Moving Parks

Most people I know have a cell phone. It’s one of those fact of life that I have come to expect from average person I am to meet on a daily basis. When meeting new people, I automatically assume they can be reached at any time at my convinience because they will have a number where they can be called upon regardless of where they are.

One thing I’ve noticed lately is how having a cell phone also changed how we exchange our information. Gone are the days of, “Let me find a pen and paper” or “Send me an e-mail with your number”. Instead, the “what’s your number?” question is followed by rush of everyone on the table pulling out their mobile and proceeding to punch in melodies of button presses. Once it’s stored on the phone, we don’t bother with details of trying to memorize it by heart nor even looking at the number again. (unless of course our beloved phone meets its untimely demise from meeting with the hard floor too or flirting with water).

How has it changed your method of getting people’s contact numbers? Better question is.. how many phone numbers do you know by heart?

“How are things at your new job?”, was the simple question directed at me at a dinner get together. My answer to this question prompted reaction by all those at the table all too familiar to me by now.

Yes, I’m hard to please and I don’t think I would have it any other way. Specially when it comes to my professional life.
So, I’ve moved companies 4 times in the past 5 years (that’s one company per year average). There are definite ups and downs but I must say that I have learned invaluable lesson due to all these moves. Allow me to try to list out some here:

• No matter what the size, all companies have the same problem: Too tight of a deadline
• There are always room for workaholics
• Spend first two weeks reading up on documents and asking questions. You will know more than average person in the company by the end and you really get to know who to ask for help when in need
• What you did or how you did in school really don’t matter. In fact, which school you went to matters even less
• There is always someone higher up in the corporate ladder who is less fit to be holding that position than you do

There is always the feel of being under paid regardless of how much of a raise I got by moving companies..

So? Anything to add to the list?? Observations, comments on your previous employments?

It wasn’t all that long ago when people actually were willing to pay decent sum of money to get a hold of gmail invitation. Today, once I logged into my gmail account, I discovered that I have 50 invitations to give out! It was a quiet move by Google. No announcements and no bolded “xx invitations left” in the main page. Just a simple input filed added with “50 left” in small font.

So.. who wants a gmail account? I do have have 50 invites left to hand out after all! Or, will this become more like a collector’s item? Maybe it will serve as a statistic to show how long you have been on gmail like that of the good old ICQ number where less number of digits you have in your ID showed that you were one of the cool ones to have discovered it before rest of the world. Maybe I should guard my unused invitations!

As the past gifting season of Christmas is slowly fading in our memories, I’m sitting here sipping tea out of my new travel mug. A friend gave it to me as a Christmas gift. Although I appreciate his thought and I do like this mug for its simple elegant look, one thing about this mug does have be thinking.

The big BMW roundel on the side of the travel mug. Just because my car happens to be a BMW, I guess he thought I would need a travel mug to go with it? So that has me thinking… How much of my identity is formed by the things I own? In fact, how much of my brand preference affect how others see me?

I know the whole value of the brand talk can spawn off and take a lengthy discussion but all I’m trying to think is how much of “me” is reflected upon the brand I choose or does the brand I happen to chose somehow have a reflection on my identity?