eBay Adventure - Never Speak Ill Over Your Business

Yes! After receiving an email from a customer saying that she had not received her package, I completed a missing package inquiry and her package was delivered yesterday. This was pleasantly odd because this morning I was prepared to tell my customer about the current status of my missing package inquiry; but, I remembered what a pastor preached about periodically checking things so that you would know the current status of things. I checked my package’s tracking number and saw that it was delivered yesterday.

It’s vindication because the company told me to refund her money over this. I refused because I didn’t exhaust all of my options plus the customer didn’t ask for one. I figured it out as a businesswoman. I went through the entire process. I also didn’t speak ill over my business. I spoke that this matter would be resolved and that my customer would receive her package. It was such vindication that I spoke this into existence (and did the work).

            Never ever speak ill over your business regardless of what you are going through.

Carla is a tall women’s fashion luxury consignment. Her motto is giving women Neiman Marcus merchandise at near rock bottom prices. Shop her store at: www.ebay.com/usr/carljenkin_6

Scrum Journal : Day 4

Today I awake at 5:45am to leave the house at 6:50am and board the early orange line to Vienna. I am up early because becoming scrum certified is my goal. I admit that I am a techie and love doing statistical programming. My first foray into project management is actually IT project management. Scrum is natural to me especially since it provides the framework for continuous improvement; and, I am all about this.

This stop is the last of the line and I have never been here before. Dunn Loring, the penultimate stop, is the farthest I have even been. I then transfer to the 2B bus to the office building. The ride is going very well but I miscalculated staying on the bus an extra stop forcing me to walk back over the bridge. I have managed to find it. I arrive at 8:30am right on the dot. Well, this is an adventure.

I sit in the only remaining seat (in the front, of course). I thumb through the material and it looks manageable; that’s until the instructor starts going off on tangents. I admit that I am scared because we start at 8:30am ending at 12:20pm (Lunch was supposed to be at 12 noon but there was another tangent) and we’ve only covered 8 slides on 4 pages. I’m just happy that I have read Jeff Sutherland’s book and some Scrum for Dummies because I’ve felt abandoned. While dining at P.J. Chang’s for lunch, I am writing in my notebook about ways to study in order to pass the CSM. I have paid my own money and have been dead set on getting my scrum certification. I will figure this out. Luckily, he speeds up the pace. At the end of day one.

I do have a tablemate who lets everyone know that he is taking a graduate software engineering program. Okay, when I advise him that he convert the scrum certification into an elective. This advice is coming from someone who has earned her MBA in her 20s. His response : ‘the way that I am set up, I am only 4 courses away from my masters.’ Dummy. He could have used this certification converting it into something else. However, I must remember that I am a quick study. I bet that we are the same age but have different paths. I refuse to pay more money than I need to on anything especially my education. Good luck with that! My father fighting in Vietnam and my paternal grandfather fighting in World War II also perturbs me about this tablemate who has never seen war but always talks about the Army. Sheesh! One more day!

I have started practicing for the CSM because I am anal and need to have as many looks as possible. It is one thing for the instructor to recommend what I should study on the exam. It is another to be able to problem solve. I need to know the why because scrum is a part of agile project management. Mastering scrum is essential towards my deeper understanding of this. Furthermore, I love tinkering with technology. For me it is all about walking into the workshop knowing all of my stuff not just what is recommended.

Yippie! I have scored 80% on a mock CSM exam. I have gotten 12 out of 15 correct. Two out of the three that I have gotten wrong are because I don’t know the terminology. I don’t know anything about technical debt of maintainability. I will ask the instructor about this.

More yippie! I have taken a full 35-question mock exam and increased my score to (29/35)! That’s better than the 15-question one. It is essential to build my stamina by taking a full mock exam because I need to know how I will react. 

Finally! My Skirt is Done!

Finally, after five classes (the three-session Perfect Your Skirt, the private session and today’s open session), I have finished sewing my skirt. I’m so happy to finish it that I run into the bathroom, take off my skinny jeans, and put it on for one of the instructors to photograph me.  I originally ended up at Bits of Thread because DC Fashion Incubator didn’t have instructors for its textiles and patternmaking courses. I refused to wait for the organization to get them else I’d still be waiting because it is 6 weeks after the Apparel design course ended on March 2^nd, DC Fashion Incubator still didn’t have any teachers. However, I’ve soldiered on creating my skirts and learning how to sew. Check it out!

Me in my new skirt that I've sewn myself!

Get Recruited! Book Review

            Ever wonder why you land many interviews but never a job offer? You haven’t seen the process from the recruiter’s perspective.  There’s a difference between job searching and recruiting.  The former is uploading your resume on Monster, CareerBuilder and Indeed.  The latter means cultivating relationships and developing a brand.  Get Recruited! supplies superior insight to increasing your visibility by tapping into the recruiter’s world, a hidden job market of unlisted positions. This book goes beyond burnishing your resume, by helping you network with recruiters, like-minded professionals, create a career advisory board, media kits, business cards and find mentors and sponsors. Mentors and sponsors are meaningful because you’ll need them at every career stage.  When change jobs or receive promotion, you must find new ones.  Graham also says that media kits, business cards and branding specialists aren’t only for Fortune 500 firms. Use them to create your own branding strategy to find the job that you want. Finally, the author shows you how to use various networking levels (friends and family, volunteering, social media, past jobs and organizational memberships) to expand your current network.  Ultimately, Get Recruited! succeeds where other texts don’t by getting you unstuck.  What more can you ask for in a career management book?