Good grades, good opportunities

When I was a kid, happiness was a number. If I did my math right, and conveniently ignored whether there was an actual kid who wanted to count his candies rather than just ate them all before his siblings knew, I would get a 10. I knew mom would give me 500 VND for that. If I got lucky and didn't misspell my writing, I would get another 10.

With 1000 VND, I could buy a new pencil and do ever more math, and perhaps the guys in Harvard would notice me. Or screw math, I could buy ice-cream and be the happiest boy on earth. The neighbor kid, Linh, couldn't be as happy as I was, she always got 9s.

src: yelp.com

But people seemed to have trouble with my happiness. School was hell for a 6 year-old. Right when I knew how to count, they wanted me to add and subtract. By the time I knew that if I had 8 candies and gave to Linh 3, I would have only 5 left (why would I want to do that!), they had already had multiplication, division and fraction in mind. As if giving 3 candies to Linh wasn't bad enough, was I supposed to share half a candy with her?

src: glasbergen.com

One goal after another and I found myself procrastinating throughout my adolescent, not in the sense that I delayed the assignment till morning of the submission day like you did last semester, but in the sense that I chose to do the easy and amusing instead of ones that actually mattered. School was hell, yeah, but it was also easy. School is designed so that as long as you follow instructions, do what you are told, and spend less time making duck face on Facebook, you would get a decent grade. What is hard is to know what you want in this life, and how to achieve it (unless your lifetime wish was to follow instructions, in which case you can make life better by being a police). It is ridiculously hard. It is hard because people would teach you the pythagorean theorem but wouldn't teach you how to listen to your heart. And it is ridiculous because it is weird to think of a system in which you have to ask for permission to go to toilet as the one that would empower you to do whatever the heck you want to in your life.

I did what I was told and was promised that I would be successful. Finish course CS404, which is a prerequisite for CS503. Get 80% of this assignment for HD. Go intern at that company, they do agile, which is hot. Those are clear, obvious instructions.

"If all your friends jumped off a bridge then would you too?" is the most stupid mocking question for people in their early 20s. Because when you are 20-something, there is no actual cliff with a warning sign "Do not jump unless you are Chuck Norris", and peer pressure is real. When everyone you know is either doing something, or telling you to do something, it requires enormous will power to do otherwise.

By the time I graduated, I didn't know how to do tax or why should I pay tax. Nor did I know how to fix my bike. Heck I didn't even know that when I asked a girl out, I was supposed to plan the whole day instead of saying "wherever, I am easy going". Which, boys, was totally acceptable for a girl to say. Double standard! But I knew how to make something as simple as a spreadsheet sound complicated and called it by a jargon, database. And people paid me a shit load of money, which was nice.

In fact, people paid me too much that I could buy more ice-cream than I would ever be able to consume. And that wasn't the ultimate happiness the 6-year-old me thought. Even though having a bigger ice-cream cone than the kid next to me is still pretty badass.

At times, I think I have this hole in my chest that I need to fill. As time gone by, I learned that competing who has a bigger ice-cream cone with a kid is evil, his mom told me so. I had some experience asking girls out. And I also started to hate people who call everything with columns and rows a database. Excuse me, that is my privilege!

I don't think spending a whole lot of time with books, paper and pencils is a bad idea at all. I have had more enjoyable time with my own thoughts that with numerous people. But if it is not your thing, don't bother. If you have been in a Work Place Preparation course, someone should have told you about the classic question "Where do you want to be in the next 5 years?". To be frank, it is impossible to see where the path you are going will take you. But you can always choose the medium to get there, be it bicycle, airplane or bare feet. Study hard and get good grades is just one among many things you can do in your life. And by focusing too much on a part, you miss the whole spectrum of possibilities and opportunities. Do you know how sad it is for a puppy to look at a rainbow?

P/s: in case you are wondering what does a dog have anything to do with rainbow, dogs are sorta color blind, they can't see as many colors as we can. Dogs' rainbow looks like this.

And we, too, are sorta colorblind, compared to mantis shrimp. Everything is perspective. Or perspective is everything. I don't know.

============================

Hồi nhỏ đi học, hạnh phúc là một con số. Nếu như tôi làm toán đúng, và không hỏi ngược làm sao lại có đứa dở hơi ngồi đếm kẹo mà không ăn hết đi cho rồi, tôi sẽ được một con 10. Má sẽ cho tôi 500 đồng. Hôm nào tôi hên, viết đúng chính tả, tôi lại được một con 10 nữa.

Có một ngàn, tôi sẽ mua được cây bút chì mới, làm thêm nhiều bài toán nữa, và những người ở viện đại học sẽ chú ý đến tôi. Nhưng mà kệ mẹ viện đại học, tôi mua kem và vui hết chỗ nói. Con Linh hàng xóm không thể nào hạnh phúc hơn tôi được, nó toàn được 9 điểm.

src: twimg.com

Nhưng mà mấy người ở trường hình như không có dễ hạnh phúc như tôi. Ngay khi tôi biết đếm, người ta muốn tôi làm tính cộng với trừ. Lúc mà tôi biết là nếu tôi có 8 cây kẹo và cho con Linh 3 cái, tôi sẽ có 5 cây kẹo (sao tôi lại phải chia kẹo với nó?), thì người ta đã nghĩ đến phép nhân, chia, và phân số rồi. Làm như đưa kẹo cho con Linh chưa đủ thảm, tôi còn phải chia với nó nửa viên kẹo chắc?

Hết phép tính rồi đến đạo hàm, tôi chạy theo mấy con số hoài và chần chừ cả thời thiếu niên. Không phải chần chừ kiểu ngâm tiểu luận đến tận ngày chót như mấy ba vừa làm học kỳ trước đâu. Nhưng mà tôi cứ làm hoài mấy thứ dễ, mà bỏ bê những thứ quan trọng. Trường học thiệt gò bó, nhưng mà dễ òm. Trong trường, miễn là bạn học theo sách, làm những bài tập người ta bảo bạn làm, và bớt chu mỏ trên Facebook lại, thì bạn có được con điểm đàng hoàng. Nhưng mà biết bạn muốn gì trong cuộc sống, và làm gì để đạt được, thì khó kinh khủng luôn (trừ khi bạn tính nói với tôi khao khát cuộc đời bạn là sống theo một cuốn sách, trong trường hợp đó, bạn có thể cân nhắc làm công an). Nó khó tại vì người ta dạy bạn định lý Pythagore chứ hông có dạy bạn lắng nghe ruột gan mình. Và thiệt là kinh khủng khi cái nơi mà bạn muốn đi vệ sinh cũng phải xin phép lại được quảng bá là nơi chấp cánh cho mọi ước mơ điên khùng.

src: primaryeflresources

Nên là hồi đó tôi cứ làm theo lời người ta bảo, và được hứa là tôi sẽ thành công. Học xong khoá CS404, rồi lên CS503. Làm xong 80% tiểu luận để được điểm tốt. Đi thực tập ở công ty nọ, tụi nó làm agile, đang hot. Đó là những định hướng rõ ràng.

"Nếu mấy đứa bạn mày nhảy cầu, mày có nhảy không?" là câu hỏi vừa móc họng, vừa ngu si nhất trần đời. Vì mấy khi trong đời này, bạn thấy cây cầu nào có bảng "Cấm nhảy, trừ Chuck Norris"? Và áp lực xã hội thì mạnh hơn cả trọng lực. Khi mà mọi người xung quanh b, hoặc thì cắm đầu làm, hoặc thì bảo bạn cắm đầu đi, phải cứng lắm mới nghĩ khác đi được.

Đến hồi tôi tốt nghiệp, tôi không biết tại sao tôi phải đóng thuế, và đóng làm sao. Tôi cũng không biết sửa xe máy. Má, tôi còn không biết là khi rủ con gái đi chơi, câu "Đi đâu cũng được" là không chấp nhận được (nhưng mà lũ con gái thì nói câu đó thì bình thường, WTF). Nhưng mà tôi biết làm những thứ đơn giản như cái file excel nghe hoành tráng và phức tạp, gán cho nó cái tên bác học "database". Và người ta trả tôi cả đống tiền để làm mọi thứ tôi đụng vào nghe phức tạp.


 (Unrelated, but, everyone, me everyday)

Mà thực ra là, người ta đưa tôi nhiều tiền quá, đủ để mua kem cả đời ăn không hết. Nhưng hoá ra ăn nhiều kem vậy không hạnh phúc như hồi 6 tuổi tôi tưởng. Dù thì rằng ăn cây kem bự hơn thằng nhỏ đứng bên cạnh vẫn ngầu lắm.

Khi không có gì chơi, tôi thường tưởng tượng cuộc đời tôi đầy những lỗ hổng cần phải được chắp vá. Lớn dần, tôi học được là so đo cây kem của mình với con nít là xấu xa. Má thằng nhỏ bảo tôi vậy. Tôi biết nói chuyện với mấy đứa con gái hơn một tẹo. Tôi cũng bắt đầu ghét mấy người cứ đụng vô cái gì có hàng có cột là kêu database. Xin lỗi, mình anh có quyền đó thôi.

Tôi không nghĩ cắm đầu vô sách vở với bút chì là mọt sách. Nói thiệt, nói chuyện với mấy cái giọng trong đầu tôi vui hơn gặp mặt ối người. Nhưng mà nếu tôi có con, và nó ghét sách như ba nó ghét hột vịt lộn, thì cũng bình thường. Nếu bạn đi phỏng vấn, hay chuẩn bị đi phỏng vấn, chắc có người đã hỏi bạn câu thần thánh "5 năm nữa em muốn mình như thế nào?". Thì lật bàn đi về luôn cho rồi. Nói thiệt, chả có cách nào biết được 5 năm nữa bạn ra cái giống gì đâu. Nhưng mà bạn được quyền chọn phương tiện để dùng trong 5 năm đó, xe đạp, máy bay, hay chân đất cũng được. Chọn thứ bạn thích ấy. Ngồi học và kiếm điểm chỉ là một trong vô vàn thứ bạn có thể làm trong mấy mươi năm. Tập trung quá vào một việc là bỏ qua nhiều khả năng và cơ hội khác. Giống như mù màu nhìn vào cầu vồng.

P/s: Có rất ít người mù màu hoàn toàn, phần lớn họ chỉ không nhìn thấy được nhiều màu sắc như mắt bình thường. Và mắt của con người nói chung cũng là hơi hơi mù màu, khi so sánh với con tôm tích. Mọi thứ đều tương đối.

src: southernfriedscience.com

Legitimacy in management

"I am surrounded by idiots" is the secret more young managers keep than they want to admit.

http://www.quickmeme.com/

The typical promotion path of these middle level managers started as being high achievers. Early in their careers, they put in the time, effort and study to thrive. Gradually they become really good at a certain kind of job, be it developing, testing, or designing, and possess a specific set of skills that make them valuable. Upper management shows it appreciation by giving them raises and putting them in a management position. It is in this new position where the very skills and knowledge which made them successful in the last position that make they feel everyone under them is stupid, ignorant, and doesn't give a crap.

From that turning point, managers start to feel alone in their new role. Everywhere they look, they see people who tried to hold them back, gave up in their careers, and certainly can't understand how their success feels. They start to believe it is human nature and internal drives that led to the difference between them and others. As a young principal architect, speaking for countless of other fellow high achievers, put "I learned that developers are developers for a reason. They don't work hard enough, or aren't bright enough, to be architects".

http://www.theamazingpics.com/

That saying contains an assumption in it though. It roots from the belief that as an adult, the decision to work hard to get promotion is a purely rational calculation of efforts and benefits. It isn't supposed to be personal. But that is exactly where it goes wrong. Many researches have proven that we human are not as rational as we thought we were. These viewpoints range from that for rudimentary cognitive task, the increment of reward leads to poorer performance, to that happiness fuels success, not the other way around. I believe that getting professionals to actively engage in a project also has a lot to do with how people in management communicate their values, how they behave and whether a proper principle is there to keep words and actions aligned.

The principle is called “the principle of legitimacy". The idea dated back to 1814 and was used in Malcolm Gladwell's book "David & Goliath" to explain the role of lawmakers. Legitimacy is based on three things

• People have to feel like they have a voice, that if they speak up, they will be heard
• The law has to be predictable. There has to be a reasonable expectation that the rules tomorrow are going to be roughly the same as the rules today.
• The authority has to be fair. It can't treat one group differently from another.

#1 implies that employees' opinion must be valuable to management. Usually the foundation of this mutual respect is that within their specific domain, the employees possess a unique set of skills and that make their opinions particularly insightful to those who need it. Though, that rarely happens in this part of third world countries. In Vietnam, employers tend to come to developers because they are cheaper than Indian and have arguably better code of ethics than some of our neighbors. If they want to listen to someone they would come to IDEO already.

#2 states the expected behavior of the employees, as well as the words and actions of management need to be consistent. The equivalent of the law in software development is probably the specs. And among us tech people, it is a mutual understanding that the specs is never complete. For certain parts of the system, an engineer has to make assumption to keep the project move on. If he gets it right, he wouldn't get any praise because people expect it as a part of his job. If he gets it wrong, oh well, he would be blamed as having no common sense. He is said to be a bad seed and has to be let go, even though Urban Dictionary has its best 

Common sense (n): A mythical force that is supposed to bestow knowledge of the obvious. Unfortunately, humankind has proven, time and time again, that there is no such thing as common sense - Urban Dictionary

And by letting go of such "bad seed" rather than improving the specs or creating the buffer to allow certain variants of the specs, what is the message the management is sending to the remainers? That it is building a team of talented, engaging and agreeable fellows? Or that there is no place for people thinking differently from it and therefore everyone has to be in the fear that one day they would get its idea wrong and be let go?

It is debatable whether firing the bad seeds would lead to a better environment, or unless the environment changes, the effectiveness would redistribute itself and new bad seeds emerge. It is much less debatable that when the specs is not based on concrete written rules, but human whim, the predictability the specs needs is lost.

#3 depicts an ideal organization where the product is the heart of the organization and is the result of fine collaboration between various department. But in reality, depends on the organization originality, fields of expertise and office politics, there would be one group that takes the lead on product timeline and puts constraints on other teams. The management loves this team, the adult version of teacher's pet. But for the rest who have to burn midnight oil for unrealistic deadlines and whose ideas are not appreciated properly even though at the end of the day, it is them who do the hard work, everything doesn't sound fair.

It is human nature to wish to do a good job, given what they are doing, and their capabilities, skills and knowledge. But when employees look around and almost everyone would know someone else who got burned because they had a strong and vivid idea how a system would be built and unfortunately that wasn't in favor of the management. If that many people in your social graph had been pressed by management, does the system seem to be fair anymore? Does it seem predictable? Does it seem like you can speak up and be heard? And if management is seen as the enemy, how on earth would it expect people to change their ways?

Game of Politics

Office politics. As old as mankind. Taboo of modern workplace.

No matter how people avoid speaking of office politics, it remains one of the most popular reason driving people out of the organization they once loved. Those who state their organization is office-politics-free either still have the political forces on their side, or are ignorant.

src http://architechsolutions.com

So can you explain office politics for a five-year-old?

Workplace politics is the use power and social networking within an organization to achieve changes that benefit the organization or individuals within it. Influence by individuals may serve personal interests without regard to their effect on the organization itself. - Wikipedia

Okay, that is confusing. When you think of office politics, you are probably thinking about something more colorful, and sometimes, darker. Like

• When people are against you and you believe a certain colleague is the culprit behind all your miseries
• When the idiot in the next cubicle keeps getting promoted and is getting his own office now, with a door. While the hard-working you have stuck at the same place for a really long time.
• When a project failed, slings and arrows are fired and you get sick of all these hideous people that care for nothing but their own welfare

Yep, they are all credited as office politics. Any drama in an organization is.

But that is still confusing as heck. You can feel office politics in those stories, but can you articulate it? And when people don't understand something, they either fear it, or avoid it, or both. Sounds like a good reason why workplace politics became a taboo in modern society.

Office politics is a big game of monopoly

In the game of monopoly, the single governing factor is capital. In the game of office politics it is the flows of information. This applies to both formal and informal flows. What makes the difference between you, your boss and the CEO is not knowledge, skills or experience, everyone knows something better than others, but that the corporate is structured such that people higher in the organizational pyramid receive more information and lower people receive less. Same goes for gossip groups. These groups are abundant sources of informal information, and when an organization is poorly structured, or manipulated, the information doesn't get to management level and managers fail to understand the dynamics of their teams.

In monopoly, the means to acquire more capital is to own as many strategic properties as possible. In office politics, it is to put you into positions with greatest access to the flow of information. It can be as formal as climbing up in the career ladder, or as informal as holding an internal seminar for knowledge sharing, mentoring a neighbour team, or joining a sport club.

http://dailyps.com/

As in any monopoly game, you don't really have the option to opt out in the game of politics, in the same way a monopoly player has to keep rolling the dice even though she is surrounded by others' properties. The earlier you accept this, the earlier you have a proper understanding about office politics. That you choose to deny the existence of office politics and its power doesn't mean the political dynamics are not going on. It is not necessarily a bad thing and has to be avoided at all cost, like a monopoly never means to destroy your friendships even if you lose a game or two.

Office politics is all about relationship

People are affected by emotion for more than logic and reason. Which means that when we like someone, we more likely enjoy working with them and willing to do a favor. Remember that even an asshole doesn't want to work with an asshole.

That is neither right or wrong, it's just we being human.

By actively choose to engage in it, the game of office politics allows you to control your code of ethic, manage up, and build better relationship with colleagues.

What you do not know hurts you more than what you know.

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Tại vì không biết dịch `office politics` sao cho hay nên để vậy. Cao nhân bốn phương xin chỉ giáo.

Office politics. Lâu như lịch sử con người, huý kị nơi văn phòng.

Chúng ta có thê quặn bụng, nhăn mặt, hay làm ngơ khi nói đến office politics, nhưng quan điểm cá nhân không thay được sự thật đây là nguyên nhân hàng đầu làm đổ vỡ cuộc hôn nhân doanh nghiệp - nhân viên. Ai bảo là nơi mình làm không có office politics thì hoặc là chưa bị chọt, hoặc là không biết gì.

src http://www.business-digest.eu

Bạn giải thích office politics cho bé đi mẫu giáo được không?

Office politics là sử dụng quyền lực và quan hệ trong một tổ chức để đạt được những thay đổi có lợi cho tổ chức hay cá nhân. Những ảnh hưởng cá nhân có thể nhầm tư lợi thay vì mang đến lợi ích tập thể. - Wikipedia

Là một định nghĩ hàn lâm, và tối nghĩa từ Wikipedia. Khi bạn nghĩ đến office politics, có lẽ bạn nghĩ đến những câu chuyện màu sắc hơn, và có thể, đen tối hơn. Kiểu

• Khi mọi người không ai theo ý mình mà mình tia là con bánh bèo kia là chủ mưu
• Khi thằng dở hơi bàn bên được thăng chức và giờ có luôn văn phòng riêng, có cửa với cái núm gỗ gụ sướng mê người, mà mình nhân-viên-chăm-chỉ thì cứ chết rú ở đây
• Khi dự án banh chành và những con người xấu xí này cứ đổ lỗi qua lại làm mình muốn bệnh

Ừ đều là office politics đó. Mà mình gọi bất kỳ chuyện om sòm nào trong văn phòng là office politics cũng được.

Nhưng vẫn lùng bùng đúng không? Mình có thể cảm thấy office politics trong những câu chuyện xung quanh nhưng mà tìm ta một định nghĩa sờ nắn được thì thiệt là khó. Mà cái gì chúng ta không hiểu, hoặc ta sợ, hoặc ta ngại, nhiều khi cả hai. Bởi vậy office politics mới thành ra huý như giờ.

Office politics là một ván cờ tỉ phú

Trong cờ tỉ phú, năng lượng vận hành trò chơi là dòng tiền. Trong trò chơi office politics, dòng tiền là dòng thông tin. Những dòng thông tin này bao gồm tin chính quy và tin ngoài luồng. Điểm khác nhau giữa mình, sếp, và CEO không phải là kinh nghiệm hay kỹ năng, mỗi người điều biết một thứ tốt hơn người khác, mà là tổ chức được cấu thành theo cách những người ở vị trí càng cao, càng nhận được nhiều thông tin, và những người ở thấp thì ít hơn. Mấy nhóm bà tám buôn dưa lê cũng vậy. Mấy nhóm này thừa mứa thông tin chợ trời, trong một tổ chức yếu, hay bị thao túng, thông tin này không đến được phía trên và bậc quản lý ngày càng xa cách.

Chơi cờ tỉ phú, muốn có thêm tiền thì phải mua những miếng đất tốt. Trong trò chơi office politics, những miếng đất tốt là những vị trí tiếp cận được với các luồng thông tin. Có thể chính thống như leo lên mức thang nghề nghiệp cao hơn. Có thể cà chớn như vô team đá banh :)

src http://static.deathandtaxesmag.com/

Trong cả hai trò chơi này, mình không có lựa chọn đứng im không làm gì hết, mình vẫn phải thả xúc xắc dù nguyên con đường đằng trước mấy đứa bạn tốt xây khách sạn hết rồi, vô là chém luôn. Càng chấp nhận sớm điều này, càng sớm hiểu đúng về office politics. Mình làm ngơ với game show văn phòng không có nghĩa nó không diễn ra. Và office politics tự nó không xấu, cũng như cờ tỉ phú chưa bao giờ được tạo ra để mấy đứa bạn bo xì nhau dù có thua nợ đầm đìa.

Office politics chính là cách đối nhân xử thế

Chúng ta bị ảnh hưởng bởi cảm xúc nhiều hơn lý trí. Nghĩa là khi mình mến một bạn, mình thích làm việc với bạn đó hơn, và không ngại giúp đỡ người ta ít nhiều. Nên nhớ là cả thằng dở hơi cũng không muốn làm việc chung với một thằng dở hơi khác.

Và điều này chẳng sai hay đúng, vì mình là con người, vậy đó.

Chấp nhận office politics là một trò chơi, và chơi giỏi, giúp mình "giữ cái thiên lương" và xây dựng những quan hệ tốt trên cả công việc.

Những gì mình không biết thì làm mình đau hơn những thứ mình biết.

The transforming 2014

Without any planning or intention, 2014 was surprisingly big to me. It is not 2008 (when I graduated from high school), it is not 2012 (when the world supposed to end), 2014 is the biggest transition in my life, when many doors were closed, and other turned open. No photo or video could have captured my experience over the last year, but lucky enough, I have words. My wish when writing down these lines is that a few years from now, I can look back and say, "oh boy, there was a time like that".

1. Look. 

I went from this

to this

Oh its just the hair style, no biggie? I had had that hair side parting with me for as long as I can possibly remember. For 24 years, that had been how my hair looked. The idea of changing the hairstyle never came to me, even during those rebellious high school years when I got to know that weed wasn't grass. When I was a kid, a cousin told me that my head was not round and looked kinda ugly. I wasn't too fond of the idea of showing that weird-looking head to everyone.

But as some point, life was so depressing, and I got tired of that same look  in the mirror every day. And it was just the hair, I had my head shaved once when I was 10 (that was how my cousin commented on my head shape), "how worse can this be?", I told myself. Fuck that.

Though I still miss the thick layer of hair covering my neck and ears during winter, I also enjoy rubbing my head really hard, all the breezes running through it every night I ride bicycle home, and the fact that I wouldn't ever need a comb again. More importantly, I learned that restricting myself from something someone said randomly in the past is really stupid.

2. I left the company I founded.

Okay, strictly speaking, I did not found the company. I was employee number zero in Vietnam, and I was fortunate enough to get a bunch of friends, who are all smarter than me, to believe in "building a fun place to work", and together we tried. I spent 3 years at the company. The first 6 months I lived in a tiny little apartment office in Taipei, Taiwan which was right opposite of the National University of Taiwan and had a spectacular view over Taipei 101, the city's most prominent landmark. The next one year I continued to live from another apartment which was 5 minutes away from RMIT where I frequently passed by to give customized pitches to people I would love to work with.

During this period of time, the press painted a rosy picture about my career. But just among us colleagues, we all knew the reality was far less compelling. Why it happened the way it did has been a repeating topic among us, both current and ex-colleagues. But we could all agree that I was a horrible person. As a manager, I horrified my subordinates with my temper. As a colleague, I was far from a source of inspiration, I was the source of depression. And as a friend, I was an asshole. Lets not get into that.

At some point, people had it enough, and they made clear that the picture of "a fun place to work" couldn't be painted with me in it. It has been more than a year since, and I still haven't figured out how did I stray off my path so far, and so wrong. I was blindfolded and didn't know what to do, and yet was given too much authority. I am grateful that my colleagues showed me a way out. But I also came to learn that friendship isn't something you can screw and expect it to heal, at the cost of an arm and a leg.

3. I learned to cook.

My mom is over 50 now. She doesn't know the difference between Skype and Facebook. Actually she doesn't know how to shut down a computer other than pressing the power button for a really long time. And she thinks most of the things I do are stupid. And like all moms on earth, she is a great mom. My father is a man of work. As a professor, he seems to be very good at doing research and guiding his students on their thesis. But you leave him alone in the house, he would be starving. Mom has been looking over him and then our brothers ever since their marriage, and I can see she would continue to do so for many more years. I grew up to be a clone of my father, utterly useless at house chords.

But soon after I gave up hoping there would be another woman cooking for me, I'd better come up with a plan to survive the rest of my life. I had denied that I did not suck at house chords, just that I was so busy. Well, being unemployed, time was one of a very few assets I then had abundantly. Being a bookworm, I got started in this kitchen business in the most reasonable way I could possibly imagine: bought a book and read the shit out of it!

Now three books, a few cuts in fingers and many months later, I have to say that I am a terrific cook with excellent outcome 80% of the time. The other 20% conveniently "coincidently" all happened during the time mom came to visit me, with the peak being the kimchi soup that too sour for human to taste. She has been teasing me endlessly for being useless and inferior to her. But that was one more topics for family dinner, I really don't mind.

My signature disk, tía má con mực, though I love adding some beans and call it đậu má con mực

4. I got back to bicycle.

One day, I came into the Martin shop on Võ Thị Sáu street and proudly requested the shopkeeper "Can I have your cheapest bicycle please?" And that how I got my super average jade bicycle. She isn't a trendy fixie, nor is she the kind of bicycle you can travel along the country with confidence. But she is the one you can see every morning going to school with kids, or going to daily market with housewives. And that was 3 years ago.

Back when I first got her, turned out riding bicycle right after a big meal was not a very good idea. But once I learned how to cook, and honestly, was unemployed, I had certain control over my daily routine and riding bicycle just made sense again. And hey, it is environmental friendly, you dinosaur-fossil-burners! 

"Are you doing this for exercise?" was the most common reaction I got when people knew I was using a bicycle for 90% of my travel in this mega city . Well actually it was not. I simply felt good, really good, whenever I rode a bicycle. It somehow inarticulately reminded me the time I was in high school. High school time was carefree, no stress, no KPI. And for a while, I used to ride my high school sweetheart home every day on a borrowed bike. Pedalling around the city must have awaken the pavloved animal in me.

I also enjoyed the slow pace a mediocre bike had to offer. Ever since after high school, thing had moved too fast for me. RMIT. Assignments. Exams. MultiNC. MultiUni. ITClub. Internship. Cogini. I realized I didn't really have time to look back and retrospect what had happened and how I had responded. Every day the trip coming back home was the new precious break I needed to get back to the balance I had long lost.

And in a city like Saigon, everything happened on the streets. A random foreigner lost her bike ticket and had trouble explaining it with body language. An auntie fell off her bike due to a street accident. A high school girl in her áo dài almost busted to tear when the chain of her bicycle misaligned with the gear. Riding a bicycle meant I always travelled at the speed I could comfortably stop to help these people and had no worries leaving my dear bike on the side of a street. It might add a couple of minutes to my schedule, but made somebody's day, such a bargain.

5. I learned to love Dalat again.

When I was 18 and left home for college, I had this weird feeling that the place I had spent my entire life would all of sudden become a place I would stop by a couple of weeks every year. That empty feeling gradually turned into the reluctance of going back home, because what was the point if I soon would have to say goodbye again?

By the time I graduated, my whole family got into a hideous fight over the only piece of land my grandparents owned, the piece of land I spent my childhood wondering around, with a running nose. I hated seeing people who were so close to me turning against each other. I hated how lonely it was every Tet ever since then. And I hated Dalat for reminding me of all the good memory. And that was back to 2011 and I thought to myself, getting back to Dalat once a year was more than enough.

But as time gone by, and I had to travel more often for work, I spent more time, usually on bus or airplane, thinking about home, as a real physical place, instead of that definition of home vs house I learned in high school. If there is a place I have to spend the rest of my life living there, it aint gonna be Taipei, Condao, or Hoian. It gotta be the place where every breath is full of cold air filling my lungs, where sunlight is scorching and shade is freezing, where morning dew cracks my lips like a dry field. As long as I can still enjoy those, there is one and only home for me. And it is really ridiculous to hate your only home.

And then there were guys like this https://www.facebook.com/dalattraveler and this https://www.facebook.com/hunter.dl.1 who took fucking mesmerzing photos about Dalat and by doing so, remind me every day how beautiful she is. They gave me the motivation to explore a new Dalat that I have never seen before. And like that, I am in love with her again.

6. I standed up where I fell.

I believe it must be a struck of luck that got me the current job. When I left the company I founded, I went through six months of unemployment. The time was precious to me. I got time to think about what I really wanted to do in my life, what I was better than others, and how my skills aligned with my goals. During this period, the internal healing process took place. I came to understand there are many other important things in life other than work. I realized that the easiest way to be hated is to try doing things that I am bad at. And then that I was burden-free, I could focus on learning rather than earning again.

But on the other hand, I also felt that the life without a schedule, a team, and a goal was rotting my mind and body. At the end of six months, I started to find a job. I understood that even though the healing was happening, something was wrong with me fundamentally. I wanted to find an entry level work that I could spend less time worrying about the daily work and had more time to observe a team dynamic and learn leadership from the ground up. To my surprise, I went on a whole month without getting a single interview. I was freak out, I thought that what had been wrong with me, was then obvious to others in the industry and no one would want me again. Out of depression that my professional value was below zero, I applied for management level vacancies. Within a week, I got 4 offers. I picked a Singaporean company that wanted to build its development team in Vietnam for 03 reasons. (1) The company was the one that hustled the most to get me. (2) I got to do my own product for the first time. and (3) building a sustainable team was where I fell and I wanted to stand up from that.

I proceeded to build a team, with the constant fear that I would fuck everything up again. I ran the team with XP, believing that a good team is a self-organizing team, and my job was nothing but to empower them. The team got its first milestone, rebuild the system from scratch in 6 weeks. During that period, we also managed to send our designer, Minh, to Singapore for a conference without slowing down. We ran our first Product Design Sprint, under the lead of Minh, and got tons of good ideas what we wanted to do with our product. We received investment, moved to a new office and continued working our asses off to meet the expectations from investors.

People still come and go. Once in a while I still got reject from a applicant because what I did (and didn't do) in the last job. But the most important achievement I got from this is that, once again, I can make new friends, like, really close friends. It means tremendously to me when the guys asked me out for lunch/dinner, let me know troubles they had in their lives, and even sought for advices from me. I am glad that I wasn't as broken as I thought. Or I was actually broken, but time and friendship fixed me.

People seem to love what I have been doing. I was asked to mentor a team to run Scrum. I was also asked to build an even bigger and more demanding team in Singapore, which has been giving me butterflies in my stomach recently. And we are planning to bring the team members to the next level, sticking to the one and only promise I made when they chose to believe in me: giving them the platform and support they need to  "punch above their weight class". As a former office dictator, I couldn't ask for more. Thank you, guys!

7. I led the organization of Barcamp Saigon for the first time.

Organizing Barcamp Saigon 2014 was probably the most stressful experience I have had since 2012. Coordinating different parties for a 1000-participant event was an incredible amount of work, especially when I could only spend a few hours a week on it. A month before the event day, my full-time job became part-time and Barcamp became my full-time obsession. I really appreciated the support I received from my company and colleagues. Without them, I wouldn't have been able to devote my time to Barcamp as much as I did.

There were multiple times when things were FUBAR (oh man I love this acronym) and for more than one time we talked about an exit hoping that it would save us from all the miseries. But this brutal experience also taught me the importance of not losing hope even in the darkest hours. And the rest is history now :)

Volunteer work like Barcamp also made me rethink a belief I had built up since college. Remember that in every group assignment there would be a free loader and you, trying to get a good grade, had to cover his ass and called him assholes multiple times a day? I thought that once I graduate and work with serious people it would be better. But guess what, it is just wrong. Actually most of the time there is no such person as a free loader. Just that everyone has a different set of goals and values in life, and at the end of the day, commitment is more of a moral question than a radical one. I learned that I am responsible to fulfill my expectation and the good news is that as long as I do a good work on my own, respect other people and let them feel confident in what they choose to do, the team will jell and miracle happens

.It is also another personal achievement that despite all the stress, I didn't get nuts and lose any friends, which would have been very likely to happen if it has been a year ago, with my notorious temper. I pat myself on the back for that.

I also got a chance to go to Barcamp Danang and was blown away by what these people at their 19, 20 have done. Freedom of speech might be still limited in Vietnam, but Barcamp is definitely going strong.

8. I came to accept my life would never be back to what it used to be again.

Few years ago, I met a woman who changed my life. The story, among many others of my life, didn't have a happy ending.

When I was a kid, a friend told me that to love someone is like to save a file to a hard drive, you can't really delete it until you save a new one on top of it. But the last two years taught me that true love sticks with you, changes you and continues to change you as the years go by.

I still remember the overwhelming emotions when I saw her, the incredible excitement when I wandered downtown with her, and the moment my heart stopped when we kissed. I continue to revisit all those memories from time to time... But what I remember the most is the empty, helpless, and unbearable feeling the day she gone.

The pain wasn't all at once. It took time to form, to grow, and to, in turn, alter my life. In contrast to my belief that as time gone by, I would forget her and get back to the old me, I'm awed to realize that the life I am living today has had her embedded in its framework. I came to accept that history will stay, and I'd better cope with that.

The new life shows me that I need to work on and improve on before I'm ready to be a part of a loving and committed relationship. And hence all the points above.

Although it has been taking a really long time now, I hope to once again find love and that pain will hopefully turn into fond memories I can revisit with a smile and sense of nostalgia.

So....

Having all these said, by no means I am a completely different, flawless, prince charming now. I am still skinny as heck and my effort to put on some weight hasn't got any return yet. There are many broken relationships since the old time that I don't know how to fix. I still have a long way to go with anger management. There are a whole lot of technologies/practices I would love to bring to my team. And to do that, I need to be better at time management and delegation. I am still struggling to write 01 blog post a month, and I have been telling myself that I need to spend more time to read and meditating and less time on social network, but the fact that I am writing this note on Facebook is pretty much self-describing :)

So, in all possible ways, I am still trying very hard everyday to be an okay person.

I don't have the habit of making new year resolution, nor do I plan to have one this year. 2014 was a surprising turn of event, and I am looking at 2015 with the same eagerness!

Happy New Year!

The mesmerizing Barcamp Danang 2015

Last weekend I had a chance to join Barcamp Danang 2015. On the days before the event, a couple of incidents happened, including a major server crash and a winter cold, that made me think really hard on whether I should travel half the country or not. I am glad I made it, because Barcamp Danang was absolutely fucking mesmerizing.

That was the first Barcamp ever for Danang, and it was held by a team of organizers and volunteers whose average age was 20 and never experienced a Barcamp first-hand before. I had been enjoying being the youngest person in the room for quite a while, then all of sudden, I was older than everyone. And that awed me. When I was 20, I was probably sitting in some random corner playing game and these guys had already organized the first, and therefore biggest (can't beat that), Barcamp in Central Vietnam.

Barcamp Danang was organized at Duy Tan University, which I found some similarities with Hoa Sen University where Barcamp Saigon was held last December. Both are private universities with urban campus and a paranoid of freedom of speech.

The event started at 8AM with the opening session. I was invited to be the MC of the session, like, of all the people on earth, me - an introvert that has a tiny panic whenever talking to a stranger? Unlike the opening of Barcamp Saigon, which was simply a recap of what Barcamp is and what to expect on the event day, the one in Danang had three small speeches from distinguished guests, so pretty much like a standard conference. The speeches left little time to convey the Barcamp spirit. I find that a pity. Minh Do, organized Barcamp Saigon for 5 years, once told me that the most important thing about opening session is not the information, people will always ask questions about the thing covered in opening session, it is the spirit. So ideally the opening is the time for ice breaker and audience participation so that they are set into the right mood for moving around, meeting new people and exchanging ideas. I made a mental note to myself that the meaning of opening session should be better communicated next time.

The first Barcamp in Danang attracted 32 speakers, covering 4 main topics: technology, entrepreneurship, education and volunteering. Around 10% of the speakers were foreigners, and aside from Vi Nguyen from Funkoi, I don't think there was another local using English in their presentation. The organizers was worried there wouldn't be enough speakers as the format of Barcamp was new there, so of these 32, some submitted topics to Barcamp, and some were invited. No matter what, I think they did a pretty good job at bringing diversity to Barcamp topics. I ran into all sort of speakers, from motivational speaker who had the room repeat "I believe in my own success" to students holding a fireside chat about their volunteer project. For people who experienced Barcamp the first time, I have to say they (the speakers) were really creative on methods of delivering their content.

Most of participants were students. General speaking, students are great, they are young, energized and willing to learn. But in an event whose focus is the interaction between participants like Barcamp, an average student is lack of the depth of thought and experience to really engage in a presentation or conversation.

At lunch break, Tam, an organizer, managed to invite an indie band known as Du Ca Danang to come. The band absolutely blew my mind with their talent. The little music show was first held at the lobby, but soon attracted way too many people that we had to move them to the school yard cum parking lot where they played even more passionately and the crowd went crazy. I talked to myself "Damn it, I love this! Barcamp Saigon really should have this!".

I have to admit that I had a little worry that people wouldn't come back after lunch break. But it turned out to be ok. 70-80% of the participants came back and the presentation rooms were still crowded. And there is this thing that I have observed in many Barcamp, people usually find the afternoon session more enjoyable. The event was less crowded, and those who stayed were more serious about Barcamp, which translated into more focus and interaction.

To end the day, Alex Cuva helped me running his signature Open Space to give everyone a refresh after a long day. The final activity was feedback from participants. Barcamp organizers always love feedback, it lets us know what we did good, and what we didn't. Feedback time is always a very touching time. From the heartfelt sharing of everyone, I felt like Barcamp Danang scratched the right itch of the local community. There were people who wanted to be exposed to new schools of thought and there were people want to share their ideas and experience so that the rest can stand on the shoulders of giants, and Barcamp Danang, though strictly not 100% a Barcamp, brought all these people together.

I believe Barcamp Danang was a success, everyone seemed to learn so much from the event, be it organizer, volunteer, speaker or participant. The organizer team is planning to have another, bigger, better Barcamp in August 2015. It is hard to know if the event can happen as planned because a Barcamp is the joint effort between many parties and leaps of faith are always needed. But I know for sure that Barcamp Danang will have a special space in my mind for a long long time (in fact, I am still getting Facebook notifications about the event everyday).

Wish the young organizer team of Barcamp Danang best of luck and success on their journey.

PS Of course every Barcamp needs to end with a decent Beercamp. I made sure it happened. What happened in the Beercamp, is another story ;)

Barcamp Saigon video clips

Bacon Over Eggs (part 2)

By far, whomever I told the fable of chicken and pig managed to see themselves as pigs and agreed that eliminating the decision making power from chickens would brighten their work life.

And that is the tricky part of the fable. Most people think they are pigs. While Pareto principle (80/20 principle) implies that most are chickens.

If you want to know within your team, who are pigs and chickens, but can't afford spending 3 months turning your organization up side down, comparing your respectable colleagues to farm animals, then check out this story, told by legend Ken Schwaber, known as Squirrel Burgers.

Once upon a time, Ken worked at Fat Burger. One night he was given the task of closing up alone. About 15 minutes before closing time, a customer came to the window with $1.20 in his pocket and said he wanted a Double Fat Burger ($2.50), Large Fries ($1.25), and a large drink ($1.25).

Ken was the only one there. And he probably didn't have the best day in this life. He noticed a dead squirrel in the parking lot when he came into work. He scraped it up, cooked it, put it on a partially eaten bun from the garbage (inventory control said he couldn't use a fresh one), and gave it to the customer for $1.20.

The customer ended up going into a coma. And the company was sued for millions of dollars.

src: ibtimes.co.uk

In this F&B disaster, who were pigs, who were chickens?

• The customer was a pig because he bet with his own heath. That was a deep commitment.
• Ken was a pig, he was fired from his job
• Fat Burger was also a pig. It lost its business and faced a PR crisis.

And in every organization, the squirrel burger story is a norm. There is always a department affected by a decision made by some other random department. If everyone is committed to their work with their own career and welfare, should not everyone have the right to make decision? And then, with universal suffrage (or worse, bosses are more "equal" because bosses), there gone all the benefits of Chicken-Pig distinction.

But I know, and I believe you know, that not everyone is pig. Ken could always find another job, in fact he went on with software development and became a legend :). Fat Burger could always start its franchise elsewhere, Vietnam for example. Only the customer was The Pig, it was his own life on the line.

The story of squirrel burger points out that everyone tends to think she is a pig and that our mind plays with us, no matter what we do or don't do, we will always wholeheartedly believe we are pathetic pigs and all the chickens are making her life miserable.

That is, the chicken-and-pig question is in fact a moral question. At first sight, you are a pig. On the second thought, are you really?

====================

Trước giờ, mọi người khi nghe câu chuyện gà và heo luôn nhận ra mình quả thật là một con heo, và lấy đi quyền quyết định từ những con gà rách việc là một ý tưởng thiên tài.

Cái khó của tư tưởng Gà-Heo chính là ở chỗ mọi người đều nghĩ mình là Heo, trong khi qui tắc Pareto (qui tắc 80/20) cho rằng, trong mọi tổ chức, Gà luôn chiếm đa số.

Để hiểu được lý do phân biệt Gà-Heo sao phức tạp vậy mà không cần bỏ ra 3 tháng bới tung công việc của bạn, so sánh đồng nghiệp khả kính với đám gia súc nông trại, hãy nghĩ tới Tèo, phụ bếp của Mập Donalds ngay chợ Bến Thành (chuyện phỏng theo Squirrel Burgers của Ken Schwaber thần thánh)

Tối một ngày tháng 5, một đứa bé cầm 10 ngàn bước vào và hỏi mua một phần Big Mac, khoai lớn nước lớn. Tèo khá cao hứng tối đó và nó muốn làm thằng bé vui. Vì bánh và thịt bị quản lý bằng hệ thống kho, Tèo không tự ý thó một tẹo ở đây, ở kia mà không ai biết được. Nó bèn lấy phần bánh khô cứng của ngày hôm trước, rảy thêm chút nước cho mềm, và chiên một miếng thịt cũng của ngày hôm qua nốt.

Ý tưởng của Tèo thật sự vô cùng rất là khủng khiếp. Thằng bé đau bụng nghỉ học luôn ba ngày, ba mẹ nó thuê luật sự kiện đủ đường, Mập Donalds bị phạt cả triệu đô, Vài tuần sau người ta thấy một cửa hàng Trùm Burger hiện ra ngay chỗ trước đây của Mập.

Vậy trong đại hoạ của Tèo, ai là Heo, ai là Gà?

• Đứa bé rõ là Heo rồi, vì nó lăn lộn qua lại báo hại ba mẹ nó hết mấy ngày, lại còn nghỉ học bị ghi sổ đầu bài.
• Tèo, cũng là Heo. Bằng chứng là nó bị đuổi.
• Mập Donalds cũng là Heo nốt. vì mất tong miếng bánh An Nam thòm thèm suốt từ thời mở cửa.

Và trong các công ty, câu chuyện như của Tèo diễn ra khá thường xuyên. Luôn có một phòng ban nào đấy bị vạ lây bởi một quyết định ất ơ ở một ban phòng khác. Nếu mọi người đều cam kết vào công việc bằng chính quyền lợi thiết thân của mình, mọi người nên có quyền quyết định, đúng không? Và khi đó, phổ thông đầu phiếu (hay tệ hơn, phiếu của sếp thì quan trọng hơn vì đó là sếp) xoá sạch mọi lợi ích của chế độ Gà Heo.

Nhưng tôi biết, và tôi tin bạn cũng biết, không phải ai cũng là Heo. Tèo luôn có thể tìm một công việc mới (nó được nhận vào Trùm Burger, đứng ngay chỗ trước đây nó đứng và người ta còn cho nó huy chương gì đấy). Miếng bánh An Nam chỉ là một mẩu trong chiếc bánh Đông Nam Á của Mập. Nhưng thằng bé thì khác, nó có thể đã đi hầu cụ kị nhà nó.

Câu chuyện bán burger của Tèo chỉ ra, rằng nếu bạn hỏi một người bất kỳ, nhiều khả năng bạn ấy (cũng) sẽ cảm thấy mình giống Heo hơn, rằng cái tôi của chúng ta thường quá lớn để chấp nhận sự hiện diện của mình nhiều khi chỉ để trang trí.

Vậy nên, câu hỏi Gà-Heo là một câu hỏi luân lý. Thoạt đầu, bạn là Heo đó. Nhưng nghĩ lại một lần nữa, có thật vậy không?