Friday, July 9, 2010

The Ultimate Appraiser

An old boss of mine once told me "perception is reality." This was in a meeting during which she laid out how poorly I was doing at my job, and how her hope for my future in the position was dire. That was one of many meetings in which I was told that I wasn't good enough that changed the way I view the working world and my place in it. Although ranked among the harder periods of my life thus far, that statement was one of the most important things she could have said to me.

Perception is reality. Well, if that is true, in reality I was not meeting deadlines on time. I was using my time inefficiently. I was wasting my coworkers' time with questions that had already been answered and with fixing work that I had done improperly. My work was poor quality. My writing skills were lacking. I did not advise students properly. I did not belong in my position.

If I juxtapose my reality with my boss's perception of reality, then there are some areas that certainly overlap. But in my reality, I did not feel as though I had the knowledge and skill set necessary to do my job successfully. My coworkers were hostile towards me and did not give me thorough answers, which required me to ask seemingly the same question over and over. I was creative and was good at doing creative things, but those were not the things my boss wanted me spending the most time on. I was depressed, confused, and feeling a huge pang of regret. But I still wanted the position. I wanted to feel like I was good enough. I wanted desperately to wake up one morning and know all the things I needed to know to do well in that job. And ultimately, I failed. But at least I failed on my own terms (I quit, whew!). After I left, they hired someone with years more experience than me, and I believe the department is better off for it.

But what of my self worth? If it were left to my old boss and coworkers to decide, based on their perception of me, how much do you suppose I'd be valued at? Not very much. Granted, their perception doesn't really matter anymore now that our two realities no longer interact, but I still took some very valuable lessons away from the experience.

I am the ultimate appraiser. I am the one who has to assess my value and live up to it. At the same time, I must acknowledge and change my "output" to shape the perception of those around me to fit my own definition of myself. Sometimes "just being yourself" is not enough to achieve this. If I have a diamond to sell, and I show it to you, and say nothing and hope that the diamond speaks for itself, you may think it's cubic zirconia and refuse to give me a fair price for it. I could also try to convince you that it is anything but cubic zirconia, but you may not believe me, and it doesn't matter what my perceived value is at that point. You won't buy it for the price I think it's valued for. But if I can present it in such a way that helps you see and understand the value that I know, then I am successful.

And so, I continue to strive to present that value to the world. And I hope someday the way I present myself will match the way I see myself.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

What's in a blog?

This whole blogging thing is really daunting, isn't it? I sit here and I think of clever ways to portray my thoughts and ideas. Perhaps if I put in a double dose of SAT words, or maybe if I find some piece of information from the remote depths of the internet universe, you all will grace me with your traffic once a week (or, if I'm lucky, once a month). I assume people blog as a way to release stress, so I will not make this into a stressful thing.

If I have a thought or something I'd like to talk about, I'll post it. It may not be written in the most articulate prose, but I will try to get my point across. And it shall be glorious.