social promotion
About five years ago, I was romantically involved with someone who hated my skillset that I had developed over the course of the six years immediately prior to meeting them.
In arguments, I was often insulted because I possessed this skillset, which they did not. I internalized these insults and stopped employing them. I was heavily involved in politics and without these skills, one cannot really maneuver in a schmoozy setting.
This brings me to the day that I had held a political position that also involved a fair amount of accounting knowledge. As I had given my resignation to the group, I concurrently also broke up with said person, and tried to salvage the decision I had made. It was the wrong one, but I needed to clear out of the haze of the relationship. Phone calls were hastily placed; votes were counted; and professional demeanor was re-introduced to many who had decided to vote.
As the vote was held, I figured there was a slate of favors being performed that guaranteed people to vote against me in return for something. The eye movements of my immediate friends in this organization confirmed this as the vote was counted.
I lost my re-election to the position by one vote. Ironically, all the gay guys in the organization voted against me. They had worked in cohort with someone else and were plying favors from a 'big daddy' gay man figure who was on the verge of aging out of the leadership of the organization.
I was furious. Most of these gentlemen had little or no professional background (or skillset) for that matter, but attended meetings and largely acted as spinning fates (in mythology folklore).
Pacing towards the bathroom, I got several hugs and taps on the shoulder as my friends were not happy that I had lost. However, I took the loss in stride and people told me afterward that it "wasn't personal".
To the contrary, it was very personal. At least for my opponents. A 25 year old overweight female virgin with thinning hair was promised sexual experiences at a political convention known for hanky-panky in the mid-west if she voted against me. Another young, effeminate gay man berated me for calling him out about attempting to turn the organization into a gay daytime soap opera, replete with apparent sex with a minor.
My successor was known for not having any skillset and notorious for making promises about task completion he never kept. I completed my assigned job on the board largely by reading publicly-available information on the state's website, as well as employing personal finance budgeting articles from about.com and a few references regarding non-profit accounting. After all, I did pickup a few things from bookkeeping and finance as my day job.
Given the pomp of this individual, I informed the organization to outreach to me if he needed assistance. Predictably, he never did, and the organization ended up with severe mismanagement years later. I'm surprised it didn't make the front page of the Herald. Any opposition researcher should note that youth-affiliated groups are always rife with this sort of behavior.
This brings me to a soft spot for many millenials. We see change as something government or traditional channels are not providing at all, and thus we do not engage with them, do not deal with the legwork/bureaucracy, refuse to deal with old people (who subsequently may be poorly trained users of everyday technology) and don't want to turn the whole thing into a How to Use Technology free class, or simply are apathetic and don't care.
Therefore, who is left in these organizations? From my experience, the socially or occupationally inept individuals retain the bulk of membership, and consequently, also the leadership. But I digress from a larger point: government or political appointees (or elected individuals, in some instances) don't need to have any sort of qualification. Patronage is really the only requirement. These individuals are poorly trained and poorly advised to deal with things like tech, fiscal compliance, or attempting to dynamically fix a problem because may of the same protections for employees also do not enamor cheap, low cost solutions that work in other sectors.
Whether it be directors looking to offload pension liabilities to a new asset manager, workers ensuring compliance with new guidelines for IDs on public benefit cards, or data-crunching for public transit effectiveness and efficiency, we are wasting copious amounts of money and political capital because the skillsets and flexibility of the institutions do not line up. Everyone carves out their little niche of people they know and rely on. Every fiefdom knows someone else who knows someone who needs such and such a favor.
I hear my parent's generation saying "yes, relationships are very important" and "you don't know how to toil away doing x, y, z and keep your head down to make lasting, effective change."
There were times after that chain of events where I saw similar happenings in the political realm that made me want to disregard any experience I had while involved, mostly because I didn't need to practice such behavior-witnessing. Like many parts of my life, I was present for that behavior long before I really needed or ever wanted to be there. By my own observational skill and want to be keen on every topic under the sun, I nevertheless absorbed it.
As an aside: Since then, I have sporadically involved myself in politics as I keep coming back to the same conclusion: I nurtured a skill that is valuable. However, I am unable to overcome the memory of being tarnished and degraded simply because I possessed something that made me appear plasticky to someone I loved. I still feel guilty that my apparent skillset made someone else feel angry to such a degree, whether they were emotionally ill or not. I guess the same was true with my parents. It also goes so far as to reason why I back away from people who are very accomplished (romantically); I feel like shit because they believe and see that I've underachieved. Thus, those that extended an olive branch I treated with suspect and turned on because I didn't find value in myself compared to what they had going for them. But I'm over the age of being a cute young guy where sympathy and my relative lack of experience may have allowed them to smile and still try to instill a sense of worth.
Bottom Line: There are inept people in some of these organizations where decision-making sucks due to patronage.
Bottom Line 2: Value your strengths because you believe in them, not because other people do. One day, some things seem like a strength; other days, they are a giant weakness. Develop your own sense of what you want to do. (I'm probably too late).
Bottom Line 3: Generationally speaking, we are still frustrated with our choices of change agents and institutional use of technology.
In arguments, I was often insulted because I possessed this skillset, which they did not. I internalized these insults and stopped employing them. I was heavily involved in politics and without these skills, one cannot really maneuver in a schmoozy setting.
This brings me to the day that I had held a political position that also involved a fair amount of accounting knowledge. As I had given my resignation to the group, I concurrently also broke up with said person, and tried to salvage the decision I had made. It was the wrong one, but I needed to clear out of the haze of the relationship. Phone calls were hastily placed; votes were counted; and professional demeanor was re-introduced to many who had decided to vote.
As the vote was held, I figured there was a slate of favors being performed that guaranteed people to vote against me in return for something. The eye movements of my immediate friends in this organization confirmed this as the vote was counted.
I lost my re-election to the position by one vote. Ironically, all the gay guys in the organization voted against me. They had worked in cohort with someone else and were plying favors from a 'big daddy' gay man figure who was on the verge of aging out of the leadership of the organization.
I was furious. Most of these gentlemen had little or no professional background (or skillset) for that matter, but attended meetings and largely acted as spinning fates (in mythology folklore).
Pacing towards the bathroom, I got several hugs and taps on the shoulder as my friends were not happy that I had lost. However, I took the loss in stride and people told me afterward that it "wasn't personal".
To the contrary, it was very personal. At least for my opponents. A 25 year old overweight female virgin with thinning hair was promised sexual experiences at a political convention known for hanky-panky in the mid-west if she voted against me. Another young, effeminate gay man berated me for calling him out about attempting to turn the organization into a gay daytime soap opera, replete with apparent sex with a minor.
My successor was known for not having any skillset and notorious for making promises about task completion he never kept. I completed my assigned job on the board largely by reading publicly-available information on the state's website, as well as employing personal finance budgeting articles from about.com and a few references regarding non-profit accounting. After all, I did pickup a few things from bookkeeping and finance as my day job.
Given the pomp of this individual, I informed the organization to outreach to me if he needed assistance. Predictably, he never did, and the organization ended up with severe mismanagement years later. I'm surprised it didn't make the front page of the Herald. Any opposition researcher should note that youth-affiliated groups are always rife with this sort of behavior.
This brings me to a soft spot for many millenials. We see change as something government or traditional channels are not providing at all, and thus we do not engage with them, do not deal with the legwork/bureaucracy, refuse to deal with old people (who subsequently may be poorly trained users of everyday technology) and don't want to turn the whole thing into a How to Use Technology free class, or simply are apathetic and don't care.
Therefore, who is left in these organizations? From my experience, the socially or occupationally inept individuals retain the bulk of membership, and consequently, also the leadership. But I digress from a larger point: government or political appointees (or elected individuals, in some instances) don't need to have any sort of qualification. Patronage is really the only requirement. These individuals are poorly trained and poorly advised to deal with things like tech, fiscal compliance, or attempting to dynamically fix a problem because may of the same protections for employees also do not enamor cheap, low cost solutions that work in other sectors.
Whether it be directors looking to offload pension liabilities to a new asset manager, workers ensuring compliance with new guidelines for IDs on public benefit cards, or data-crunching for public transit effectiveness and efficiency, we are wasting copious amounts of money and political capital because the skillsets and flexibility of the institutions do not line up. Everyone carves out their little niche of people they know and rely on. Every fiefdom knows someone else who knows someone who needs such and such a favor.
I hear my parent's generation saying "yes, relationships are very important" and "you don't know how to toil away doing x, y, z and keep your head down to make lasting, effective change."
There were times after that chain of events where I saw similar happenings in the political realm that made me want to disregard any experience I had while involved, mostly because I didn't need to practice such behavior-witnessing. Like many parts of my life, I was present for that behavior long before I really needed or ever wanted to be there. By my own observational skill and want to be keen on every topic under the sun, I nevertheless absorbed it.
As an aside: Since then, I have sporadically involved myself in politics as I keep coming back to the same conclusion: I nurtured a skill that is valuable. However, I am unable to overcome the memory of being tarnished and degraded simply because I possessed something that made me appear plasticky to someone I loved. I still feel guilty that my apparent skillset made someone else feel angry to such a degree, whether they were emotionally ill or not. I guess the same was true with my parents. It also goes so far as to reason why I back away from people who are very accomplished (romantically); I feel like shit because they believe and see that I've underachieved. Thus, those that extended an olive branch I treated with suspect and turned on because I didn't find value in myself compared to what they had going for them. But I'm over the age of being a cute young guy where sympathy and my relative lack of experience may have allowed them to smile and still try to instill a sense of worth.
Bottom Line: There are inept people in some of these organizations where decision-making sucks due to patronage.
Bottom Line 2: Value your strengths because you believe in them, not because other people do. One day, some things seem like a strength; other days, they are a giant weakness. Develop your own sense of what you want to do. (I'm probably too late).
Bottom Line 3: Generationally speaking, we are still frustrated with our choices of change agents and institutional use of technology.