Forem: ChanceTheHacker

How to get more stuff

ChanceTheHacker — Fri, 22 Nov 2019 13:30:17 +0000

Ask For Things You Want

Yesterday, I asked for a job that I was not qualified for. I knew I would be told no, but what if? The potential outcomes are infinite. What if they needed a more junior position but had not yet mentioned it? What if future potential was more important to them? What if they had a friend who was hiring? What if, what if, what if? The point is, I have no freaking clue what was going to happen, so I asked.

This means, I had to deal with rejection. They were going to tell me no. So what? About the worst outcome is they may consider me overconfident and overambitious. Again… so what? And honestly, I kinda am. Is it all that bad? I mean yea... there are faults, but it can be quite the boon as well. If I developed a reputation for overconfidence it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Who do you want, the overeager junior employee, or the lazy senior?

No surprise here, I did not get the job. I did walk away with something special though. Human interaction. After I was told no, I thanked them for considering it, reiterated my determination, and wished them luck. Interestingly, I am now “in the market” for the job. In my mind, and in theirs, I am in the candidate pool for this job. Granted, I’m drowning at the bottom of the pool, but I’m in there baby!

Get To The Point

Well, what the hell is this blog post about? Good question, considering I’m tearing into my fourth paragraph and I haven't even gotten around to it. It’s about asking for the things you want.

People are innately selfish. That is not a bad thing. I go to work. I earn money. It’s in my bank account. I pay my bills first. With the remnants, I do my best to help others. I come first though. There is nothing wrong with this mentality. that’s how we survive. If we gave away everything we would have nothing. We would become the burden of others. Even the most generous of people must consider their needs before yours. This is why you should ask for things. In their mind, you will always be playing second fiddle to them.

Ain’t Too Proud To Beg

Now let’s be clear. I want to step back a moment to make a point. Asking people for stuff all the time gets superrrrrrrrr annoying. It becomes begging. Do not beg. Ask for the big stuff in life. Don’t go asking for a buck every time someone takes out their wallet. Ask for what you wish you had but you were afraid of the answer. That promotion you keep getting passed on. Ask for it. Yearly raises? You deserve that shit, ask for it! Overworked and burnt out? Ask for personal time. You won't belive how generous people can be if they know you want something.

Unsolicited Story Time

A long long time ago, in a Massively-Multiplayer Online world, I was in this big guild. A guild is dozens, to hundreds of people that work together to beat the hardest content in a video game. In many ways, it is like a company.

I believed I was one of the best players in the guild. Unknown to me at the time, my peers thought the same. I wanted desperately to have a leadership role. This is likely due to my overflowing 20 year old ego. In all my wisdom, I spoke constantly about how I did not want responsibility. I didn't ask for it, but that wasn’t because I didn’t want it. It was because I was afraid of being rejected. I was protecting my fragile ego. I did not have a leadership role, because I didn’t want it! It had absolutely nothing to do with my qualifications!

All my best friends were leaders in the guild. I spent hours on end with them, and I was not in a leadership position. I loved these people, we had a close bond. Eventually though, I began to resent them for not making me a leader. WHY?!? I was telling people I didn’t want it, but I did! After months of resentment I had enough. As tears of frustration wound down my cheeks I decided it was time.

I went to my closest friend and asked “Why haven’t you guys promoted me into a leadership position? I’m hurt… am I not good enough? Do you guys not like me? What is it? I work so hard and do so much. I don’t get it.”

Before he even deigned to answer me, I was promoted.

He said, “You didn’t want it. We were waiting for you to step up. But we didn’t want to push you into something you don’t want.”

The Riveting Conclusion

Internally, I was torn up about this for months beforehand. The interaction took a whopping 15 seconds. I spent months of my life in misery, wishing I could lead, and for what? Now, I had been actively sabotaging myself, that’s true. However, this is just an extreme case. Often, people don’t realize you want something. Trying to subtly hint rarely ever works. Why? Because it is, by definition, subtle! Subtle, nuanced, vague, and understated. These are not adjectives I want when asking for a promotion. I’d take crude, unrefined, or even coarse over those any day.

The fact of the matter is, sometimes people just aren’t thinking about you. You think about yourself constantly. It’s so obvious to you, so you assume it’s obvious to everyone. It isn’t. Bob and Sarah over in cubicles 4 and 5 aren’t worried about your car payment. They don’t care about the mortgage you can’t afford and shouldn’t have agreed to. They just don’t. Are you worried about how Sarah has 26 gym memberships that she keeps forgetting to cancel? No, you aren’t… so get over yourself.

You have to put your needs and desires out there. You need to make them clear, concise, and tangible. If you don’t, no one else will. Sure you might get lucky. You might hit the lottery too. But you shouldn’t be planning your future around it. So the next time you want something, just ask. You might be surprised.

Don't waste your time, or time will waste you

ChanceTheHacker — Tue, 12 Nov 2019 00:05:54 +0000

It's My Job To Maximize

As a boss, my job is to get more work accomplished for less money. That doesn’t make me your enemy, but it’s an important fact to remember. When I need something done, I’m likely rounding down. Will it take a day and a half? Round down to one. Needs 6 people? Down to 5. This goes for everything. I want to minimize as much as possible, because these are the metrics I’m measured by. Now, this is a gross oversimplification. There is much more to being a boss than cutting costs.

Today, we aren’t talking about bosses though, we’re talking time. Sometimes, your deadline can’t be finagled. Sorry, you’ll have to manage. A deadline does not become this mythical immovable object on it’s own, though. It got that way because an unreasonable promise was made and now we’re all counting on you. So let’s learn to avoid it.

You Think It’s Reasonable… It’s Not

People always promise more than they can deliver. Yes even you, no matter how negative your self image may be. When your boss asks for a timeline, it’s a guarantee that you will not provide yourself adequate time.

Usually, this is not a symptom of overconfidence. It is because you can not expect the unexpected. I hate that stupid saying. You’re not psychic, what do they expect from you? What you must learn to do is allot yourself time for screw ups. They’re going to happen, and they will take way more time than you thought.

When I first learned this technique, I tried to figure out how long something would take, then doubled it. What’s scary is, often I was pretty accurate. Imagine telling your boss something will take you a week and it ends up taking two. UGH! You look horrible, and it’s really frustrating. You’re working your ass off, and nothing is getting done. Your boss thinks you’re bad at your job, and you feel like you’re bad at your job. It’s a lose-lose situation.

Nowadays, my subconscious already tacks on extra time before I even realize it. But I still try to squeak in a few extra days. We’ll expand more on why later, for now, trust me, you want that time.

Finish Early

You know what really makes you look like an all-star? When you finish something way ahead of schedule. Finishing something early saves money, and means more production. Cutting costs and increasing production are two things that really get a manager salivating. They eat it up. If you develop a reputation for providing this, you will be the stuff of legends.

But I never have enough time... How can I finish early? I’ll make it simple. Don’t procrastinate. We all do it. Especially now that you have this nice fat timeline with plenty of room for errors. It’s very tempting to think, “There’s plenty of time, no rush.” Or the dreaded "I'll take it easy this morning, then kick it into high gear later." That is not why you asked for more time. Don’t fall into this trap. You didn’t ask for more time because you’re lazy. You asked for more time because you need it.

The problem is, avoiding all procrastination is nearly impossible. It takes superhuman levels of will power, and I’m no superhuman. You need what I call productive procrastination. We will delve into productive procrastination more in a later blog. I’ve applied it to basically every aspect of my life, not only my work life.

We all need mental breaks, or else the job becomes tedious and monotonous. If you don’t take breaks you become less productive. That’s fine, embrace it, but do so in a productive way. Don’t pick up, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, or Facebook. These are huge time sinks. Switch your focus to something that will help your performance, or switch tasks on your assignment. This will allow your mind the time it needs to reset and refocus. Progress is the key to productive procrastination. Progress can come in many ways. Researching an upcoming problem, talking to someone else about an issue, or planning future steps are all forms of progress.

Under Promise, Over Deliver

So let’s combine the two skills we’ve learned. Give yourself some breathing room, and don’t waste your time. By combining these techniques, you should be able to finish most tasks early, or at least on time. The irony is, you don’t have to work any harder. When applied properly, this will change people’s opinion of you. When you complete assignments late, it doesn’t matter if the initial timeline was unreasonable. People will view you as a slacker. It doesn’t matter if you’re saddled with nothing but impossible tasks. When you don’t meet deadlines, the assumption will be you are either lazy or slow.

On the flip side, if you properly negotiate an adequate timeline for yourself, you can work at a normal pace, and people will think you’re out there killing it. It’s all about managing people’s expectations, and then making certain you meet those expectations.

Smile more, look where it got Jason

ChanceTheHacker — Tue, 05 Nov 2019 01:33:53 +0000

Say Cheese!

If you ask anyone “Hey do you know Jason?” If they've met him, the answer will always be “Jason? Yea I know him, that's my boy!” Even me, I love that little guy. No literally, he is a little guy. It delights me to no end to point it out. He claims he is 5’ 5” but there is no way that’s possible. He’s like 5’ 2” tops, but anyways, his height isn’t why I’m writing this post. If it was, I’d make it short and sweet, same as him... Ok I’ll stop the short jokes, I had to get them in though. I’ll be showing Jason this post as soon as I’m done, and I don’t want his head to get too big. Mainly because it wouldn’t match his tiny little body. OK OK, no really I am done… probably.

The real reason I wanted to write this article, is just because we all love Jason, and I want to try to analyze why we do. A few weeks ago, Jason was approached by another company. They offered him double his current hourly wage. So maybe we should all try to learn a little from Jason. Hopefully it will help us as well.

So why exactly is it I think we all love Jason so damned much? For starters, as Jason reads this, I know it is cracking him up. He’s probably saying something along the lines of “Yoooooo, you better stop calling me short” with a big smile on his face. I have known Jason for years, and it seems nothing ever gets under his skin. If it’s funny Jason laughs, but there is way more to it than that.

A Change of Course

Let’s change course momentarily. There is another guy who works with us, and I’m going to say some rather disparaging things about him, so I’m not going to mention his name. Regardless of the things I’m going to say, I want to make it clear that I don’t dislike this person. He’s actually a pretty good guy and can even be pretty funny at times. He just comes with a lot of traits that make me not want to be around him very much. In small doses, he can be great, but in bulk it’s a nightmare. This guy is basically the anti-Jason, so let’s call him Nosaj.

So to analyze Jason, first let’s look at Nosaj. Why is it that hardly anyone likes him? First off he complains, constantly. This is doubly true when people think his complaints are unfounded, as they so often are. Nosaj tells people how much he makes, which is significantly more than his average coworkers. Then he complains about how he doesn’t make enough. No one wants to be part of your pity party when it also feels kinda like you’re bragging.

When you speak to Nosaj, you get the feeling he is waiting for you to finish talking, so he can say his thing he wants to talk about. He is loud, and often will cut you off or talk over you. When he does deign to let you finish your sentence, he generally starts in with a completely unrelated topic. It leaves you feeling as if he hasn’t listened to a word you said. This usually makes you a little insecure, and you feel like you’ve bored him.

Lastly, Nosaj is overconfident, and overly critical of others. Let’s be honest, who wants to deal with a person who can’t admit to their own mistakes, but loves pointing out everyone else’s problems? Not me. Writing down all these negative thoughts about someone is making me feel pretty slimy, so I’m going to end it here.

Positive Power!

So what makes Jason so special? Jason smiles. Always. If you give him a difficult task, he will smile and just get to it. He doesn’t argue or ask why it’s him that has to do it. He just smiles. He doesn’t complain, because what will that gain him?

When you speak to Jason, he stops and he listens to you. When you finish, he asks you questions that pertain to what you were saying. He engages you, and gets you to tell him more about what you already wanted to talk about.

Jason’s also pretty quiet, and often you have to coax things out of him. This, in turn, makes you genuinely curious to hear what he has to say.

Lastly he’s a humble guy. When he doesn’t understand something, he asks for clarification. When you tell him how or why, he listens, and tries to learn.

But it’s Hard :(

Smiling isn’t always an easy thing to do. It seems to me though, that the things most worth doing in life, are often the hardest. If smiling was an easy thing, Nosaj would be doing it. Sometimes, things just aren’t going well, and those are the times you have to smile most. But why is that?

When you think of getting that big promotion, you probably think of working hard, and finally proving to everyone that you can do it. The sad reality is though, that working hard, and proving yourself worthy is only a small part of it. It may sound harsh, but it’s also a popularity contest. The job is going to go to the person they like the most. Plain and simple. As long as that person is vaguely qualified enough for the position, they’re going to get it. In some extreme cases, the person may not even be qualified at all.

Be honest with yourself, who would you hire if Jason and Nosaj were applying for a job with you? You would hire Jason right? Well if this was a perfect world, you would have said to me, but Chance, I don’t know about any of their skills. I find it highly unlikely that you even stopped to consider their skills at all, and well, that’s just kinda how the world works. You just knew that Nosaj never smiles, and he’s a real pain to be around.

This is what we need to learn from Jason. Learn to smile, learn to listen, and try your best to look on the bright side. The more you do these things, the easier it becomes. When things get tough, just remember, Jason is always looking up, and that’s because Jason is just so much shorter than everyone else that he doesn’t have a choice.

Oh and smile too, it helps.

Lead by asking

ChanceTheHacker — Sun, 03 Nov 2019 15:14:45 +0000

Lead by asking questions

Something beautiful just happened to me. I’m at work, and in between tasks sometimes I work on my site Chance The Hacker or write blog posts on google docs. I was fiddling with another blog post I’m working on and stopped to check in with a new guy on site. I spoke with him for a couple minutes, getting to know the guy.

As I walked off, he said "Hey Chance?"

"Yes?” I asked.

He asked me "Why do I respect you so much?"

Yea I know, pretty heavy stuff right? And I just met the guy. I didn’t really have an immediate answer for that, I had to think a bit.

I said, "Well I hope it's because I treat you like a person instead of like a tool I can use to get the job done."

He nodded and walked off.

Now, if you were of a skeptical persuasion, you could be excused for thinking maybe he is just a kiss ass. You may even be right, but it got me thinking. Why should people respect me? If I don't know the answer, how could others. Is it my intelligence? Well here's a hot take. Am I the single smartest person in the room? Ok, let's pretend I am. Will I be the smartest person in every room? Should they still respect me when I’m the dumbest in the room? It happens more often than I’d like to admit.

Ask Aretha

You can’t demand respect by just being better at things. Well you can, but it’s not going to work out for you very often. When someone bigger, better, and faster comes along, you will have to guard your pack like a lion, and lie to them to keep them complacent. No, what you need to do is gain respect, through respect. That’s not easy. You have to actually care about other people. You have to know their wants, and you have to help them get there. Does this sound simple to you? Caring about people you love isn’t too hard. Caring about people you like can be trying, but not too bad. Caring about someone you can’t stand is damn near impossible.

I hate to tell you this, but to truly be a leader you are going to need to care about people that really piss you off. Those annoying people, can sometimes be the most valuable members of a team, and if you can’t utilize them to their full potential, then you aren’t a good leader.

My main gig is Demolition site supervision. This is what I do 40 hours a week and have been for well over a decade at this point. It gives me a lot of time to think about how people tick, and how my actions affect them. One thing I never forgot is how I felt when I started out as a laborer. If a boss was rude to me, or condescending, I always got them back. Mostly, the boss never knew, but I always got them in the end. How I did it was always different, but usually as soon as he wasn’t looking, I’d drop my tools and find my buddy. We’d both stop working and just chat for a bit. Maybe look at facebook, or talk about last weekend at the bar. I think back on those days often, and try to remember how I felt, and how I reacted to my bosses. My own actions taught me, you can’t rule people by fear. If you think talking down to, lecturing, or threatening your workers is going to push them harder, let me tell you, it won’t. The best and the brightest of them are going to rebel the second you are out of sight.

Ok, so you can’t yell at them, got it. So what do you do when your workers aren’t being productive, or are just plain lazy? There’s no easy answer. You have to actually know the person, their goals, and their desires in life. I can’t tell you exactly how to handle it. So instead, I’ll tell you a story about a man who we'll pretend was named Konah. A long time ago, on a demolition site inside a medical R&D facility far far away…

Story Time

Konah was an African Immigrant working for me. He had been in this country for around a year, and he had never done demolition in his life. Konah came to America from an entirely different culture, and his outlook on life is nothing like mine. Projecting my outlook on life onto him, is not counterintuitive. You have to get to know him to even begin to understand his motives. America is a fast moving country. We want things done, and we want them done quickly. The majority of the world does not function this way, and that's something hard for us to grasp at times.

I was having a big problem with Konah being slow, and even other members of the crew were complaining to me. Konah had been quietly removed from the sites of 3 other supervisors in the company. No one had bothered to explain to him why, they just moved him. I was his last Chance, pun intended. So I started to eat lunch across the table from Konah, and I would ask him about himself during lunch. I would ask him about the food he was eating, because it’s different from mine, and I would offer him some of my food, and ask for some of his in return. I asked Konah one day what his favorite type of meat was. In his country they eat what is available, not what walmart has on sale. I’m not joking when I tell you he told me his favorite meat was monkey jerky. Some other people at the table laughed, but I made sure to let him know I wasn’t judging. We talked some more and he said if he could find me some he’d bring it in for me. I told him that I believed eating monkey in the US may be illegal, but if he found it, I would at least try it. He never brought monkey in. Thank god, because I really would have tried it, and I really did not want to. We shared food of the non monkey variety, and he would tell me about how americans hated his food because it was way too spicy. His food was very, very hot and was often too much for me, but I still liked to try it. Maybe I’m a masochist. I asked tons of questions, and a repertoire grew between us. We accepted that we’re very different, but also have a lot in common.

As a result, I saw a slight improvement in Konah’s working, and I could speak to him and ask things like “Hey whats up, how come you’re not moving as fast” and I didn’t have to worry about him taking offense, because I had built up a real camaraderie with him. He knew it wasn’t just an attack, and that I respected him. He still wasn’t the best worker, but he was improving.

As it turns out, Konah was working an 8 hour shift, then after work he was going directly to college classes, without even the time to shower on most days. He was going to college to get into cyber security. In my spare time, I enjoy learning about ethical hacking, even though I’m really not very good at it. Now we had common ground. We could speak to each other about our shared interest in computers and networking.

It was at this point now, I can finally start to really be a leader for Konah. I understand him, I understand his hopes and dreams, and I also understand that he’s very smart but also lazy. However, now I know why he’s lazy. He is lazy because his body is completely exhausted and running on empty. You’d be lazy too.

Every day, Konah began stopping 5 minutes before lunch time to go to the bathroom. This becomes his new habit. Each day he tacks on a few extra minutes. At first, this is fine. I understand he’s tired, and people are entitled to a bathroom break. The poor guy is working a lot of hours, and also attending night school. If he wants to take a break, alright. The job is still getting done at a good pace and we’re on track to finish the job early.

I want to just step back a moment to point out how important that distinction is to make. Your goal as a supervisor is progress, not making sure people stay busy. You are not the twitter police. It does not matter if someone spends an hour talking on the phone. What is important is results. Are they productive on a large scale? If they are accomplishing equally as much or more than average, well then don’t worry about it. Some people need time to unwind so that they can really focus 100% when they are working. If you try to push that person too hard, you will end up with an unhappy worker who accomplishes less. Their work will also be lower quality, but every time you walk by at least they look busy right?

But I digress. So Konah, began pushing this bathroom thing further and further. At this point I need to mention that these bathrooms were locking single person bathrooms, and air conditioned. He would come into the lunch room straight from the bathroom, eat as fast as possible and go to sleep. Eventually one day he left 30 minutes before lunch to the bathroom. He walked into the lunch room 15 minutes late looking bleary eyed. We all know what's going on at this point. He is napping in his own private bedroom. My crew is getting frustrated that they have to work while he’s in there obviously asleep. These people are paid by the hour. They are required to be working if they want to be paid for that time.

So at the end of lunch I say to Konah, “Hey, stay with me for a moment let’s talk.”

Once the lunch room is empty, I ask, “Are you feeling ok lately?”

I don’t go directly into reprimanding him. I want to give him the opportunity to explain himself. This isn’t me just being phony, I really hope he will give me some explanation that makes sense.

Sadly, he does not. He says, “I’m fine, I don’t know why you’re asking.”

“I’m asking because I have noticed that each day you’re going to the bathroom before lunch, and each day you seem to leave a little earlier. I’m wondering if everything is ok with you.”

He stutters a bit and responds, “Well sir, I don’t know why you think that. I think maybe you have made a mistake.”

So at this point I have to say the hard thing. It’s hard because I do care about Konah. I feel very strongly that I need to tell him things he does not want to hear so he can have the opportunity to change them. Often supervisors skip this step, because it is hard to have a face to face talk with someone and say “Hey you’re doing bad.” Instead they choose to write them off as a bad worker. This is not a worker being bad, this is you. If they think their actions are acceptable, they have no reason to change them.

What is vital, however, is that you tell them these things in a way that they will genuinely listen to you, rather than feeling attacked. There is no easy way to do this. For me the best approach has always been, only state the facts! For example, I do not know for certain that Konah has been asleep. It’s as obvious as day, but I did not see it with my own eyes. So instead, my response is…

“Konah, I want to be honest with you. I believe that every day you go into the bathroom and sleep before lunch. It does not matter if this is true or not Konah, because it is what I believe is true. I understand why you would be sleeping. You do physical labor all day, and at night you labor mentally over schoolwork. The problem is, you simply can not be asleep in the bathroom alone for two reasons. Most importantly, it’s dangerous. This is an active plant full of chemicals, and accidents waiting to happen. If you don’t wake up when alarms sound, you could potentially be trapped. Second, your coworkers believe also believe you are sleeping, and are growing resentful. Not only is this not fair to them, but if your coworkers are resentful of you, it will create a hostile work environment.”

He replied “But sir, I think you are mistaken because I do not go in there to sleep.”

My reply was “I understand that, but if you are sleeping, or if you are not, is not the issue. The issue is that I believe you are sleeping, and I must base my opinions on what I believe is true. What I need you to do is simply change my opinion, through action. Don’t allow me to believe you are sleeping in the bathroom any more.”

“Ok, sir, I can do that.” He said.

“Before we go though, I want you to know that if you are tired or exhausted, and you can’t function at work, I just need you to tell me that. Every person on this job is important, but if I know you need time off, I can plan for that, and you can get some rest and come back refreshed later. This is not an issue, I just need you to have open and honest communication with me, If you’re too tired, don’t tell me you have a flat tire, or you’re sick, just talk to me. Tell me what’s going on in your life. I will do my best to help.”

So what happened?

Afterwards, Konah went back to work and he actually started worker harder than he had before. He wanted to prove to me that he wasn’t lazy, and he really did prove it. Now-a-days Konah mostly just works on my crew. They rarely send him to other sites because other supervisors always have problems with him. That’s just fine by me, I’ll take Konah any day. People tend to take notice when they send me nothing but the company’s “problem children” and my jobs always finish up way ahead of schedule.