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Archive for October, 2009

Learning And Life - The Victor and Victim Syndrome

October 30th, 2009 Jason Kendall No comments

We all know people who appear to breeze through life, happily moving from one triumph to the next. On the other hand, we know others who never quite make it, and always have an answer why life has dealt them a hard blow. Society is made up of victors and victims, and the difference can very often be boiled down to one key factor - attitude.

When moving in a new career direction, it’s essential to learn the habits of the victor to achieve a successful outcome. The victims attempt actions in a timid manner, hoping for good things, but never really believing they’re worthy of great things. Victors commit mentally to a successful outcome, and back their actions with emotion.

Take two tennis players about to play for a championship. One says “It’s my last chance - I’ll give it my best shot,” but the other says “Winning is my destiny.” No prizes for guessing who’ll win the tournament. They may both put in the same hours, but the victor spends more time on his mental training to win.

We can define the victor by the word OAR (Ownership, Accountability and Responsibility) - a figure paddling towards success. The victim is defined by the word BED (Blame, Excuses and Denial) - one who stays in bed and gives up.

The victor takes responsibility for his or her tasks, and doesn’t hope for someone else to lead the way. He’s accountable for his actions, so takes them seriously, and sees things through by tackling problems not creating them. He doesn’t take excuses from himself and is responsible for the outcome of his actions.

The victim always has a reason for not achieving, and it’s rarely to do with him or herself. Everything is always someone else’s fault - he feels out of control so lays the blame at someone else’s door. He makes excuses for his under-performance, not realising the only person he’s convincing is himself. After repeating this pattern of blame and excuses for long enough, the victim lives a life of denial, convinced that there’s absolutely nothing he can do about his situation.

To stack the odds in their favour, a mental work-out may be needed for some students approaching a life-changing training program. Anyone who’s a fully paid up member of the victim society must address their issues before they get going, to fully embrace the potential in front of them.

Attitudes (both good and bad) are just habits, and with constant repetition, habits can be altered. Pay attention to the voice inside your head - if it sounds like a victim, then stop it dead! Instead, mentally verbalise why you can be successful. No one is any better than you - it’s just that some people have fought their demons and emerged victorious.

“There is no such thing as a hero, only those who rise to the occasion”. Those were the words of Winston Churchill, and they’re just as valid today. We need to have the attitude of a winner in order to become a winner, both in learning and in life.

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The Reasons To Study IT - A Personal Insight

October 30th, 2009 Jason Kendall No comments

I’m not suggesting that IT training and IT careers are the be-all and end-all of life on this planet. Can you imagine, for example, where we would be without the football superstars who entertain us so well on a weekly basis? Yet there’s got to be a reason why more and more people are training for careers within the IT industry.

An interesting development has been the increase in IT training for those people who are seeking a career change or an enhancement to their existing skill sets. In reviewing this, I’m curious as to why IT continues to offer the attraction, and is this option really viable?

Whilst we all acknowledge that in relationships, key elements and people themselves can change. At the age of 10, a boyfriend or girlfriend can be considered a cute thing, but it isn’t expected to last. At the age of 18-20, relationships are often less transient, but they also have a shorter lifespan than others later in life.

Equally our young people are asked to plan and make decisions about their working career quite early on in life, and yet historically there appears to be an inherent resistance to change as times progresses. If we accept that life changes, and we also accept that circumstances change, surely it’s prudent for us to accept that career paths should and could change?

Modern society continually relies on IT, and IT related factors. Based on simple economics of supply and demand, this leads many people to assume that a career in this field would be reliable and well paid. Many people see a direct transfer of how they use IT systems socially (such as social interaction on the internet e.g. facebook and playing games etc.) into a career. What factors would actually lead towards a successful career, and is this a genuine realism of a career within IT?

A key element in answering this, I believe, is an understanding that a career in IT is as dependent on factors such as a client base (if self-employed,) or an employer and economic issues, as any other career path. Nevertheless, there is a great deal of evidence to suggest that professional people within the IT industry can move between employers and industry sectors more freely. This is due to the wide dependence on IT services across both geographic and industry models.

One of the key elements is the term ‘Professional IT People’ - just as in any other industry, employers have consistently sought human resources where the skills can be proven by both experience and an approved benchmark. This applies whether that is a degree, or recognised apprenticeship culminating in an industry standard qualification, such as electrician and plumber.

The IT industry is just the same. Many people have access to a computer at home, and can experience several factors of the IT industry in a refined environment. Yet this is in many cases vastly different from the skills and resources required in the commercial sector. We’d all agree, I’m sure, that spending four hours a night surfing the internet or playing games doesn’t make us a qualified webmaster or a qualified games designer.

Professional qualifications within the IT field such as MCSE or MCSA are immediately recognisable as an industry standard. Employers can rely upon the skills offered, and as such there is a reduced risk of breach of commercial insurance policies for work and services provided by such people, whether they are self-employed or directly employed.

If you’re seriously considering a future within the IT industry, you must look at how best to position yourself to become attractive to an employer. Holding a professional qualification goes a long way towards this. We should at least be aware of what the employer or client is looking for in recruitment or engagement, as they are the ones paying the salary.

Plenty of data exists to support the view that the growth in the IT sector is faster and more resilient than many other industry sectors. We’re witnessing a transitional shift in industry sectors, from the first world through to the third world, and the rate at which many growing or ‘tiger’ economies are adapting to (and embracing) long standing IT systems is very fast indeed.

Up to now in this article we’ve looked at the trends, which with the slow down and in some cases demise of traditional industry (and therefore traditional job-for-life expectancies), there will be an increasing propensity towards several jobs and career paths over our lifetime.

What’s more, we’ve noted that the IT industry remains attractive consistently as it continues to provide both supply and demand across geographical boundaries and across industry sectors. Todays forecasts also predict the increasing long-term dependence on IT systems overall. This includes the professional individuals who develop, utilise and maintain those systems, as they remain integral to many organisations long-term requirements.

Salary forecasts remain high within this industry, with plenty of evidence to suggest that this is achievable. It’s worth noting however,that in many other sectors the top-people get paid the top-money, and just ‘being there’ isn’t good enough and doesn’t guarantee the top-money.

We have also put forward the case that employers review recruitment for IT skills as no different to any other facet of their business, and they expect the individuals to formally demonstrate their skills and qualifications, in exactly the same way as they expect their electricians and accountants to be professionally qualified to do the work they’re employed to do.

It’s my belief that there is considerable evidence to view a career in IT as a strong and viable option for many people in today’s economic and social climate. Significant salaries are definitely achievable. And yet, it’s equally clear and only common sense to expect to have to gain a recognisable professional IT qualification. This not only clearly demonstrate one’s own ability, but at the very least it displays the attitude that your prospective employer can rely on you in the commercial field and that you are serious about this career path.

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Learning - The Real Cost

October 29th, 2009 Jason Kendall No comments

The average cost of bringing up a child in the UK amounts to 193,000 pounds in total. Long term studies, which recently indicated this say it equates to approximately 26-28 pounds every day. Long suffering parents, who were almost unified in their total lack of surprise, greeted the news with a swathe of cynical retorts.

The current recession and its effect on traditional educational systems is now being evaluated by many pundits. They make consistent reference to the strategies to survive adopted by parents, teachers and students alike in the recession of the 1990’s.

Analysis suggests that the money spent on education and schooling overall could on average be up to 40 percent of the entire household disposable income. With the hardening attitude towards mortgage allocation and bank lending, this figure could increase as young people stay with their parents for longer and extend their education programs - almost as a by product of something to do until things start to get better.

The cost of living is increasingly monopolising the family focus. Additionally, many companies are cutting back on training and development programs. So people feel it’s pointless spending money on training when they do not know for certain that they will not be made redundant - it is little wonder that many are now re-accessing their method of personal development and the subject matter that they study in.

Historically, public services, banking and the like have all been thought of as stable long term employers and attracted people accordingly. Over the last decade or so this has largely been superseded by the perception of employment offered within the IT industry.

Unlike training in the motor industry or engineering, where key skills often have to be gained in a practical environment, IT training can be predominantly home based. Whilst it is difficult to transport a complete car production line into the home, computer based training is easily at hand. Developments in the intellectual property field such as IT have grown exponentially as a result of this and the continued enhancements in the way the skills are taught and learnt.

Remote access 24/7 to highly skilled lecturers is available due to the utilisation of new training methodologies. This adds weight to the strategy and the final results are qualifications in a field that’s widely sought after on an international level. Add to that easily quantified salary and career structures, and it’s little wonder that IT training is attracting so much attention.

With many people unsure of their future, whether early on in their career or mid way through life, home based training in subjects such as IT can often be seen as a superb, low cost, easy paced development program; gaining skills that are easily accepted anywhere in the world and highly resilient in a changeable economic environment.

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The Four Stages of Learning - How They Can Affect YOU…

October 29th, 2009 Jason Kendall No comments

Dividing the different stages of learning into sections can be really helpful when we’re trying to work out where we are and how far we can go. Looking at the big goal can be quite scary - (let’s say professional web designer with a big portfolio of customers who are dependent on our expertise), when it’s as much as we can do to recall the names of the software we’ll be learning from!

Let’s look at four different levels of understanding. Whenever we take on anything new, we all experience these stages, and recognising them helps us to evaluate ourselves and our progress.

Unconscious Incompetent, Conscious Incompetent, Conscious Competent, Unconscious Competent.

Career changers frequently begin at stage one - Unconscious Incompetent. We know we want to change at this stage, but we don’t yet know what we don’t know, what we need to know, how to learn it or where it might lead us! It sounds pretty desperate, but knowing we want to change is the important thing - we can be taught everything else .

The main thing is to take advice. The stage one person can discover what’s involved in the process by talking things through with an experienced advisor; then they can find out where they want to go and what they need to learn.

Next comes stage two - Conscious Incompetent. We’re now probably at the start of our training course. Having been explained the different options, we’ve decided on our career path. So we now know what we have to learn - in other words we’re conscious of what we don’t know yet, or what we’re currently incompetent at.

It’s important to understand this, to have the wisdom of knowing where we are. Understanding conscious incompetence means that we don’t get so frustrated in our early stages of learning - we might not be very good at it (especially if it’s been a while since school…) but we know we’ll get better. Modern interactive learning accelerates this process, so we don’t have to stay at this stage for long.

Conscious Competent takes us to stage three. We’re in the flow of the learning environment, and can pick things up much more quickly. We still have to consciously think about what we’re doing on a continuous basis, but we’re able to learn competently. We’ll most likely complete our studies and successfully pass our exams during this learning stage, which will probably also extend into our working life too.

Remember when we learned to drive a car? We’d got to conscious competency by test time - good enough to pass the exam but still consciously aware of every manoeuvre. It wasn’t until we gained more experience to consolidate the knowledge that we moved into stage four.

In the computer world, before we become Unconsciously Competent we’ll most likely be several years into our working experience. At that stage, we know what we need to know, and no longer have to consciously think about why we do something. Although school’s never out for the pro, (and the joy in IT is there’s always more to learn) getting to this lofty height of understanding makes all the hard work worth it.

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