Daijoubu |
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About Me .:. Hmmm... I'm 32, study Japanese, have a beautiful wife, work as a production engineer, and love to play with new toys. .... |
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Friday, July 22, 2005
Having to manage a manager For the past few months, I have been reporting to a vice president. My previous manager, a Director had left the company after moving our group from Operations to Engineering. Since my previous manager left, I've been frustrated and felt stranded. The simple day to day things that should be no brainers are now bringing my work to a screeching halt. I can no longer get expense reports or purchase requests approved. When I ask about it, all my co-workers tell me to ask the VPs assistant to put a sticky note on his monitor to remind him.... Why do I have to get a sticky note to remind a VP to do his job in a timely fashion!?! How the hell did he get to be a VP without being able to get things done? Why does he have direct technical reports if he is not able to devote time to managing them? I have spoken with my so called manager a total of 4 times. A 2 minute introduction when my previous manager left, and then 3 short emails trying to arrange a vacation. That's it. I sometimes see him in project approval meetings, but we never exchange a word. In short, I don't believe I have a manager. Rumor has it that's all about to change. Tomorrow I get a manager. Despite the fact that I hear nasty rumors about how he's not very competent and his employees almost had him fired I'm looking forward to it. I can't do my job if I can't buy equipment. I need someone to push the red tape around a little so I can navigate in this company. Posted by Daijoubu at 12:17 AM Categories: Rant , Work | |
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Friday, March 18, 2005
Ticket Punching by Kevin Salwen in Business A year ago, I would have told you I loved my work, it was great! Over the last year, through many changes here, I'd have to say that I've felt unhappy and I've wanted to go elsewhere. Today I saw this post and it rang a bell.... I feel like I'm just here to get my ticket punched and then move on. And I'm not the only one. My co-worker moved to a line manager position so he could put in his time, get his ticket punched and go somewhere more fulfilling. Ticket Punching by Kevin Salwen in Business
Posted by Daijoubu at 11:56 AM Categories: Rant , Work | |
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Tuesday, February 15, 2005
Stop whining and do something! Why do people insist on being stubborn about things? I have one developor here who only complains... Constantly complain complain complain. Yes, we do not have a written standard for how this log file should be formatted. But you have a 600kb sample to look at. How hard is it to ask us how to do it and work from there? Why do people have to get so upset that they don't have a requirements document that clearly states what should and shouldn't be in the file? If you want one, write it. Don't tell me that it's not your job either. I don't need it, I don't use it. I am quite capable of managing my requirements. I have a thick stack of requirements for my software. Why, when I point out something that isn't quite as neat as it could be does he explode? Pissing and moaning and whining about how it's not like this software, it's not neatly documented, it's not completely modular, etc. Yes, I know that, everyone knows that, and if they didn't, they picked it up a month ago when you started whining about it. The question is, what are you going to do about it? If you say nothing, then STOP WHINING! I don't want to hear it if you don't plan to fix it. Posted by Daijoubu at 9:37 AM Categories: Rant , Work | |
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Tuesday, March 02, 2004
Today. I've taken more of an interest in setting goals for myself. I'm trying it out at work, and it seems to be working pretty well, it gives me the ability to say no when people come up and ask for favours. This is important, because after doing favours for everybody for years, it appears that people have come to expect it out of me. I need to break them of this, and start to focus on my assignments and let them do their own work. I don't mind helping them, I actually enjoy it, but it's just gotten to the point where I spend all my time helping other people, and not enough time doing my own job. Posted by Daijoubu at 10:36 PM Categories: Work | |
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Thursday, January 29, 2004
Performance reviews I had my performance review today, and I was very surprised! My boss gave me a very good review! He seemed very impressed with me, and wants me to work on getting myself and our department noticed in the rest of the company. How the heck am I supposed to do that?!? I suppose the first thing I should work on is my communications skills. He's very happy with my communication among team members, but he wants more business communications. I suppose I should have asked him where to go to start to learn this, but instead I picked his brains for more resources about manufacturing. Being a geek, I've always ignored business communications, but now I find it's become my weakest spot. If I start my own company up, it's going to be even more important. So, I'll ask here. Where would you suggest I go to start to improve my communication skills? What books would you recommend? What courses or workshops are good? Posted by Daijoubu at 10:29 PM Categories: Work | |
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Friday, January 23, 2004
BDUF Work has always got some strange twists to it. Today, I got asked to bail out our marketing and engineering department. Apparently we're releasing a brand new platform, with a proprietary communications bus, and nobody bothered to develop a configuration tool for our OEM customers. When engineering was asked to do something about it, they said it would take 6 months before they would have something released!!! What takes 6 months to build?!? Apparently they envisioned some big graphical windows based tool that you could click and drag to configure the systems they build. Why? All they're going to want to do is to configure 30 systems a day with the same settings. Why not have the settings in a file and just download them all at once. Maybe have the ability to download the settings from a working system so you can clone it. Start simple. And to make it even worse, engineering planned to take the standard waterfall approach. Build a requirements document, then start building a framework, and then build the entire application, eye-candy and all before giving it to a customer. So, after discussing with my boss, 2 project managers in engineering and marketing, we decided to give my method a try. Posted by Daijoubu at 10:21 PM Categories: Rant , Work | |
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Wednesday, January 14, 2004
Pizza Hut is Lean? I wimped out and bought Pizza for dinner today... Hichan wasn't feeling well, and I suck as a cook so.... I thought we might as well use our coupon and treat ourself. On the way to get the pizza I started to remember the last time I was hanging out in one of those pizza joints to pick up our pizza and I began to wonder if these people are a lean manufacturer of pizzas? They'll probably think I'm crazy if I ask to tour their store, but I do remember they were making the pizzas as they were ordered, one piece at a time. I didn't get a good look at the dough making process, and I don't know about the ordering process for the raw ingredients, but there's potential there. Posted by Daijoubu at 10:42 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Work | |
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Monday, January 12, 2004
Performance Wow, twice in a month! Today I completed my performance review. Most people at work really think it's a joke! They don't even try anymore, just mark themselves all 3 (met all expectations) and hand it in. I spent about 2 hours trying to figure out where I could improve myself. I had to give up on putting down career objectives though. I couldn't interpret the corporate objectives into something my department could help with. At least not in any area where I wanted to learn more. Posted by Daijoubu at 9:25 PM Categories: Personal , Work | |
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Thursday, January 08, 2004
What to do with my future... It's time for my performance review at work again.... I don't know what to put down on it. It's kind of a joke among my department, but now that I think about it, it's more like an under-utilized opportunity. It's a chance to sit down with your boss ( mine's great, but it's almost impossible to pin him down, he's too busy. ) and get some guidance from him. It's a chance to set goals for the next six months, and see how you performed against the last set of goals. I never used to take this seriously, but lately I've been thinking. I guess the question is, where do I go from here? It seems my work is less and less about manufacturing, and more and more about design. Should I move to engineering? Should I learn more manufacturing? I just saw a job ad in Surrey for a production engineer that looked like it had more opportunity than my current job, but I'm not in a good position to hop jobs. Maybe I should ask for more guidance in that area. Currently I'm interested in Lean Manufacturing and how to apply those same practices to other aspects of work. For some reason I've also started to think about starting out consulting. But consulting on what? Manufacturing? Process engineering? Software development? I'm not an expert in any of those, but I have pretty broad knowledge. I'd like to learn some alternate techniques though. Maybe this is what I should discuss with my boss. Which of these areas will fit with the company in the future? Posted by Daijoubu at 10:10 PM Categories: Personal , Work | |
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Thursday, July 17, 2003
Today in.... Nah, just today. I guess I'm kinda quiet today and yesterday... I'm not sure why. Just not a lot to inspire me to write. Well, Hichan is always on my mind, but I think it might get boring if that's all I ever write here! After all, I'm the one that's in love with her, and... Let's just say I could go on forever about her. Today, I woke up, started eating breakfast, and spilled the cereal all over my lap! Not a good way to start. So I got changed, and then called Hichan and talked to her for a while on my way to work. I think if I didn't have to work, we'd spend all our time on the phone... Or at least I'd spend a lot of time listening to Hichan fall asleep over the phone! :) Work wasn't bad. It went quick. I actually seem to be ahead! Not through any miracle of my doing, but just because all the engineering projects are behind, and missing the delivery dates that they promised me for sample units... Well, I have a meeting tomorrow to decide what's going to happen to one of the projects. I spent about an hour developing a test plan for the new product that we're going to be selling to a major auto manufacturer... God that thing is simple! I don't think that I've worked on anything that simple in the years that I've been in my present job. I'm not really sure where my evening went today though. I spent time making dinner, I watched Tokyo, Boy, and was amazed because I could make sense of it with no subtitles! I guess that I am making progress. Slow progress, but it's still progress. Then I went for a nice walk to return CSI to the video store. I was tempted to stop at DQ on the way home, but decided it was better to save my money and go with Hichan instead. I took a hot bath tonight, and now I'm here. I guess it's time to go practice reading! Posted by Daijoubu at 9:19 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Thursday, July 03, 2003
The more things change, the more they stay the same. So what do I want to say today? Today was kinda dull! I went to work, chatted with my co-workers when I got frustrated.... Found out that I might have a raise, but won't know until next week when I talk to my boss.... Probably only 2 or maybe 3%... Our company has been doing well according to our plan so far this year. That's a good thing. Better than the last few. I spent some time having coffee with my friend tonight... We talked for a bit. She's a nice girl, having trouble making ends meet at the moment, but she's getting by. We had a good talk about all sorts of things... The Olympics (she's for it! :( ), buying a house, the people around us at the Starbucks, having children... She reminded me that I can take paternity leave and collect unemployment insurance for up to a year so Hichan and I could still make ends meet if we had a child before she qualified for UI. That took a worry off my mind. I don't think I'll get a house for a while now though... With the Olympics coming, the housing market will be a mess here. :( Too bad. Hichan's sending me all the email she's saved from me, so I can put it on CD for her... It's strange to read it now, 9 months later. I can see emails where I was telling her the same things I do now about how I wanted to know everything there is to know about her, and I can see emails telling her how hard it was to be away from her for 2 weeks! Now it's been almost 4 months! I'm feeling exactly the same excitement and anxiety I felt at that time. Posted by Daijoubu at 10:02 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Wednesday, July 02, 2003
2010 Olympics Well, the interview went pretty good today! People told me they were impressed by my questions! I managed to get a fair bit of programming done today too! I did find out that I have a lot more work ahead of me than I had planned though... It turns out that the engineer that originally designed this program threw out his design at one point and started just writing things however he felt that day! What a horrible mess! Everything is all tangled up in one big mess. There's no real way to tell where one section begins and another ends... I'm not sure how I'm gonna get it all straightened out, or if I should just start over... :( On the other hand, I managed to get an appointment booked for Hichan's physical when she gets back to Canada, and I was able to get our gift order increased to cover the extra guests that will be at the wedding! I've also heard today that Vancouver managed to win the Olympic bid! On one hand, I'm proud of this. We managed to convince the Olympic Committee that we are able to host another world class event, but on the other hand, I'm disappointed with my city because we're now going to devote millions of dollars to something that boils down to a big party. Personally I believe this money could be better spent improving the living conditions for the poorer areas in Vancouver, or to hire more teachers for an over crowded school system, or maybe to improve our health care system, or how about investing more money into reducing crime? For a city that thinks we can't handle a crowd on Canada Day, how will we host the world? Posted by Daijoubu at 9:06 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Rant , Work | |
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Tuesday, July 01, 2003
Canada Day Hmmm.... So what have I been up to? Well, Sunday was my friend's surprise birthday party... She really was surprised! Apparently surprise parties are not that common in Japan. She seemed to have a very good time, and everyone got along well. Although she did refuse to cut her cake, but could you blame her? I couldn't stick a knife in Winnie the Pooh either! Monday I made some progress on my new program. It's nice to work in the office when everyone is taking a day off. Less distractions. I still spent 2 hours in the morning reviewing paperwork, and another 1 and a half helping a co-worker with a design she was working on. Today's been a very good day. It's Canada day after all, so I don't have to go to work, although I still had some studying to do so I could be prepared for the interview tomorrow. I should still figure out what skills I want for this job. Anyways, I woke up, and the first thing I did was to call Hichan and talk to her. Somehow, I had managed to get one episode ahead of her in CSI. I have no idea how that happened. We talked for an hour until she fell asleep and then I let her go. For the morning, I watched some more Kinpachi Sensei and GTO. The more I watch, the more words I can pick out on my own. It would be interesting to get a raw copy of these shows and see how much I could understand. I also did some more work on trying to get started on creating my own operating system. That's been slowed down because the programming tools on Cygwin are broken for this. I probably just need to learn how to use them better. That afternoon, Hichan called me as soon as she woke up. I love when she does that! She sounds so cute and in need of a good cuddle when she wakes up.... I can't wait to get out there! After dinner I studied Japanese grammar for the first time in over a week. I need to devote more time to that. Then read up on interviewing technique. I hope I do well tomorrow. I wonder what I'll wear? After that, I read a bit more of Wild Swans. I'm fascinated by this book! These women seem to have lived a very eventful and powerful life! Now, I'm here. I was hoping something interesting would come up out of this, but I think today was just a brain dump.. I'm not really in the groove to write, I'm just jotting things down. Too many other things on my mind. Oh ya, I spent some time going over my speech for my wedding. It doesn't seem as difficult as my friends made out. Maybe it's just because the whole language is new to me, that this blends right in. I should have this down by the time I get to Japan. I just may need some coaching on the pronunciation of some words. I'm picking up the meaning as I go along, but this is a bit harder because I can't find all the words in the dictionary. Current CD - SMAP MIJ Number of episodes of CSI left: 4 Posted by Daijoubu at 10:51 PM Categories: Books , Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Thursday, June 26, 2003
small moments in my small life I'm still feeling tired today... I'll catch up on my sleep on the weekend though. I hope! Depends on how late I get home on Sunday. I got a strange assignment today. I will be interviewing a new applicant at work. I have no idea how to do that. I always sucked at interviews as an applicant, and now I'm being asked to sit on the other side of the table! The first thing that came into my mind is "What questions am I not allowed to ask?" Human rights are nice and everything, but companies are so scared of lawsuits and accusations that there is a lot of pressure on people to not even allow conversation on certain topics. I'm not allowed to ask how old you are, marital status, health, citizenship, and various other things that people might think I was biased against. While this seems fair, people are so scared that if the applicant starts to mention any of those things, I have to tell them to stop right away. Thankfully my boss happened to have some notes and articles on how to conduct an interview. I may stop by the library this weekend and pick up another book or two about it. This person will have to handle my job while I'm in Japan so I have to do a good job. My friends just got back from an ESL school in Port Alberni (it can't be Port Alberni... There's nothing in Port Alberni.) and told me all about their trip there. They said it was very fun, and the students seemed to be learning quite quickly. That's good. It seemed kind of strange compared to my idea of school, because the students were off jet skiing, water skiing, horseback riding, hiking... It sounded like a very fun time! Maybe I should study a little English.... I spoke to Hichan this morning... She's very, very tired. I feel bad that she's going through all this. I should be there, taking care of her, not here writing a journal and socializing. This just adds to the items on my "Reasons why Daijoubu is a bad husband" list! I just hope Hichan is too happy to have started her own copy of this list! :) Speaking of Hichan, she leaves the sweetest messages for me! When I left work (late, busy chasing paper around the office so I could send it to Ontario, which was a waste of time because some of the important people that needed to sign it went home on time!) I saw that I had 2 messages on my phone... One was an old message from my friend that had gotten lost on her way to Calgary, and the other was from my honey! She left me a message in this wonderfully sleepy, dreamy voice telling me she was tired and just woke up and that she loved me! It's these things, these tiny little moments that take so little, 2 minutes on the phone, but that add up to so much, that show that I have become a part of her life, everywhere. I can't really explain how I felt, I was just overcome with happiness... I love this woman! I'm so glad she asked me to watch a movie with her almost 9 months ago! Anyways, that's about it for today. I'm going to dig around on the internet for a bit, and wait to see if I get some email, then it's off to bed, all by myself... Only 37 more nights alone.... Posted by Daijoubu at 9:17 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Tuesday, June 24, 2003
shujin Ha! Two in a row! So, today. Well, I woke up, had breakfast, shaved, and Hichan called! Awesome awesome awesome! It's so good to know someone wants to talk to you everyday! I don't know how I can express that to her, that I want to be the one that calls her just so I can hear her voice... All I seem to be able to do is say I love you. Somehow that doesn't seem to be enough compared to what she does for me. I need to work more on that side of myself. So I went to work and found out that the program I was writing for China finally worked! That's a relief. I was about to fall behind on developing the new test system. We had a 2 hour meeting this morning to talk about the schedule. I don't have much time before I leave for Japan. Some of the testing will be done while I'm in Japan because the prototype unit we need to develop our test software won't be ready till the middle of July. That's cutting it very very fine. I've got to set up a good schedule and stick to it if this is going to work. Anyways, I spent a little bit of time looking for something to give to Hichan for our 9 month anniversary, but I just couldn't find anything that seemed "right" There were lot's of cute things, but nothing jumped out at me as being able to create exactly the reaction I wanted. So now I'm torn.... Actually, I can think of something, but it feels a little second rate compared to my first idea but it's much better than nothing, right? When I got home, I found that the landlord had been working on my balcony. I knew this was coming, and I should be glad that he wants to put money into maintaining this building, it just would have been nice if he'd given me a day or two's notice. The rest of my evening has been spent on laundry and studying. I decided to update this because I'm trying to get back in the habit. And because I need a bit of time to let my body cool off after taking my hot baths at night. I'm getting much more accustomed to them now... Still get sweaty, but no more itches and a lot more tolerance to being in there. Oh, Hichan bought her ticket for coming back to Canada yesterday! Yay! I never thought a wedding would be that important to me, after all it's just a ceremony, a way to make the promise I've made to Hichan public, but now it's taking on so much more for me. It represents the start of my life together with Hichan. After being apart for so long, it really seems like a fresh start. It's taking on the significance that it used to have in peoples lives, where it would mark the start of a couples life together in the same household, for better or for worse. I really feel that now. It marks the start of our life together, where Hichan and I can live together in Canada. The time where we throw our safety nets away and rely on each other to make the relationship work. I still believe that I made that promise when I agreed to marry Hichan, but after being apart I feel a new commitment to her, that the wedding anniversary will be a way to measure our time as a family, and a time to think back on what I've done wrong, what I've done right, and how I can improve as a husband. That's important to me. I want Hichan to show me off as the perfect husband. The man that knows her every mood, her every like, her every dislike. The man that knows everything about her body, but that always looks at her like he's seeing her for the first time. I want to be the person that she thinks will listen to her, no matter what she has to say, the person that tries to understand her position completely before I express my own. Only when she honestly feels that, will I think that I've done well as a husband. I know that sounds like a lot when I read it, but doesn't everybody deserve someone like that in their life? I want to be that person in Hichan's life. Hichan, I love you. Episodes of CSI remaining until I see Hichan: 5 Posted by Daijoubu at 9:23 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Tuesday, June 17, 2003
Various things... And another week has gone by. I'm not sure why I don't make the time to update this. I feel so much better after I've written here. I guess I'm just getting a little self-conscious about what I think right now. Too worried that I'll say something that Hichan might read and get worried about. I don't want to upset her, she's working so hard and I'm helpless to do anything about it! Sigh. Work is going along pretty well, but I've been a bit frustrated. It's nice to have steady work that I can just concentrate on without getting annoying phonecalls, and visitors, but there are somethings about Windows, and international versions of Windows that are annoying! It took me almost 2 days to find out why my program looked different under Chinese Windows and North American Windows and how I could fix it. The wedding is coming along pretty well. I have to admit that I know very little about how my wedding is coming. I keep getting updates from Hichan, but I'm sure that she doesn't share the difficulties that she may have with me. My parents have decided to go to Japan for my wedding, so I'm helping them find prices for airline tickets, and hotels to stay in. Hichan has offered her apartment, and a weekly apartment. She's so helpful! I've paid for my tickets now, and I should pick them up this weekend... Hichan's ring should be read this week too! Posted by Daijoubu at 9:41 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Rant , Work | |
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Monday, April 21, 2003
Stuff. It's been a quiet day at work today... Lot's to do, but no real "Emergencies" from the factory. I do find that I miss programming. It was always fun, having these little puzzles to do in my head everyday. I don't miss the monotonous stuff though. The kind of program that you write once, the just make copies changing a handful of predefined constants. Those were boring . Testing after testing after testing, no variety! I like that part of my current job, I have a ton of variety. Today I dealt with design flaws in a PCB, worked on the release of a new product, sourced components, worked on assembling a test system, helped Helen out with some problems she was having with an existing tester, and worked on finding substitutes for a long obsolete component. I had a wonderful idea for a journal entry, but it seems to have slipped my mind... I don't know what to say... I'm having trouble coming up with a letter to Hichan's mother. I don't know why I typed mother there, it just seems more right to me. I just don't think that I know the language well enough to be able to explain to her how I love her daughter. Maybe I'm thinking to complicated. Maybe I should just make it a simple list of the qualities about Hichan that I like. That's a start. Hichan told me today that she's worried we may lose touch, and forget each other.... How could I forget her? She's a part of me. Forgetting her would be like forgetting to breath. It just can't happen. Every moment that I'm awake there's a little thought of her in my head. I noticed today that when I look at her picture I see it like it's the first time I've ever seen her. I kind of just sit there and stare. I start wondering who she is, what made her that way, what's happened in her life before she met me, what was she like as a child? What was she like in high-school? What did she find attractive in boys? What hobbies she had? What did she do with her time? What classes did she enjoy? When did she start to work? When did she start to find boys attractive? When did she decide to come to Canada? When did she decide that she wanted to be with me? I just think that there is so much about her that I don't know, I want to know it. It's all absolutely fascinating to me. I could spend my life just talking to her, I'd never run out of questions if she'd let me ask them all. I watched Field of Dreams the other day, not a bad movie. Maybe one day, once I give myself some free time, I'll sit down and watch it from start to finish. I think it's time to sleep now... I'm getting a little tired, I got up early to run this morning... Posted by Daijoubu at 9:17 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Sunday, March 16, 2003
Further away... Well, I leave for the Dominican Republic in 20 minutes.... Not only has Hichan gone home, but now I'm traveling 12 hours by plane in the opposite direction! This is so hard. I've talked to her almost everyday since she left, and I can barely stand it.... I miss her. Hichan, if you still read this, I want you to know that I love you, and I miss you! I'll see you soon! I'm planning to take lots of pictures on the company's digital camera. I'll post them here when I get back, along with any thoughts and entries that I come up with while I'm traveling. Posted by Daijoubu at 2:28 PM Categories: Hachimitsu , Personal , Work | |
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Much love to: BlogSkins,
Rick (the design), and (of course)
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I had breakfast this morning with a friend who works for a brutal organization. The hours are rough, the work would be fulfilling if the management ever allowed that to happen. It's a company in the creative arena yet built on productivity that reminds me of Henry Ford -- x number of people for y number of hours equals xy (+z if you whip people enough).
