book (knowledge) but without practicing blocking, striking and having command over your form (building the habits), you're not likely to react with any of them in a confrontation.

Imagine driving a car. Buttering toast. Writing programming code. Drawing a picture. Dialing a phone number. Reciting a poem. Building a sand castle. Even tying your shoes is a foundation of habit that your parents (probably) started you learning when you were a toddler.

Going fast after you have a good skill isn't a problem. I find the problem comes from the directives people have given me to rush through things. That is what stresses me out and leads me towards failure.

Unfortunately sometimes building skills is counter-intuitive. One would think that by going faster, the job would see itself complete in less time, and perhaps by dropping balls for other people to pick up, this is true. Maybe by passing off guesses when you don't have answers, this is true (giving the answer fast while in effect, lying).

There is no peer of yours that is authoritative to tell you whether or not you are good enough, black enough, white enough, tall enough, hung enough, fast enough, proper enough, honest enough, smart enough or tough enough. Only providers can do that. Mothers. Fathers. Sometimes employers and other family. So don't ever let some pompous bragger who wants to with-hold information rather than act as a team get you messed up. Partly because it isn't their place but mostly because they're usually hypocrites or liars about their own bag. Seriously. Ignore them and don't sweat it. If they really knew everything like they pretend they do, do you think they'd be doing what they're doing now?

That reminds me. If I don't start making some serious cake soon, my names gonna be mud as far as this book is concerned. Time to put some theory into action and start making some dough. Cake? Dough? I'm making myself hungry.

Creating a money cog.

2010-01-15T13:31:00.000-08:00

So, I have my money cog here. No, actually I really don't. But what I do have is some vague ideas about my current finances. Frankly, my current finances are pretty weak, but I'm going to start putting one together to help me identify where my areas of improvement are rather than stressing out about it.

A money cog has a few attributes. It is primarily an accounting/reporting mechanism, a billing system that includes both accounts payable and accounts receivable (laymen's terms, what I get and what I shell out).

A billing system should tell me a variety of things. Rather than create a list of common elements and exercise would probably be better. I had an idea while working at a cash register how to go about creating my own money cog.

Firstly, a 'money cog' as I've put it isn't a creation at all, really. It is a series of processes. Money comes in here. Money goes out there. These processes are subject to agreements and laws.

This costs $5.95. Do you want it? Yes? That's an agreement.

I have to charge you 6.3% sales tax. That's a law. Each of these processes can be mapped.

Think about the money. Where is it coming in? Where is it going out? And then make a map from one endpoint to another. It can be as detailed or plain as you like it to suit your needs.

So here is the walk-through of one process. Starting at the hands of the customer and then being deposited into the bank.

When standing at a cash register, the person hands me the cash. It goes in the drawer and I give them change. The drawer is counted at the end of the night to check for errors and give the next person an exact dollar value to start from. The money taken from the drawer is accounted for (enter other processes for taxes and such) and placed somewhere safe inside the store. The money is later deposited into the bank.

What about taxes? Those are pretty important, but it isn't as terrible to think about as I once thought. Paying taxes is just another one of these processes like taking money from the customer, then following the steps through to depositing the money in the bank.

It really isn't the foreboding landscape of drudgery when I think about it like that. It's manageable, and can even be fun when taking time to look at the steps.

The state of Massachusetts requires quarterly tax payments for the self employed (I'm not sure about businesses in general). I don't know how I would approach the quarterly tax payments. I have been self employed, but I did a terrible job of it. I suppose a good question to ask here would be to ask what percentage of the money needs to go to taxes. Then I separate some of the money into a different savings or checking account, or just earmark it in a spreadsheet. That is a guess. I haven't done it successfully yet.

Creating a good billing system is simply thinking about the money. Looking at the processes. If you find something to be profitable enough that you can afford it, I would look into getting a CPA. CPA stands for Certified Public Accountant. You can get someone to do your books for you for less than what you would spend for a CPA. From what I've read, some CPA's even have bookkeepers in-house at reduced rates.

I have a website that uses Google Adsense. The way this system works (a part of my personal money cog), is that every time someone clicks on an advertisement I get money.

Someone submitted advertising to Google. Every time someone clicks their ad, they pay money for it because it redirects people to their website. If that ad is on my site when they click it, I get a piece of that revenue. Google will send me a check for it whenever what I've 'made' is above $100.

Google Adsense also has some guidelines to follow when placing these ads on my pages. I can't place more than three ad units on my pages. Nor can I place words in the content of the page asking people to click my ads. It has to be natural so that the value of the ads works for Google, the advertising and me. If I don't follow these rules, I'm subject to be banned from the program. Maybe this isn't a law exactly, but it does carry consequences if I don't follow these rules, so I say fair enough to call it a 'law' for me to follow.

This process is a part of my money-cog. While the sites I have built are not very good right now (hey, I'm working on it!) they still provide me with some income. (Another guideline I have to follow using Google Adsense is that I can't tell you how much I make).

So title of this blog post is a misnomer. I don't create a money cog at all. I map the money processes. This helps me find more money. When I add documentation for the accounting, it also tells me how much I owe in bills to others and taxes.

I don't know about you, but I'm certainly going to think about this money-mapping exercise in all sort of places. Everywhere money is being made, I'm going to make maps for myself to see what I'm interested in. Why not? It's my life.

I have to add here too that other businesses that work with you appreciate being paid on time. In the business scene, this is the biggest object of contention between business entities. Who pays on time is a reputation builder in the business community. It's not a deal-breaker so much as it is a stress reliever to your vendors and business partners.

After writing this, I'm going to go make a series of maps. I'm going to use the free OpenOffice.org software to create some simple diagrams of all my money processes. Mostly because I'm curious about why I've been so ineffective with my pages that use Google Adsense. A piece of paper would work too, I suppose. Or a whiteboard.

From this, I'll be able to determine where my assets and liabilities are and act accordingly. This map can help show me where to move next. Plus? I just love making maps. I can't get enough of it. When it comes to business, I'm an analyst at heart.

School gives you knowledge. School can teach you habits. School does not teach you how to make money. Only people who make money (or study those who do, I hope!) can do that for you.

I'm recommending Robert Kiyosaki's website and the book "Rich Dad Poor Dad". Not only did Mr. Kiyosaki grow up with one "Rich Dad" and one "Poor Dad" to create a series of differences to work from, but he also lays out great definitions of assets and liabilities in his book. I also found a lot of information in the teaching section of his website for concepts to get familiar with.

I've also found a few interesting things to get at least shallowly acquainted with by reading over the guidelines of Robert Kiyosaki's teaching curriculums, specifically balance sheets and income statements. Do you know how old balance sheets are? I'm so definitely making it a homework assignment for myself to read up on them today and make a quick draft of my own, spending no more than about half an hour.

What makes a good manager?

2010-01-14T09:15:00.000-08:00

Managers are people who should help organize the organization - who has a particular responsibility so both esteem and accountability may be afforded to the individuals who have earned it.

It's a fact. People who keep all the responsibilities for themselves think of people who do their detail work that way. "Let the _________ do it. It will be funny to watch them struggle while they aren't going to reap the benefits for it. Those _______ should know better".

Any managers out there? Start splitting the responsibilities. You want your departments to shine like gold? You want morale within the organization? All I've ever heard about building team morale in the workplace has been abstract. Mostly what I've heard team 'morale' being is bone-throwing, concessions and extra benefits. Perks. While it is gratifying, it doesn't build morale or security.

Here it is in black and white. Identify things that need to be handled or aren't being handled properly. Turn it into a responsibility instead of piece of detail work. Assign an individual to attend to this responsibility (note how I'm not saying assign a person to be responsible for it while someone else does it). That's a recipe for games and bullshit.

A good manager is an analyst. A good manager gets a feel for every aspect of the business that needs hand-holding that resides within their domain and chunks these tasks into responsibilities. She finds where customers are disgruntled and creates more options. She takes the heat off of the employees and gives them guidance.

A good manager can see the perspectives of at least three viewpoints: the ownership or the upper management, the customer, and the subordinate. Clinging to any one of these viewpoints over the others will cause bad habits to develop over time. I've seen it everywhere.

There are other roles that a manager can take that would cause me to call them a bad manager. A blamer of subordinates for one. A manager who doesn't know how to split responsibilities effectively and blames their employees? Not a good one. A manager who has their lips stuck to their boss in order to have the right to abuse their subordinates? Terrible, terrible person for management. This person is also likely to get their asses kicked once an employees leave.

Think about the post office for a moment. Ever wonder how their responsibilities are set up?

A good manager doesn't create unfair expectations simply because an unfair expectation has been declared by owners. One unfair expectation is to expect that an employee should be working on both interruptive and non-interruptive responsibilities simultaneously. This is a recipe for dropped balls like I've never seen. The employee is not at fault for this. This is also where the manager has the greatest room to innovate. Often there is blame instead of innovation.

Hint: if this 'simple task that should be easy for anyone' is not a responsibility. If it is a task that requires no authority, it isn't a responsibility. This is a clue that it's someone else's loose ends. Hence a developing attitude of "Let [the] _______ will take care of it".

If you have these types of roles within your organization, shame on you. The rules you've created to try and rectify the situations are and will be ineffective. Your management is a piece of dung. Please fix it.

Dear managers and business owners. Take a look at the responsibilities within your organization. Don't forget to include the agreements you've made with your customers as a part of this. If indeed you want to call yourselves organizations, well, try organizing by these constructs. Because largely, none of you do this well. At all. Not from any place that I've worked at (but I have seen sole proprietors with only direct subordinates pull it off). Really. Sometimes good managers but bad owners. Sometimes the reverse. Sometimes both are bad.

Stealing from the big picture.

2010-01-14T08:21:00.000-08:00

I've often stretched my attention in order to create things that are perfect. In fact, my object of contention with other workers and bosses has been just that -- I want it to be perfect and they don't.

Here, the goal has been for me, making something that shows superior craftmanship. However, I'm a novice when it comes to a great many things. I expect too much from myself. I simply don't have the skills to be an expert at everything when I haven't done everything.

Where this really gets me the most is looking at new projects. I wind myself up to meet the task, usually failing somewhere near completion. I never want to let go of a particular task because I don't want that piece of work to be a reflection of myself for people to mock and belittle.

That fear isn't without basis in reality.

Many people criticize the works of other individuals, stating how much better they could have done the job -- this is often by the same people who leave their own loose ends.

I have to ask myself, where is the bullshit? Where do I fit in this grand scheme of criticism and how can I find my own productivity?

I can do this by creating versions of my approaches and skills.

I can't express to you how much of a hold-up it has been in both my professional and personal life that I expect myself to do things perfectly the first time. While there are people who have pretended they can do it perfectly the first time, they can't. They secretly rush themselves when they see a problem in something they've done and pretend to everyone else that they're the cat's ass. They really aren't. They learned their skills somewhere. They needed other people's help somewhere, and that's the part that is left out.

When it comes to creating something or getting through the task at hand, I am not subject to the self proclaimed 'masters' of any craft. This is my domain. I do it my way because it works for me or it doesn't work for me.

A skill means: knowing the series of steps to create a desired outcome. It's a guideline, created by myself for myself. Sometimes other people's advice on how to approach a problem works really well. I try those things too. But more often than not the people giving me advice saying "you just need to do this" and are leaving out the resources that they themselves needed to accomplish something similar. Or worse. They are giving advice about something they have had no experience with, creating hurdles for me to overcome that don't even exist, wasting my effort.

I hold on to my projects. I don't want to let them go. I want them to be perfect. What I've found that works is that I'm not going to do it perfectly. I hold no such expectation over myself. What I expect is to get it in some sort of working order.

The next time I look at it, I can make it better. I will look at the project again and this next time I do it, it will get closer to perfect. But perfect is never my goal.

My goal is to meet what needs to be done. That means I have no time for other people's detail work, loose ends, or dropped balls. I'm no one's slave. If someone wants to keep all the responsibilities for themselves and give you the loose ends, that person is a slave holder, not a provider. If someone can't fork over a responsibility (and responsibilities are where esteem for yourself is truthfully found), then they can handle all the detail work themselves until they figure it out.

So what do I do in order to let go of my project so that I'm still fresh to face other things? I look at my project with minimalistic eyes. I promise myself that I'm not going to stretch myself beyond the borders of human patience and planning. I simply look at it and think of something very small to do.

This is contrary somewhat to David Allen's Getting Things Done. It's not necessarily the next step so much as it is a chip off the project. Taking just a little piece of the problem to build a few skills from.

Always, I have tried to keep the entire project in mind when I work on something. This doesn't allow me to get much accomplished, unfortunately. This is where I separate my working life into modes. Analysis is a great mode, and awesome for finding flaws in processes, but it isn't action and by keeping the full project scope in my head while trying to work on a small piece doens't work for me. I get tired out.

When starting this blog/book all I could focus on was the problem I had with repetitive taks, however repetition isn't a life-sucker. It's someone else's detail work that is the life sucker, meaning I'm contributing to someone else's responsibilities when all I should be working on are mine.

I've tried quite a few ways to get around it. I've tried making all responsibilities mine, but I fail. I've tried to contribute to the visions of projects, but find there isn't an attentive ear for my contributions. I've tried to move faster, only to crash because I don't pay enough attention to details. I've tried putting my ducks in a row (however venturing into new territories, lining up actions are impossible if they've never been done before).

The only thing that works for me in uncharted territory is to 1.) Look at it, 2.) Take a small a piece as I can find to work with. That is productivity in uncharted waters, and it is the very essence of skill building when outside of one's domain. Look at the big picture. Take as small a piece of it as you can. Forget the big picture for a while while you work on it. That works.

Again, if it's someone else's brain child, they are the ones who need to carry it to completion rather than handing off loose ends for us __________ . I am no one's loose end person. I am no one to be rushed for someone else's satisfaction. I am not subject to the whims of fancy by middle-men who believe their value to their superiors is in rushing, belittling, and suffocating the people they supposedly 'manage'.

Next up: What makes a good manager?

Principles of management

2009-10-16T09:31:00.000-07:00

When it comes to work that needs to be done there are three parts to it. Identifying the goal, defining the individual parts of the job, and walking things through to fulfillment.

1.) Goals unify. Moderate goals succeed.

I've been pretty frustrated with poor management primarily because their lack of sharing the goals leaving the employee feeling directionless or conflicted, especially when that employee has to make decisions on the fly while working. This puts the manager in the position of being the only decision maker, with the employee continually revisiting the manager for more information or decisions. I can't tell you how frustrating it is to have a manager not fulfill this duty and then blame a subordinate for being incompetent.

When the goal is both ethical and clearly defined, those decisions should be a snap on the front lines.

When employees are getting frustrated and the boss feels the need to crack the whip, it's usually a problem of poor goal making, a lack of investigation of what's really going on or goal communication.

Sometimes poor goal communication is because the boss knows instinctively that the goals that he or she has set are full of unrealistic expectations on the employee or doesn't take into account what responsibilities an employee already has. As if by raising the level of difficulty, he'll simply get more out of the employees like a lawyer might tell you to ask for more than what you want or need in a court case, to increase your chances of getting more.

That game is called 'let's split the difference'.

No. Let's not split the difference. Let's figure out what the resolution is. Let's find a reasonable goal to set and complete it so everyone isn't stressed out and trying to meet something that is unrealistic.

That is not a team building skill. It's not even that successful. People have so many directives in their heads as it is, it's nearly impossible to perform a complete overhaul of internal processes just by making more rules to lock them down.

What is a team building exercise and a huge productivity builder is to create a moderate goal and execute it. Repeat. Create moderate goal and execute. Repeat.

That is what I have seen by my mentors that really works. But it is also a management overhead that needs to be invested in.

Moving from point A to point Z is not moving from point A to point B. Poor management needs to acknowledge this fact. I have constantly been managed by my superiors in this manner throughout my career as an employee.

If employers told their employees, let's all move to point B please instead of getting red in the face and yelling "GET TO POINT Z! GET TO POINT Z!" I couldn't count how number of people who would be more relieved or how much happier the world would be. It sure would be a better world for everyone. Including the bosses themselves.

Whenever the goal is "GET TO POINT Z!" it makes me want to slap people. Repeatedly. Until they say, "Yeah, uh, point B probably comes first huh?".

The fun part of work: identifying the jobs that need to be performed (defining point B).

Deciding what needs to be done is the best part of work. It's the investigation of the problems and the plan. What makes it so nifty is the lack effort that needs to go into it. It's just thinking. Thinking about who is going to be satisfied by this. How much money is it going to make. How many snares are we going to run into?

It's my favorite part of work. It is the organization. It's the thinking of what will get you to where you want to be. It's dreaming, it's inspiring and it's delicious.

David Allen who wrote Getting Things Done is one of the best I've ever listened to on the topic. I recommend anyone who is interested in getting things done definitely check out either his book or his audio books. I found them the most inspiring to play while actually in the middle of knowledge-work, being able to take some of his principles and incorporate them on the fly.

One of the biggest problems that I've come across trying to put my business life together is being able to separate knowing what needs to be done from doing what needs to be done effectively enough that I'm able to switch between these modes when I need to.

A lot of my professional life, I've been stuck in the first mode which is getting familiar with what needs to be done. Looking at the big picture is so enthralling for me that I get stuck in defining more and more things to do without taking the steps to accomplish them.

I think a lot of this is the fear of dreariness. A fear of being left to do the work alone.

Don't get me wrong. I like doing work! It's how I do work that has made it disgustingly upsetting. It's the bad principles of middle-managers that have run my life that make me a wreck, not the work itself. The work is both fulfilling and rewarding. And it feels good to be in motion, especially if I know what it is that I'm doing and I get something out of it at the end. Money. Relaxation. A stronger bond with my team.

The dreariness comes from the inattentive job maker. If the person who is making the jobs is simply sticking others with what he doesn't want to do or gives jobs based on expectations rather than agreements, this person has not earned my respect as a job maker and in a humane world, simply should not be in a position of management of other people.

I'm going to keep that in my personal notebook for reference. Has the duty been assigned on what is expected because of someone's position or because there has been an agreement? Nothing will squash morale better than this.

Dream up, pitch and preserve the fair deal.

How I jump between these modes is simply a matter of distinguishing whether or not I'm gathering information or if I'm jumping into something past the point of no return. Before jumping it, make sure you know what signifies completion. In other words, know what you're getting into.

Carrying out the work

If the goal is digestible, the required work that needs to be performed has been chunked into reasonably accomplish-able pieces, the work should be delegated to someone's domain.

This is another huge gripe I have with businesses. People earn the right to have a particular say in things because of their efforts, but none is typically given. You want to lose your best employees? Don't give them dominion over anything in the business.

So who's domain is it?

Too many times I see a responsibility handed to a group instead of a person. Any result in failure is then handed down to who is the least favorite of that group rather than the accountability of the individual who leads them. No accountability. Just games.

So what we need then is, who is responsible for this? What person is responsible for this? Does that person have the necessary resources to accomplish that goal (including time)?

Work shouldn't be 'up for grabs'. It should go to the person who gets the credit for accomplishing it. The person who has both the knowledge and the authority to make decisions with what has come their way.

Worker productivity comes from a few things. 1.) Not being interrupted/distracted. If their job is to BE interrupted, don't assign them things that need follow-ups and require multiple steps. 2.) They need to handle the same types of tasks. That doesn't mean that have to sit in the same spot all the time, but for God's sake, stop taking them out of their realm because you're too cheap to hire someone to handle a different type of task. In order to have remarkable workers they need to be able to specialize. 3.) Having the ability to follow things through to completion and enough cool-down. There's not much more disheartening than to go back to a task you've already decided has been completed. People need a chance to really wrap up tasks and projects. It saves future work, and future costs. Imagine if everyone wrapped up their projects with more documentation. How much money would you save in future interruptions?

To be continued.

The N word, twice this week.

2009-10-05T09:09:00.000-07:00

There were two different instances in the past week that really got my blood boiling. Not so much that these individuals should know better exactly, but how they are using me to justify either their indignation or self importance.

Take the first example. I met a new person and started talking to him. He's in a field that requires manual labor. A field that I have some respect for as one of my friends was in that field his entire life.

It's a stressful job, he explained. In fact he knew someone who passed away just last week from it at the age of forty. He stood closer to me and said, "But you know, just a n******."

I was a little shocked. Like I am every time someone uses that word in private. I've always wanted something better than creating outcasts of people to make myself feel superior. Black folks aren't the only people I'm sensitive about this with. People keep on and keep on trying to get my to buy that if I accept their outcast of another that I'll somehow be superior like them. It doesn't happen every day, but frequently enough.

What I don't get in this situation is the hypocrisy. How can elite white males who have found how to use their efforts effectively (because their bosses tell them how) call a skilled worker "just a n*****" and then bitch about black families being on welfare when the topic changes?

Maybe they don't notice how those two things match up.

I was irritated with him. For the lack of a better word, I started getting "pissy". I wanted to show him that he was not, in fact, someone I wanted to be near me. I'm thinking now, that was the wrong move and instead I should have said something like, "well, at least we'll be paying for that n******'s wife and children to eat now eh? And putting his kids in jail because they don't have a dad anymore. What a fucking shame, eh?"

I think he was just trying to fit in with me. Feel like he belonged somewhere, this guy. I won't lie. It did make me angry, but really looking at his motivations, I had pity for him. He must not have felt smart enough, or nice enough, or maybe he was frustrated about how part of his life had turned out and needed someone to blame.

You have to hate someone else in order to stand next to someone you want to call friend?

I didn't challenge him on it. I'd rather keep investigating this whole race thing in more detail. I really want to know who is full of shit and who isn't.

Second encounter with the word this week. A 40ish-50ish aged guy walks up the counter. He's a fit guy. Muscular. Nice fitting T-shirt. Sleek hair. "Fu##ing n******s (giggle). Let me ask you. When you see someone with their pants hanging down, doesn't it bother you?".

I told him no, that I'm not anyone's judge. I shrugged him off. I think I screwed up when I did that, because I was lying. Not only did I refuse to acknowledge his question, I lied about how I felt.

The truth of the matter is this: It does irritate me. I wouldn't tell anyone to stop wearing their clothes like that because I don't think I have the right. But it does get on my nerves. I'd be lying to say otherwise.

I have to assume that I'm not going to be shot or hung by starting with the truth.

Is that irritation a form of racism? I have to think about that more. Is my problem with jeans that rest 'too low' on men's hips because I want them to be "more like me"? To conform to what I'm used to?

Is it a selfish thing to want someone to dress a certain way before I accept them? I have the urge to tell people that have their pants too low around their waste the following:

"I don't see any utility in it. When you walk around, it makes you look like a penguin. It's like you want me to tell you that you look good, but I don't see anything in that style of dress that makes me like you any more. It makes you look ridiculous."

Your clothes don't fit and to me it makes you look ridiculous.

I can figure out simply enough why that first person was saying the black man, working in his own field, deserved no sympathy for dying young. That man wanted me to accept him. Intuitively, I think it's a sort of cover up. Like, "I'm okay to stand right here with you contemplating the universe with you no matter who I am because you and I can both agree that another man's life is worth nothing".

That's a pretty despicable thing to do and I'll play no part in it (in fact, what I want to do now is send money to that family for their loss) but the second guy has me dead to rights. I feel the same irritation.

I wear my hat backwards a lot of the time. I do that because it's comfortable to me. It keeps my hair out of my face while still being able to look up without tilting my head back. But I've gotten what seems to be exactly the same sentiment about me wearing my hat backwards. Like I'm a disappointment because I wear my hat like that.

Comfortable is how wearing my hat backward for me is. When I think about it, I'm not sure if it started that way or not. I think I tried wearing my hat backwards because it might make me look cooler. Actually cooler is not the right word. More relaxed. That's how I wanted to look. A way of saying, "I'm going to try to take this in stride".

And I've been partial to baggy shirts because I've been a little overweight my entire life. I have some bulge in my belly and I don't want anyone to see it because I'm afraid they'll judge me for it.

I wear baggy shirts because I don't want to show my belly fat, and I wear my hat backwards because I want to look (especially for girls) that I'm more relaxed. And eventually, the hat became comfortable to wear like that.

Could the baggy-and-showing-my-boxers style of wearing pants just be showing to girls that I'm a more relaxed person? The message being something like, "Hey. I'm informal and really good for cuddling?"

Really, I've worn my hat backwards and my shirts baggy in the hopes of being accepted by more people. Hopefully getting the attention of the people I want to draw into my life.

Baggy pants and hats nudged off to one side of my head. Would that be so different? I'm thinking, no. I'm just jealous that I'm not the person this style of clothing is aiming for. I think that's it.

Yeah. That's the irritation for me. I feel left out. Alienated. Like I will never belong in that crowd and there is absolutely nothing I can say or do to cross that gap. Because this dress is meant to be cute for someone else, I throw my hands up in the air.

The only reaction I have left to have about the whole mess is mocking.

Maybe it's the same thing with moms and meals. "Take your hat off at the dinner table, please, because I don't think I'm going to be able to reach you with you on".

Probably not like school where they make you take your hat off. Man did that piss me off. Wish I had told my teachers, "As you soon as you show me that you give a fuck about me as a person, I'll take off my fucking hat. Douchebag."

I think it really comes down to that. The mocking about how I wear my hat. The mocking about how a young man wears his pants (black or white). That other person who's irritated about it feels like they have to swallow how cool I am before they get a chance to settle themselves enough to talk to me.

It's a barrier. A rift. But it's easy to just ignore the clothing when I understand it's a draw for someone else and not a repulsion of me or who I am (though it can undoubtedly be turned that way (as in shoving it in someone else's face, that's still not how it starts or is originally intended).

I can believe that without doubt because of how I wear my own hat 'outside the norm' and what grief I catch about it.

The Rudolph syndrome.

2009-09-17T12:10:00.000-07:00

I explained in one of the first posts that I had a friend when I was very young who was black and we got along famously. That was when we were on our own.

As soon as either of us entered the other's home, alienation set in.

It wasn't hatred. It wasn't that his sister thought I was -bad- or that anyone in my family thought my friend was -bad-. It was just uncomfortable. Customs are what people are accustomed to. Being outside that normality and trying to connect with other people is difficult.

Is racial hate derived simply from a lack of knowledge about how that person is usually treated? Does not knowing how to act around someone cause animosity? Probably not at first. It's when people start throwing shots at one another that it turns into hatred.

When I was young, my friend and I were fine on our own. We stayed entertained. We explored the local woods and the clay pit. We had fun.

The problem with racism in America is not primarily a problem of fairness but a problem of hospitality. I think that's where it starts.

Hospitable. Good word. Awesome word. If there be a meaning of any single word that could fix racism (or perhaps hate in general), that would probably be it.

The questions becomes this: do I accept this new person by asking myself how they might feel comfortable, or do I seek the solace of my peers in order to justify being rude to them?

The only problem then becomes, who's 'good enough' for hospitality? Is hospitality earned? Does it require effort on the part of the person who would want to be welcome?

What kinds of things are going to put me off from being hospitable (rather than being very rude)? Isn't that one kind of hate? Being rude?

What I mean by hospitality here is considering someone else's situation rather than just my own. Sometimes that means really looking at the person instead of just assuming I know them. In fact, I'm a little ashamed that I've done this even with my closest friends and family. I figured I've learned everything I need to know about them, I suppose, and then begin to ignore them. It's like turning off a light.

(Not to worry though. Really listening can turn that light back on pretty quickly.)

So what would showing hospitality be like to someone of another race? I've been fairly separated from people of other cultures and races. I assume: It's a stretch. It's being a little more accommodating while trying to understand someone else's situation. I mean... being available for that other person. Even if it's for a five minute conversation or something as simple as keeping a heads up for them when they're crossing the street.

I for one will be putting that stretch a bit more into forging new friendships rather than accomodating my boss. The energy is probably better spent there anyway.

In regard to children specifically, there are two dynamics I see. When the 'alien child' (of any race or culture) would enter a group of 'the others', there seem to be two groups who rule social acceptance. If an adolescent is the decider of acceptance in the group of 'others', other adolescents would be their guides. If a parent, other parents.

A young child doesn't know much about hiding behind the judgements of their peers or role models. All they really see (or maybe better put, all I really saw) is the potential for a new friend, or not.

Even though these seem like safe places not to make a decision about allowing other people into my life, I've found that none of the groups that I'm a part of can tell me how I feel about a particular person, unless of course -- I want to be a clone.

Now that I think about it that is exactly what causes the gap. It has been the judgements of my peers that have kept me from reaching across any sort of split. It's been the judgements of the men on hate radio. My loyalty to my peers should be to follow the judgements that they make about other people they don't even know? That doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

As a white man, I face the scorn (or in milder cases, the discouragement) of men who've looked at unfortunate black men and have decided that they are not their problem (corresponding judgements would be: I didn't hold slaves so I have no obligation to restoring their heritage as a people, it will take too much effort and they won't do their part).

As a black man, my guess would be that in order to cross the racial divide one would face the scorn of being some sort of sell-out (supposed cooresponding judgements: you'll never be the right kind of black man if you work for a white man, white men only consider us fit for their labor, but these are purely guesses on my part).

Bill Cosby is most certainly not a lazy or bad man. Michael J. Fox most certainly isn't a pigish sort who's out to fix only his own problems.

So where is the truth? It's not the judgements of other parents (for how children are allowed to act). It's not in the judgements of hate radio (of 'who isn't good enough' today). It's not my boss who tells me I'm not allowed to sign poor people up for our service (because poor people are only out to screw you on the deal.... uh, not sure he did all the math on that one).

I think discarding my peers' judgements about other people or groups of people is where the bridge is - no matter how good of a friend they are. Even the best people let those judgements slip from time to time. Doesn't necessarily make them evil. It does makes them human. The real bugger is when people believe that those judgments are a good place to hide and snipe at others.

It's so attractive to do it. It seems safe. The problem is, the people who are at the receiving end of those judgements..... not too comfy. And there is no single person alive that is not subject to the same types of judgements (if not exactly the same that they exude).

By judgement, I mean: who's not good enough for consideration.
What it generates is a collective permission to treat people poorly.

Hiding behind other people's malignant judgements isn't limited to issues of race. It's rampant through humanity like a plague. It's everywhere from Cowboys vs. Indians to Man vs. Woman.

How many lovers have you written off because your friends would think them unworthy?

Think about it.

Authority and accountability: Making business decisions.

2009-09-09T07:10:00.000-07:00

Without a leader at the helm, the business doesn't work. I'll tell you why.

Cooperation becomes increasingly difficult with the power struggles. Naturally people tend to look for who is in charge, and if no one is, they seek naturally to fill the void.

Empowerment of the employee comes from the employee being able to remove all of the roadblocks to complete functions necessary to the survival of a current objective. If those objectives 'can't' be reached due to internal opposition, there are only a few options I can see.

1.) Start playing office games and condemn third parties to schmooze your way into the good graces of staff you need to help you complete tasks at your call.
2.) Demand that there is a single authority for the business (or at least directly in your management hierarchy).
3.) Quit the job.

There has to be an authority. Even if each department is autonomous, eventually someone is going to cry foul. There has to be a big cheese to give the final word or it can be a never-ending and bitter feud.

If there is no single authority, blame will run rampant to justify how someone gets more of a say (I suppose assuming unconsciously that this will give them more decision power). I've seen it happen in a few businesses. It was pretty annoying for me. My hunch is it was annoying even for management.

The issue comes down to the types of decisions that are being made. Two people can't make the same types of decisions, or heads are going to bump. There are going to be screaming matches. And when a decision can't be reached, customers and employees are going to the unfortunate victims as the excrement does flow downhill, as they say.

Is it an equipment decision? General sales? Business development? Analysis? Billing and collections? Customer service? Implementation?

Someone has to have the final say. It doesn't have to be the head honcho, but whoever is designated for a particular decision type needs to be unchallenged by anyone but the big boss or some designated mediator with complete autonomy.

One could take these head bumping events as an opportunity to further define where decision making domains more distinct. I personally would not stay in a position long where I had accountability but no power of decision (authority) where I needed it. It's not too far of a step above slavery in my book.

The only workaround I've found to these situations (where the boss thinks you should be honored to make minimum wage to fuel his boat) is to specialize. When you are so familiar with something that someone else isn't, you are much more likely to be able to call some shots, get esteem for your position, and build your credibility. You might also be more inclined to guess and pass it off as fact (like I've been tempted to do many, many a time). It seems to come with the pressure of the territory to act that way.

On being a consultant: presenting options and avoiding guesswork

2009-09-07T09:42:00.000-07:00

Being a good consultant has basically meant knowing what's useful for other people.

To do this I've gotten acquainted with two things: The business I'm consulting for and all the options in my field that will help suit their needs.

This can be a tiring thing and I'll tell you why. Each problem needs a custom solution as best that can fit the needs of the customer as possible. When you have a number of different types of businesses that you do work for, this requires learning about a great deal of things rather than specializing in a few.

It's gotten me a lot of business, working like that. But I've needed other people to help me because it's nearly impossible to have all the answers all of the time.

I can break the consulting gig up into a few categories of work.

1.) Telecommunications (it's good for a geek to know phones, answering systems, DSL, cable, T1s). I haven't had to know necessarily how to set up a router for a T1 line for a customer when doing consulting work, but it's good to have a general idea of how they work when there's a problem.
2.) Desktop applications: knowing the working environment of the pc's on the floor. When you know what functions the people have to carry out, you can suggest different software that can save the business owner money. For instance, is the Microsoft Office Suite really necessary or can they get by on the free OpenOffice.org package? Knowing the ins and outs of installing and updating different accounting packages like Quickbooks and Peachtree is also a plus. Every business has some sort of accounting software they run, and it's integral to their operations.
3.) Security: Are the computers likely to get spyware or viruses due to how they are used? Being prepared for that has been especially useful. It's good to keep in mind what options are available to these customers when knowing what's most secret or detrimental to their survival.
4.) Backups: What are the different types of backups that people can use? What are the price differences? What would they need off of the computer if their hard drive crashed? What's most important? Their contacts? Their financial data? Payroll? Emails? With this, you can help come up with a plan. Customers typically know what data is most important to them because they've been worrying about losing it.
5.) Equipment Purchasing: Who are you going to use as a vendor for the computers that you recommend? Or are you going to resell the equipment to them? What's going to happen if something breaks?
6.) Remote access: It's convenient. Having a few different plans for business owners to get to their work computers while away from the office will benefit you.

Remember, when dealing directly with a customer, there is never a time that your solution is "one size fits all". I wasted the first two attempts at consulting that I made because I thought I knew more about what to do with someone's business than they did. Big mistake.

The choice always has to be in the hands of the customer or simply, the customer is going to find someone else.

From the consumer perspective, I would be wary of anyone telling me that the one option they've presented me is the 'only way'.

They're either a little full of it today, or they don't know their stuff. Just so you know I'm not bashing anyone I have also been at times, full of it. I have at times not known my stuff. I have at times made guesses and passed it off as fact.

I try to forgive people when they do it because I myself don't notice when I do it all of the time. But, regardless.....

Be wary of Official Guessing. The person doing it typically has a very important tone in their voice. It can also be a precursor to you getting extremely frustrated with the person doing the Official Guessing due to the guess putting pressure to end the investigation.

I say that because I've gotten extremely frustrated with it. Even people I consider some of my best friends do it to me, and I've done it to them. Guessing sucks.

I'm not sure why it happens. It could be that people are pressured by more things than they can handle so their patience is shot. I find that the most probable.

What I do know is when it happens. Guessing happens during investigations of things. Investigations made when trying to handle situations where someone has identified a problem. Someone raises a question. Someone else doesn't want to answer it. The presentation here by the Official Guesser is that they have done all the investigation necessary and have all the answers that you need to know.

Like I said, I've been guity of it but it irritates me past the point of being able to work with that person in a team environment. Guessing is no friend of cooperation. It is the fastest method to end partnerships whether it be with employment, vendors, or customers.

As I stated above an Official Guess typically sounds, well, very official. I've found that typically the more official it sounds, the more likely it's spoken in ignorance (as in their investigations aren't complete, so they make them sound more complete).

When I first started doing some consultant work on the side, I made all kinds of guesses. What afforded me the luxury of doing so was my familiarity with the Internet when pretty much everyone else I knew was at a loss about how things worked.

When my customers would ask questions and I simply didn't know the answer, my pride refused to let me answer with "I don't know". I had to know. I was the computer guy. I assumed that since I didn't already know that I had to guess until I learned.

Luckily this was only with the first customer or two, so I learned that my young and headstrong ideas about me being the boss of other people's companies going to work out so well. Maybe I knew things they didn't, but they knew when I was guessing.

All that needed to happen was to lose a customer or two. Watch them sail away into the distance and me having no money to show for it.

It wasn't pleasant, but the lesson was learned. I don't own other people's businesses and they're not going to tolerate my guesswork simply because I know more about a subject than they do.

Luckily for me, I shaped up. I learned how to be more valuable to these business owners. It's taken a lot of time, because I'm a very headstrong person. One thing that's helped with that considerably is to notice when other people are doing the Official Guessing. When I can spot when someone else is doing it, it helps me keep tabs on myself.

What did the trick for me was to always be the provider of better options when the customer has a problem. The more I lined those things up, the better (and more successful) I was at consulting.

What is "I can't"? Get responsibility, get outside the game.

2009-08-30T08:34:00.000-07:00

"I can't."

Every time I've spoken the words "I can't", I've sacrificed my own ability. Abilities I didn't know I had. It's an excuse to back down from pressures that are upon me.

I have all kinds of reasons why I say I can't. "I'm too tired." "No one will do it with me."

Rather than get into the logistics, I'll tell you the story of the day "I can't" left my vocabulary. I was twenty-six years old. I was in an office standing at a table seating two company executives. Our large telephone lines had gone down for the call center which housed about fifty customer service representatives. No calls were coming in. The president of the company was livid. The chief operations officer was sitting at the table. So was the head of the call center.

I was on the phone gathering reporting the issue to the phone company about when the lines would be back up so the business could continue.

What I was prepared to do was tell the phone company and hang up the phone. The chief operations officer had another plan in mind.

As a bit of background, the chief operations officer had been my mentor in the previous months up until this event. He was so effective in what he did and stayed so completely on top of things regardless of the workload on him that I wanted to learn everything about how he did things. What he did when I was on the phone took me entirely off guard.

After giving the representative on the phone our information (including the circuit IDs of our T1 lines), she gave said I was 'all set'. I took the phone away from my ear.

"They said they've opened a ticket for our issue and they'll call back within an hour," I said.

"Don't hang up the phone," said the COO. He said something else I didn't catch, but his message was clear.

The woman on the phone continued to try to hang up. "So, we'll give you call back in about an hour...."

I was stuck between between being what I thought was polite and hanging up the phone and going against the grain. I wanted to throw the phone at the receiver. I didnt' want to deal with this.

"Sir. Are you there?" The voice on the phone asked.

"You hang up that phone and you're fired," the COO said. I'm sure my eyes opened a bit wider to that.

I made my choice and found my resolve. I leveled with her. "I'm not able to hang up the phone just now. I'm sorry. Give me just a moment please."

This was not apparently what she was used to. She continued to try to get me off of the phone, but I refused. I stated calmly and simply that getting off of the phone was not an option for me.

"Ask them to speak to someone higher up," the COO said.

I did.

Incidentally, that's not supposed to happen. What supposed to happen with telephone companies is that you report the issue and they have to get back to you within an hour with an update. That is what is required by the FCC.

Instead what happened was I got more information as the COO had wanted. I made it all the way through to speak with a network center technician.

What the COO had guessed was that the person taking the report really didn't know how long it was going to take, and knowing how long it was going to take was the information he wanted to give the president of the company.

I stayed on the phone. I spoke with a few different people. Eventually I got on the line with a person in the network center, someone who actually did the repairs internally and ordered dispatches if something out on the streets needed troubleshooting.

That was where I needed to be. He told me everything I needed to know. Mostly this was what to expect from them in the coming time until the repairs were made, something the representative that initially took the call was not able to do to the COO's (or my) satisfaction.

This was useful for the chief operations officer to give to the president, good for the head of the call center (who was also at the table), and good for me primarily as the experience of not letting myself take the out and present something that was half-assed.

What I had learned from my dealings with other coworkers was to do what was reasonably thorough simply so my boss couldn't say that I wasn't doing my job.

Call it minimum employer satisfaction.

It's a game between employer and employee. Management would like you to think that it stems from lazy employees. It doesn't. It stems from egocentric management. The boss makes demands instead of giving responsibilities (sometimes for no other reason than he's the boss and he's allowed to), the employee does as little as possible to meet goals.

That is what changed in me on the phone that day. My outlook about problems changed from doing as little as possible to make something tolerable, to completely addressing situations in as many ways as I could.

As soon as I define something as my responsibility, "I can't" falls from my hands like sand.

The rigor of work tends to beat this possibility out of people. The boss tells you how to do it, you do it his way. Ingenuity is lost. The will to strive is eventually lost as well. I fall back into that game of minimal satisfaction. Screw that. When you remove the chains of "I can't" and do things your way, you're going to be a star. You're going to figure out how to do something that no ones else has because you're outside the game.

People who see themselves in a fatherly role (be it business or home) are going to continue to bark orders or convince you that you're not good enough instead of giving esteemed responsibilities. When a person keeps all the responsibilities they keep all the shots. There is a leap in logic here by the boss. That because all the responsibilities are theirs and the employees are simply there to do what they're told, that there must be something inherently wrong with them.

"Why can't they be as driven as me to make sure that I make money? They must be lazy. I suppose all I can do is crack the whip on them. Oh sigh...."

Who's going to make that a conscious admittance to themselves, much less rectify it? These people must feel terribly important about themselves.

It's true that the boss is responsible for deciding what needs to be done because it is his business. It's true that the boss may need it a certain way because he doesn't want to spend more money that he has to and it is his money. I completely agree that those things are not there for my squandering. I'm there to protect the company's interests. Otherwise I'm no more than a threat to its existance and I've no reason to be there.

But employees do squander company resources as a part of that game.

The lie is who starts the game. Ownership and management tend to think that employees are all hell-bent on bleeding them dry. I'm sure there are some that do that, but the majority of people I've found at work aren't like that, at least not to begin with.

'Bad' employee attitudes and behaviors is typically a reaction. If you've ever been an employee, I think you would agree.

What is it a reaction to?

When your friends are not being your friends.

2009-08-28T15:01:00.000-07:00

One of the hardest things I've had to go through with the jobs that I have is to not let my friends exploit my position in order to make it easier on themselves.

My friends have tried to convince me that it's okay for them to steal from where I work. Many times. Many friends.

It doesn't mean these people aren't my friends. Some of them really are.

I used to work 3rd shift at a gas station that sold alcohol. People would try to get me to let them take a six pack or a bottle of wine all the time. Strangers were a snap. Even when they offered me $50 it was easy to turn them down. I could always tell them that their $50 wasn't worth having to find another job and certainly wouldn't cover any criminal fees I'd get if I got caught.

Even friends will do this to you occasionally. They'll pressure you into thinking that you're not being fair while you're the only one taking a risk. They'll even come to the point of threats. When it comes to this type of situation, they will try to make me think that something is wrong with me for not letting them use whatever station I hold to give them preference. Mostly it's that I'm a wimp for not taking risks for them.

Who needs that as a friendship?

When this happens, I turn the tables and start sarcastically remarking about how good of a friend they are and how gracious it feels to know that someone's really looking out for my well being over their own quick interests.

That will usually set them straight, friend or stranger, because the standpoint is valid. They aren't being my friend in that context. They are not helping me to look out for my own interests in that situation and they know it. I'm only someone to be taken advantage of to meet their own end. Fifty dollars to sacrifice my working reputation is not worth it. Neither is a quick thousand. It doesn't last. How is it worth it to sacrifice my paycheck and future business references?

I have more examples of when friends aren't being friends, but this situation is particularly important to the work environment.

This is the very meaning of the word corruption for me. It's not only useful to know in the joby-job world. It's also useful to help me understand the corruption in politics because I intuitively imagine the gain types and pressure tactics to be similar.

Someone's short-term gain, someone else's long-term loss.

Corruptive persuasion always involves the use of a hostage. Identify which hostage people normally use against you and you've found your weak spot. By hostage, I mean what someone would 'keep away' from you. Maybe that's money. Maybe that's someone's acceptance or attention. Maybe that's someplace safe to sleep.

Guaranteed, it's something that you're hungry for. So be on the lookout for people who'd try to use it to their advantage while giving you something that's really a bum deal in return.

Four types of jobs.

2009-08-23T11:11:00.000-07:00

1.) Sales: making agreements with customers for what you will provide compared to what they are going to pay you.
2.) Fulfillment: Engineering, production and delivery.
3.) Support and retention: interfacing with customers after they are already yours. (Sometimes retention is left to sales).
4.) Maintenance: Cleaning, finance, management, quality assurance.

I'm not sure if this chapter will make it to the next draft of the book, but knowing the types of jobs available helps me determine what job I want. I've had experience with each of these job types at one point or another in my life so it's helpful for a guide for myself now that I'm trying to figure out what I want to do next.

It's also very useful to know job types because you can get hired to do one job, but get stuck in another when you don't know the difference. For instance, you might think you're getting hired to do fulfillment (creating solutions and implementing things) but really your'e stuck in maintanence (mind-numbing rush-work).

Sales:

There are all kinds of strategies when it comes to sales. What I've found is there is a little bit of sales in everything that I do. 'Real' sales (not as in a cashier) is a responsibility for the negotiated deal, and there is a quote that I've been passed on (that I can't find the source of) that says that the secret of success in business is the negotiated deal above all else.

I find that's true. I wish I could quote the source. It came from a magazine clipping that one of my business mentors showed me.

I've probably been the most blunderous when it comes to negotiating deals in my own experience. I've shorted myself continually in order to be the 'nice guy'. I'm not saying that I'm going to flip and be a 'bad guy' and start making with the unfair dealings, but shorting myself is not going to keep me in business, ethically empowered or happy.

The other end of the spectrum holds no allure for me either. I basically have to sacrifice what I think it 'good' about being human in order to get what I want.

Take the island of Manhattan for instance which was purchased for the equivalent of roughly $24. Did the Indians know how valuable the land would be, that owning that particular land as property (which was a foreign concept to them as air and water being owned) would be so lucrative? They had no idea. They totally got screwed.

In the movie Forest Gump a member of the Black Panthers spoke about the 'White Devil'. The actor presented a very preachy sort of activist who was very upset. Basically upset at people getting shorted on deals, it sounded like to me.

What that character really didn't convey was two things. 1.) The definition of a 'white devil' (other than saying it's someone with white skin). and 2.) How to circumvent it's power.

I'm not advocating hocus-pocus, mystifying hogwash. I'm trying to state simply that the mark of a corrupt man is found in how fairly he makes deals. There is no 'white devil' lurking in the shadows waiting for us. There is only the attempt of a person to take advantage of another person's weakness whether it's their unfamiliarity with a situation (which can combatted by gathering knowledge) or their pressures (which can combatted by preparedness, sacrifice or delay)

Unethical lawyers use it. Unethical computer techs use it. Car salesmen. Any tactic that would keep you from investigating where you would be shorted.

There are also very shady ways that you can be convinced to do things without your direct consent. I'll cover these as well. How to spot them and how to combat them.

So how can you make a deal without screwing someone, but also get what you want?

Be useful for that person. Be someone or something that the other person needs. A supplier of something. A designer. A broker. A gopher. A partner. Be a support of a businesses goals (for money, of course). Fit the need.

I'll put a full write-up together on negotiations when I get to it. This blog post is on the types of jobs and I've totally digressed. Thank goodness this is all a draft, huh?

Fulfillment:

This is where business is the most fun for me. I love making stuff. I'm clumbsy at it a lot of times but I learn and become capable through my mistakes.

Fulfillment means implementation. Fufillment means something solid has been put in place that wasn't there before I/we started on the project. To watch these things come to fruition is work, but it's rewarding. And I can tell you from experience that it's extremely difficult to implement anything alone. Inspiration decreases without being able to touch base with others.

Fulfillment jobs I've had are: IT consulting (creating plans to alleviate frustrations of business owners), making pizzas, working as a cashier, and moving furniture. Working as a Systems Administrator is more a job of maintanence than it was fulfillment. It's a lot of housecleaning keeping servers and routers up to date and operational. Making sure people's email boxes don't go over their space requirements isn't putting a solution together. It's more like being an over-glorified waste management consultant.

Web design is also fulfillment. Anywhere you get to use your skill sets in order to bring your vision to fruition, you're in fulfillment. When you're doing mind-numbing rush-work, you're in maintenance. Is it bad to be in maintenance? Not really. I have to do maintenance too in my regular day-to-day activities. But being rushed while doing them is bad.

I don't trust any circumstance where I'm being rushed to come to a decision. It means someone is either knowingly or unknowingly attempting to manipulate me. You shouldn't either. If you notice you're being rushed, immediately stop what you're doing and start asking questions.

Bah. I've digressed to negotiating. I should have been writing about that instead today. Ah well. Good notes for it later anyway.

Fulfillment is basically the ability to use your own know-how to get something accomplished. This is where you get to be an expert in what you do. It's where you don't have a micromanager (hopefully) riding your actions to their satisfaction.

Support and retention:

This is basically interfacing with customers. There is a blend of fulfillment and sales with these jobs (as there is with all these types). Support and rentention jobs are basically a capture-bucket for customer's dissatisfaction. They're not always used in this manner. In fact a lot of ways that I've seen these jobs used are to keep customers dissatisfied. That doesn't really work long-term. Some business owners do think it works because they've already moved on to more lucritive books of business. It doesn't keep those customers, however. All it does it allow the business owner to use less resources on it to squeeze out more money.

That smaller or less lucrative customer base is going to dwindle until it's gone because someone else will be doing it better than them very shortly.

I've highlighted that because it's another important aspect of how American business works. It's a way a business 'graduates' to the next level while squandering the needs of the older customers. I'll get into that in more detail later because this is a great place to scrape up some new business for yourself.

Support and retention are where customers look for help. They need questions answered. They need a way to get their product returned. They need a resolution to why their service or product isn't working for them. This is where the personal touch of a company reaches customers the most (and also a gold-mine for sales staff).

There are two messages that these jobs can send to the companies' customers. "Glad you gave us your money. We're going to keep as much of it as we can by keeping you on hold" or "Thanks for investing in us, we thought of you and set this up to help you".

The former is a terrible job to work at. The latter: a joy.

Maintenance:

A real maintenance job is fixing or cleaning things. Fixing machines that break down. Cleaning up a mess on the floor. (Stocking shelves I would consider maintanence too because you don't get to use much of your own know-how).

In fixing things (or sometimes even building things), you do get to use your know-how, but unfortunately this is where companies tend to put ball-busters and whip-snappers. People who like to yell to make themselves feel like they're doing an important job. Frankly, I think all these people do is cause people to make more mistakes than they would have to begin with. If it were my business I'd give the guy a bottle of ant-acids and send him on his way. Seriously.

People in maintenace jobs need to take their time more than any other. It might seem like since these jobs take less skill that they have to be pushed to move faster than what's humane. Uh-uh. Bad idea. The term 'going postal' didn't come from a movie or some abstract concept. It came from people bringing in guns to the post office they worked for and executing everyone in the joint.

They say: location, location, location.

2009-08-19T12:40:00.000-07:00

I say usefulness, usefulness, usefulness but location is indeed still important.

Take infomercials for example. Most any of the products you'll see on infomercials are useful. They fit some need that is created by a frustration that someone has or where they could be better entertained.

Products in infomercials are specifically important for me to think about because not only do they represent usefulness (fitting the need) but they also represent to me a roadblock of people's habits (being the roadblock of picking up the phone to order).

How can you sell an item in an infomercial when a lot of people are not accustomed to picking up the phone in order to buy things? Perhaps this is why an As Seen on TV store can stay afloat? I for one have seen dozens of useful things for sale on infomercials that I've wanted to buy but simply would not pick up the phone to order it.

So there's usefulness, but there's also where your customer is going to be both interested and accustomed to buying things (with products specifically).

Where would people be looking for my service? The yellow pages? Their friends? Where would people be looking for my product? The department store? Google? Where would someone be looking for my information? In a book? A magazine? A web page?

I still have a hunch that usefulness is really more important than location when it comes to getting the word out about your useful thing. If it's that useful, word of mouth will get the news out better than advertising ever will.

Building castles (defining jobs , getting skills -- and knowing what I'm currently doing).

2009-08-06T09:32:00.000-07:00

The basic principle is this: Do I build foundations or do I constantly wing it?

There's probably no wrong way to go about living life, but I'm primarily concerned with control over what I do (what my goal is), how I do it (my own way), how fast I do it (at my own pace), when I do it (when I ready to).

If I'm doing what other people tell me to do, I'm working on their goals instead of mine. (I will however contribute to where I live and where I work. I do have a vested interest).
If someone is forcing me to do something their way rather than showing me how to do something, I'm not likely to work with them long.
If I'm doing something at the speed someone else wants me to do it, I'm going to get burnt out. Another human being isn't capable of knowing what my reserves of energy are. I do. I refuse to let anyone squander that it for me.
If I do it when someone else is ready to do it (and I'm not), my heart won't be in it.

I've mentioned a few times in these chapter drafts that I've spent a lot of time flying by the seat of my pants. It's exhausted me, and due to the level of burnout that I'm at, I simply refuse to do it. When people pressure me, I don't make agreements. Not in business and not in love. I've simply never found lasting happiness in any of those circumstances.

So how do I get what I need -- and occasionally what I want without putting myself under the gun?

It comes down to this question. This choice. What am I going to check out today? What am I going to check out after that? Check out breakfast? Check out how I'm going to link my menu items to my content on my new site?

All the rules of every boss or loved one falls away when I do that. Checking things out isn't a commitment to do anything. It is my choice of how I spend my time and it produces almost automatic actions and the benefits of my evaluations. Still, in this mode I find it easiest to do any kind of work because it contains almost no effort on my part.

All I have to decide is what I want to check out next.

So what do I mean about a castle specifically? It's a metaphor of building a foundation for the things I want to do, a foundation of preparedness. It's the opposite of what I would call being in 'the trenches'. That's what my work life has felt like for twenty years or so. I've felt like I was in the trenches. It's been a miserable existence, feeling like that. Never in command of what I do, not deciding how I do things.

The concept of 'building my castle' is the opposite mode of how I've tried to do business my entire life. That opposite mode I would call 'the trenches'. Being the equivalent of cannon fodder in business is not very monetarily rewarding. You do learn a great deal about business and can form some solid friendships with people, but it is stressful due to low pay and uncooperative environments.

How do you put a castle together?

How does one get all the skills and resources to be prepared for a particular goal? The easiest implemented mode is to endlessly 'check things out'. Harder but possibly just as effective is to complain out loud or on paper to yourself to identify what skills and resources are needed. Another is continual trial and error. You could go to school for it (ack, pspspulah. money.)

Building the castle is nothing more than gathering resources based on what problems you can identify.

Here are some problems that I faced:

I'm frustrated by layout and design in general and had problems making a graphic template. A friend told me about the 960 Grid System, so I gave that a shot. Seems to be working pretty well and I'll probably continue to use it.

Aptana Studio for writing the code in the web pages was sluggish and I couldn't scroll through all the open documents. I'm now using NetBeans IDE and I'm much happier.

I've gotten stuck so I've needed a new approach. Now I'm just 'checking things out' instead of trying to put square pegs in round holes. That new approach has been making a big difference in both my attitude, my approach, and my general well being. I'll probably be using in more places in my life than just this project.
When rushing through repetitive work, I would also find myself lost. To get around this, I would simply tell myself what I was doing at the time. This helped me clear my head and get moving again.

A castle is a sort of abstract idea, I suppose. A word for an environment I have control over in order to accomplish a type of task. I could have many castles. Paperwork, for one. I could create a workstation that's dedicated to paying bills. Maybe that work surface could be dual-functional for laundry folding. Since I don't feel like leaning over to put my shoes on, maybe I'll put a knee-high bench for putting on my shoes before I walk out the door. Workbenches with different tool arrangements.

Am I getting a little ridiculous? Maybe. But the point I'm trying to make is that for each thing that I want to do (that I'll likely be doing again) is to make sure my environment is suitably prepared for me. I don't necessarily need the best washer or dryer or the best care or the best stove.

I just need what I need in order to get it done.

I need to define for myself what the jobs are (by checking things out), build or find any associated skills that I need, and make sure I don't lose where I'm at in the project by defining for myself what I'm doing presently.

Racism means: 'not your kind'.

2009-08-05T14:36:00.000-07:00

At one point I thought if I were to completely spell out what each use of the N word meant that I find the sentiments needed to deconstruct the issues.

I don't think that is going to do it.

The sentiment behind racism is a hateful identification of someone who has done wrong to someone or is believed they will do wrong to someone.

It's a method of keeping ourselves safe and in some situations nothing more than justifying self worth.

When someone cuts you off when you're driving, do you identify the kind of car it is, because they cut you off? Do you say to yourself, "Oh. THAT car!? Okay. I'll remember that car for next time."

The same thing happened to me with people with certain types of faces. A wide-cheekboned person or two in my life has intimidated me. When I see someone who lookes like one of these people, I immediately want to say bad things about them without cause because the original issue was not resolved with these other individuals.

Basically what's happened is, I've told myself in order to protect myself from danger I need to watch out for wide-cheekboned people.

It's an unconscious thing, making these marks of safety for myself. I've found that when I do it, I'm full of shit.

For instance, not all Mazda RX 7's are going to try to cut me off.

Do you hate any particular expensive cars because of how someone drove one either threateningly or in spite of you? Think about it.

The issue isn't the color of skin. The issue isn't the type of car. You can't determine if someone is going engage in social competition, steal from you or try to harm you based on their skin color, the type of car they drive, or even the clothes that they wear.

These are lazy assignments.

I don't make a mental note about skin color when someone does me wrong. I don't get car models when someone cuts me off. I don't identify their political association. I get names. I get license plates. (I'm in-fact thinking of starting a small notebook on the matter. Perhaps I'll get to take it up with them at a later time).

If someone screwed my friend on a deal, I get that person's name and remember it. Someone lies to me and doesn't fess up, I make sure I'm not in a position where I have to listen to more of their lies.

Applying a wrong-doing to a group of people instead of an individual is asinine. It doesn't solve what started the problem and creates a perpetual and unresolvable mess because it doesn't deal with the original offender.

It deals with a group instead. Whatever group it is, has an identifier. Race. Car make. Facial type. Hair color. Financial status. Type of shirt. Type of job. Political affiliation. Manner of speech or movement. Family. Neighborhood. City. State. Country. Religion.

You name it. Anything that has to do with someone's life or lifestyle can be used to mark a group for an individual's deeds. And from that group, usually an innocent is usually who ends up paying the price for it.

Individual accountability.

Take children. They can't stand up to their parents. How many years does it take for a child to take a parent's demanding bullshit (unable or unwilling to stand up to them) and then take their aggression or start social competitions with their peers?

I've known a few bullies. Out of three specifically I know each of their fathers were abusive. Am I saying that all bullies had abusive fathers? No. Do I know people who aren't bullies that have had abusive parenting? Yes.

My point is that when someone does wrong to someone else, when it comes to black people specifically, the color of the skin is identified. Not a face. Not a name. A skin color.

A skin color isn't capable of being unfair to anyone. A race can't feel the blame of a wrongdoing. A choice of car purchase can't account for an individual's actions, but that's exactly what's suggested with racism.

Business in a nutshell.

2009-08-04T15:38:00.001-07:00

There are ~~two~~ three (so far) main skills that revolve around successful businessmen/businesswomen (I have to investigate these traits a bit more too).

1.) Accounting (tracking of money exchanges)
2.) Usefulness (how well the need can be met)
3.) Effective agreement making.

Business accounting was invented by the Jewish people a very, very long time ago. From what I saw on the history channel, they used to count with stones in the very early stages of the craft.

These were talented mathematicians who could prove who owed how much to whom and when. They started the concept of interest and how letting people borrow money could actually make money.

Do you need to be a talented mathematician in order to have a successful business? No. It's mostly adding, subtracting and understanding percentages. Do you need to know how to account and plan for what you make and what you spend? Yes.

From what I have seen, if you're good at one and not the other, your business is going to fail. If your business is good at accounting but not at usefulness, there will be cutback after cutback of spending until the company crumbles. You can try to convince people that they need stuff when they really don't, but you're not going to get many referrals.

Some people will go the extra mile and lie on their accounting before they go under (which does nothing more than really mess up the employees and get the decision makers put in jail).

If your business is good at being useful but not at record keeping and bill-paying, you're going to lose money everywhere, you won't be able to make good decisions about which options are going to be the most profitable, your reputation will be hurt (as other businesses you don't pay will ruin your credit) and you're likely to eventually get shut down by the IRS.

Both are needed to be successful.

Is accounting hard? Not really. And if you have strategic skills enough to play video games, you've got the innate ability to plan out finances.

I've been known to invest a bit of my video-game-go-get-it-ness into my financial planning. It makes a huge difference in my attitude and the results.

As far as your usefulness goes, look at way to relieve people's frustrations in order to make your business successful.

There are plenty of frustrated people out there. What I would recommend is solving your own frustrations however. This kills two birds with one stone. You're happier because you've solved your own problem, and you can make money off of it because you can make something useful out of it for someone else to buy!

What makes repetitive tasks undesirable work for me.

2009-07-31T17:09:00.000-07:00

Rushing.

It's taken me years to figure it out, but it's how fast I rush myself through repetitive work that makes it unpleasant for me.

When I have a bunch of similar things to do, I just slow down -- taking my time with things.

I obviously didn't figure that out working under a supervisor, but putting this web page together I learned that the more I rushed myself through actions that were similar the more I wasn't thrilled about going back to them. Also, on the pages were there was something different to do was painful to even think about. I wanted to be done already!

David Allen from Getting Things Done talks about the concept of relaxed control. Taking my time with repetitive tasks is how I've found to beat my exhaustion with projects.

Most jobs are repetitive in some form or other, and managers are usually pushed to get the most out of their employees rather than make sure they are comfortable.

Why shouldn't a worker be comfortable, I ask? Is your employer going to fire you because you pace yourself or make a plan about what you're doing? If so, I'd be looking for another employer because that kind of employer is not looking out for you.

In the first project I took a screen shot of nearly ever part of the Norton 360 Antivirus program. When I was making the pages that corresponded to these screens, I was trying to get as many of them out as I could at once and afte r about a week of that I just didn't have the will to do it anymore.

I started asking myself how many more days it would be. I started timing myself on how quickly I could do it. I started finding even more efficient approaches to doing it. I tried doing it faster, and faster, and faster. I started making mistakes. I started getting frustrated and wanted to be done with it. I tried different strategies. Mostly, I kept lying to myself about how long it was going to take.

Lying to myself about how long something is going to take won't get it done any faster. If at all in this case! All it can do is make my work shoddy, deplete me of resources and make me lose track of other things that are important to me. Eventually if I'm in a position where I have to do this regularly, I'm not going to stick with it.

It made the work detestable to even think about much less get back to work on. I abandoned the project altogether. Luckily for me, this time I noticed why.

So, this has been working out for me the past few days and I wanted to share. The repetitive work that I'm doing is toward my goal, but I'm not pushing toward my goal while I'm doing it. I'm just listening to some music and making sure that I'm pacing myself instead of rushing through anything.

Now when I come back and sit down to work on it, it's more like sipping coffee with an old friend rather than jumping through hoops for a drill instructor.

How to bypass most undesirable work -- Preparation... and slowing down.

2009-07-30T10:00:00.000-07:00

I've had a problem leaving things until the last minute most of my life.

Homework was the big thing when I was in high school. I'd listen as well as I could when in class so I could skimp everything I could when it came to doing things at home. I hated homework. I didn't want to read books because they were assigned to me. I didn't want to outline chapters for a history book.

If I had looked for what was undesirable about these exercises, specifically what I was missing I think I might have been a wiz at high school. But I wasn't. I was a terrible student.

During my time there they also handed out these little orange notebooks for study skills. It was some sort of state-wide or nation-wide program that was bred to help kids with their homework.

None of it was based on "here's what sucks about homework and this is how you fix it". No. It was, "after you've decided that you're going to do what sucks, this is exactly how to suck any sort of creativity out of it."

I just wasn't interested in it. It was a system for 'how to study', basically and not a sentence of it stuck with me.

The one useful piece of information that I got about studying was from another student. One of the brilliantly beautiful girls. I remember her name too, but I'm not saying it because I had a huge crush on her.

She said that most of her study time was getting ready to study, not doing the studying itself. Her preparation time was making sure she had everything she needed, and organized in a way that she liked it best. I've adopted that principle in my own life many years later.

Am I able to express how helpful the concept of preparation is? It's most of what I need to get rid of my own undesirable work.

My work life has been almost entirely based around fitting square pegs in round holes because the boss wants something yesterday. Well. He or she is going to have to wait.

Don't get me wrong, I prepare all over the place. But that's part of my problem. My preparation can end up an endless cycle when I don't define my goals well. My preparation overtakes my goals and I end up learning about more technology things, then learning about more management things, then learning about more industry things - without getting to what I've envisioned.

How much undesirable work is there in preparation of something I want to accomplish? Almost none. How much of the work that I want to accomplish is actually preparation? My estimate on any given task I can think of is roughly 80%-90%.

That means that 80%-90% of my time can be nearly effortless preparation. That doesn't sound too shabby, does it? It doesn't look too shabby either to have everything laid out in front of me, ready to use at my disposal.

This is a big help to my motivation because I know it's going to bypass all kinds of unpleasantness while still getting me to where I want to be. It also helps me with the concept I call castle-building (which is basically a place where I gather tools and strengthen my know-how about specific environments/tasks). This might be a garage or den. A room. A desk. A workbench. I use this concept in comparison to "reacting unprepared in the trenches" which basically means throwing myself into situations just to see what happens or because it is what is expected of me.

I won't say that the throwing myself at situations unprepared hasn't been rewarding as a learning experience, but I won't say it was ever pleasant to do either. I'd rather read and create demo projects for myself or find someone to apprentice under.

Whenever I feel reluctant to do something I'm going to do these two things: define the goals that I actually want to achieve in the situation (aloud or on paper if I have to) and if there is undesirable work involved, stay in preparation mode until there isn't.

Of course, I'll revise that as needed.

----

A revision: 8/28/2009, (also a note).

Telling myself that I'm working too slowly makes me speed up. When I speed up I make mistakes, I get frustrated that I can't go even faster, then I lose interest because it doesn't seem to want to happen automatically.

When I slow down the work transforms into something that's comfortable and I'm able to notice things I'd otherwise make mistakes on.

----

Life support to success (family)

2009-07-29T11:19:00.000-07:00

Here are some examples of what I would call support (family/significant-other based).

1.) Belief. It's a whole lot easier to go with the flow. What you believe about me pushes me in that direction. I mean whether or not you believe I'm going to succeed at something or not. If you don't, either change or go find another person to support because you are not going to be good for me.
2.) Down time and safety. When I don't have a quiet place to rest when I need it, it's torturous.
3.) Training. I need experience doing things. It's easiest to learn while doing it myself with someone proficient guiding me.
4.) Food. I need yummy food. I need food that's good for me. I need as much food as I need to eat. If I don't have as good of food that you do, I'm going to hate you.
5.) Clothes. If I don't look the part, I'm simply not going to get the part. Period.
6.) Love. If you don't hug me or guide me, why would I want to stay around you? (Note, I'm not suggesting that I need people to randomly hug me. By 'hug' I mean, show me I'm appreciated in -any- form dammit. Ain't a person alive that doesn't need appreciation of some form.)
7.) Discussion of goals. It is unkind to exclude.

The basis of the contention with 'successful' or 'disappointed' white versus 'complaining' black is that we all have the same opportunities. We don't. We don't have the same support and we don't have the same opportunities.

This disappointment is based on a fabrication.

People who are poor or can't make it over the hump just "don't work hard enough" is a bunch of BS, and this is a complete denial of what the successful REALLY needed in order to have made it where they are.

Another of the 'disappointment' sentiments is that the poor won't conjure the determination needed in order to find success. Problem is, the poor typically haven't seen success and don't know what it tastes like. None of their friends are successful. Their parents probably also were not successful.

Does one need determination in order to be successful? Yes. Is it possible to have determination if you don't have an idea how something can be achieved?

If you don't know where the money is other than undesirable work, don't know how good you can be at something and no one believes in you, why the @#$^ would you put any effort into anything?

In order for someone to be successful, they have to have at least some idea of how to do it and how much they're going to get out of it or determination is not psychologically attainable, much less sustainable.

One of the harder questions, what gave slaveholders the right?

2009-07-28T15:34:00.000-07:00

In a nut shell: No one was there to hold them accountable. Not themselves. Not each other. It was only after Abraham Lincoln was elected did it come to contest.

When no one is there to stick up for someone else, human beings sometimes make the leap in reason that they can do anything they want to people. When there is no accountability or a protective presence, assumptions are made. Bad ones.

Like having sex with prostitutes or exotic dancers. Just because the woman's father or brother isn't there, doesn't mean she didn't have them at some point, or doesn't need that support in her life. Just because she doesn't have other skills she's proud of doesn't give people a right to use them as discardable deposits for male sexual desire.

None of the men that would attend these places and take full advantage would want their daughters in such a predicament, but I guess they figure since no one is going to stop them or their friends are doing it too, then there's nothing wrong with the situation. It's easily exploitable and only takes fifty to a hundred bucks in my area.

Same with slave holders. Best as I can figure it what gives abductors and slave holders a right is an assumption of right based on a lack of resistance or at least a perceived protection.

There are still slave traders to this day. The sex slave market is alive and well and traveling through our own cities. I wish I knew a source that could tell me how many of these slaves were in the US currently. How many women in the United States are brought here and then forced to be prostitutes? How many are there right now, today? Hundreds? Thousands? I'd be guessing if I came up with a number.

Across the seas, more slaves. Check out this interactive map. Worldwide the estimate is 27 million slaves. Lots of them are children.

How the slave trade flourishes is by finding people and populations that aren't looked out for, because it isn't a matter of right and wrong for slave traders, it's about how much resistance there is and what they perceive the consequences will be.

It's how much people look out for one another. Slave traders and holders really don't care about this concept. It's in brotherhood, sisterhood, parenting. All the skills for looking out for one another is a part of our human makeup.

I've had two or three people tell me that what I'm doing with this blog isn't my responsibility and it really comes down to black people picking themselves up and doing what they need to do like white people have to do it or other successful black men and women.

Isn't it the responsibility of all men to make sure that atrocities don't happen and and if they do, restore what has been taken by them? Unless people think we should wait for the aliens to come down and fix it for us?

That's probably not going to happen. But if it did, I'd be fucking ashamed of the human race that slavery still exists. Hey there alien dudes. Not quite ready yet. We're still not accountable for all our own diverse species. We'll get to that at some point. Check back with us in say... oh, never? Our heads in our butts in much too comfortable.

So there's a bunch of poor people, black and white, and I think about what their options are instead of how much I expect from them.

I can tell you from a lousy experience or two that support is necessary to finding your way through life. If you don't have that support and the time that you need to develop your skills at your own pace without someone telling you to get a particular kind of job so they don't have to be your vaulting point, your chances at being really successful at life are fairly slim.

Compound that by poverty. Again compound that with having only a single parent. Again compound that with gangs, street and domestic violence. Unsafe schools. Generations and generations without sufficient knowledge to make money.

When I think about what options a black man in poverty has, that future doesn't look as bright as the future I believe mine to be.

Goal setting -- the two types that help me and how I see them misused in business.

2009-07-26T07:11:00.000-07:00

Specifically this morning I've been thinking about how my goals affect my motivation, but since sitting at the computer I've been thinking more about the types of goals. Where I've seen them in the business, and how they've affected the work environment.

I've seen a lot of goal-makers. I'm judging, but rightfully so when I say that most people in the position of creating the goals (owners and mangers) are very lazy at it. I don't think they have a clue how both the quantity and quality of work would be effected.

The company mottos I've heard have typically seem contrived to me. They say you need a company slogan. I agree with them because this implies it's used to keep everyone on the same page.

But when I've seen these goals created, they haven't been for unifying purposes.

The three cases where I've seen a company slogan put in place on a developing small business, it was created as an advertisement. This is likely due to the business owner not really knowing what he or she really is a source of, but that's a guess on my part. What I could tell you immediately is that any employee who worked for that company would be able to tell you if the company motto is true or not because at one point or another they've tried to follow it and they've either gotten shot down or been wildly endorsed.

If I were working under the Coca-Cola motto who sells 'refreshment', I would suggest selling four-packs of different flavored lemonades, handkerchiefs, personal fans, laying down pipelines of fresh water, and lobby for legislation for naps in the business environment (isn't a power nap refreshing?). My brain is going to take that motto literally and go as far toward success as it can.

It seems to me that really what they 'do' is get as many different types of drinks on as many shelves as they can. Perhaps a better word for that would be 'saturation'?

I think I might be picking on the Coke company too much trying to make a point. And truth be told I like Coke products. I like Pepsi products too. What they both do well is refreshment diversity. I do love lots of choices at the cooler.

What I'm really trying to get across is that the main goal of the company is important for -everyone- involved to know if there will be any sort of innovation. If a company isn't interested in constantly being the best that they do, that company isn't going to last. They can start fudging number, cutting corners, slamming their help, or buying other books of business, but if they don't define what it is that they do and then constantly work to do that better, what use are they?

When no one knows what they're working toward, how can they have any ideas on how to better do it? Sure, employees can intuitively guess supporting goals of the company, but if the company isn't honest about its goals, most everyone in the company is going to be banging their head against the wall in frustration of how to make money, or even be productive.

From what I find in my own work, I have two types of goals that work for me.

One is the main goal and that's "What am I going to be a source of?". That's my holy grail for the business that I'm working on. That's always what I'm working toward. I use my heart, how I feel about things (and how I want to alleviate or enhance something), to help me determine the answer to that question.

The other is the supporting goal (Much like David Allen's "what's the next step?"). For this I use other questions:

"How much of this do I want to do before I wrap it up for a while?"
"What's the coolest way to do this without creating too much more work for myself?"
"Does this really fit my main goal?"

David Allen has created a marvelous work called "Getting Things Done." What I find to be his crowning achievement in enhancing the business world is the principle of "What's the next step?". His entire system didn't work out for me. I have a hunch this is mostly due to my own problems of not know what it is that I want to accomplish rather than a flaw in the work-flow management system he's set up.

I'm prone to leave things open-ended. I like to be creative so I set myself in all sorts of directions, to learn things, to feel like I'm more in control. That never gave me control over my work however. That method only kept me going in the wrong directions or going in circles. By open-ended I mean I've set no place where I'm going to stop. It's the vision I've created that shows to myself, "This is where I've done what I've set out to do".

These are where my supporting goals have typically been out of whack.

There have been a number of times that supporting goals have been overlooked in business. This isn't necessarily a terrible thing, but the results can be abusively inhumane.

Specifically this is an environment where only the main goal is addressed, and all the supporting goals (where anyone might be able to have any sort of creativity at all) is ruthlessly annihilated by the sentiment "make the main goal happen now" over and over again. Make it happen now. I don't care to discuss anything else. Is it done yet? How about now? Is it done?

I've done this to myself as well. Just hammer myself with the main goal and hope that the supporting goals present themselves.

Another thing I picked up about goal creation is to be sure everyone knows who is responsible for what. It's a must for cooperative organization. It lets you know what you have available for time and resources without stressing everyone out.

The most useful concept I've found for supporting goals is the idea of familiarizing myself as best I can. I've use project documents for this, but I haven't found them altogether necessary -- just spending time with the project and either organizing or just looking at what I have so far and comparing what I have against where I want to be.

In summary: The main goal is what I'm going to provide when I deliver my product or service and the supporting goals are what I use to set readily attainable waypoints.

(This idea is very much based on David Allen's, "What's the next step", however the supporting goals as I would create them do not have to be in order as the Next Step would imply. It can be broken into chucks for other participating members).

When I don't have a partner when I work on things (which is typical nowadays for me), I find that a notebook and paper can help. Even if it's just to complain about what I can't do right now. Those complaints can help me figure out what I need to look more into. That also helps to find and eliminate the word can't, and that is a very powerful place to be for anyone to reach.

I also find it to be a great use of a coffee shop, a pen and some paper.

If I decide to sit down and do it -- where do I get started? (also updates on the project itself)

2009-07-25T07:29:00.000-07:00

So I'm working on the interface for my project. I've used the 960 Grid System to lay it out, and I've successfully created a search feature using AJAX to narrow the list of antivirus options.

"A fast reference of how to turn off antivirus".

What I noticed most quickly is that as soon as I start, I got stuck.

I don't know where to begin. But I beat that. Here's how.

First, I got familiar with the environment.
Then I decided on how much I wanted to do.
Then I created a plan.
Then I stopped when I was done with that plan.

Did I mention I've reached extreme burn-out? Part of my problems with motivations is not asking myself this question: "By what will I measure success for today?" Meaning, how much am I going to do today? I'm certainly not going to trudge through any repetition to the point of nauseousness, and I don't want to aimlessly wander about in tutorial wonderland.

I want to get something accomplished.

So I ask myself, 'what is the least that I can do that will satisfy what needs to be done on this project before I wrap it up?'. This isn't an absolute rule for me, but it's an awesome way to both protect myself from more burnout, and keep myself working only on my goals.

I hate wasted work. It makes me lose faith in myself that any work I do is a waste of time. It drains me to exhaustion and depression. So in order to keep myself on track -- I present myself with possible outcomes and pick and choose to my liking. That part of the work is fun, fun, fun for me.

Obviously, I need to know what I'm working toward. But how do I get started?

First I have to take stock and revisit what I'm trying to do. Here's my list:

1.) I have a clearly defined goal that I'm working toward.
2.) I have a rough graphic design template.
3.) I have a list of commonly used antivirus packages.

What else do I need? A plan.

Having some up-front experience of how AJAX and jQuery works is a bonus. It helped me envision at least a slighty cooler graphic design template. Browsing around the Internet for other examples of menu systems was also helpful.

Here's a good working principle that I find useful: If I'm not able to envision my end product, then I need an example to fill the gaps.

Other people's work. Diagrams. Tutorials. Books. Internet searches. Asking questions of other people. These are my sources for gathering examples that I need.

Here's what my graphic template looked like when I made it a couple of days ago.

I've made some modifications since then, but what this picture does for me is even further help me define my goal. This graphic design template is made with Inkscape and a 960 grid system template (helps to space things out nicely).

Then I took a piece of the design template (the list of antivirus packages and search box on the left) and put in the functionality that I thought would be useful there - an AJAX list.

Here is the Turn Off Antivirus page in it's current construction. This will probably be where it ends up for good. Here is the tutorial and source code on AJAX that I hacked in order to make it work.

What I'm frustrated about right now is how I'm going to get the right-hand side of the page working. I'm frustrated and discouraged because I don't have a plan. I need one.

Like I said before, when in doubt when it comes to web page design, just get all the words on the page and move stuff around. It's a lot easier to work in the graphic design stage and move stuff around than it is to tweak the HTML/PHP/AJAX/jQuery every time I want to tweak something.

Since my initial experience and vision of the person who is using this page is someone who's talking through the steps over the phone, I want them to have what they need as quickly as possible.

What I want to happen: When I click on the title of an antivirus software package on the left, I want the directions to immediately show up on the right. I want the person visiting the page to know how to check what version of the antivirus software is in use. This way they can be sure they are reading the correct directions in order to get the job done.

What I had envisioned first was to have two buttons at the top of the text, however I think that's going to be too out-of-my-way for a first draft of the page. What I've settled on is making HTML targets to get down to the Check Version portion and the up to the How to disable.

Each entry for antivirus is going to have to have this.

So my answer to the question how do I get motivated and decide what I want to do (seeing how that I've gone everywhere else BUT answer that question, this post will definitely need a large edit) I found my answer.

I get started by organizing. This is a way of saying looking over all that I got and making plans for what is going to go where. That's my default work mode because it has almost ZERO undesirable work to it for me.

I figure out what I need by organizing/searching, then I define goals and make plans.

I find that if I have troubles with motivation the problem is I've put too much undesirable work between me and my goal. Undesirable work is a motivation sucker. Since I don't have a lot of motivation to spare, I've been looking at that pretty heavily.

For the content to be replaced, this is the closest example I found that matches what I want the page to do: http://css-tricks.com/examples/MenuFader/. I love CSS-Tricks.com. It is an amazing site chock-full of useful goodies. Chris Coyier is a web page design hero and I can't talk up his site enough.

I have another goal here that I've been reluctant to admit because I know it's going to make my project linger more than I want it to. I want to have this be a learning experience for jQuery and AJAX as well. I don't want to get into all the nooks and crannies of the systems, but I do want to look things over and tweak it to my needs.

These things aren't necessary to my goal of getting the site up and running, but it's going to make my site look better and work better, and it's important to me to look good at what I do.

Makes me feel good about myself, and finding that in the technology world isn't that easy. Usually what I get to sport are khaki pants and a geeky language that no one understands but other geeks.

So a little jazzing up of the site is a boost for me.

Elements of racism and where the sentiments have evolved.

2009-07-24T07:48:00.000-07:00

Here are what elements I find. Though on review, it seems this isn't just limited to a shameful history.

A history of abuse (I don't know a single person who doesn't carry blame for some unfairness that's been done to them. I'd be interested to know how many people on the planet don't resent even their own parents for one thing or another).
Objects of contention (immovably unresolved and bitter standpoints).
Acts of spite (very literally actions taken with 'fuck them' in mind).
Intimidation (it is the most effective means I've seen of propagating hatred).
Definitions of what people are allowed to have

The main object of contention has evolved into what I see as two main sentiments:
Black: "You don't give a fuck about me. I have to do this on my own." ("You are worthless in partnership" is a part of this sentiment.)
White: "I personally had nothing to do with it, so therefore I owe you nothing." ("Deal with it," is also a part of this sentiment.)

These sentiments are impassible because neither one of them is incorrect. These are both reasonable statements. The burden of blame implied with both these statements might be contrived, the facts are the facts. Black men are indeed stereotyped as incapable and their needs discarded. White men alive today did not in fact have anything to do with the slavery that took place and it seems reasonable to feel as though the responsibility is misplaced on them.

I'm looking at what's missing in order to create this problem. My question is "What's missing?"

The only answer I can find is: The location of prosperity.

Why my own frustrations are what I'm going to use for new business.

2009-07-23T08:55:00.000-07:00

The reason I use my own frustrations as a way to 'fit the need' is because I have a hunch, that someone else has had or will have the same frustration. It is also a way I honor the life I have been given.

Based on that one principle alone, I don't lose hope in what I'm doing.

Mostly that's because I will always remember how useful it would have been if someone had alleviated it for me when I needed it.

I'm also very drawn to this approach because I don't have to spin my wheels in order to find what I need (a way to be good at something and make money without going in fifty directions a day in order to find it).

It meets my ideas about building my castle. There are thousands and thousands of disciplines when it comes to learning technology. Which do I learn in order to be successful?

That is why I'm going with my own frustrations, because how I feel is one of the few things I'm really sure about in life. Whether or not it truly is my source for no-fail new business is yet to be seen.

So I'm back to my goal again, this time finding a list of the most popular antivirus packages to base my page design on. The design part should be fun.

Where do I stand with my boss?

2009-07-23T06:12:00.000-07:00

If a man already has his billing system set up and has his reoccurring revenue coming in and I'm working for him, there is a role that develops between me as the employee and him as the employer. These roles apply to my direct supervisors as well as the guy in charge of the entire company.

In some situations, my boss has been my adversary. This isn't necessarily my bosses role, but mine. I become my boss's enemy in order to survive what I perceive to be (usually thoughtlessly) hostile tactics on his part.

In this situation, typically my boss is not on my side regardless of the situation. My input is not required for anything. He does both of our jobs for us when it comes to evaluation of what's required and leaves me only with undesirable work. When my bosses become my adversaries, typically this situation happens because this boss doesn't listen to my input, makes all the decisions for himself and has a greatly different view of how other people fit into the equation. He makes goals vague and specific actions that need to be taken perfectly clear.

If this is a direct supervisor, it's someone who's not looking out for my interests but only his own job and the boss above him.

This could also be someone who steals credit rather than introduce me with esteem to the people my work has satisfied, or to the other people in my field or environment. This undermines my value as an employee. It hinders my raises, my marketability, and my self esteem.

In this environment I've also taken the role of sniper. This means I've tried to gather people to come to my aid by how someone else is doing something wrong. That's never worked out well for me and I'm also not proud of myself for it.

My master (maybe better called 'my expert/teacher/mentor'). I think of this as an apprenticeship. When someone in my field is more knowledgeable than I am about a skill, I take this role of apprentice. I'm compliant in requests to do work. I try not to be a drain on this person but instead learn ways to contribute to their goals. I read about the subject matter. My goal with my resident expert is to become a peer. I've taken the role of apprentice with people that I find honorable, knowledgeable or handy. I consider this type of business relationship a part of paying my dues in the field. It is impossible for school to teach me everything I need to know to be successful. If I believed that, I'd be in school forever instead of out gathering experience.

These people include me in the decisions making process and share their reasoning in why they've done something.

They also throw me all kinds of bones when it comes to what they've found works really well. It takes trust for someone to share those things. I'm grateful when I receive them.

There have been times that I've thought that bosses are just inherently bad and that in order to be happy I would have to be self employed.

To the contrary I've found that not all bosses are bad. It's been a matter of how willing they are to cooperate with their peers and superiors, how reasonably they come to agreements, how well they define goals and how much importance they place on including subordinates.

How fatherhood and business situations rub off on me.

2009-07-22T08:52:00.000-07:00

He loved Stephen King books. He read them all the time and I read them when he was done. I love Stephen King books. He loved watching science fiction television. I watched them with him. Now I love watching science fiction television.

My father didn't take to watching sports. Care to hazard a guess if I'm a devout sports watcher? I'm not.

My father is a simple man who believes in decency and I love him for it. He was never violent with me. He didn't throw his weight around as an authority. He's a loving soul at heart. His gentleness has rubbed off on me in many ways. So have the people in business rubbed off on me in much the same way.

Combined, they have taught me just through being near them how to approach different things in my life. Sometimes it's through their philosophies but mostly it's how they handle different situations even when they don't have a nifty saying to go along with their awesomeness.

Other businessmen specifically have taught me how to make money, how to spot unethical men, and given me methods of trusting other people. I hold dear to my heart that I've had some of the best examples of businessmen in my life (I feel) and I'm thankful for that blessing.

It can be an unspoken legacy to simply do what my father would do, or do what another businessman has done.

These principles are handed down from folk to folk. I've taken what I've needed from all kinds of situations where men make decisions and how I think they've made them.

I guess you can say I'm kind of a philosophy scrounge.

When I see someone doing something that I think is either noble or profitable, I think to myself, "Yeah. That's how I'd handle things if I were in charge." I try to make it a part of my decisions when I get the opportunity.

That's really all I have on this. I wanted to qualify why I think fatherhood and business sense is sometimes inherited just by being in the company of people who make decisions.

A breakdown of undesirable work.

2009-07-19T13:54:00.000-07:00

The experiences I've had with undesirable work has lead me to define it as: "a task I have to complete without the necessary resources". Work is not inherently unpleasant as they say.

Some of the resources are the following:
1.) A Dealine. If there isn't enough time, then the goal needs to be adjusted. Likely the adjustment is the removal of someone's ego.
2.) Preparation. Winging it wears me out. I'm not doing that for anyone but my family or a real good cause.
3.) Expertise. Not having someone available to ask questions of when I don't have the answer.
4.) A Team. If I'm going to be stuck with undesirable work, I better not be the only one.
5.) Clearly defined goals. When left to my own devices to complete something: not having a clearly defined goal by my superior or customer.
6.) Skills. I need to have done it before. If I haven't, I need someone else who's done it before.
7.) Power. When I have no say in the decision making process of the work. "What!? Include our employees in what should be done!?!?" Yep. They're the one's the front lines. They are the interfaces to the customers and they're the ones who get the most undesirable work.
8.) Support of my superiors. When I need extra resources that were not preordained - or for the people who have necessarily gone the extra mile.

If these resources are 'just not possible at the current time', then neither is my availability and your very good tax dollars will be most appreciated for my food stamps and housing, thank you.

(Which, by the way, I just got the food stamps and it's wonderful to have the support. Thank you State of Massachusetts. I won't abuse your generousity.)

A few types of undesirable work:

1.) Repetition as far as the eye can see. I have to note that of all the repetitive tasks, number crunching is the highest paid. This is the tool of the Big Boys. Monitoring Cash flow. Lots to share there.
2.) Work where credit will be assumed by a superior or weasel-peer. In this situation, you have a corrupt person at the top of your ranks.
3.) Environments with the threat of injury or loss of life.
4.) Work where only someone else will reap the benefits. Slavery.

A few reasons why work isn't inherently unpleasant as they say, but really someone not acting honorably:

1.) The undesirable work is split unevenly (somone at my job sticks me with what they don't want doesn't suit them, or my partner doesn't support my efforts). This is typically someone 'just seeing' if they can get out of doing their part. I have been guilty of this. Partly because my generousity has been abused, party because I've been a lazy coward. I'm sorry.
2.) Someone steals the credit for the work I have done. Nothing makes me more angry.
3.) The unrewarding/undesirable work is dropped on my lap and I'm expected to complete it without due resources (see above). One way I've seen people justify this is to make me believe that I'll bee 'good enough' if I do things in this manner. As Shakespeare would say, "Let them be pricked".
4.) Another situation is when other people assume there is a 'graduation' from undesirable work. It's the most vile work environment you will ever see. (Please don't confuse this with paying dues in your field. There are lots of things to learn and sometimes the only people you can learn from are jerks). However, .....
5.) Any situation where I've seen people practice business, love, parenting, or brotherhood have dropped me in the water because they're hacks at what they do. Some people will suggest this as a method of learning, that it builds character or that's just the way it is. The only thing that's really done to my character is make me want to kick them while wearing boots. Then watch them dance unhappily while holding their shins. Then when they're particularly off balance, poke them gently with long, blunt sticks.

That's what it feels like to be dropped in the water.

The saddest part about this is that none of these people ask themselves how to be a better ______ . And it's usually just that simple.

From everything that I've looked at, undesirable work might be also the key to understanding the contention between the white and black cultures.

This war is a quiet hatred. It's whisper in private speech is 'what people deserve'. Each of it's sources needs a sound slap to the face. Hopefully in turn to slap whoever feeds them the bullshit they spout. That's where peace is at.

I don't do someone else's undesirable work for no reason. I'll do it for collaborative effort. I'll do it when it includes my own vested interests. I'll do it in order to gain experience in a field in the spirit of apprenticeship. If not, I'll do it if I know what I'm doing and if I'm paid well.

Next up: Business and trust.

What kind of source am I going to be?

2009-07-17T14:00:00.000-07:00

That's probably the best question I've come up with since starting this blog.

I've been exploring the ideas of goal revision (which is useful) and reoccuring income (which is super), but I haven't thought about it in the context of what's going to make me happy.

I've assumed that making useful things is going to be the key to my success, but is it going to be by using technology? What do I care about that I want to contribute to? Cars, computers, community care... what?

Another problem I've had for my entire life. I don't know what I want to be good at. Depends on what I want to do, I suppose. I like writing, clearly. But writing isn't enough for me. I want to be talking to people all over.

Do I want to be a source of humor? Of information that helps people fix problems?

For now, I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing, because I want the cash and I really want to know everything about this process so I can duplicate it many times on a small scale.

Diversifying, that's called. Putting my eggs in different baskets. Helps if one initiative fails to have others as a backup. Usually this term is used when it comes to stocks but since I'm setting up web pages with advertising on them to get re-occuring income, it's still the same principle. If the bottom falls out of one thing, there's another as a backup.

Oh, and I've revised my goal a bit more to better fit the original 'stuckness' that I ran into. When I got the idea it was from not being able to describe what needed to be done over the phone to shut off their antivirus. So that's my revised goal.

"Make a web page or pages that people can use to walk through procedures to disable antivirus when they're on the phone." That's the best overall stated goal I've come up with, and it really does keep in mind what source I want to be for people.

So, I said before, micro-goals. I don't think that's an adequate description of what I'm trying to do. Perhaps instead a major goal is what I need, but just little things to do that meet that goal time and time again. Yeah. That sounds like a MUCH better idea.

By the way, Coka-Cola says their major goal is "Refreshment". It's a huge claim on the market, but if that were true, they'd have fifty flavors of lemonade. They don't. So they're sort of full of shit. Either that or they don't talk about their goals to their employees anymore.

That's the question I've been looking for. What am I going to be a source for? What are people going to come looking for me to do for them?

Answer ------ I'm the best answer for how to shut off antivirus when you have someone on the phone waiting for you. That's my goal. That's how I'm going to be a source of something, and that's how I'm going to meet that goal every day I possibly can until I'm the best there is at it.

There's really no one else in the market that's going to be that specific source, so that's going to be me. Once I've got it good enough, then I'm going to be a source for something else.

Since the simplest way to meet that goal is to write down the steps, I'm going to go download another antivirus package, download it, and get the steps for that too. Then I'm going to post that to my blog as well. That micro-goal idea is -- trashed. One big goal, finding the simplest ways to meet it, by defining what source I'm going to be.

In order to be the best, I'm also going to need what versions of these antivirus products they use and how to find that out quickly as well. So it sounds like two quick lists for each antivirus package: 1.) The steps to shut off the antivirus, 2.) The steps find out what version.

Useful Initiative Part IV: Revising my choice of words in the title.

2009-07-16T19:43:00.000-07:00

I used a resource that Google provides for keyword popularity. Apparently people don't search for "shut off norton antivirus", but they search for "turn off norton antivirus" at least some.

Bummer. I didn't think that the link itself to the page would be changing. I really don't want to hunt down those links. Sounds like useful idea time.

What I'll do instead is create a new post and point the old post to the new one. That way the links are still good. Technically this is improper etiquette on the web. You're supposed to use a 403 redirect. But I don't want to look up how to do that again right now and go through the hassle. This is a good step for now.

I'll get to that in another revision.

Also, I've noticed that I've started to tinker instead of goal-revise. That's a problem for me. I really need to write about my goals more (to myself at least). It's so easy to get confused when I'm working on something when I really don't understand what my own goals are. It really has tripped me up continually throughout my life.

On a good note, I noticed that I ranked number 5 in Google for the term "shut off norton antivirus". But again, like I said no one is really searching for that. They're using the word 'turn' instead. I'll see how well I rank in a few days with the new page titles.

My useful initiative, by example: Part III - Revising my first attempt to fit the need

2009-07-16T17:46:00.000-07:00

I wanted to refine my attempt, so I revisited it. Not only did the page look a little bland, but I want to get the information across in a better way.

To do this I took the screen shots I had created (a resource) and then chopped them up into an image.

With this initial design, since it's a "how to" answer, I wanted to display the steps in a visual manner. Since I'm not trained to do this, I just made an attempt.

I think it might be useful to share that I had an idea to do something else about halfway through. It was a good idea I think, but I need to look into it a bit more to see if it's something I can actually do or not. In the meantime, I finished up my diagram. I spent about thirty to forty-five minutes for the this picture... resizing, getting the lines to match up, etc....

Here's a copy of it. How the current page looks is here. I've been posting what changes I make to the page here because I know I'm going to keep revising over and over.

This graphic seems a little confusing. I need something less confusing that's about as compact for my next revision.

What I made it with was a combination of two free graphic editing programs. One is The Gimp which could be called a PhotoShop replacement and InkScape which could be called an Adobe Illustrator replacement.

By the way, if any of my fellow web geek friends were to see that page right now, they might not think very highly of me. If that's the case, first I'd have to tell them to go have sex with themselves temporarily. After that, I would put up my next revision.

I guess what I'm trying to relay here is this: just because what you make isn't good enough the first time --- it doesn't mean you can't make another pass at it by revisiting the goal and doing some touch-up.

My next idea is using small animated Gifs (I was thinking video too, but I'm just not sure yet.).

I might also employ the use of some other technology. Maybe jQuery. jQuery is responsible for all the cool effects on web pages you've been seeing recently on sites like myspace and facebook.

I'm really going to look into that tomorrow. Right now my idea is that when they roll over a specific step in the process of shutting off norton, a different image appears to the right of it showing them a visual representation.

Just some thoughts to make it much more appealing to use. I wonder if that might be a good idea to use as a principle of business design? Refine the product's appeal? I'll have to think about that, but my intuition says that the roll-overs are more fun and since this is what I've chosen to do for my useful initiative, I might as well put some fun in it too right?

Are you beginning to see how looking at my useful initiative and sculpting it to better and better fit my original goal is going to make this page better almost every day?

This is satisfying to do this revision stuff. I don't feel like a moron because I know I have the chance to add to it over and over again. Much better than when my boss would make me feel stupid because he'd make me do things half-assed and leave them unfinished all the time.

Life is good. I'm looking forward to adding to my goal again tomorrow.

I've sort of forgotten my goal so I'm going to try to repeat it from memory. I want to make a web page where I can get the information of how to shut off Norton Antivirus over to my visitor as quickly and painlessly as possible. I need to remind myself of these things.

I forget and start wandering off.

Sources and Resources

2009-07-15T17:57:00.001-07:00

I distinguish sources and resources as two different things.

A source is somewhere I get something from. A resource is something I already have on tap. It could be that I'm already paying for it, but I already have it available.

I have a friend who lives up the street from me that knows a lot of the ins and outs of getting things when you're poor. He is my source of information (presently) for finding good food for myself. He shares all kinds of information on where to find stuff. Food pantries. Free clothing. Discount or free furniture. He's lived on this same city block his entire life.

I have a few borrowed resources presently. One is this computer that I'm using and the room I'm sitting in to type. I didn't buy it. I don't rent it. I guess you could say that the person I'm borrowing it from is a source. He's also paying for the electricity that allows me to use this computer.

My website: niftygeek.com is a resource. I registered the domain name a long time ago and the website sits on a computer hosted in a data center with lots of other computers and very, very large Internet connections.

This web site is hosted for free. Partly because I'm friends with the people of that business. Partly because I made a business deal with them to send them other hosting customers if I found them.

Blogger is another thing I use for a resource. It's free. And I've already set up the Tidbits blog to publish to niftygeek.com.

I set that up the hosting location with business agreements and got a bit of know-how from exploring the blogger.com interface. The domain name still costs me ten bucks a year (or something like that). There have been times I haven't had the money to pay for those domains, so I'm glad there's a friend of mine who looks out for me there. It's a decent domain name, so it's good to have handy.

Here are some other resources: Open source software (I use quite a few open source packages in order to do a lot with computers).

There are also some websites that I use to find out more information about how to do web work. There are quite a few web technologies that I deal with, so I'm not going to delve too deep into that presently.

Hopefully I can be a source of yours. Perhaps I can eventually be your source for business design. This is something that I'm striving for. I have a lot of other goals as well, but this is most important to me. Eventually I hope to refine all of the concepts that I put here and turn them into a well organized book. Perhaps even a series of youtube videos. I don't have any ideas about packaging this information in useful ways yet.

I'm trying to think of other sources and resources that I have. Some resources are of a personal nature. For instance, my skin can get very irritated when I use Ivory soap. When I use Dove soap my skin feels great. No problems. It's a lot gentler on my skin. I consider both knowing that Dove soap does the trick and that I have it in stock, both resources.

Side note: I always share resources. Always. Whenever I get a payload of anything I share some of it. Half is a good measure to try.

I also have my collection of clothes. That's a resource. Couldn't get around too well without those. The washer and dryer that I use are also resources (again, borrowed resources, but still resources for now).

I don't have much. Most of what I own was lost when I got sick. I'm not sick anymore thankfully, but everything I'd collected during my lifetime was lost to me. Even my guitar. I really miss playing my guitar.

Any printed information that I have in my posession is a resource (like the locations of food pantries and soup kitchens here in fall river).

Having friends with cars that I can ask for a ride is a source. My source for rides is my friend. His car is his resource. I'm defining this stuff for myself as I go. Please pardon the repetition.

I guess I can safely say that a resource implies ownership in one fashion or another where sources don't.

My landlord of the place where I stay is a source. I'm lucky he's a kind soul. I don't take advantage of his generosity because I don't want to lose him as a source.

Sources are like a river. Stuff comes from them. In that way, the Government and other people paying taxes are my source for food stamps presently. Abusing those sources would not be in my best interest if I want to keep any sort of comfort while I'm getting on my feet.

One huge lesson I've learned about sources is this: If someone doesn't want to be my source for something (someone doesn't want to hire me, doesn't want to go on a date with me, doesn't want to help me) trying to force them, love them more or threaten them doesn't help.

There's always another source for what you need. Always. Keep that in mind. It helps when you get really, really pissed off at someone who can't or won't give you what you need (especially when you think they're being unfair). Fuck'm and get on to finding another source. This is a big cause for me getting stuck. If someone says no, they say no. Nothing you can do about it.

Resources (things you have that you can use to help you do business) are things that I gather to help me meet my goals. Resource gathering without a goal is a waste of time. I end up with a lot of junk I have to watch over that is useless to me because they don't fit into my goals. I'm talking about physical objects and information. Not people. This idea of resource gathering is a primary feature of what I call building the castle. It's got a romantic ring to it no? Building a castle? I like the sound of it.

Too often I see people used as resources.

That would kind of imply property. Wouldn't it?

I'm going to be looking for sources of distribution soon to get the word out about these principles of frustration, usefulness, and microgoals. I might even more heavily define the principle of re-occurring income as a part of that distribution.

I was thinking I might hit someone up at the Small Business Development Association. Considering I don't have a working model yet that proves the theory, it's possible that they'll giggle after I speak to them. Might be best to wait until I've got more to show them (and you) first.

If I were to propose to put a packet together for the SBDA, they might help distribute it for me to people who are already focusing on getting a business set up. My ideas are more suited for someone who isn't at that level yet, but still, it seems to me that these principles would pretty much help -anyone- in business that doesn't believe in exerting more effort than is necessary.

I'm fucking tired of running in circles where everyone tells me prosperity is to be found. Seriously.

What I'm looking to do is to be your source for your business design. So you can customize it to fit your own needs, based on what you have experience with and what you're interested in.

I'll have to come back and talk more about sources and resources once I think of more examples of where I've used both. I also need to get the principles of mining frustrations for useful ideas and turning them into a cycle of goal refinement down pat.

Although I haven't yet be successful, I have a hunch that goal refinement is the very key to a happy life. Revise and talk about your goals at every given opportunity with anyone who might be a source for you. You do this and you're going to be in very good shape.

So where do you start defining your goals? Start with the words, "I need" and then finish the sentence. Say that sentence again and make it longer. Say it again and again until it is exactly how you envision it.

Partners are also sources. Talk to them about specifically defining frustrations and defining goals as often as possible. Not only will it make you stronger partners, but you'll be more productive as a team. There are too many times that I've made suggestions about what to do with my partners without goal refinement. What ends up happening is one of us spins our wheels to exhaustion or one of us loses interest. However, if our conversations were mostly about defining the goals or defining problems/frustrations/stress/strandedness, we'd be in pretty great shape.

If my sources don't trust me, sooner or later they aren't going to be my sources. For that I use my rules of conduct base on the golden rule.

I try my darndest, daily, to make sure that I never do anything to someone that I wouldn't have them to do me. Not ever. I don't take things without people's permission. I don't take more than my share. I think about other people that are in my same situation -- I try to look out for people how I'd like them to look out for me.

If it weren't for the violence and killing, I probably would have been better suited for the mob than working for men who don't give a hoot about me. Too late now.

You know what I think we could call getting business ideas from investigation people's frustrations (primarily our own problems and frustrations)?

I think we could call that the source of new business. I think that's a super name for it.

A big part of life is getting as many sources as you need. And that's exactly how I've been doing it. I determine what I need, and then I go and get the sources to supply it.

Sources of food Part II

2009-07-15T08:38:00.000-07:00

So I found all the pantries in the area. Some of the food was good.

I said I would let you know about the canned pork.

Truth is, it was terrible.

When it comes to food, my goal is this. I need good food without too much effort.

The nifty idea of putting the can of "Pork with juices" mixed in the spaghetti sauce to mix with the pasta was a good one. Unfortunately, the meat that was in that can was not good enough.

I gave it a fair enough shot. It looked inedible when I opened the can and it made me nauseous. I'll spare you the details on what it looked like.

Now, I have been a lover of Deviled Ham in my life and this pork smelled something like that, so I figured I would give it a full-go and try it out in the spaghetti sauce.

I kept my gag reflexes down while mushing it with a fork into the spaghetti sauce. Some hope started to brew. The more I mushed it up, the more it looked like pulled-pork (which I know to be pretty tasty).

I also made sure that it was well cooked. I kept it on the stove longer than what I would normally heat just spaghetti sauce. Ugh.

Lo and behold. When I had the finished product, it still smelled inedible. I ate a full plate anyway just to make sure.

It was terrible. I couldn't shake that it smelled more like dog-food now than anything. I didn't get sick, but it was so bad.

Now. My goal of getting good food without too much effort didn't work out so well.

I have to mention again. Anyone who would tell you that in order to be a good businessman you have to put in a lot of effort is full of shit. Don't tell them I said that. Ask them to talk to me about it so I can tell them myself.

They just never found a way to do it. Getting good food for you and yours is really important.

I'm revisiting my goal again of getting good food without too much effort. Anytime something sounds like too much effort - it is. But there are still ways to meet simplified goals without putting in too much effort.

For instance: when your girl tells you that you're not loving her right, there's an assumption that we/you/I have to try harder. Trying harder to love someone doesn't work. Don't bother. It's wasted effort. What you can do that does work is to be more supportive of that person instead of judge them for what we consider to be not good enough about them.

I mentioned that I'm also in the process of applying for food stamps. I should know by the beginning of next week whether or not I'm accepted for the emergency food stamps or not. That would be nice to get a card with $200 worth of food on it for the month.

So my plan is this. I'm going to hit all the pantries available to me for canned and dried food and then use the EBT/Food stamps for good meats -- because from one visit I highly suspect that's what's lacking in the food pantries. EBT for quality meats. Maybe even marinaded meats for the grill? Sound yummy?

It does to me. That's my plan. Tomorrow I'm parterning up with someone else who needs food too (who also has a car) and we're going to hit as many food pantries to get canned, dried, and fresh foods other than meats.

What I'm afraid of when it comes to making money and loving other people

2009-07-15T07:13:00.000-07:00

What I'm afraid of when it comes to loving people and making money are one and the same. I'm afraid I'm going to be taken advantage of, that any generosity where I give more than what's safe to do so is going to backfire.

It is the only reason I've ever held back being generous or supportive.

It's pretty much the same thing with the money cog.

Are you afraid of that kind of abuse? Do you suffocate people to get them to do what you want instead of being their partner to get what you both need?

By suffocation I mean do you withhold from people? Do you withhold sex from your partner when you're unhappy? Do you withhold the better food from your children? Do you withhold raises? Do you withhold the truth because you're afraid people will use it against you instead of be your friend?

I've done that. It keeps me safe from being hurt. But when other people do it to me, it infuriates me.

I'm afraid that sharing will mean that I won't have enough. If I share my heart will people use it to hurt me? If I share my cigarettes will they look out for me when I don't have any. What about money? If I share my money or house with people will they look out for me when I don't have the money or the house?

When I tighten my belt, I suffocate my happiness. When I deny people a share in what I have, I suffocate their happiness.

So, a lot of my lessons have been about what to share. And there's a central theme to it running worldwide.

I'm afraid of undesirable work. It makes me physically ill to think that I'll ever have to put in too much effort in order to be happy. I'm sick of too much effort. It's broken me as a person and I am contemptuous at the concept. It has never shown it's reward. People might say, "Just a little while longer and you'll be over that hump" or "If you try a little harder you'll be welcome with us."

Fuck you people who say that. You're still waiting too. You just happened to have enough money to go on vacation once in a while, but you're not included when it comes to the real wealth either.

No one gets real success unless they get real business. No one's going to give you their money cog. The best you got is the idea you can spawn off into your own business and that's what I'm going to show anyone who wants to learn how to do it.

The secret of not putting in too much effort is this: micro-goals.

I will find a way to survive where I never have to be the guy who puts in too much effort.

I'm never going to stay at a job where effort is what they pay me for. My effort belongs invested to what I believe in. Not a cash register.

Since I've wasted effort just about anywhere you can imagine, I'll write up a post on that too.

I have another fear when it comes to making money. I'm afraid that I won't be able to handle the workload and I'm timid about that. I don't want to waste my effort and I don't want to be stuck doing undesirable work. Never, ever if I can ever possibly avoid it.

So this technique I'm working on with micro-goals is where I'm headed. By micro goals I mean that the better that I define the smallest amount of work that meets the goal, the better. That means I'm more likely to make money. Once I have that goal where I want it I'm going to meet that goal again and again.

In order to stay profitable, I'm going to duplicate the same goal again. If it was a good goal to begin with (as in it alleviates someone's frustration/stress/stuckness) - then why not meet that goal as simply as possible again and again?

This is a good way not to get your business stolen from you by someone who does it better. Because your business is to choose where you meet a goal better than anyone else on the planet. You can find one of these very easily and you can make huge profits in it.

Better news? Once you perfect it? Go and get another one. There are plenty of unhappy people on the planet. Finding a useful thing for these situations can be easy-easy.

Once I find my useful goal - and make sure it fits the need of that frustration that I found, I'm going to refine that goal to the best of my ability and I'm going to meet that goal again and again and again. Because this is where my business is.

My useful initiative, by example: Part II - Beginning implementation

2009-07-14T17:52:00.000-07:00

From my previous attempts I have a lot of leftovers from my work. I have over a hundred files from taking snapshots of the program and then making web pages that pointed to each other.

The program is Norton 360. After I go and look up the goal I settled on last night, I'm going to go come back and repeat it.

Someone needs to know how to shut off Norton as fast as he or she possibly can. I'm going to set up something that will show them that information as quickly as I can get it to them and I'm going to put advertising on it so if they find something else they're interested in they can click on that.

I suppose the easiest way to go about this is to come up with the sentences that would guide someone through that. So that's what I'm going to do, make a web page with the series of steps. To do that, I'm going to open up the trial version of Norton 360 that I installed and write down the steps for that web page.

I'll just jot those notes down here: This is for Norton 360 Version 3.0.0.135

Open the program
Click "Settings" in top nav
Click "Antivirus" under "Detailed Settings"
Click the pill looking button next to AutoProtect until it says "Off" right next to the button.
Norton Antivirus is now disabled.

There are other things to consider here and make a decision about. For instance, the Firewall that is a part of Norton 360 might also be the issue that's causing issues downloading email. Since it fits into my goal of shutting off Norton to check if it's causing the issue with email, then that's what I want to do.

Here are the notes for shutting off the firewall:

Open the program (if not already open)
Click "Settings" in top nav
Click "Firewall" under "Detailed Settings"
Click the pill looking button next to "Smart Firewall" until it says "Off" to the right next to the button.
The firewall is now turned off.

Now I've got the list of steps for both.

Should I just put it on a page and get it up on the Internet so I can be found? My gut tells me yes. Not because that's what I'd do if I wasn't sharing this with you but because my other goal for this project is to show you exactly how it grows.

So I'm going to do that quickly. I'm going to use the HTML editor that's available free with the Seamonkey web browser.

Scratch that. What I'm going to do is just publish it as a blog on niftygeek.com. That way I don't have to mess with uploading the page I've just made with FTP and then link to it from niftygeek.com (which was what I was planning without making it a conscious goal).

Okay about ten minutes after making those notes with the directions, I'm back with a link for how to shut off norton antivirus.

Luckily for me Blogger took care of all the formatting, and you'll notice there is already a Google Adsense advertisement for people to click on if they find something interesting there. (Please don't click on ads on my site unless you're interested in them. That's a part of the agreement between me and Google).

Although I did identify one of the goals with this project was going to be to track it's progress, I didn't define how I was going to track it's progress.

Well. One way I have to do that is with the server stats. I can see how many people viewed what pages on my websites. Because I have a 'spammy' energy drinks website on there, a lot of the visitors are there for information on energy drinks. What I can look for are search terms (hopefully) that were used to find my webpage with the words: "Shut off Norton Antivirus".

Notice how I linked to that twice on this page every time I used the words? That will help Google and other search engines realize that the page I just created is really about shutting off Norton Antivirus and hopefully place me better in the search engines.

That would be nice. More people might find something interesting on the ads there.

Also, what I'm doing there is telling the search engines that this page is about shutting off norton antivirus. Technically, that's not true.

What's more true is that that page right now is about Turning off Norton 360 Antivirus Version 3.0.0.135. So what I might want to do as a next revision is to make that page more like what I'm promoting -- a good idea, I think. Wouldn't want the search engines to hate me for false advertising, would I? Definitely not. Mostly because they can ban me for spamming. Not a good idea if I want to continue using this method to make re-occuring revenue for myself.

What I'll do to even it out is to link to the page with "Turn off Norton 360". That's more appropriate, and less likely to make someone angry when they click on the link. I believe there is a difference between plain old Norton Antivirus and Norton 360. I'll have to check that out.

I'm going to leave it at that for tonight. I need to get some housecleaning done.

Tomorrow I'll work on the page a bit more. I'll have to come up with another goal so I can be more useful and get more money. Always important to revisit the goals in business. Too many ideas, too few goals.

Driven me in circles all my life.

Sources of food.

2009-07-14T11:49:00.000-07:00

I'm not kidding about trying to get my useful initiative up and running ASAP -- as in today. I'm just excited about something else so I'm jotting it down so I don't forget.

My current situation is this: I'm staying with friends on a couch. The job that I have barely pays the rent (I'm late every week). I'm getting some more hours at 7-11, but until then, I'm in some pretty cruddy shape when it comes time that I get hungry. I start feeling like a leper.

Today was a pretty good day in finding sources of food.

I went to by the Office of Transitional Assistance in Fall River a few weeks back and picked up the application for Food Stamps. I don't plan on being poor for very long, but in the mean time I need to eat and I need to eat decent food.

The leftover sandwiches from 7-11 can be gross after a day and I don't get those sandwiches every day. I'm afraid they're going to make me sick.

So in addition to dropping off a half-completed form, on the way back I saw some people standing in front of a building. I asked someone in the car with me what they were standing outside for.

It was a food pantry. A place where you can go and get food. You'll need some sort of an ID to bring with you in order to get food there.

What I found out when I went there was this:

I can only go to that pantry once per month in order to pick up food for myself. There are seven pantries in my area. Each of those places has the same rule. I can go to each one, each month. They are only open on a single day, or maybe two days per week. They are only open for about two hours at a time when they are open.

Counting... that's seven visits to the pantries in one month that I could make.

I'm not going to list out all the food that I got, because that's undesirable work for me. What I will say is that I liked the orange juice. I liked that there was an almost complete meal idea in that there was spaghetti, spaghetti sauce, and some meat (although it was canned meat .... I'll let you know if it was okay) to put in the sauce. There was some mac and cheese too.

I borrowed my friends car and another friend who already knew about the pantry came with me. Just to escort me there a bit.

Expect to stand in line for a bit. Depending on how early you are it makes a difference. Might want to remember sun screen or an umbrella, maybe some water, a towel... depending on the weather, whatever you think is appropriate. It might be a while.

Expect to be turned away if you don't have an ID. That's just the way it works. They need to make sure people aren't going to get what they need.

Expect the people there to be knowledgeable about where to find other stuff. They didn't only tell me about six other food pantries that I could get food from. But they gave me a flyer showing me the times of soupkitchens that feed people already made meals every day of the week.

A note on discount grocery stores.

If you don't know what they are, I have two in my city for example. The names of these businesses are Price Right and Save-A-Lot. It's grocery shopping, half-priced. See if you have any near you.

I can't tell you how many people tell me that, "If it's for free than it's for me." Interestingly enough, I haven't run into any of those people during my travels of finding free or discounted food (except for maybe one).

Anyone who would tell you this is a dishonorable thing to do -- that this makes you one of the people who can't contribute, is at the same time full of shit and not being your friend. You tell me how else to get good food for yourself that doesn't involve doing undesirable work for someone else's money cog or doing business reputation damage for or with people who use guns.

Don't get me wrong. It isn't wrong to have a criminal mindset. The problem isn't even a matter who you steal from. The only problem is what you steal.

Stealing know-how to get things for yourself that doesn't hurt anyone else, is none of anyone else's business. That's your business. That's where you become successful. That's how you get the car so you can find a date. McDonald's doesn't give a hoot and will never give a hoot if you ever own a car or a home. They are not there to provide that for any of us (though, nothing against McDonald's, cause they got nice chicken sandwiches and fun jungle gyms and all).

It's when you hurt someone or take something that doesn't belong to you where people are going to get you back for it. Some men might claim that servicing their customers for something that they don't is a conflict of interest.

It's not.

There are contracts for it called Non-Compete Agreements. There are aspects of non-compete agreements that need to be lifted.

There are also some Intellectual Property Rights that need to be lifted. Just because you had an idea for something because you worked at someone's business can't allow them to keepy our idea. Of course there is an except to that.

Legislation needs to be put in place for that to end. Both of these out-of-bounds practices are monopolistic and only makes me a slave to someone else's money-cog, will make my children subject to the same thing.

It's a bastard of the free market system.

I do not and will never advocate ruining another person's prosperity. Not ever. But when someone prohibits my own prosperity, we are going to settle the problem one way or another.

My apologies for getting a little side tracked. I'm irritated that people think they have a right to do that because of a piece of paper.

I'll get my useful initiative online ASAP so we can start tracking it's profitability. After that I'll get into how to apply these concepts to other than making web pages.

My useful initiative, by example: Part I - the frustration turned into a goal.

2009-07-13T19:33:00.000-07:00

When I worked for an Internet Service Provider doing technical support we had a lot of calls about people not being able to use their email.

One common problem that we ran into was that the Antivirus software they used to protect their computer would interfere with how their email worked.

I felt Stressed when this problem happened. Squeezed.

First, I didn't have this antivirus installed on my computer. Second, to talk someone through disabling their antivirus (so we could see if it was the source of the problem) I would have to have them describe to me what they saw on their screen and then guess at which menu item to have them click on.

This Internet Service Provider was very keen on keeping the support calls short. This is understandable given their need to squeeze me for every ounce of effective time but I felt conflicted because I needed to keep the call short but I didn't want to leave the customer Stranded.

The acceptable solution in this case for the company was to tell the customer that they would need to disable the antivirus on their own because the Antivirus package was not our product. We just provided Internet and email service to them. If they didn't know how, they would have to hire a computer person to do it for them.

There are a few opportunities to steal in this frustration.

1.) I could use the knowledge that the company itself doesn't want to deal with that particular issue and suggest that I could do this work for them. Create a spin off service-based self employment -- with that ISP referring business to me when they have issues that they don't want to support.
2.) Since I found sites that offer interactive screen shots that simulate installed programs, I could satsify both of my issues without creating a new opportunity for myself. Unfortunately (but fortunately for me) there are no sites that have interactive screen shots of Antivirus programs. This is the option I took.
3.) I could propose to this customer directly that I'm available after-hours (even though this violates the contract that I signed in order to work there). Probably not the best option because they could get a lawyer and take away the money that I earned from it because I signed that agreement.

I was thinking that there must be people all over the Internet who would want to know how to walk their customers through changing configuration settings in Norton Antivirus, but there was nothing available.

This is what I chose for my first useful initiative. I started making a plan.

My plan was originally to download a trial version of Norton Antivirus (cause I'm dirt poor), take screen shots of the entire program, and then make web pages out of them so you can click on the menus and change settings like it's the real program.

Then, I would duplicate this process over and over for each of the other antivirus packages.

I sat down and started working. I started it from one angle (taking all the screen shots at once), but there were hundreds of them. For every click you'd make on the program, another image had to be saved to a file. And then I had to organize them.

I got lost. The task was too complicated, too repetitive, and I found that I was working not to meet the goal of getting my useful iniative out there and making money, but instead I was focusing too hard on perfecting the process. This is another problem that I've had with my jobs. I've deluded myself that if I perfect the process then it will be easy every other time I do it.

It's not! It's even more unpleasant to do!

After scrapping the project almost a dozen times to start over I did it. I perfected the process. The only issue was that I didn't want to do it anymore! How unrewarding this that!? I also started cutting corners. I was excluding everything about the project that made it useful for someone by just putting the pages together without looking at them!

AGH!

It sucked. I thought, all that work and I've got a half-finished screen shot application. I've got nothing to put on the web and I'm spent. All those good ideas and now I'm in the middle of nowhere.

What am I going to do now? Well. If it's all messed up, I tell myself that either something is missing, or there's a problem that I haven't defined.

And then I defined it.

It was undesirable work. I was in the same boat I was in when I was working for someone else. I thought to myself, there has to be a way to not do the undesirable work. I mean, everyone else makes their businesses profitable by passing off the undesirable work to the people underneath them (and it might be important to note, that most of the people who do this work, a lot of them think it's meaningless undesirable work - that there's no reason for it).

I had created busywork for myself. A terrible thing to do to someone who is a bit of a scatter brain and a creative.

I was stuck and stuck good. This thing was half finished and I had nothing to show for it. After a good deal of frustration, it dawned on me to revisit the goals that I had to begin with.

When I started the project, I was so excited about how useful it was going to be for other people (and thereby profitable to me because of advertising), I made a mistake about making the goal.

I made it open ended. My goal was enormous and full of holes. Lots of places to get lost. I thought about it and it turned out that where I was frustrated was just in knowing how to shut off Norton Antivirus and turn it back on. That's all I needed. Now I had a hundred pages but I still had nothing to show the world.

So I made the goal smaller. Or maybe better said I made the goal more precise for what met the frustration.

When I was sitting at the computer desk doing technical support, what I needed was to type into google, "shut down norton" and have a page at the top of the list to click on so I could immediately walk my customer through how to do it.

So there are the requirements to meet my goal. My useful initiative (my project), ideally needs to be at the top of Google (which is hard to do if your page isn't both relevant and useful), it needs to show people who don't have Norton installed to tell other people over the phone how to turn it off.

That's it. Cut it off there. Don't allow feature creep! Feature creep is a term used in software development but for creative types, it can be a nightmare in anything they do if there aren't any rules mucking up their creative juices.

In software development, it basically means adding things to the project instead of getting a project done. Feature creep killed the first six or seven tries at my project that should have been super simple.

Always, always revisit the goals. Say them as many times as you can to yourself. To any of your partners. The more clearly you can define the precise and useful goal, the more likely it is you will be a visionary.

But don't let things side track you from that goal. If things do, that's okay too. All you have to do then is go back to your goal for a few minutes and you'll be golden.

The most serious 'stuckness' I found was when I was measuring my success by the number of pages I was pushing out in a given time frame. My goal had changed. It was no longer getting my useful thing out the door and making money. Instead, it was how I could train myself to do a particular task over and over again in the most boring way possible.

And since I'm going to restart the project while I'm writing this blog, I'm going to work on the goal some more.

Here is my first attempt.

My goal is to show how to shut off norton antivirus for someone who's looking for it.

My goal is for someone to come to my page and see how to shut off norton antivirus. Does that include everything from the frustration I had?

Someone needs to know how to shut off norton as fast as he or she possibly can. I'm going to set up something that will show them that information as quickly as I can get it to them and I'm going to put advertising on it so if they find something else they're interested in they can click on that. Then I can get some money for it. Best part about it? It just sits there making more money.

I'm going to get to the concept of re-occuring revenue also. It's based on the principle of an asset (the way a stock or bond will continue to make money for you). This is where the real ka-ching, ka-ching comes in.

These are the places I've found re-occuring revenue. I'll eventually make it it's own page, but here's a quick list for now. These are one time work, paid many times. Sounds good, doesn't it?

Stocks and bonds
Rentals (Land, apartments, cars, movies... you name it. Anything can be rented).
Telecommunications lines (if you can work the right deal with the telco).
Insurance brokering (both as a billing administrator and as a salesman - but the salesman doesn't get as much as the billing administrator).
Web hosting (if you can make the right deal with a web host, you can get a piece of what other people pay every time they pay).
Advertising on websites (what I'm doing with this super small useful initiative).

I'll flesh that all out later. So much to cover. I'll see if I can get useful initiative number one up on the web and making money by tomorrow.

Finding the useful thing to base your business initiative on.

2009-07-12T08:49:00.000-07:00

I've had pipe dreams with my friends since I was a teenager. At one point I wanted to start a newspaper with my friends. We tried it. It's started off really well. All kinds of other kids showed up. The meeting was huge, maybe fifteen people in my small apartment.

I wanted the newspaper because I didn't feel it was right for things like teen-aged pregnancy to not be in the school newspaper for us to talk about. I thought if other kids talked about it with each other instead of it being just on the television or parents' rules that we could be a support group for each other.

Problem is, I was thinking about how awesome I'd be as a teen-aged newspaper editor rather than making news that was interesting and relevant for the other kids to read. That would have been useful. Ideas where to take girlfriends out on a date. That would have been useful. Where to find free resources on how to get better grades. An article about things in school that would better prepare children for life instead of exams. How to stand your ground with bullies without getting your butt in a sling. That would have been another great article.

The problem is, I wasn't thinking about being useful. Instead it was about my own dreams of finally being accepted.

That's a theme that has followed me through my life. I get jazzed that some idea or another is finally it but don't have a clue what to do about it. It's kind of frustrating when you have these creative juices flowing, but nothing to put it into.

The question is: where do you get ideas from in order make money?

The answer is: Find the frustration. [edit: That's what I'm starting with anyway].

A business mentor of mine passed on some information to me that is the best feature of an ethical salesman in my book. Find the pain. It's a sales strategy. Even if you're not selling the exact product that will alleviate your potential customer's pain, you'll still gain experience in the market by understanding that pain, and you can be a resource for it. With that you raise from slimy sales dude, to a consultant. Instead of putting one over on the customer, now your goal is to be on their side to fix the problem. That might not get your numbers that you need to keep your current sales job, but like I've mentioned -- the company isn't going to look out for you anyway, so why not look out for yourself and build where it matters instead?

Your contacts and your toolkit for solutions. These you can always take with you.

What my friend and mentor didn't say was the word frustration. He said 'pain'. I accept that frustration is pain. But how does one recognize it?

Frustration for a customer or an employee (and trust me when I say employees matter too when it comes to this) is recognizable to me as the following.

My or another employee's insecurity: Where I don't feel secure that I have the know-how to do what needs to be done. When I get flustered that I don't know how to do something (especially if someone finds it appropriate to mock me for it), I've found it's the best place to build a fort. It's time to ask people to back off before I get pissed off. This is my job. I learn how to do what needs to be done my way when I'm prepared to do it.. This is where I find my growth as my own worker and businessman. I would tell people that if they aren't here to help me find my own trench or available to answer my questions about how to do my job -- ethically, then they should continually investigate how to better have sex with themselves.

Where someone else half-asses a solution: I get frustrated that other employees don't address things in a manner that really satisfies customers. Even more frustrated when it's supported by managment. When I identify those things, I can build tools for myself to address it in a more complete way -- as in, where I don't feel the customer has full satisfaction. And when I find everything that meets the goal to both satisfy the customer and keep myself within the bounds of the current business needs? Really useful. The combination of this and the last issue is what I've used to come up with my first idea to make money on my own. I'll start that example with you very shortly.

What the boss hides from or justifies not doing for customers: When bosses put their employees in the way of customers as a means to not come to a resolution, there is a frustration. This and price are the two factors you can use to build your business strategies differently to get more customers, specifically their customers. I'm not advocating competition as in hurting other people's livelihoods. I'm advocating being more useful than your competition so your more likely to prosper.

Rushing to fix constant problems: There is a term in the white collar world called "putting out fires". That saying is in other places of course, but it's the office world that it has dominated my life most. I'm not sure that frustration is the right word there, but it is burdensome not to be able to do things how I want to do them rather than running around patching issues. It's usually the bosses fault for implementing some strategy that he or she didn't bother to include me in.
It's a never ending, off-balance juggling act of fixing problems that come up at the wrong time. There's room there too for your useful idea, method, service, or product. It's also something I'm going to revisit with the concept of building your castle.

Someone doesn't know how to do something that needs to be done: There are a lot of people in small business that don't know how to do something with their computer. What happens to them is they have to stop. Then they have to wait for someone else to show them how or do it for them. From my experience, you'll probably make more money by showing everyone how to do it than you will from showing one person. You might make $75 to $200 per hour to show someone else how to do it on an individual level, but you'll constantly have to learn the next new thing to show another individual. You'll probably also make more money by doing it for them. I don't mean charging them through the nose. I mean a fair rate, but you can base an entire business off of doing things for other people. I've found that although I enjoy tutoring people, I don't get enough out of it either to support myself or have enough pride in what I do. I've felt kicked around rather than appreciated. I end up being a tool for people to use instead of a person. More on how to use this specific circumstance to your advantage when I get to how to build our own castles.

Stranded: Where are people stranded? Woah. A whole lot of examples just popped into my head at once. I'm going there.

Here are some examples of businesses using implemented usefulness to frustrations, specifically when someone is stranded:

Have you ever needed to replace a screw in your home? I have. I needed one for my cabinet handle once. Now, without any experience in buying screws all I had to start with was the stripped screw and the handle on the cabinet. Then the question, how am I going to find a replacement screw? Am I going to have to look at where the thread wraps around this tiny piece of metal and measure it up against another screw like it? Am I going to have to go back and forth to the store? Am I going to have to buy a few different kinds? I felt a little helpless. Stranded.

Wouldn't you know it? I went to the Home Depot with the stripped screw and what did I find but a block of wood with screw holes in it hanging from the isle where the screws were. I put my stripped screw in the hole to find the right size. I matched up the number next to the hole with the plastic case hanging from the wall. I went to the check out. Done.

A very handy friend of mine might say, "Oh good. Not really a big deal. But yeah, you got your replacement screw." In fact when I did mention it to him, he wasn't impressed. But I sure was.

How cool would it be if I were the guy who made the first little block of wood with the screw holes in it like that? First to have a frustration - or helplessness. That's another good word to help find your useful product or service. Then to come up with an easy solution for anyone else who might run into the same helplessness? Then work on designing it in secret until I'm ready to mass produce it so it gets put in the place where people can use it most? That really, really excites me that I have the same potential as that person. And only because I recognize where I myself am stranded and then ask the question, what could have made this less frustrating for me?

I think of people in poverty who want to get out. Do the same principles apply? Why does it just have to be music that gets you out? Or sports? Or being a genius at school work? I for one didn't like school at all. Other than basic skills like reading, writing, (obviously some history), and a little math school really didn't prepare me for the meat and potatoes of life. I didn't leave high school knowing how to balance a check book. Didn't know how to make money other than working at a restaurant or a cash register. My father didn't show me anything. (Not that this was entirely his fault because he was a stressed out single father).

I had a dream of being a writer or sometimes and actor or musician, but I could never find real training in it that I could afford. Lucky for me there were writing magazines that told me that the most important tool in learning how to write was reading. I've found that to be true.

The following is a more complex business set up, but who else would better apply to the idea of being useful for someone stranded than AAA? That's kind of funny. They built a network based on people being helpless with a broken down car. Think it's possible that it started with someone either breaking down somewhere he or she couldn't get help, or were afraid one of their loved ones might?

Frustrated. Helpless. Stranded. Stressed. It looks like more than the word frustration that will help you find your useful initiative. I probably should have thought that out more than say it was only frustration, but it does seem to me like these other words also apply and will help in finding the useful initiative.

Again I would have to thank my favorite business mentor for telling me the phrase, "Find the pain." By the way, just for the plug because I think he's one of the best if not THE best business friend I've ever had: His name is Don Whitcher and he owns a business called "Retiree Benefit Solutions". Thank you so much Don. For everything.

When you have those negative feelings, when you feel all stressed out or powerless, there's a way to turn it into money. What Don suggested was to use these feelings that other people have to sell a or a service, by being useful. What I'm suggesting is to use your own feelings so you can have your own business.

I'm going to show you that by example with a very simple thing. Then I'm going talk about how not to get stuck if you decide to try it out for yourself while also talking about the only black business owner I've met in person, and make a total guess at why I think his business failed (based partly on why self employment failed me).

While I share the places I got stuck with this project and had to take different directions, we can see how well the live project is doing. And maybe learn a few more things along the way. I've learned a few just by writing this.

Everything I've taken with me from working at minimum wage jobs

2009-07-11T20:27:00.000-07:00

I'm going to start where I'm working right now. That's 7-11. I'm also trying to do some web site work to make money, but I'll get to that later.

Convenience stores

From working at 7-11 I can tell you that today there are free Slurpees. Every year on July 11th there are free Slurpees. I was thinking that it might be fun to hit like four or five of them in a row to get free Slurpees. I saw at least one whole family that came in today for them. Good for them, I say! The world could use a lot more free Slurpees.

Another thing you may not know about 7-11. There are write-offs on a daily basis. I'm not sure how many other convenience stores do this, but it's possible you can work a deal with the owner of the business to get free or very low cost sandwiches on the day the sandwiches expire. This might be against their policies, so don't tell them I told you that. Think, sandwiches, hot dogs and pastries.

After only working there for a couple of weeks, I know that I can probably eat for free or at least at a very discounted price by eating the sandwiches expiring from that day. I would walk in there and ask if they had any expiring food that they would sell me at a discounted price. (Chances are if I hit the right store they might just give it to me for free). I would be careful here though. If they clerk working at the store is anything like me and you take all the write-offs from that day instead of just your fill, that clerk is not going to like you very much and will probably starting keeping all the write-offs out of sight.

When you are an employee at a convenience store the following things are usually free for you to eat: Any of the fountain soda, coffee and Slurpees. Hot dogs or specialty items on the grill. Food write-offs like packaged sandwiches. It's possible to get your fill of food from a day's work there. Not always the best food, but decent enough to live on for a while if I need to.

I've also dreamt up ways of jackpotting convenience store ATM machines, but I'm not sharing those ;)

Okay. Ten years working at a pizza delivery place I found a quite a few things I could keep. First and foremost what I took from that job was the simple fact that I never have to pay full price for pizza. Ever. There is never a time that a pizza place is running that there isn't at least one special/coupon for delivery. A lot of times they'll tell you that they only have specials for pick-up. Thing is, you really don't need the specials. What you need is the coupon. The coupons usually kick the special's butt where value is concerned.

I ask simply when I call to order pizza: "I don't have any coupons. Is there a good coupon or promotion you will let me use?" I don't bug them. If they say no or only give me a half-assed 'special' I tell them thank you and hang up. Doesn't mean I can't call and ask the same question again sometime though :). There are usually at least five different places you can order pizza from in a given area, at least where I've lived. I ask. I don't harass. Just in case they remember my voice I don't want to be the guy they talk about after they hang up. That person on the phone is like me when it comes to minimum wage. I don't want to piss them off.

Chances are that out of two pizza places, one of those pizza places is going to give you the deal.

The best pizza deal I've ever found is to buy-one, get one free. There might be better deals. For instance, you might also go into one of the shops after very busy rush and ask if they had any pizzas that they messed up that they'd sell at a discount.

I'm not going to turn this blog into an excerise of living from the scraps of society. That's just where I'm starting. What I'm doing is giving you ever single thing I've taken from business that I'm not sure you have have to be prosperous.

Second thing I took from that job: The recipe of the pizza! Put a little sugar in the sauce. It cuts the acid in the tomato sauce. Ever notice that Pizza Hut sauce is sweet? I did in fact get the recipe itself (not to Pizza Hut). The pizza shop was a small franchise that a friend of mine purchased, so when I asked him years after the franchise folded he gave me the recipe. I did promise him though that I would 'guard it with my life', so I remain true to my word. If it makes you feel any better, I've since lost the recipe anyway so I couldn't share it even if I wanted to.

What I could have done though, is take the recipe and learned how to make my own way to sell it. Considering that's a huge jump from having a recipe to creating a delivery or frozen pizza business, I'm not going to do it. Mostly because I don't have the experience to do that.

Third thing I took from that job: The idea that I'm not going to be rewarded from the company for looking out for their better interests. Most businesses simply don't give a hoot enough to reward me. That's stupid on their part, but it's the truth from almost everywhere that I've worked. Although I'm fond enough of the pat on the back, it doesn't help me pay the rent, buy a car, or take a loved one to the movies.

No one cared when I found an $1,100 safe drop in the trash that I was taking out and returned it. I heard jingling when I emptied the small bucket into the big one. It sounded like change. My honesty kicked in. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad I returned it. I'm proud of myself. Point is, no one gave me raise. No one even remembered after the day was done. I say, wtf? If it were my business I'd praise the hell out of that guy and make him employee of the year for goodness sake. I wonder what's wrong with people sometimes. (Please note, that was before my friend bought that store from the franchise).

Fourth thing thing I took from that job: Delivery scams against other employees. If you take a bunch of the pizza deliveries that are close to the shop, you'll get five times the money that the other drivers so. You'll deliver five times the amount of pizzas (getting more money in tips and delivery charges and you're back faster to deliver more pizzas). I didn't do this. In fact, I was always the guy who got screwed and had to take the drive to the edge of town with a single pie. I don't count the people who ripped me off like that friends. They and I still have some unfinished karma. I'm not advocating doing it. I'm informing you to watch out for these greedy bastards.

Fifth thing I took from that job: Slapping dough. It may be a largely useless skill outside of working at a pizza place, but when there are friends over and I make pizza, I look freaking cool. Worth mentioning to get skills that make you cool with my peeps. The computer field never did that for me like pizza did. More likely to get a date by impressing her with my dough slapping then telling her how I hunded down and removed a Windows DLL error on her computer. Just saying.

Sixth thing I took from that job: The idea of combining complimentary offers. Our pizza place was right next to a Friendly's restaurant - an ice cream place. I worked a deal with the manager of the Friendly's to buy their ice cream cups at a discounted rate (it was the pizza shop owner's idea). I even did some graphic design for the coupons. We delivered pizza and ice cream! The lesson I learned was you can make some interesting combinations with what people want to buy when it comes to complimentary foods and activities. Movie rentals was another idea that the pizza shop owner thought of. I thought it was a great. Unfortunately the business folded before that idea had a chance to take off.

Seventh thing I took from that job: An introduction to dealing with vendors (other businesses that you purchase stuff from). For some things like pizza boxes, we could save some bucks. Where we didn't skimp was on the quality of the food itself. Since a pizza is like thirty to forty percent cheese by weight we went with the vendor who had the best tasting and smoothest melting cheese. Expensive cheese oh, and as a side note thin pepperoni. Two important things to me at least. I love crisp pepperoni on a pizza. I love me some thin pepperoni on pizza. Makes my mouth water. Yum-my.

Eighth thing I took from that job: American principles of job advancement. When I was promoted it was based on a few things. 1.) I already knew how to do everything my current position warranted and showed my eagerness to do that and more in the same position. Constantly coming up with more ideas to improve what I was already doing. 2.) There was an availability in the position above me. 3.) I showed an interest in getting that position.

I'm not exactly recommending that approach, because as I stated about the 1,100 drop I found, it's not necessarily a good thing to be the best worker. Businesses tend to take every single ounce of your heart and without remorse stomp it in the dirt when you ask them to compensate you for it. It hasn't been all that pleasant being a dedicated worker, truth be told. It's full of lots of disappointments and unfairness.

When I was the best at the position that I could be, I was noticed. I started delivering flyers. Then I answered the phones. Then I started making pizzas in addition to answering phones. Then I started delivering pizzas. Then I became a shift-runner (the step before being an assitant manger). Then assistant manager. Then manager. Then got my own office in an room next to the business doing nothing but marketing, designing coupons, meeting with other people. That last part was really fun. Frankly, I think the advancements in the business were largely a waste of time, but I did get all those lasting pieces of information to take with me as a foundation for the corporate environment I would later be in.

The nineth thing I took from that job (and maybe every job I've ever had): My heart was misplaced. I watched over that pizza place like a hawk. I looked out for it. I made sure things were okay -- for a business. Seriously. I wasn't looking out for someone I loved. It wasn't even a good cause. It was pizza! I was looking out for rocks that were placed in the dirt. Trying to feel like I belonged somewhere. I think that's it mostly. I dumped my heart into business because I got a loneliness in me that if it isn't clinical, it should be.

I've used my jobs as a way to feel accepted. Because of that, I've been seriously kicked around by the bosses who want to look good for their boss. Jobs are always someone else's domain. Never my domain. Never what I can show to someone else to say, here. Look at this. This is what I did and I'm proud of it. You think that's cool? Watch what I do next. That's what sucks the most about working in business. It's not mine. It's not a home. It's not a family. I've tried the best I could to make it that replacement, but it hasn't worked no matter how hard I've tried.

Here is the biggest lie about having a job: it's the assumption that if you work right, you'll be treated right. That doesn't happen. Don't ever expect it from American Business. Maybe you're fortunate enough to be well trained and work for Google, but not even a white kid who's willing to learn what anyone wants him to learn to advance couldn't get into Google.

Good news is that there are at least to be taken from these mediocre job existences. What you can expect is to find all sorts of things that you can use ethically to your advantage both while at the job and after you leave it. I hear in radio ads that "I can have that rewarding career!". Bullshit. I don't know anyone with that rewarding career that went to community college. Maybe a person here or there that ended up a big fish in a small pond and makes himself feel important by not cooperating with others. From what I've seen, even fully educated people are fucking miserable at what they do most of the time. They do power plays in the office trying not to admit it, but it's still true. Unless they're either really, really, really good at what they do or have the extraordinary opportunity to be with some very team oriented people, business largely sucks for everyone.

They say that work is inherently unpleasant. They're right, but not entirely. Work is only as unpleasant as giving a kid chores is unpleasant. If you give a child the crap work of the house, he's going to hate his chores. You give him something he or she has the authority to make decisions about, and all of a sudden it's fun. That's what's taken from the underlings in business. They don't have the power to choose what they do based on what their responsibilty is. They don't get to make goals to better do what they're responsible for. And when people mess up? They don't use it as a learning experience for both the person and the position.

They fire them. As if they're not good enough to be human. wtf?

Work is only unpleasant when you're not in charge. They didn't get the 'work is inherently unpleasant' entirely right. Having no power over the direction in your work is unpleasant. And that can only be inherited from the boss of that business. There are ways to make every job powerful for a person. It's just that no one does it.

I guess my life lesson at thirty-five is this. I don't give to the business world anymore. Not to my supervisor, especially when he steals my credit for what I do. Not to the fat man at the steering wheel who would lie to me just to make more money off of me. OFF of ME. I mean, I don't mind the boss man making some money off of me. But 300%? 400% of what I cost as a skilled worker? All the while telling me that he's just forwarding on the cost? Really?

No way man. No more.

So I'm taking from business everything I've learned and turning it into something else that's ours instead of theirs. Something everybody can keep.

My irritations aside, my lesson is to take everything I can when it comes to business and share it with someone else who's been left out.

Namely, you. Hi. Sorry for my rant. Back to it.

There are lots of things you can take with you along the way to success. Industry-related skills, the methods of the business owners (which largely suck because the they learn it from how everyone does it which also sucks) and the workers, learning how to get what you need out of difficult people, making the contacts in the feild where you can get a question answered when you need one and most importantly what I'm going to show you that really rocks socks is to listen to where people are frustrated - how to notice it in yourself and others.

Listen to where the customers are frustrated. Listen to where the employees are frustrated. Understand what frustrates you. This is where business is messed up and where the IN is. This is where you can profit -- from finding a way to alleviating those frustrations.

I have a simple web project that I'm going to do where I'm going to give you the backstory behind the project, where I found difficulties, some things I had to admit about my own abilities in the goals to this project, overcoming some lies I was telling myself - have always told myself and show you in real time how well the project launches -- just so I'm giving you real world experience (actually in real time too) instead of a theory.

It's a fairly small project, but if my theory is correct, you and me both got some serious money making ideas and implementations coming our way. If it doesn't work, well, I'm going to be a little embarrassed after talking it up this much.

I've got that all put together to start work on it, so I might as well get crack'n.

I think you're going to love it. I really really really hope it works out.

Why I feel these things need to be said and why a white male should say them.

2009-07-11T10:55:00.000-07:00

It's usually a joke but I hear it all the time. That black men are to blame, however it's not so politely stated.

No one has ever explained to me that fatherhood in Black America was destroyed by slavery. All I hear is that it's an unfortunate situation. I may use the terms over and over about Black Fatherhood in an almost sales-like manner, but I'm truthfully very excited that this might be IT. That this is the the concept that could finally restore what's been lost to slavery. With that as a basis of common ground, there is so much to share.

All the evidence I see around me points to what has been lost due to American Slavery is the authority and dignity of black men to be successful and run their own homes. White males seem to take it for granted.

What I usually hear is the N word when it comes to the expectations of how a black man is going to act or react. It sure does make a lot of sense that their authority in fatherhood has been lost.

All I gather from the speech used by many white people is that unwealthy black people are stuck where they are because of some latent inability to be contributing, decisive, insightful and important to prosperity - that all they will be are a drain on the society.

However, every black man that I've had real conversations with has been both caring and gentle. How does that make a black man unfit to contribute? Is the disappointment in black men then because they don't have philosophies to share with white men about how to be successful?

Wooo. Any white men ever ask where that might have been lost?

I think it might be just that simple.

The idea that Black Fatherhood is what has been lost to slavery and still not yet restored makes the most sense to me. Why they say black men abandon their families. Why they say more black men are in jail.

The problem is there are few sources to gain the knowledge to be successful for an un-wealthy black man - or for an un-wealthy person in general.

How can you honestly expect that a person who has not been in business would know how it should be run? Someone has to show black men the ropes (or more appropriately given them the reigns) so they can come up with their own ideas. THEN they'll be able to share their philosophies with us.

What do un-wealthy black men have now? If they're in poor neighborhood, no one will hire them? "How to get a gun." "Where to find drugs." In fact, being poor without that knowledge isn't limited to skin color.

When a black man can say: "This is how you make money." "Here is how you really impress the girls" - then the racial tensions are over. Bling sure is at least a step, anyway. That's where black men need to be believed in and supported. Black men were kings for thousands of years before they were brought to this country as slaves. They learned how to provide food and shelter. They used tools. They had to have known that supporting their loves ones was crucial to survival.

A lot of poor black men are missing the heritage of know-how and methods to pass to their children. I believe it was stolen by slavery. I believe that being not only -involved- in business, but if black men were had the authority to make business decisions they could rebuild what has been lost from their culture. I also think this would be useful for women as well, but that is probably best left to another blog.

There are business situations that I've been included in because I'm white and eager. This is where I have found a lot of my principles for how I want to conduct my professional life, and partially for the woman that I love and the role model I want to be to my children. I want to be successful. I don't want to be corrupt.

How to manage that is what I want to pass down to my kids.

I didn't have the barriers to get into these situations that most black men do have. That's why I feel this is needed to share -- not because a black man is "incapable", but because he doesn't have the opportunities that I've had.

I've been bounced all over business. It's hard to survive in the business world without losing yourself. It's been hard to find opportunities to make money too.

And I'm white!

Meanings that surround the N word - compared to the word 'dude'

2009-07-10T17:43:00.000-07:00

It's only one word, but I've found several different meanings. Its is diverse in meaning as the word "dude". It's slang. A filler word.

Where the problem arises is when these words are used to convey disappointment or disregard for the other individual. Strangely, people somewhere along the line have started blaming the words themselves rather than investigate the meanings of these expressions.

I use the word 'dude' frequently, fluidly, and without insult.

Interestingly enough I was once told that the word 'dude' only meant that it was a horse's male genitals (twig, not berries). I was told by this person not to use the word because I would face the threat of being beaten up.

That made me a little nervous of all the people I had insulted and it took me a good number of years to figure out that it didn't just mean a horse's male parts. In fact, I'd never heard of that so how could I have meant that?

It's a cop out. Don't get me wrong. I'm sure the word dude also means horse penis, but I've never used the word in that manner. In fact, does that mean that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles also mean 'horse dong' when they're happy about getting pizza?

At some time or other someone probably used the word 'dude' to convey disappointment. He probably said "Whatever dude" in a dismissive tone insinuating that the other person wasn't capable of understanding him, using it as a dismissive insult.

Perhaps he looked it up in the dictionary, found the horse genital definition and then decided that everyone who says the word dude must mean they're calling him a horse's penis and they needed to be beaten up immediately.

It's slang. It's a lazy word. It means a lot of different things based on the context.

Sometimes when I get really excited at good fortune like finding a fifty-dollar bill, I'll say in a surprised tone, "Dude!". I really don't buy that I am, in fact, secretly thinking about how joyous horse genitals are at this moment. I'm happy about a fifty-dollar bill and I'm saying "Look at this!"

From how I hear it used, the N word works much the same way. Only instead of the word being a general expression of joy or disappointment about a situation, when it's used to describe disappointment in a race of people behind closed doors it's not like the word 'dude' at all.

These sentences that are said with N word as disappointment are offensive for very specific reasons. Mostly, they're accusations of how black men are supposed to react to given situations, or more specifically, what should be expected of them or what they deserve in the combined decision making prcesses that comprise life, what should be shared or kept from black men, or how they can contribute to given situations.

The negative connotations of the N word imply black men should not be a part of anything important.

When I drop something and break it, I might say "Dude." It would have a flat and disappointed sound as it left my mouth and you might be able to tell from my tone that I'm a little sad about what happened.

Still, I find no horse penis in my expression of the word dude. Perhaps the Bill and Ted could tell us, "A most unfortunate situation" and play some air guitar for us.

Sometimes when the N word is used, it means, you're incapable of contributing (like you don't have what it takes)- said in a disappointed tone. They're statements bred to make you believe that you are unfit to contribute - while simultaneously bashing you for not contributing. That doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Third grade context clues is what I use to base this on. Bless you Mrs... I can't remember my third grade teacher's name.

Most curses are like that. It's a command for people or situations to be 'away' using the threat of harm or infamy. A command to go away because some part of the people or situation is "bad", "unfit", "ill-equipped" or "bad intentioned" - generally, a danger to one's happiness.

They are made to make them feel ashamed of themselves when truly most of these curses are based on where resolutions need to be found instead of telling people to go away.

Either the person saying them hasn't looked hard enough for a resolution (basically they truly don't know what they're angry about) or they're being a hypocrite about their own human make-up. (For instance, saying a sexy woman is a wh*** denies that a man is attracted to a her but just can't seem to get her attentions).

Curses are used to place fault without regard for what is in-fact the truth. And the N word has the most forms of disregard that I've heard used of any word.

I say fatherhood was stolen. Really heritage is what was lost. No family business to pass down. No fathers breaking up fights in the neighborhood.

By the way, I think of the term fatherhood as passing the experiences of know-how. How to both take action and direct honorably.

There's no denying it. For the most part when things get out of hand the responsibility of stepping in and directing the situation falls to men.

I think the cursing in the N word is also like a sort of resignation on the part of white people. They just don't know what the problem is so the assumption is that black people are lazy. Well. Bill Cosby isn't lazy. Oprah most definitely isn't. Will Smith's not.

I bet you that every successful black member of society has had the mentors they've needed to learn ways to get what they need without hurting other people. And maybe that's where a lot of poor people are stuck (white, black, asian, hispanic.... any poor people).

Maybe some of them actually believe that you have to hurt people in order to get stuff that they need to both survive and feel proud of themselves. Maybe some of them believe the only success they'll ever see is to scam fifty more dollars from the government.

I need to both be able to get what I need and be proud of what I do. If I honestly believed that stealing it from other people was the only way I could get it, I would be afraid to give it up.

----

Edit 7-28-2009 11:48am - restructuring based on different meanings - exact sentiments I've heard.

Negative Sentiments/Attitudes

"They won't be of any use to us". - When the possibility of including black men is presented, the slur is uttered.
"They're to blame again".
"Someone who deserves to be ignored".
"Someone who will not respect my way of life".
"Why should we pay any attention to them when no one else looks out for them?"
"Someone who is obsessively sneaky"

Positive Sentiments

There are a lot of positive ways I've heard the word (typically between two black men or in some rap music).

"Someone else who's had to go through what I've gone through."
"Someone I'm fond of." Someone I haven't seen in a while.
"Someone I'd like to help me figure out if this is fair or not." or "Someone who's experience might be valuable here." As communication between two black male peers.

Clearly it's slang and has many, many meanings.

For the purposes of bridging what rift there is between white and black, rich and poor - it is the investigations of where and why there is disappointment that needs to be addressed in order to find resolutions (my opinion, and what I will continue to do with this blog).

How business could help restore Black Fatherhood.

2009-07-10T14:19:00.000-07:00

First and foremost, I'm going to say right up front that I'm ignorant of the Black American household. I don't know how your father or mother or siblings really treated or taught you.

All I get are what's on television and the web, how I see you interact on the streets, and educated guesses of what you need based on where our racial tensions are. That's all I got to go on. I'm more than happy for you to set me straight any time I step out of line. So whatever that takes, tell me where I'm screwing up about what you need.

If you're insulted, tell me. We can explore that too. Maybe I've got more crap that I need to clear out of my head.

And whenever I speak about Black Fatherhood missing stuff, I am not implying that you're not good enough to know how to do something. You are good enough. If I didn't believe that, I wouldn't have started this.

Your forefathers had the know-how. They were taken against their will and brought here where .... (I'll say it) WE took that away from them. A lot of black men have created new know-how out of the hundreds of years in this country, but a lot in the poor communities have a lack of options. That's what I want to help make.

Options. And where to find what you need and how to take it once you've found it. That's my goal.

I've been in the business world. I've worked with men and women who've migrated from Wall Street (as their underling for sure, but a lot of their business sense has rubbed off as they one or two of them included me heavily in everything from operations to vendor negotiations). I've worked in gas stations, a pizza parlor, washing dishes at a deli, worked at an insurance company as their network administrator, delivered newspapers, worked as a cashier at a department store, and sustained myself at least temporarily in self employment as a computer consultant.

I've seen the weasels in Corporate America shining their bosses shoes. I've been one of the unappreciated people in customer support. I've had my own office when I was a technical consultant with a insightful and moral entrepreneur. I've had people take credit for my hard work. I've had people bully me. I've seen the power of removing the word "can't" from my vocabulary. I've been a part of business initiatives where people who said something couldn't be done were proven wrong. I've learned how to manage projects. I've learned how to work with difficult bosses. I've learned how to tell if a boss is corrupt or not. I've worked for good people, bad people, friends. Sometimes I've run the show and screwed things up. Sometimes I've just been the extra set of hands.

I think of all the business sense that's been passed down to me because I was able to work at these places - and graced with the opportunity to meet successful men and gather some of their good business strategies based on their expieriences. I also think about how that really isn't a part of the less fortunate in Black America.

I think black men need that. I think they need the wisdom learned from those environments without having to sacrifice their support from their friends -- their brothers.

Personally, I would much rather include a black man as a business partner to help raise him up rather than write this, but my options are how they are. Generations of Not Being the One who Makes the Decisions is where a big part of the problem is.

As I see it, that's the most important problem that the two sides of white and black have. White men make the decisions. Black men don't get to see any of the understanding behind this and take from it what makes sense to them.

I think this is what would restore fatherhood for black men. Taking the principles of white man's business and converting what they need from it to meet needs of the black community.

I have a lot of theories about business. One of them is that a business is like a family. That family can have an asshole as the father who cares for nothing more than himself or that business can have a genuine person making the calls who gives a hoot about his employees and actually offering something good for their customers.

I've worked for both types. I'll share everything I know about it.

There is another object of contention at hand here.

And I imagine that problem is mostly due to our terrible past. I think about what it would be like if I were black and wanted a job and the pressures I would have from my friends. I'd feel like a sell-out, abandoning the importance of my bond in brotherhood in order to be successful.

I'd be thinking, white men enslaved my people. How is it fair that in order to get into business I have to basically have one of them be my mentor? That doesn't seem fair.

With that in mind, I understand why it's been so many generations where black fathers haven't had much to hand down to their sons.

Slavery eradicated thousands of years of the evolution of Black Fatherhood. I can't even begin to describe how important the job is for a father to prepare his son for life is - at least to me. And what does a black man have as a choice? Sacrifice his principles of brotherhood in order learn from someone who might be a direct descendant of someone who had enslaved people like him.

That doesn't sound like either an easy or a likely choice especially considering a black man's peer pressure.

From television and every gripe I overhear: There's a whole lot of competition from your community to be the right kind of black man.

That's probably an incredibly difficult thing to overcome when you just want to be good.

The problem with that is there's a terrible roadblock created by this pressure. You're pressured to be successful, but not allowed to borrow from a white man. It's an unresolvable situation and your alternatives suck.

I can tell you that I've been very lucky with schools even though I never graduated high school. There were no guns to speak of in the schools I went to when I was growing up. There weren't any real gangs to speak of where I lived. Schooling and getting a job were things I was reluctant to do, but there were plenty of opportunities for me.

I didn't have to worry that people would mock my responsibility to be true to my people just because of the color of my boss's skin or the clothes I would have to wear. Well. Maybe the clothes.

Anyway.

So I hear the stereotypes about how black fathers are in jail or abandon their woman and kids. How they're involved in crime instead of being a productive member of society. It makes me angry when people propagate that stereotype while ignoring the cause for the problem altogether - or maybe they just don't know?

So, borrowing the business concepts of the white business owner is probably a super-helpful to you - but how the hell can you get that when you have to get even more criticism if you work for a white man?

Frankly, if it were up to me, I'd start a business make one of you the president and pick my brain whenever needed to make decisions. Since that's not very likely considering my current circumstances, I'll have to make do with spilling everything I know about it. Everything that I've learned. I'll spotlight some books too - simple ones that they've passed around the business world that also help on a personal level.

Maybe other black fathers who have taken the hard road could shed some light there too.

One thing I haven't really gotten into is why I think that business experiences are the key to restoring black fatherhood. First, it's a great metaphor to get us off the white-black issue and focus on what works in being a man... and second: It's where I've learned most of my principles of fatherhood. There's nowhere else I know of where fatherhood styles mingle. Where principles from different families do battle on what's right to do or not. Where you get a lot of different outlooks to pick from in how you want to base your directions and decisions, basically what matters to you.

Simply put, there is no other place a man is more responsible for making decisions or see his dreams come to life (other than of course having kids, I suppose). It's amazing the joy that comes from completing a project that you know how to do. Conceiving it. Planning it. Choosing how to implement it. Watching it come to fruition. Being with other people who want to see the same thing happen and cooperate toward it.

Who makes the choices is where the power is at in business. There are a variety of ways that business people delegate tasks. I'll get into that as much as I can. I will say up front that one of the things that irritates me the most about delegation in business is that people usually don't give the authority to make decisions when they delegate a responsibility (if you can even call it that). They'll say 'do this now' or 'do that now'. It's not a very supportive way to do things.

Please note: a lot of the time when I'm talking about business, I'm also talking about fatherhood.

I think that's where the most of a black man's frustration is. Where your frustration is. Basically you're not given the power to make decisions. You're left to be mocked for something you were born into with no hand to get you out of there. When I say mocked, I mean from the 'white' side of things, there really isn't a lot of support.

What I can tell you is there are a lot of white people who do give a hoot. We just don't know what the hell to do about it is all.

What options do you have in Poor Black America? No dad for support a lot of times from what I gather in movies, the news, and stereotypes. Moms are good, but it's a rare thing for a mom to show her son how to make money - especially making money without letting the boss pee on you. I'm sure you how infuriating it can be when someone has the gall to do that.

How to really DO it? How do you get the hell out of there?

I'd imagine usually you have to have a rare degree of talent or luck to make it out of there without becoming a criminal. Sports. Music. Maybe you're lucky enough to be left alone to focus on school work. I never had to deal with that bullshit. Poor White America too when I think of it. Eminem for one. He got out with rap.

And to top it off (again from what I hear) not many dads to resolve issues by finding where the problem started and put that on the individual or individuals who started the problem. Just gangs to beat or shoot whoever today's big offender is.

I figure if I can learn most of my fatherly principles from business then you can too. Only problem is you have to get into Corporate America to do that... and that's sort of skipping a whole lot of steps from where you might be at now.

I won't mention any names or businesses, but what I will give you are specific situations that I was in, and probably the crappy way that I addressed the situation. You can make up your own mind.

I've heard Barack Obama talk about his father once on television. How his father told him that service was the important part of life. I think that was pretty awesome that he shared that. It's not necessarily my own philosophy, but I think it's things like that that are missing. That need to be available for the black culture to have their own basis of power from father to son without violence or theft being the only option to thrive.

What I'm going to talk about first are two concepts. One is the principle of usefulness in business. The second is how to find and nurture that usefulness to a profitable fruition. That 'How to find it' is paying attention to frustrations.

These two principles aren't really fatherhood or corruption related, but they are very sound principles toward success that I can walk you though by specific example.

They say necessity is the mother of invention. They should have included frustration.

Dear black men: an open letter about black-white racism.

2009-07-09T16:52:00.000-07:00

It seems to me that outlooks on race come first from parents, so I'll start with them.

They didn't tell me anything about it. Anticlimactic, but it's true. I didn't learn anything about how to interact with black people from them. They left it up to me to make up my own mind. About race. About politics. Women. You name it. They never stomped their philosophies into me.

Overall, I'm sure this has been a good thing. I didn't have a battle any preformed notions or prejudice. They basically just handed it to me. Look around. Figure out how you feel about stuff.

However much I've not liked my upbringing at times, I have to hand them this: They did that part right.

My grandfather gave me his philosophy once. The basic gist of it was that as long as a black man wasn't trying to 'take anything' away from him, he would be polite as the day is long. He grew up in the deep south. Things were harder then when he was a child - meaning, I don't think people had as much to go on with how to interact. The culmination of his life, and that's what he came up with. I think it was a good start at a philosophy even with it's separatist (and possibly threatening) overtone. I loved and still do love my grandfather. But my heart is different from how his was.

His philosophy didn't take with me. It didn't shed any light on the problem. It didn't explain to me while I could feel people being uncomfortable around each other. The conversations that were avoided. It didn't explain why black folks acted a little differently, spoke differently. Why there weren't any black people in the suburbs or apartment complexes where I grew up.

That was the curiosity of a nine year old. Come to mention it, that is also around the time that I made the only black friend I've ever had. It's hard to remember names from that age. I'm pretty sure his name was Trevor.

The most amazing part of being friends with him was that not having been introduced with nasty outlooks before meeting him. I didn't have anyone else's BS in my head. It was just the two of us.

We were only friends for one summer. I can't tell you a whole lot about him probably because I don't remember a lot from being nine years old. What I do remember is that he was very polite. He spoke softly. I wouldn't say timid, but maybe he was a little down on himself.

I went to his apartment once. It was a good walk from my grandparent's house, but not so far that we needed a ride. I think we went there to look at his comic books that particular day. I don't remember what it was, but he showed me something of his in his room. Star wars characters, maybe. I was a huge fan as a kid.

The most vivid memory I have of him was meeting his sister on the way to his apartment. She was in a bikini and minding some other siblings at the pool. She'd been sun bathing.

She looked at her skin and then Trevor's. "Damn Trevor, you're black!" she said. "I'm black, but you.. wooooo."

He just looked at the ground. I was never sure if she said that because I was there or to make him feel bad? What I've settled with is that she was probably nervous, not knowing how to act with this white nine-year old in an all black apartment complex.

I don't think we were friends much longer after that. I don't know if it was because there was a problem with me going to his apartment or it was just the end of the summer. I truly can't remember. I wish I could.

That was my only real close encounter. The rest of the time, black people have been like aliens to me. I don't know much about them and truth be told because of that lack of interaction, I'm afraid of how I'm supposed to act.

I don't want to say the wrong thing, but here's the catch. How else am I going to get un-ignorant unless I take that risk of saying the wrong thing? There are other things that make me afraid too. A thing probably better left to a later post.

And there's that stupid forbidden word. The N word. It's possible I've done more paying attention to that one word than any other thing in my life.

It is the laziest word in the English language. I'll write you an entire post just on that one word. What I want to talk about is what the word really means. I want to talk about what it means when I hear white people say it behind closed doors (not that I'm going to name anyone).

Mostly what I would like to define is what I think is still wrong.

Our history sucks. I find it difficult to deal with. What I've found so difficult is that I didn't enslave anyone. It's possible that in my bloodline someone did, but I didn't. So how can I approach a black man and say hi? How can I tell him, "I know the history behind us sucks. I don't have to walk around with it. You weren't the slave. I wasn't the slave owner. But for some reason you and I both still have this shit to contend with."

That's what I've always wanted to say. I just don't have the nuts for it other than the written word.

And I'd want to say this too. I get pissed when people use the 'N' word lightly. I don't know if it's ignorance alone that makes people do that. But then again, it's that lazy word again. It means so many different things.

The situation is still bad. There's that shadow of 'what am I supposed to do about it' (as I perceive it) hanging over black men's heads. Would it make it even if white men were slaves for a while? That doesn't seem like it would fix the problem.

The problem is that there is no bond between white men and black men. All I hear is blame and mockery -- at least on the 'white' side.

The banners on billboards with multiple colors never gave me any good ideas about how to contend with issues of race. Although the sentiment feels like it's right, it just doesn't give me any ideas on how to bridge the gap.

I thought once, what if we ditched the concept of difference 'races' and just called it the human 'race'? I'm just as guilty as that colorful banner showing racial diversity. It still doesn't give me anything to work with other than a philosophy to shove on other people.

Over two hundred years of slavery. Of black people, by white people. That's the object of contention between the two sides.

I have a hunch that the resolution is to be found in what's been taken away from black men because of that slavery. My hunch is that what has been taken away is the authority of fatherhood.

I've heard enough jokes and stereotypes about black men doing fathering. I don't think it's fair considering how many generations have been brought up without the knowledge of their fathers behind them, to pass down again to the next generation.

That's what's been lost due to slavery. Fatherhood. All the know-how and authority behind it to pass down to one's son. And what fatherhood has remained or been restored still isn't enough. I believe that's exactly where the gap still is.

White men's slavery stole black men's fatherhood. That's what's missing. That is what needs to be restored.

There are great black poets, musicians, doctors. Now? Even Obama. President of the United States. But that didn't stop a beating I saw in the streets a few weeks ago.

I put my eyes to the ground whenever I'm around you. I have no idea if it's okay to be 'me'. And I'll tell you, I'm tired of thinking that casting my eyes at the ground to give you your space is what you need in order to thrive. I don't think that's the solution because in many cases that distance between the two races isn't closing. The hatred and blame is still there.

My fear of black men has come from different places.

One is because I've had no idea how I'm going to address how truly terrible the history of our forefathers was. Another is because I've felt intimidated by black men. Part of this is probably due to me being a wuss. I hate violence. I hate even more the idea of violence between me and a black man. I've never been a part of it, but I've seen it happen. Maybe that's what I'm afraid of. I'm afraid of a lost chance to be a good friend to a good man because these tensions are still prevalent anywhere I go.

Some of these fears are irrational.

So I'd like to talk about everything that's involved when it comes to racial tensions, as accurately as I can lay down in front of us both as what problems I see there are, and share any ideas of what could restore the authority and dignity of black men.

I want black and white able to cooperate without bitterness. I think I understand some of the bitterness toward white men and I have some ideas there for how to ease it.

Maybe I'm partially an idealist, but I'm pretty sure anyone can see that civil rights activists, legislation, violence and blame aren't fixing the problem at the individual level - and that is where something is broken.