I got up at 7AM on a Sunday morning to watch Toastmaster International’s panel discussion about the partnership of Toastmaster and Rotary Club. Somehow, the link didn’t work. I tried several times and waiting, nothing happened…I was a bit annoyed of wasting time and sleep. Then I reminded myself that I ‘gained’ some time to …
Category Archives: Joy
Customer Interview
My boss asked me to work with the product and UX/ research teams in designing and preparing customer interviews of a customer portal. Learning a new system (totally different from the one I’m leading and the opposite end of user journey) and about customers are very exciting to me. However, for several team members, interviewing …
Let’s Try
The product manager proposed 2 changes for communication: (1) instead of him doing the stakeholder demo bi-weekly on Monday for the new features, he wants the developers to do so after each sprint on Thursday. The benefits: stakeholders and tech team get to know each other and tech team could practice presentation, coached by the …
Learning
When Y suggested ‘Show, don’t tell’ for writing, I googled to learn more, see ‘Writing’ post for more details. I was fascinated to see the examples and impacts (to myself), meanwhile, worried how could I ‘match up’: others wrote so well, how much re-write I need, how long the editing would take (for sure beyond …
Writing
I asked Y, a friend to help review my blog, UncoverSpecial turning to a book. She gave me 3 suggestions/ ideas. (1) Distinguish situation and story: though my blog is not a novel yet each post shall has both elements: what’s the situation and why is it ‘special’ (story); (2) Show, don’t tell: show (engage) …
Love and Logic
Chinese pronounces eight as ‘Ba’, similar to Eight so Eight Eight (August 8) is Father’s Day. I called home to wish dad a Happy Father’s Day! Normally dad handed the phone to mom quickly, today we chatted. He spent most of time talking about a recent car repair and a fuel system cleaner. I know …
Mask of Love
I opened the box of masks that mom and dad sent. The box was first wrapped by paper then covered by tape. The box itself was also covered by tape. Inside, a neatly taped plastic bag contained 10 envelops of three disposable masks each. Mom and dad went to pharmacy every few days to buy …
It’s Working
At the end of April, my boss shared with me a colleague’s comments that my email is too long and difficult to understand due to a blend of styles/ info. I decided to work on it… I read articles and class notes about email writing tips and asked my roommate who is a strong email …
Rebel Talent
I read Rebel Talent book by Professor Francesca Gino at Harvard. She described different rebel talents that bring joy and meaning in life. For example, Massimo Bottura is the owner and chef of Osteria Francescana, a Michelin 3 star restaurant yet he hasn’t been to culinary school (dropped off law school). He has 2 sous-chefs …
A Strong Closing and New Beginning
July marked one year anniversary for me on several fronts: at current company, UncoverSpecial blog, and 1 year book project… At work, I enjoyed performing a variety of roles and activities, from community management learning, platform analysis and proposal, to cross-functional collaboration in software development and deployment. We’re leveraging technology to increase team productivity, reduce …