Update About New Blog
13 May 2012 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Work
I have started a new blog for work memo and sharing on stuff like marketing, branding, design, photos, videos, web, etc. This one is literally just a blog, meaning I do so-called “blogging” to share information with some memo. It’s purely a practical blog for ideas, not much writing, so check it out only if any above keywords clicks you. Otherwise it doesn’t concern you much, so please stay in Bombay Dog.
http://benonpareil.wordpress.com/
A Japanese famous thinker, Takaaki Yoshimoto, reportedly said that everyone can be a professional if we continue the same job for ten years. Well, I have completed my five years, so it’s a half way. It wasn’t really intentional to come this way so far. I guess I have convinced myself that it’s already the time go a bit more intentional and design my way.
Reaching Somewhere
08 May 2012 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Life, Work
The Crazy April is over, and now it’s Crazy May. I am planning work for a Crazy June these days. I have a physical pain in my heart.
I work in very hiper-active and agressive way at office, though it is actually by a lot of intentional effort. I am slow and merrow by nature, more poetic than logical, which only close friends knows well. I trained myself considerablly hard over years and kind of created a work-personality which is quite different from my natural character. On and off.
People have different motivation and value at work. Money, self-growth, friends, achievement, finding-self, social causes, whatever. I think my motivation is to go see far, as far as I can, and dig into detail as deep as I can, because only that way work can be meanigful. Some people think that I make a big deal of every little problems all the time, but if you compromize for one tiny thing, like a badly painted wall soaks rains and gets weaker by time, you end up compromizing many other things and only achieve a compromized goal in the end.
Poeple get used to compromization. It’s a simple psychological theory; once you say yes to what you are not proud of, you carry a burden of the compromization and feel less confident to say no to other coming stuff. One thing leads to another. I see such situations A LOT, a lot. Every day, every week. So I try hard not to get myself into it, nore to let other people too. Because in the end, everything bounces back to us.
Therefore, I usually respect people who mess up my plan by suggesting something new, because only they can take me and my project to a higher level. I like people who make things complex by bringing overlooked problems (and I like people who also help me simplified in the end). Oppositely, I cant get along with people who don’t really care and take failures like a bad weather or natural disaster, because they never learn, and I don’t learn anything from them. Persistence is the key. It’s an obsession, in the other words. It’s important to let things go sometimes, but if you let everything go, there won’t be anything remaining in your hand.
Actually I never really care what happens to my personal life. I just let things happen like a natural disaster and accept whatever happens. It’s easier and happier. Often, I question myself which way I want to go further. But I guess, for now, I think I should just blindly walk far and far withoug looking back, till I get to a place where I can really feel that I have reached somewhere.
Creative Outsourcing
09 Apr 2012 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Work Tags: creative, inhouse, Movie, movie projects, outsourcing, video editor
I have been scratching the surface of videographics and a little bit of animation since last November because I had a burning movie project to take care by the deadline anyhow otherwise my boss was almost killing me.
Outsourcing is not a piece of cake, especially in creative projects. You’d shop around external vendors and freelancers, prepare concepts and instructions, spoonfeed and give feedbacks, (even takes care of the editors’ self-esteem and pride issues) and would even scrap the project because of quality in the end.
After many attempts, I gave up and decided to give it a shot by myself. I just couldn’t find a better alternative to meet the deadline. It worked to some extent and I quite enjoy learning new skills and gain freedom through it. (Still contact me if you are a great editor and want a job, because I am more than happy to give up this super timeconsuming work).
After editing a couple of movie projects, I found that editing is about love. Love to the objects, love to people. When I am spending hours to pick up the best phrases and smiles of a person from movie materials, I am actually in love with him or her, thinking so seriously how I can communicate who they are in the limited short crip. Also I now understand why there’s an editor’s cut version of mega hit movies, as there are many scenes that I am dying to show people but have to cut because of the length.
And I started thinking; if it’s about love, the thin line which separate between amateurism and professionalism is just about sense and skills. So when I think of outsourcing such creative projects, my dilemma is if the editor or designer can get really deep into the message or the theme, and if they can share the same heat and spirit as inhouse staff shares. Would they care as much as we care? Would they fight not to compromise as much as we don’t want to? Whold they be happy to give 120% output by gaining the same amount of money? This is the challenge. Not easy in any kind of works. (No conclusion, unfortunately)
Running High
27 Mar 2012 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Life, Uncategorized, Work
March makes me feel scared of April. And April makes me more scared of May. Yeah, all day, all the time.
The moment you set a target or a goal of your work or life, though we say it is a motivation or a drive putting it in a positive way, crap, it also becomes your weakness. The higher you set the goal or standard, or the more you want it to become true, the more you are scared of being failed. So the challenge is; how can we keep our spontaneous and relaxed attitude while running in the maximum speed you’ve ever be?
Marketing and sales are clearly driven by numbers; whatever you do, you don’t do, you do great, or badly, affect the numbers very clearly. Ask anyone in your marketing team and they would tell you that they see the dream of being chased pretty often. How to deal with the pressure depends on the person.
I basically try ignoring the possible fact that I may not be capable of handling the goal as hard as I can. I try to keep myself in running-high all the time to pull myself away from the slight sign of fear. Most of the time, feeling fear is the same as feeling isolated. Isolation creates a doubt of myself and stop my own system of openness and creativity. So I try not to be scared; of people, of mistakes, of future, of being annoyed, of seeing the reality, become alone, or whatever. Even so, I am often caught and feel like doing a deadman walking. Let’s say that even President Obama or Manmohan Singh may also feel the same way quite daily, or at least let me say quite a few Japanese prime ministers have actually quit because of stress, pressure, or gastric ulceration. Fear is one emotion that is very difficult to make others understand. The higher the position be, the more the person is lonely because of the gravity of the fear.
I sometimes feel that my heart is squeezed up and almost stopping because of stress and pressure, and often can’t sleep thinking of new project’s failure. The good part of being in Marketing is that you are always trying something always new because of rapid trend change in the technology and market, but the bad thing is that you are always challenged to adjust and go beyond. Do I have an idea? If I have an idea, do we have power or knowledge to execute? If we have all of them, do we have money and followers? Even when you made a success, you are facing a higher goal next day. An endless civil war.
Junior staff or non business people sometimes ask me why and how we set a goal so high. Their point is “Okay, at least I understand the George Mallory’s word ‘Because there’s a mountain there‘, but you guys don’t even have a mountain but you’ve created the imaginary mountain. Why bother?” Yeah, point taken, but it’s just, I mean, we’ve got to go, and let us just see how the world will look like when we climb higher.
Still I tell you, the good thing of setting a goal is that at least we are running towards it, not we are running away from what is chasing us behind. In other words, it’s just like you are drawing a picture of the beautiful landscape that you’ve seen only in your dream. The picture in the end should be more beautiful than the one in the memory. Let’s speak this way.
Supplemental Effort
18 Mar 2012 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Work
A company is a purposeful playground. If you observe it in long view, some kids come to join, some leaves. One idea is continued, another idea disappear. In another words, people and ideas are like body cells. Even everything inside changes, a good company has its own character which remains the same over years because who and what it wants never change.
Each person has his own character, too. The good thing is, as long as you are working in an organization with multiply diversed roles, you don’t need to be a perfect person as other people can cover up your weakness. At the same time, you should also be good or keen at something which can cover up other people’s weakness.
I often think what if I become a perfect me, and the thought always gets into a mase. Does it mean that I overcome all my weakness and become more well-balanced? Or does it mean that I go extraordinally in my small strength? You may say both; then it’s a long way for a short life.
After I came to India, I was influenced by people around and forced myself to be open and direct as much as possible. That eventually became a habit of mine. It sometimes go too extreme and create some troubles, but that is another story. At least I am confident people know what I am good at and bad at, which gives people to make a fair judgement on who I am.
If you believe in people around, showing all your cards you’ve got is the best way to win the game. The fact is, your career is created by others who observe you, not always by your intention. It is also the same for a company business. When we work on even a small single job well, clients think “OK, let’s try letting them do another one also.” When we fail, they think “Then let’s ask that to someone else next time.”
Decisions and judgements are always made by someone else in the end; it’s never be ours. Only thing we can do is doing our best in what we love to do in a commited manner. Like Hayao Kawai, the thinker said, “Effort is just a supplement, but it’s a worth supplement as there’s nothing else we can do anyways.” So let’s just relax and do things come on the table right.
Working Smart
08 Mar 2012 4 Comments
in English Posts, Work
My boss started a new rule in the office; “Come early, leave early.” You pay the penalty if you overwork. It helps the team members to plan works efficiently and balance work and life. I’m impressed for the fact my bosses are encouraging it.
Working smart is a tricky business. In short, to work smart, you have to go through the phase of total mess. To “do” things less, you need to “think” ten times more. To be “simple”, you should know the complexity very well.
If Einstein said “Genius is 1% talent and 99% percent hard work”, Now way I can avoid hard work. Some people are naturally smart worker who do less work to make the same performance as hard workers. Actually I don’t like nor respect them much. My ideal smart worker is who doesn’t save their time and power. They work hard, and make explosive performance out of it. I want to be someone like that.
It’s a difference between a cool smart worker and a hot smart worker. I am baically anti-cool as my principle of life.
Or, in other words I don’t have a talent to be a cool smart. Whatever I do good is through painful lessons by banging my head against the wall like one hundred times. And I don’t know if there’s any other ways on the earth to make something new or creative without banging heads, seriously. So often when I manage completing work without a dead heat, I feel less happy and unsatisfied. I feel like I would have done much better in a different way.
So it’s another tricky thing; living on the thin line between a heat and a burnout. You need a skill to hung in there.
Yet, I think the rule is working. It makes me think. Does hard work comflict with smart work; can it be combined? Does quality really suffer in heavy schedule? Yes, sometimes no. It’s a forever theme.
Good To Great
21 Jan 2012 6 Comments
in Books, English Posts, Life, Work
Jim Collins’s Good To Great is one of the books the titles themselves are inspiring (which often means I haven’t read it yet). I love book titles. One of my hobbies is spending time in bookstores just checking around book cover designs, and evaluate the grade of titles, and imagine what is told inside, and learn something from them without reading.
I am deeply interested in copy writing which sell a new idea in the simplest way. Good book titles gives many ideas and insights in how to sell a book-long story, theory, or concept to readers without opening the book, and also the tone, font, and the design even gives you the idea whom it is talking to.
Speaking of Good To Great, I haven’t read it though fully, but basically the book talks about companies’ transformation from good to great, in terms of the business sucess, culture, ethics, and branding, etc, etc. But Whenever I go to a business management section in a book store, the red cover speaks to me personally, “Hey, are you just Good, or Great?”
When I find myself with full of lack and disabilities personally and professionally (which happens so often), I picture a dark forever-expanding cosmos or a tunnel with no end under the ground. Being extraordnally is something beyond imagination. After many years, I want to say I became wiser by ages, but I am not as confident as I was before, anymore. But maybe, though being great as a person is difficult, being great as a pair, as a group, and as an organization is possible. I may not be complete as one, but I may be able to fullfill a part of something Great, and Extraordinally.
I suppose I was too busy to enjoy myself and what I do, and I had never asked to myself if I am actually valuable for someone else; for family, company, friendship, or community, whatever bigger than me. In fact without me knowing so well about it, I am grown up, and expectations are changed .
If my 20th was the journey to find my self, my 30th is the journey to release what I found as myself to the air and go looking for something much more valuable than that. I am in back-and-force yet, but the life, work, and people somehow give me many oppotunities to challange myself to the limit. It asks me, “What’s your contribution more than being yourself?” I can’t answer that now, obviously. But I would be, if I can stay in the right track. I have at least 50 years more if I am lucky. I want to be more brave and good person so I can travel through this phase successfully.
Trained Eyes
05 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Work
One of my friends was in pottery a while ago, and she talked about the mystery of art criticism. “If you are new, and don’t acquire systematic knowledge of art, you never understand how critics says good or bad on a creation. Of course you have your own like and dislike that’s enough to enjoy art, but not enough to do art.”
It’s not only about art. At any professional work, we need to have such trained eyes by experience on what we create, no matter how big or small the work is.
I work for an inhouse marketing team in an Indian company, and we do literally any kind of strategic content creation for marketing, advertisement, and PR. Apart from the beauty or artistic factors of the contents and graphics, we have the valiable of what customers care and perceive, which is the most essential element of our kind of creations.
I am in the early career of this busienss, and my eyes are not yet well trained like an experienced professional. I still depend on senior people who have the better eyes. When I care how clean a button design is, they cares if the color, size, or the shape is motivational to click it. When I care how a copy message is consise and cool, they care if the message could have a possibility to be taken in a different meaning by the customers.
It is an advantage of working for an organization. Life is more complex yet your creativity gets maximized when you are exposed and reviewed by so many others who are better than you. Being professional is to have more and more multiple view points and angles to criticize a quality of work. If I am 2D-thinking alone, other people fulfill to make it 3D-thinking. Eventually, I get to bring others’ viewpoints in me and will be able to think differently, beyond myself. I hope.
That is why being patient for my work is very important. I do rework ten times to reach the mark, revise one proposal several times till people agree, talk and consult people till I get the best idea. I tell to myself don’t be afraid of being messed up and confused, don’t be depressed to ball up a piece of paper with full of my “fresh-new ideas” and start from scratch, because that’s one of the most exciting parts of working with people. If I listen carefully, there’s always a chance of breakthrough of myself in senior people’s words.
Many people start their own business or freelancing. That’s also a great adventure of life. Some people spin out to seek freedom, and I understand how they feel too. But working style does not matter. In any fields, longer and more serious we work, more we realize how the ramaining way is so long and far from the milestone of reaching a certain professionalism. I can’t make it alone all the way only with my ordinally mind and talent. I need help to get there.
Cheer Up, Sleepy Jean
25 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Work
Dealing business is just like being in a forever unrequitted love. You never feel rested nor secure, some things work, some backfire, one day you feel like the king of the world, and another day you feel like a begger on the street. Up and down, up and down. One step forward, one step backward. Miserablly, yet wonderfully, your heart will never be
filled up. You are always hungry.
Sure, I am personally too far from being a master of love or business, of course, but I am getting used to live in such hopeless struggle and little by little learning things from it. An important thing is to manage your motivation and positive attitude in spite of the situation and condition.
Businessmen are those who literally live at the border between reality and dream, yet, their eyes are always looking towered the direction of the dream side of the world. If you are not a dreamer, dealing with an expected-growing business (or chasing a high school queen) is like a meaningless civil war.
I think I am basically a dreamer, and a natural believer of “ALL IS WELL (whistle, whistle, whistle)” at the very bottom of my heart. But I am often affected by the situation and struggle with self-limitation. What should I have done better, what went wrong, why am I so stupid, etc, etc. It’s needed to some extent, becaues I don’t learn without the pain. But, I have to be cool at the same time to find a practical solution and effective strategy. I have to be flexible, be cool, yet hot. I want to be a believer of dreams with the painful sense of reality.
We need pure fuel pomped from the bottom of ourselves to be running long. Water mixed dirty fuel won’t let us run continuously. I find that more we are into work, more it requires the purity of heart, honesty, and the childhood innocence. People I respect at work have this purity. I have some too, and I think I can dig deeper and find another huge oil mine in myself.
My heart will not be fulfilled nor reach the goal forever, actually, because goals keep moving. It doesn’t matter. I think I can even run far without knowing the exact goal, believing my sense of direction. We already have fun, passion, excitement, struggle, love, growth, everything on the way. I want to be on move. I always want to stay on the way.
Metacognitive Management
02 Aug 2011 Leave a Comment
in English Posts, Work
Successful people in any fields have two aspects of characters in themselves; a producer and a creator, or a passionate heart and a cool head, in other words. We have to be creative and hot to cut the edge while the creativity needs a direction, just like a young horse needs strong and tight rains held by an experienced rider.
Bridge and Snake
I would say I have a certain level of passion and creativity. My level of creativity is called survival creativity (I named it). It’s no epoch making, but it can grow a tiny idea up to have a reasonable shape. Being a survival creator is not by talent or ability, but by determination and choice. It’s a belief, I would say. In front of any problems, I tell myself – unconsciously and blindly – that I am the only one who can come up with the world best idea ever. I find it like going fishing. You can’t see fish under the black water in the sea, yet you never think that you won’t catch the biggest fish. You just wait for it to come closer and closer.
At work I’ve trained myself this way, naturally, to some extent. But I certainly don’t have a cool producer in my head. So sometimes – or maybe often – I lose my track and run and run and run to nowhere like a stupid horse thrown a snake. Luckily I have a few cool people around me who tell me “Just stop, calm down, sit here and think” now and then. Everytime such things happen, they would say “Why don’t you change already?” and I question myself if I have an ability to actually be grown up. Being grown-up is one of the most difficult challenges in the human history (isn’t it?).
Big snail appeared in the rain. Going slowly.
The best practice for self-management is to have imaginary but actual grown-up people in your head. Like your bosses, father, favorite novelists, a guru, or whatever people who you admire you keep in your mind, and imagine what they would say. In front of my new proposal, I imagine my boss or senior say “Is this only what you could come up? Did you really think through?” If I’m almost heated up, they might say “Slowly count to 10 and then speak.” My mother might say “Why did you not plan it well?” when I am messed up. These voices gradually turn to be my own voice eventually, that’s what I hope.
Life itself is unmanageable. I’ve thrown my responsibility to manage my own life and just decided to let it be. I passionately live for a moment, if I try to sound cool. Carpe diem, seize the day. But my work and my work attitude is one of small things in my life that is manageable and that can grow me up and change to the next level. It’s not easy, but possible. Yes, it is.
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