You are what you seem
Yeah. I've been struggling with an appropriate blog title the whole morning. The other options included, "you are how you appear", "you are what you appear", "appearances" and "smoke and mirrors".
Anyway, I was thinking the other day about perceptions and how important they may[not] be. I was talking with a colleague at work yesterday morning actually, about how one not only needs to be good at what he does, but also be able to sell himself. Unless, I pointed out, you are extraordinary. If you are Einstein, it doesn't matter if you don't comb your hair and so on. Aren't 'mad scientists' just adorable. If you'll get us a vaccine for bird flu, I don't think many people will mind how you look or dress, etc. The trouble is these exceptional individuals are indeed the exception and a lot of 'good' people aren't very good at selling themselves. Those who are may not be as good know how to talk/act and often get ahead. The pseudo-swahili saying "empty debes make the most noise" comes to mind. As an analogy in the world of software, the UI is the application. Your application may jump up and down, make coffee and brush your teeth for you, but if it doesn' look good, no one may look at it long enough to know. They may not even care that it does all sorts of wonderful things.
As it so happened, our firm kicked off an awards scheme yesterday. To reward good performers. The maiden award at our office went to a lovely lady, who's been doing all the rights things. I cannot emphasise enough how I believe she's deserving of an award. BUT. Of course there's a but. If it was a straight drag race between her and our development team manager, our manager would win hands down. At least he would get my vote. Not only is he an excellent manager, but he's intelligent and full of remarkably good ideas. Perhaps he's earning loads of cash and a little bonus wouldn't make any difference, but I look at him and wonder. Do these guys know what they have. Perhaps if he had the right exposure and said all the right things they'd appreciate him more, but the guy just does his job. And well.
Personally, I like to do my thing the best way I know how. Appearances are way down on my list of priorities.
posted by Samborera @ 10:38
5 Comments:
Is this discussion about selling yourself or good self presentation? well i'll follow the selling bit as I have come to realise that evryone in this world would benefit greatly from learning ho to sell. The problem with corporations is all the cliques and norms that they have so in order to get ahead and to the top you don't just need to be good at your job, you also need to form connections and be likeable and basically sell yourself. Many many geniuses lose out on promotions and stuff and end up being workhorses for the top CEO's whose only talent is selling... Even if the genius was to start his own thing and work for himself he would still need skills in selling and connections in order to progress.
For me, that's a sad state of affairs. Like marriage - a necessary evil.
You read my mind, would give the Development manager my vote any day.
The impression i got from that meeting was:
->If I dont deal directly with customers, does that mean my contribution will never be noted?
->Our managers should have forwarded some names from the local office - the fact that they didnt shows they rubber stamped the nomination (no deliberation)
->Perception is everything
I think your posting should have had the heading "Impressions".
I think that is what employers or to-be employers look at. I also think that is one of the reasons I do not have a job. I have been to various interviews, and it dawned on me that I do not say the right stuff, or probably appear the part. If I was not confident in my abilities, this would probably have damaging repercussions on my ego. People (read employers) want to hear all sorts of wonderful things, I simply want to work, and simply put, hire me, I work, work good, bring you money, get me some money, everyone is happy. But who said anything was simple?
"I simply want to work". That has become a mantra of mine since I started looking for another job.
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