Keeping Egosystems in Balance

I both love and hate watching shows like "Four Weddings" and "Say Yes to the Dress."  I love them because you see people at one of the happiest moments of their lives.  My favorite one to love/cringe at is "Say Yes to the Dress: Bridesmaids."  

Say Yes to the Dress: Bridesmaids

I have been a bridesmaid enough times to know that it's a much tougher job than you initially think it will be. At first, you have all these warm feelings about supporting your friend, becoming the best sister-in-law of all time, and getting to dress up.  Over time, it begins to get taxing.  Then there comes the breaking point.  

That's where Say Yes to the Dress: Bridesmaids gets interesting.  During the show, the bride and bridesmaids and entourage pick the bridesmaids' dresses.  More often than not, the Maid of Honor throws an ego-driven fit grown out of jealousy (or grief that she's losing her best friend) and has to be reminded that weddings are about the Bride, not the whiny Maid of Honor.  

I hate conflict of all kinds, especially when Made For TV conflict gets a little too real.  I mean, TV drums up a lot of viewership when "regular" folks duke it out on TV.  I just heard on the radio that Jersey Shore was cancelled and that Honey Boo Boo beat out the Republican National Convention for viewership last night.  Not that J-Woww, Pauly-D, and the Situation are normal by any stretch, or that Honey Boo Boo and her family are either.  As a former Jersey Shore watcher, I have to confess I quit my GTL addiction because they treated each other so horribly.  I'm relieved that the show won't be seen again until the "Where are they Now" flashback episode on VH1 in 10 years. 

These shows all make their ratings from ego flare ups that in turn flare up the egos of others on the show.  Maids of Honor get offended that the Bride won't support their choice, so they get dramatic with things.  The Situation gets his feelings hurt because someone took his girl, so he gets dramatic.  And therein lies the show.  Ego versus ego.  Stay tuned: Whose ego will reign supreme this time?  

This is the first Friday at my new job.  It's been very interesting to see how folks operate here.  I've been careful to try to respect everyone's egos.  I am fascinated by the way everyone is telling me their stories - what they marginalize, what they emphasize, how they frame things.  The best part, though, is how they talk about each other.  

There is genuine respect among folks on my team.  They have worked together for years and years.  They have functioned for a year and a half without a team leader.  I have been careful this week to try to keep the Egosystem in balance - you know, how the egos function when they flare up next to someone else's.  Reality TV thrives on this, happy office relationships don't.  

Naturally, anyone new brings imbalance to the Egosystem no matter how large the organization.  The trick is to map this out and navigate the Egosystem with care and respect.  In turn, if your own ego gets a little trigger-happy, stop and recognize that it's not about you, and you are not the Bride here.  Plus, your office is not a TLC show, nor is it Big Brother.  You don't get to vote out the sour-est ego of the week.   

So today, I celebrate my first week in a happy new Egosystem.  I hope I can still say that down the road!

Assumptions Make a You-Know-What out of You-Know-Who

"THAT'S why women need to have their own income, a job, and their own security." 

A puzzled look creased my brow. I narrowed my eyes at the woman across the table from me.  She jerked her chin, directing my attention to the table to my right.  

I turned to see a trim, well dressed man eating a chicken wrap.  The woman across the table from him wore a soft cast propping up her swollen hand.  Her eye was purple and green and was swollen down onto her cheek.  She was using her good hand to fork the big salad in front of her.   They spoke animatedly. They even laughed a little at some unheard joke between them. 

It appeared to me that she had been in a car accident but my lunch mate's implication was clear: the well groomed chicken wrap eater had done that to her.  

...Shame on him for being so mean. 

...Even more Shame on her for staying with him.  

The assumption that this relationship was wrecked instead of their Camry digs at me.  I've been down the abused path before (emotional, never physical).  I spent the next 10 years unfairly projecting a parallel.  I assumed that the public/private dynamics of my relationship must be the same in other relationships, too.  I made numerous accusations to that point that only cast my victim experience in sharp relief.  It did nothing to address the faults I projected onto others' relationship dynamics.  

I think it is natural to judge others for not being like you.  It is natural to judge others though the lens you judge yourself.  I always look at other women to see how I stack up --but I never look at the things I like about myself.  I look at the things I hate.  

We are conditioned to think in certain ways by many different things.  We notice things that stand out to us.  We notice things that we don't like about ourselves.  In the process, our individuality and others' individuality are left by the wayside like so much road kill.  

It is true that all people need their own sense of security. and Shame on abusers.  It is also true that we need to take a breath, recognize our own lens, and collect more information before we mentally accuse strangers of abhorrent actions. 

The Gospels urge us not to judge.  "Judge not lest ye be judged." from my experience, this might be in the wrong order.  Before my abuser, I didn't even see abuse.  How could I have judged it?  After that experience, it was all I could see for a time.  It was all I wanted to see for a time.  I'm relieved that this burden did not blind me today.

I've listened to many a sermon on premature and uninformed judgment.  Maybe I need just one more.  Maybe we all do. 

Tweetering on the brink

I love that I'm sitting right now in a conference on the use of social media and it's fun to see others on the edge of using Twitter just like me! 

There is a lot of potential to reach people through social media. 

Death of the Four Year Degree?

College graduation rates will peak then drop precipitously in the next 20 years.  The steady rise in the number of college grads has steadily risen for decades, but the proliferation of online learning that is cheap to free will cause a demand shift for work-ready skills training.  

 Fast Company published a story this month about how online courses are challenging the way universities are doing business. 

I have been around higher ed for some time, both as a student and as a faculty developer working with curriculum design - and now as an Extension educational media and online curriculum developer.  Universities are, by nature, giant slow moving beasts.  

So - the nimble, fast paced world of private entrepreneurial visionaries have once again monetized what was once the purview of university life.  The article tells the story of two Stanford professors who quit their appointments to pursue online curriculum development. If more visionary academics evolve into entrepreneurs, universities lag and the private sector wins.  This naturally means that the consumer should also win.  

This means that the very meaning of what it means to be an educated person will shift dramatically in the next 20 years.  Paper in a frame on the wall won't mean anything.  It already doesn't mean much except that you can jump through bureacratic hoops and wear a goofy hat while walking across a stage.  Perhaps those who study college student psychological development would disagree, but the four years between high school and B.S. become less important when you have spent more time and money getting skills that may or may not get you a job.  

Being educated will come to mean that you have skills in your field and that you can learn new things and retool without blinking.  It will have nothing to do with your an alma mater. It will certainly have nothing to do with whether you completed political science, public speaking, and two lab science courses as part of your core university curriculum. 

Because barriers to acquiring work ready skills are being removed, and access to high quality education is more open, and universities are hopelessly slow to adjust - the market will shift and universities will begin to see a decline in enrollment then in graduation numbers.  Smart people will get skills from more nimble sources directed not at general knowledge but at today's work ready skills. 

The gauntlet is thrown.  Bravo, private developers! 

Now for Extension to get more market-demand oriented.  

Until Then?

If I had a movie genre that defined my life, it would be romantic comedy.  Maybe that's why I don't like to actually go see them in theaters - they hit too close to home.  You know the scene, the single girl who's in a sad state then she meets/falls for the impossible guy then through some stroke of fate he falls for her.  That's all good and great, but I am stuck at the "Then" part. And have been my whole life. 

This is where my life turns more into tragedy.  It has happened to me pretty much continuously since I discovered boys in the 5th grade.  I even prolonged one of these relationships for 2 years.  

I haven't had a proper date in 4 years.  I've been hanging out a lot in the past few months with a pretty dreamy dude.  We've got a lot in common.  Family is a huge priority, learning new stuff is cool, we both like action flicks and cold beer with wings.  Life was pretty great - but - I just recently got to "Then".  

And just like the Ro-Com leading ladies, I'm at the moment where she catches the leading man in some sort of misunderstanding or they discover that they are at cross purposes.  This usually comes before the clarification of the misunderstanding after which he declares his undying love for her.  Generally during this part of the movie, it either rains or there is a gallon of ice cream involved.  (That's how you know that moment is coming...)

Insert any Katherine Heigl movie here!

I'm all kinds of good with living in Ro-Com land up until this part.  Honestly, it's pretty fun.  But it's not what I want deep down.  I'm not even sure I want a movie-perfect ending.  Heck, I'd just settle for an ending of any kind instead of languishing on the editing room floor.  For how I've been feeling - living in my Ro-Com turned Tragedy - I'd go back a scene or two and where the tension builds and builds and you begin to feel sorry for said single girl.  

So, I'm waiting for it to rain or for the gallon of ice cream moment to hit.  Someday something like that may happen to me.  Right now with this year's dreamy dude - I doubt it.  So - I'm waiting until "Then".   Again.  

What Not to Wear: Graduate School

I was talking the other day with my new Boss about my new job and my new work responsibilities when a woman walked by  - she would have been a perfect candidate for Stacey London and Clinton Kelly to fashion bomb right at that moment.  She was perfect:  black too-short double-knit slacks, frizzy hair with grey roots, shapeless faded purple t-shirt, intently watching her white Stride Rites hit the floor in front of her, dingy North Face backpack trailing behind, WalMart bagged lunch in hand.

He asked me an odd question just after she passed:  "Why is it that when people get their Ph.D. that they either lose their common sense or their ability to dress themselves?"  I LOL'd -quietly because the What Not To Wear team was surely standing by - and then he looked at me and asked me how it was that I had lost neither of those two things.

My wardrobe the past year of grad school and first year of my new dream job!

I've been asked to prepare a talk for graduate students on the basics of success in graduate school.  This is something I know a little about, as I have three graduate degrees which made it possible to now be working in my dream job!

Part of my talk is about fashion.  I must say that it is a bit difficult to articulate what graduate students SHOULD be wearing to class and to work, but it is not at all difficult to articulate what they SHOULD NOT be wearing to class and to work.

Graduate school is about becoming part of a profession, not about learning stuff or writing a thesis or dissertation. All of the classes and tests and papers are just the multi-year job interview with yourself to make sure that jumping into a new career is the right thing for you.  Graduate school is about immersing yourself into the culture of your profession.  That includes learning to dress like your peers.

My Mom tells the story of her first college years at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma.  It's quite a conservative place, and female student in the 1960's were required to wear skirts and pantyhose to class every day.  Men were required to wear ties.  She didn't much like it then, but she remembers that when she started working full time that she felt that her ORU dress code had given her an advantage.  She was already comfortable in work clothes.  She could focus on being awesome at work (not her words, but my Mom IS awesome at work...)

I will say this - my Faculty Advisor loves her fashion.  Since she was my mentor, I took up her love for dressing to the 9's along with all of her years of research acumen.  Also, in my job, I have to be ready to meet with bigwigs in suits and clients in the business world and be ready to impress them with both my words and my appearance.  During my grad student days, I learned both of those things from the best!

That's the point I'm trying to make here with my talk.  Dress for the job you want, and when you get it (because you have looked the part for years and years) you'll be comfortable in your clothes.  People will respect you more for it, and you might just get more opportunities as a graduate student because of it.

Bottom line:  DRESS FOR THE JOB YOU WANT, NOT THE JOB YOU HAVE.  

...even if that job is multiple years and multiple degrees away.

And folks who have never been to a day of graduate school in their lives won't suspect that you have a graduate degree (much less multiple degrees) because you've not lost your common sense nor your ability to dress yourself!