Rules to work by?

[drwex]

A while back there was a series of postings about peoples' rules or guidelines for life. I'm wondering if you have similarly pithy rules for the job you do.

Comments

[skreeky]

Rule #1: Label your damn tapes.

[drwex]

LOL. So true.

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

some of these i learned too late. :)

- pursue excellence
- avoid time-wasting meetings
- sometimes "nod & smile" is the right answer
- if you have something to say, speak up
- consider compromises carefully
- sometimes "goodbye" is the right answer
- remember that you get new jobs via your resume

[drwex]

I never consider learnings to be "too late." I can always apply them to future situations, often to my benefit. Sure, it'd be nice to know all the rules up-front, but that's why life doesn't have an operating manual.

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

i'm *writing* the manual, darnit! :)

[ahf.livejournal.com]

First one that comes to mind,

Don't ask someone to do something you would not do yourself.

[drwex]

This rule would put 80% of the managers I know out of a job. One might argue that this is not a bad thing, but really the skills of management and the skills of most jobs don't have a large overlap. One of the reason so many software managers suck is because they were good engineers who got promoted into jobs that had different skill sets.

[xthread.livejournal.com]

1. Never do your good deeds in private (unless you're doing so on purpose. Then don't, anyway)
   
2. Don't go Radio Silent. If it was worth doing, it's worth talking about, and if it's worth talking about, it's worth talking about in a way that someone can repeat to someone else.
   
3. 'Runs ok today' is always better than 'Runs great tomorrow.'
   
4. People who say 'we don't want to hand them this thing that works ok, that will remove the incentive to finish the thing that works better,' should be beaten severely with sticks. This also applies to political contexts.
   
5. No one ever believes that the inside of what you do is prettier than the outside. If you make the inside a lot prettier than the outside, people will shortchange what you've done because it looks bad. The corrolary to this is that if the outside is beautiful, the inside must be too - misleading people by purposefully making the outside beautiful at the expense of the inside will lead them to be surprised when the device falls over in regular use.
   

[drwex]

Interesting.

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

Treat the admins well. You need them on your side.

[kjc007.livejournal.com]

Yes! Admins run the world! And since most are ladies, they are especially impressed when another lady brings them flowers on Admin Day.

[drwex]

Nod. I had this rule in my Rules for Life under "make friends with secretaries"

[slfisher.livejournal.com]

The most important person I have to please is my boss.

[slfisher.livejournal.com]

Oh, and it is easier to keep a reputation than to regain one.

[kjc007.livejournal.com]

o Take notes
o Write dates on all your notes; if you think you're gonna get called on something, put time stamps in your notes if you have to
o Document everything
o Label everything else
o Listen first, then make suggestions
o If the meeting is so slow and tedious and boring that it's killing your soul and destroying the project, start facilitating it
o Keep all things related to a given project in one place so you can go back and refer to older things (learn from history)
o Take responsibility for your actions and have a good explanation for why you were doing things a given way, esp. if it's not the standard way

I probably have more, but those are the top ones.

[drwex]

Good rules, all of them. I've kept a dated notebook at every job I've had since about 1985.

Of course, there's a fine line between "facilitating" and "running" and the person who's supposed to be running the suckful meeting might not see what you're doing as being on the proper side of that line...

[xthread.livejournal.com]

I second everything kjc007 just said.

[gentlescholar.livejournal.com]

Avoid discussions of personal life while at work.

Never trust kids to relay messages to their parents--not even the seemingly really reliable ones.

Sometimes, shut up and let them talk. Sometimes, interrupt them and say what needs saying. Those are both important and both good to remember and consider.

Pace yourself. There is such a thing as too much work in one day, deadlines or no.

[drwex]

Good rules, esp the kid ones.

[xthread.livejournal.com]

Avoid discussions of personal life while at work.

This is strongly dependent on the local culture of the workplace. In some workplaces, this is a very, very effective technique to isolate oneself.

This does, of course, become additionally complicated if one has a significantly non-standard lifestyle.

[drwex]

Having worked in environments like that I found that it was sufficient to be willing to participate in others' discussions of their personal lives. It's a form of misleading, since it tends to get them to think you're just like them - why else would you be willing to listen to their tales of bowling night or the kid's recital? - but isn't that the point.

[docorion.livejournal.com]

These are the rules for a happy surgical internship. Explanations where I think they're needed.

1. Don't stand when you can sit. Don't sit when you can lie down.

2. See a donut, eat a donut.

3. Don't f*ck with the pancreas (widely viewed as an organ which is hard to operate on, and it gets mighty pissed of when you mess with it).

4. Don't waterski off the spleen (the spleen is in the left upper quadrant, and is occasionally injured by enthusiastic people holding retractors. This is frequently a job for an intern, and is a rule which admonishes him/her to be aware of where the end of the retractor is with respect to the spleen).

5. Don't let go of the wire. (Certain large invasive IV lines are placed "over a wire"; you put a needle in the vein, put a guidewire (looks like a guitar string) into the needle, take the needle out, and thread the flexible catheter over the wire into the vein. If you let go of the wire, it can slilp into the body, necessitating a lengthy, risky and embarrassing-to-the-surgeon retrieval by radiology).

[drwex]

All good advices. #5 makes me gleep a bit.