October 12th, 2009 §
I bought myself an £85 pair of jeans from a major high-street retailer today. I have about 4 pairs of trousers, 3 of which I wear on a regular basis, and they are starting to show signs of wear and tear despite being in use for 2 years. The £85 jeans costs the sum of those 4 trousers put together, and I’m worried that it won’t last as long the price tag says – simply because I grew up thinking that money doesn’t always buy you lasting products.
Of course, not all clothes are designed to be industrial strength. But it should at least be able to hold my keys in the pockets. The pockets of the one I bought from Gap about a year ago gave way, and I’m having to patch it because I think it’s still wear-worthy. A pair of chinos, which I bought from Dockers, also saw multiple holes in the pockets. I’ve just thrown another pair of Dockers chinos into the trash after seeing frays at the edges of the pockets and at the rear-end.
I’m somewhat frustrated because I expect my clothes to last longer than that, and maybe I’m being too demanding. But I bought those trousers because I believed that was what the brands were promising. So I’m not frustrated that my trousers actually have holes – but I’m frustrated by the fact that the promise of the brand failed to live up to my expectations.
I expect this happens with a lot of people – they pay for the price on the tag because they believe in what the brand is promising, because it’s just too much work to go into the details of actually assessing the quality of the product to estimate the actual value of the purchase.
It would’ve been nice to know from these companies how certain types of trousers are expected to last X months/years based on certain usage. But no one seems to talk about such things, more so these companies that sell on such high promises.
Update: A good friend has just educated me on the benefits of paying for high quality denims, some of which cost almost three times what I paid for the jeans I bought today. His pair of Evisus have lasted him years, but you don’t get them for peanuts. It’s one of those rare brands that actually delivers on its promises, and they get to keep their customers for a lifetime.
May 23rd, 2009 §
I Internets, Therefore I Am
Having the internet as a big part of me is scary. It’s scary because I’ve let so much of my life be transformed by it. I don’t know how I got here, but I admit that using it has influenced me to stop watching TV, switch jobs the last few times, change the way I socialize with people, improve my domestic skills, and got me and my wife to pack our bags and move to England.
Also, it’s scary how so much of the future is going to arrive at my doorstep tomorrow. Maybe this is a curse of being a technologist, and one devoted to saving the world through it. It makes me wonder what kind of person I would have turned out to be if I read newspapers everyday, stuck with popular advice, and gone for an RM100k-a-year neck-and-tie job that would’ve made my life more cushy, if we had decided to remain in Malaysia.
It’s also scary how much I believe from the things I read.
I remember stumbling upon Penelope Trunk’s posts and being so inspired by it. Maybe because at the time, I was really feeling depressed at work, and longing for something a lot bigger than myself. That was what got me started with this blog. Somehow I had this impression that work-life in Malaysia seemed a lot worse than it seems, and I actually went around telling people to believe that and that it’s possible to achieve their dreams.
And thinking back, I don’t know if I was right. But I believed it and I still do now… but the point is, it wouldn’t have happened if I had not been living off the internet like some crazed hobo.
Is the World Really Changing?
My wife is fairly net-moderate. She’s literate, but she doesn’t feel she needs to check her Flickr or Facebook page every so often, like I do. Her inbox is filled with emails she hasn’t opened for days, weeks, sometimes months. Her job does require her to administer a Drupal site for the charity she’s working for, but it’s just a job. She’s dabbled with GIMP but that’s because it’s free and I told her to give it a try. The only thing she really relies on the internet for is streaming japanese dramas and mangas from fansub sites. If the internets died tomorrow and cellphones didn’t work, she wouldn’t give a hoot, except for maybe the lack of mangas.
On the other hand, I hang out with people who send twitter posts everytime they enter a pub. A core group of us coursemates organize events purely by @replies, it makes email look obsolete. I open up Gmail, and I get a Facebook notification from a friend who’s coming to visit the UK, and then another, and another, over a span of a week or so. No one asks for directions anymore, because it sounds silly if you don’t know how to use Google Maps. I am assimilating deeper and faster into an industry that lives and breathes technology, and will not sleep until all of creation’s problems are solved by it.
The contrasting realities are two perspectives I find hard to bring together, partly because they’re both a big part of my life.
I sometimes feel it’s like that out there in the world, too. That there’s a gap that’s moving in all sorts of directions and it’s hard to make sense where we’re going to end up tomorrow.
Being Net-Literate Doesn’t Necessarily Make You Better
I made an assumption in the past that you need powerful analytical skills and the ability to make sense of large amounts of information to survive in today’s info-rich world. Yet, I still find people who live in complete silos and have a worldview about as big as a small island. And they get by fine.
I also realized that people will gladly trade their resources for the so-called info-skilled people to do the dirty work, and just focus on managing them. This includes CEOs, managers, politicians, leaders, etc.
My dad, for example, has been running a few businesses for the last few years. I admire his reputation and his keen nose for a deal. He used to fumble so much with technology, but he’s getting better at it. By no means does it dictate the way he runs his life. He has ways of getting around that but I know it’s not about outsmarting technology.
I realize more and more that there are people out there who are successful and don’t need all that techie stuff to get there. They’re made from different kind of stuff, and it’s something I’ve only recently come to appreciate.
So now I’m not sure who’s smarter – the folks who skill themselves in technology to get ahead in life, or the folks who skill themselves in life to get ahead in a technology-driven world.
I know big things are coming ahead we’ve barely dreamed of, and I’ll probably be excited when it comes, but I can’t help but feel that I ended up the short end of a stick.
August 2nd, 2008 §
If you want to get ahead in life, specialize. Don’t generalize.
Take it from me – I’m jack of all trades, master of none.
I do fairly good pencil portraits. I used to freelance doing graphic design. I also used to play in a college rock band, fronting the vocals and rhythm guitars. I founded a college newsletter when I was 18. I’m quite good at resume writing. I absolutely love writing and I maintain 2 blogs. I’m a software engineer by profession, but I also am a certified project manager from PMI. I have experience in more than 2 dozen software languages. Now I’m thinking of building a social network. And writing an e-book. And offering resume writing services. On top of that, I think I’m pretty okay in husband-wife relationships. And in children education. And cars. Oh, and I scuba dive.
I’ve never had a problem thinking about ideas. The problem is getting them to work. There are only a few ideas that have really taken off the floor, and that only happened because the conditions were appropriate. One of them was the college newsletter I founded, Taylor’s College ADP’s “Flipside”. As far as I know, it is still in operation today. By my time with college newsletters is far gone.
Everything else I’ve started hasn’t gone very far. Some are still standing, but getting it to the next level requires real dedication, and I’m too interested in too many things to pursue one thing for a long period of time. A lot of this has led to burn-outs. I’m making a decision today to make the change.
If you’re young, and you want to get ahead in life, generalize enough to get the job done, and spend more time specializing. Choose ONE thing that is close to your heart, and defines you best as a person. It could be something that’s related to your current job, or not. It doesn’t matter. In the course of time, this is that ONE thing that will remain part of you no matter what.
For me, it really has to do with computers. And the Internet. And design. These three things put together are really all I have really cared about in my life, from the very start.
It’s not about service to the world. It’s not about earning big bucks. But it’s something people should know you for, and something you’ll feel confident being associated with, for better or for worse. It’s like marriage, but it’s a profession, not a relationship.
If you’ve already started asking yourself HOW you should be generalizing, don’t worry – it’s really simple.
Just choose not to do anything that’s not related to that ONE thing you want to specialize in.
If you want to specialize in art, forget being an expert chef. If you want to be the world’s best pet enthusiast, forget about being the world’s best accountant.
I’m not trying to dumb down your strengths. I’m sure, with the proper dedication and time, you’ll get to be all that you can be. But there’s not enough time in the world to do everything.
My aunt used to say, “anything, but not everything”. And she’s right. You’ve got the passion, but you don’t have time.
Don’t get sidetracked. You have only one life. Choose the right battles. Make the memories count.
Don’t waste it by diluting the experience with too many things.
Resources:
July 31st, 2008 §
After spending a few hours polishing my wife’s resume today, I’ve decided to open my services to everyone else. I’ll probably go through what I did with my wife – a basic review of your existing resume, ask you a bunch of questions about your experience, lessons learnt, challenges, etc… and create eye catching points in your resume that clearly highlight your work fitness and employability.
If it’s a simple case I can answer over one email, it’s free. If you want a highly polished piece, I might charge a small fee for the effort.
Resume writing is a skill I’ve honed over the years. I’ve been through three jobs in the past, but I’ve constantly updated and polished my own resume for upkeep, and for each job that I apply for, I tune my resume to maximize impact.
I’ve never had to sit through more than 2 interviews before getting a job. That being said, my resumes are very focussed because I know exactly what I want in a job, and while the resume gets me the interview, the interview gets me the job. I always know what I’m getting into because I enjoy getting into the interviewer’s mind.
One of the reasons why I’m not as apprehensive about interviews is because people are always looking for a match. It’s like dating. This is why matchmaking feels so much like an interview. You’ve got a personal bio, which is probably all in text, and says everything about you from your pet peeves to the last movie you watched that you loved despite everyone else hating it.
Resumes can be used to handle idiosyncrasies in unique ways. This is what I call “weirdness matching”. You’re trying to match your idiosyncrasies with your potential employer’s. The resume is the first part – a resume fit for Google will look different than one that’s fit for the Red Cross. This is where idiosyncrasies can play a part.
Anyway, I’m looking to increase my readership as well. Tell your friends you heard about this guy who writes resumes for his wife and now wants to write resumes for the whole world. They might get a kick out of that and drop a comment for fun.
Or maybe you can.
July 22nd, 2008 §
The world is full of people who are out to make an easy living.
This includes people climbing up the corporate ladder, insurance salesmen, retail outlets, websites… the lot. People do it because it’s simple – maximize earnings, minimize work. The rest are just details.
Then, there are people who maximize pleasure and minimize work. Facebook in the office. Eating while driving. Procrastination.
What people really want is not to minimize work, but to maximize value in place of work. Nobody wants to work to death, but they don’t want meaningless work.
The problem is – maximizing value isn’t easy, so we tend to focus on minimizing work.
Minimizing work is easy – just do less. Maximizing value requires more effort.
Maximizing value answers questions like:
- What do I really want in life?
- How can people really get along?
- Why did I just do that?
- What really makes me satisfied?
- What’s the meaning of life?
- How can leave the world a better place?
- Why are there so many history books?
- Why do I have to go to school?
- Why am I really spending money on this?
- Can I really can make a difference?
Minimizing work is just – doing less.
Are you maximizing value or just minimizing work?
If you liked what you read, consider subscribing.
