Posts

Showing posts with the label work

Do Jobs Define Masculinity?

Image
The non-Japanese portrayal of the Japanese salaryman is often an illustration of the unenviable foot soldier of Japanese economic success. Overworked and exhausted, they drag themselves into similar-looking office buildings in their equally similar corporate uniform of black suits with neckties. Admired for their individual sacrifice and hard work as a sign of devotion to help their companies and country grow and prosper, the non-Japanese observants would nonetheless loathe to emulate the way these salarymen worked and lived.

How Do We Stop Being Dejected by "Peaking Too Early"?

Image
I often half-jokingly say that I am way past my peak at age 35. While it is a way to prevent others from setting too high of an expectation for how much further my career can go, it also reflects how I reflect how I see my career so far. As a mere 24-year-old, I was already a Vice President of Operations at Lazada , an e-commerce firm that became a major player in that industry in Southeast Asia. Overseeing more than 150 employees, some more than twice as old as I was at the time, made me realize that corporate management was frankly, not my cup of tea.

Taking a Break from A Day of Essay Reading!

Every line of work ebbs and flows based on a calendar of deadlines. When no imminent projects are on the horizon, employees enjoy their downtime, taking vacations and going home early from the office. When clients call in with urgent requests, employees reluctantly do overtime, trying to get through all the tasks while their managers and customers breathe down their necks for constant updates. The deadlines vary greatly from industry to industry, with expectations being three months for management consultants to three minutes for the fry cook at McDonald's.

Where to Draw the Lines Between the Abstract and Concrete in College Essays?

Image
One thing that this blog does not particularly do well is "specificity." Often, posts start with a concrete event that triggers a line of thinking, but then dive deeper and deeper into the philosophy and values behind the thinking, until the reader is left thinking, at the end of the post, what do the abstract thoughts developed across multiple paragraphs have anything to do with the event that triggered the post in the first place. And too frequently, I am inclined to agree with the readers: as a space to freely jot down my thoughts, the thoughts are prioritized over structure or narrative.

Sam Altman's Return to OpenAI: A Testament to Employee Power in the Tech World

Image
It has been some days after the sudden ouster and return of Sam Altman as the leader of the world's current tech darling OpenAI. But even as the episode gets written into recent history, there are plenty of mysteries surrounding exactly what happened. Who are the folks who wanted Altman out so decisively, even though they, as the public, know that Altman is the face of the company and an influential voice on AI even beyond immediate company operations? And what exactly did they want to achieve through the ouster? Greater commercialization may be a culprit, but for casual observers, this is mere speculation.

Tech's Limitations in Disrupting Traditional Industries: A Reflection on WeWork's Rise and Fall

Image
The recent bankruptcy of the co-working space operator WeWork in the US spelled the end to a rather embarrassing saga in the world of tech. Under its flamboyant founder, the firm was once deemed a tech darling ready to disrupt the fossilized world of real estate management. For a while, it seems to have succeeded, offering up rental spaces to other tech startups hoping to bask in the glow of how tech can be utilized to solve legacy industries. Getting other tech firms to believe that it is an integral member of the tech world propelled WeWork to new heights in valuation.

Sex Work Stands to Gain in an AI-filled Future Economy

Image
The world is bracing for an AI revolution. Starting from the shock of ChatGPT's dexterity when it first emerged this month last year, both tech experts and the general public are now envisioning a world in which chatbots like it and its myriad competitors go from mere helpers to human work, to become central to daily operations of the global economy. With skills that range from crafting documents and conducting online research to brainstorming new ideas and putting together computer codes, it no longer seems unfathomable that chatbots replace millions of human workers around the world.

Shorter Talks, Better Results: Rethinking Consultation Efficiency

Image
One of the most useful skills, in any industry and any line of job, is the ability to think on the spot. Some people can, right after listening to comments from others or even skimming through some dense text, immediately provide their feedback and critique. If the comments are relevant, insightful, and sharp-witted, they leave lasting impressions of being quick to think and capable of real-time communication. Having more meetings, like I do for my job , can be a good way to train the mind to react to information and reply more quickly.

When Writing College Essays, Forget Idealism, Stick to Authenticity

Image
Spending years in "basic" education from elementary all the way to high school can give students an absolutist view of right and wrong. In math and the sciences, answers that adhere to the principles of existing "laws of nature" and rules of computation are correct. In humanities, those that align with historical precedents and the opinion of "expert" teachers are not to be questioned. Such thinking promotes the idea that there is always a right answer, and that answer can be reached by reading books, asking teachers, or conducting research with experts.

How Dreams of High School Students Can Inspire the Middle-Aged to be Less Jaded

Image
College admissions consulting has a straightforward premise: those who are experienced in the admissions side (through a combination of getting into top universities themselves and years of experience helping others succeed) provide expert advice to high school students who are going through the process for the very first time. In any conversation, who is the teacher and who is the student is supposed to be very clear. The high school student, or more precisely, their parents, is paying for the time to be taught how they are supposed to present their near future in a way that is attractive to university admissions officers.

The Cognitive Dissonance of Ph.D. Holders Refusing to "Apply Down" in the Job Market

Image
Several years ago, this blog concluded in a post that the meaning of a doctorate is related to a particular career option, not a reflection of the Ph.D. holder's intellect. The time was my early days of coming back to academia, right after a couple years in the East African outback for an American non-profit. The idea of getting back into the books after two years in the maize fields still felt new and exciting. Being an academic was still a viable option, made worthy of consideration when thinking about the joy of doing fieldwork in countries around the world.

Great Insights Need Not Come From Great Events

Image
Walking down the street, having lunch by oneself, staring at the sky...life is full of moments that seem to be in between more important events. Yet, even as one physically takes a break in between those important events that require full concentration, one's mind never really does. The mind always wonders, for a purpose if needed, and aimlessly, when there is no particular urgent need. Some would define aimlessness as boredom, and try to find some aim to end the boredom. Scrolling through social media on the train, knitting a sweater at night, writing this blog...they can all constitute intentional attempts to be productive.

A Reflection at the Halfway Point of My 30s

Image
The "Happy Birthday" posts on Facebook seem to be sparser than usual. As the average user of the social media platform becomes older, it has become more and more difficult to keep them engaged and communicating with their equally older friends. After all, older people are busier. They have children to attend to, subordinates to manage, and more responsibilities at work to ponder over. What is more, with more of a stake in work and private life, they are much more cautious about their public image, and try to avoid leaving digital footprints. So many of them have Facebook profiles that stay the same for years.

If Uniqueness is Destroyed by Higher Education, Then What's the Point of Encouraging Uniqueness When Young?

Image
"I don't think I have anything unique to say about myself..." I get this comment a lot when I speak to teenagers . Not that I am surprised. Not only did I not know what the future held when I was a high school student, I could not confidently that even now, 35 years old and half a dozen jobs later, I can clearly pronounce my passions in professional or private life. Scary as it might be, even more than twice as old as some of my students, I am often not in a position to provide them the one thing they are looking for – a simple, straightforward answer to narrow down their career choices based on their existing interests.

When Meetings are the Main Output, White-collar Work Gets Redefined

Image
Strategic plans on Word documents, business analyses on spreadsheets, colorful PowerPoint presentations...my image of white-collar work, based on the various past jobs I've had, had always been associated with written materials. Plenty of internal and external communications, through phone calls and meetings, certainly did take place, but ultimately, the results were reflected in written form, to be submitted to the higher-ups as email attachments, easily digestible and transmittable to a wider audience both inside and outside the company.

Mentoring Adolescents: Remembering the Need for Delicate Balance and the Lessons of Failure

Image
"I'm gonna go to Harvard." It is almost every day that I come across a student with such ambitions in this job. Replace the name "Harvard" with some other top-ranked, well-known university in the US and the UK, and the sentiment practically describes every student I speak with. There are different reasons that students aspire to a spot in one of the world's elite educational institutions. Some are grounded in the cold, hard logic of high financial returns, while others are bound by the emotional belief of pride and prestige. Whatever the reason, the goal remains noble, motivating, and worthy of encouragement.

The Potential Impact of Ending Affirmative Action on Educational Consulting

Image
Hours ago, the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) ruled that affirmative action – the practice of some of the country's most prestigious universities to openly use race as a factor in promoting diversity of admitted students – is unconstitutional. As expected, among watchers of higher education in the country, this decision has triggered immediate and widespread discussions. The impact of affirmative action policies, especially among overrepresented minorities like Asian Americans, has been noted more than a decade ago when I was a university student. With the policy's formal abolishment, changes to universities' admissions may be significant.

Who Does Quality Control on Online Classes?

Image
With the increasingly widespread use of the internet, it is becoming increasingly common for it to be used as a source of education. While prestigious high schools and universities continue to value the importance of face-to-face camaraderie among students and teachers, as well as real-world social experiences of offline activities on their campuses and communities nearby, plenty of educational services providers have emerged to offer online-only classrooms. By giving people more freedom to choose when, how much, and with whom to study, these online courses seek to transcend the physical and financial limitations of brick-and-mortar school campuses.

The Occasional Digital Nomad Detests the Corporate Office...But Finding a Good Alternative is Not Easy

Image
Where does a white-collar worker get most of their work done? The answer these days might be obvious at first sight: somewhere with good internet connections, a reliable power outlet to charge electronic devices, as well as a comfy chair and desk that does not make hours of deskwork not stressful on the back and the hips. Logically, the more routine around this setup, the better. After all, what can be a better desk than one that has proven itself, day after day, that does not cause back pain. What is better than wireless internet that has a track record of not disconnecting spontaneously over weeks and months?

The Difficulty of Assigning Meaning to "Growth" in Elite Education

Image
Flip through any media covering the latest startup world; it is not hard to assume what is considered "success" in this space. Firms that can achieve massive growth, general excitement from investors for further investment, and leverage additional resources for further development are the poster boys of the industry. Logically, such media coverage focuses on how growth enables scale, which in turn allows certain products and services offered by such successful firms to fulfill thus-far untapped needs of customers worldwide, introduce new conveniences, and improve lives.