published on wuwei.ca, http:/www.wuwei.ca/index.php?series=1
first published on rolia.net, 2010-8-1
I wanted to write about communications for a long time. However, it came last in my "First Job" series and after a long pause of 3 months. I started writing many times but could hardly make any progress. The reason? I didn't have good examples.
An example is worth a thousand words, they say. A good example not only illustrates a point; it often makes a point.
When preparing for interview, make sure you have good examples for every point you want to make. Go through your resume, make sure you have a couple of examples for every claim there. You say you're a team player, give them an example. Good analytical skills? Excellent communication skills? Superb problem solving skills? Everybody makes such claims. The only way to convince the interviewers is through examples.
Recently my son had to go through an interview for volunteer work. The place gave him the questions before the interview. One question was: what are your strengths?
My son doesn't talk much, so I helped them with this tough question. I told him he's dependable. Why? Because he does his own laundry every Sunday at 11:00 AM; because he sweeps the kitchen floor every other day; because he delivered newspaper even in an ice rain. I'm sure these are enough to convince the interviewer.
A while ago, I was playing with the Spring Framework. One day, a sample program failed to compile. The error message said a Spring class was not found. Without spending a second checking the issue, I suspected that my version of Spring was outdated, even though the Framework was downloaded only 2 weeks ago. I updated Spring and that indeed fixed the problem.
I feel this is a good example of problem solving skills. It shows the ability to reach a conclusion with very limited information. Years ago, my first boss, even though not a programmer himself, would go into our source code at a client's place and fix problems in minutes. Same thing.
For this installment on communication skills, I actually planned to write about misunderstandings. However, I again couldn't make progress due to lack of good examples. After a while, I decided to leave it alone. If you have examples on misunderstandings, I'd like to hear about them.
A while ago, I read an article on Rolia. The author said his mom loved him to the extreme. I guess we could all make such claims. However, after reading his examples, I'm convinced that his mom is indeed different.
Example #1: his mother's sister once spanked him for running around the fire place and refusing to stop even after warnings of danger. His mother had a big fight with her sister over the spanking. She even stopped talking to her sister for many months.
Example #2: he once had a debate with his friend over which is faster: train or airplane? He said train but his friend said airplane. They went to his mom for a decision. What did his mom say? Train.
I conclude this article with a bad example.
A while ago, someone on Rolia made such a claim: 真心喜歡一個人，就要告訴她你的最最致命的弱點，好讓對方在你內心變黑暗要失控的時候還能把握住你，不被你欺負. We can hardly understand what the author has in mind without some exmaples. What is "內心變黑暗"? How "失控" is "失控"? What is "欺負"? What kind of weakness is"致命的弱點"?
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