Tag Archive for 'Experience'

It’s OK to say NO

Published by Nainil Chheda on January 22, 2009 in Management and Organization. 0 Comments

In my professional experience:

  1. I did not always have a Team to work with;
  2. I did not always have a Team Lead to report to.

Most of the time, I used to work on Individual Projects assigned to me by the Management. Currently I belong to two teams (Product Management and the Network Team) and I still spend most of my time working on various Individual Projects.

In an environment where I have two team leads and multiple management members to report to, it is often difficult to make everyone realize the current items you are working on.

This results into:

  1. Difficulty in prioritizing
  2. Uncontrolled assignment of work (Work load increases)
  3. Wrong judgment in terms of assigning the correct work to the correct people.

With my 16 years of experience, one of the most important skills I have developed is to judge when it is right to say “No” to an assigned task. It is not always the correct accept all the projects which have been assigned to you. While your team lead does make the best judgment in assigning the task, it is also your responsibility to evaluate your skill set and your current list of priorities to accept the task.

Based on my experience I use a starter kit of questions to evaluate when it’s OK to say NO to an assigned project:

  1. Do I have the bandwidth to take another project?
  2. Do I have the right skill set?
  3. Based on my experience, will this project succeed? Does this project need more planning?

There have been instances when I have personally met the management team and/or the team lead, explained them my skill set and I have provided them with a valid reason as to why I would not be able to take the assigned project. It should be noted that saying “No” to a senior management is not the easiest of the tasks. You need the courage and the motivation to go to the team lead and explain them the same.

By this exercise, the management/team lead is well informed in advance about my thoughts. They then have the time to make the right decision and assign the project/task to another team member. I can now concentrate on my existing projects and complete them on time without any other distractions which might affect my quality of work. The team leads are confident in you as you have given them your honest opinion and prevented any last minute confrontation of backing out of the project.

By learning to say ‘no’ to projects that don’t fit your targeted strategy, you’ll often end up with more time and energy to say ‘yes’ when it really counts.

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Failure Is Success Rounded Down

Published by Nainil Chheda on January 15, 2009 in Life. 0 Comments

It took me 6 rounds of job interview sessions and some real strong recommendation to receive my job at eClinicalWorks LLC. The good thing is that I received the job (i.e. success); the bad part is that I had to prove myself 6 times before being chosen for the job (i.e. failure).

Failure has many flavors:

  1. Failure to meet expectation 
  2. Failure to anticipate
  3. Failure to process and complete a task

Here is a quick recollection of the areas where I have failed :

  1. As a Student : In my 10th grade I failed in “English Language” as a subject. (Reason: Attention span of a moth)
  2. As a Coordinator : In my previous experience as a “Development Coordinator”, I was not able to perform my duties. (Reason: Half knowledge is dangerous)
  3. As a Project Manager : The most important aspect of being a Project Manager is constant follow-up. I have had incidences where I have missed following up on a project.
  4. As a Network Team Member : I have failed in making sure the team follows the best-practices for Internal Communication.
  5. As a Knowledge Manager : One of the responsibilities of a Knowledge Manager is efficient transfer of knowledge amongst various departments. I failed to do so.

Failure is directly proportional to the mistakes one makes. 

Here is what have I learned from my failed experiences / mistakes :

  1. Always admit your mistakes.
  2. Accept responsibilities and follow-up.
  3. Work to understand why it happened and what the factors were.
  4. Never give up (keep on trying until you succeed).
  5. Try not to make the same mistakes again.
  6. Effective communication is the key to success.
  7. Learn from the past and move on with life.
  8. Learn from the mistakes of others.

In life, to be honest, I have failed as much as I have succeeded. Despite the pain and the stress of the failure, there is always a learning curve which one must embrace. This is what we call experience.

“Experience is the name every one gives to their mistakes.” — Oscar Wilde

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