Personality Test

According to the test, I was a high C, but there was a tie in my second highest between D and S. I do see some accuracy in this test, but how much I cannot say. The Conscientiousness factor does play much to my meticulous nature: my attention to detail, diplomatic attitudes, systematic rationale, and subtle preferences in terms in conflict. The personal profile also lists some of my weaknesses as well. Sometimes I do rely on someone to delegate important tasks, make quick decisions, state unpopular decisions, and encourage teamwork. Well, this is mostly because I'm quite lazy in nature. I would strongly prefer not dealing with unnecessary and annoying details. It takes an unusual amount of stress and chaos for me to break out of this shell. I have no problem taking a more dominant and direct approach in leading and managing, I just prefer not to.

Well conscientiousness does a fair job in describing a good portion of my work ethics, but I think dominance and steadiness do well in describing my work attitude. Although I can be quite lazy, I absolute loathe the idea of mediocrity and performing merely at average. Some might say that I symptoms of being a perfectionist, but I think that I'm a little too cocky and confident in my own abilities. I know that eventually this would lead me to my downfall. I'll either set the bar too high that I can no longer meet the expectation of others or I'd kill myself to achieve the goals. All of this shows implications of dominance because I often try to get immediate results, constantly accept challenges, always questioning the status quo, and I constantly try to cause action.

Goals for tomorrow

I apologize for the blog being so late for I've been preoccupied with somethings. Anyways, that Vision video from class was somewhat silly, it does bring up some great points. Clear and focused vision is something that is definitely needed for ones future. A quarter of my life is already over (assuming that I live to over 80) and I felt like I've gotten nothing done. It's about time to start setting some realistic goals in order to put things into better perspective. These goals should be both professional and personal. They should aim to encompass an array of experiences that would definitely enrich my life. These goals should also aim to put me in a better state of being than I am right now. After careful consideration for this assignment, I've come up with these goals:

1. Graduate and pass the CPA
2. Lose the beer gut and get my 6-pac back
3. Move to California
4. Work for large company or government and climb the ranks

I've organized these goals in order of importance, but it just so happens that they are also in sequential order as well. My most important goal as of now is to graduate and pass the CPA exam. That is exactly the reason why I'm in school and currently I'm doing everything to accomplish this. I can't say that I'd imagine myself doing accounting or auditing work for the rest of my life. I intend to use this as a means to a more entrepreneurial road. Secondly, I do intend to get my back my abs of steel. I must say that the discovery of beer in addition to bad eating and sleeping habits have definitely attributed to most of these added pounds. A good amount of discipline would definitely be required to keep my hedonistic ways at bay. The last two goals are somewhat tied together. The world too large a place to spend all my life in NYC. I'm at the point where I feel suffocated in this city and a change of scenery is definitely needed. This is why I plan to pack my bags, head out west, and start my life there. Hopefully from there, I would be able to find a job that would give me opportunities to travel, maybe even work in another country. With the way things are currently going in the US economy, I wouldn't mind at all if I were paid in Euros.

Well these are the most realistic goals I can think of right now. I honestly didn't know whether to approach this assignment with a slight sense of sarcasm and cynicism. I wanted to say that one of my goals was become the CEO of my own company, a business that revolved around my dumpling franchise. I would one day open up dumpling shacks all over the world and sell them at a modest 25 cents per dumpling/wonton. Whose to say that my current goals aren't building up to my farfetched dream? I can only take things a step at a time and for now, these goals are more than enough to keep me busy.

Midterm Mayhem

The class on that Monday was definitely not something I expected, nor was it wanted. To have that sort of stress and chaos on a Monday, of all days, is not only inhumane, but borderline insane as well. Although I'm glad that we were able to come to a compromise that somewhat satisfied all parties, I'm sure that the same end would have been accomplished in a much easier and stress free way. I have been involved in various different clubs and organizations and all meetings were conducted under the Robert's Rule of Order. These rules and guidelines are also used to run meetings in the U.N. They are very effective in organizing meetings with a large amount of people in attendence. It was obvious from the very beginning that this was a test of our management skills. I was considering whether or not I should introduce these rules and help Rich conduct class. I had decided not to because Robert's Rule of Order requires a great deal of cooperation and compliance, which was obviously something the class as a whole wasn't willing to contribute. It would have also taken some time to explain all of its intricacies and that would have been unwise since we had about an hour and 15 minutes to complete this task.

A lot of individuals were more concerned with themselves and their own individual gain then the actual benefit as a whole and asked for quite a few ridiculously absurd conditions. Others were adament agaisnt certain conditions, which also posed a threat to achieving a good proposal since a 100% accordance was required. It seemed that we were actually getting somewhere when more people had taken charge of the class. Voices of reason also gradually became louder and louder. I was personally withdrawn throughout this whole procedure. I'm not sure why but I found the whole situation amusing. I was having a good time just watching and observing the whole situation. There were times that I was tempted to scream out absurdities into the crowd. When I heard someone request 25 extra credit points, I wanted to play the devil's advocate and demand 50. I was also "Laughing Out Loud" when certain individuals voted agaisnt the entire proposal because of an understanding. Then when people tried to reason with them their reply was, "Ahhhh, it's okay... it's okay." I was having trouble keeping myself reserved and not adding to the insanity. I suppose I have a pension for mischief.

Egg-tastic

My team could have honestly done a much better job in the completion of the egg assignment. We weren't exactly enthused with the task at hand and didn't give it the attention it deserved until after a few minutes. In regards to the planning process, our team followed most of the steps. The objective of the assignment was clearly defined for us, "Save the egg and you'll save your grade." (I apologize for the Heroes pun and in my defense it is Monday night.") Our current status were that we had no idea what we were doing, we generated many alternate scenarios with altering strategies that all seem to somehow end with the cracking of the egg, we chose a plan and ultimately implemented it. It the broadest of ways, the steps for the planning process were clearly met, but our team chemistry and teamwork could have been much better. We left a huge gap for improvement.

First and foremost, we could have done a much better job coming with ideas in the achievement of our goal. Given that engineering and egg preservation wasn't exactly our forte' we could have done a better job brainstorming or at least cultivating a proper environment for brainstorming. Secondly, no one wanted to take the initiative and assume the position of team leader. In the beginning we were all passive and hoping to ride the coat tail of another. After a few minutes, a few leaders reluctantly stepped up to the plate. In addition, we could have done a much better job keeping focused. Half of the team, including I were spying on the other groups trying to determine what their game plan was. A few of the other members were discussing how this assignment was derived from a class in MIT and how they the accomplished their goals and the rest were observing with a quiet reserve. Lastly, we never identified each others strengths. I honestly think that half of us did not want to deal with each other. This is perfectly understandable since many people are uncomfortable working with ones they aren't familiar with. It's also retarded since our grade in this class partially depends on each other in regards to the successful completion of these assignments. Each and every one of the members of my team, especially myself, needs to develop better management skills for the success of future assignments within and especially outside of this class environment.

Management is a pain...

Stupid people should not be allowed to work at all, at least not with me. I hate dealing with people who either don't know how to listen or don't have any common sense at all but there's no way around it. Every where you turn you're bound to find someone incompetent nearby and chances are that they have a job and suck at it. Recently I returned to my old work place to train this guy. He's a sophomore in college and attends a school of which I shall not name. I'm still friends with a lot of the people there and trained this person as a personal favor for them. Most of the employees are extremely busy trying to fill out orders since the holiday season is right around the corner. A system that should have taken a half hour to learn and maybe 2 hours to memorize took this guy 2 days to learn and probably even longer to memorize. I had to come back a second day to continue training this fool because he couldn't grasp the concept. I wanted to hit this kid in the head with the keyboard and send him home to momma. Being that I was no longer an employee, I couldn't fire this kid. There are some people who aren't bright at all, but they supplement that with hard work and a little charisma and that's perfectly fine. These people are still a pleasure to work with. But not only was this slow, he had no personality at all. He just sat there nodding. When asked what he does in his free time, he simply replies, "Chillen." Then I asked him whether or not he's athletic and what sports he's interested in and he simply replies, "It's cool." Any possibility of further chit chat or cooler conversations ended with that reply.

I suppose this will be a life long challenge for me. I need to develop greater of degree of patience in the workplace, if I don't then I'm probably going to end up firing every person that comes along. If anyone has any tricks of the trade for dealing with these sort of people, than please let me know, I'm all ears.