Another one of those big meetings took place last Thursday, hence the lack of news on my side.  We worked late all week and amounted to little in gaining momentum for the last three weeks left on this project.  Then on Friday, I attended training session at our company headquarters.  It was my first time there; we consultants have our own cozy office near Bleecker.  Compared to our laid-back loft near the village, the corporate office was gray-suit serious.  But being on the 56th floor and having an unobstructed view of the city gives it instant posh credibility, like any corporate office should.


So at this day-long interview training session, I rehashed some basic etiquettes of interviewing, nothing particularly groundbreaking.  Our poor HR intern had to endure a few mock case interviews, and I felt horrible grilling my friend.  I'm certain the MBA candidates would be better prepped.  Nonetheless, it's amazing how quickly one goes from one side of the interview table to the other.  Our office has been swamped with interview work and our older generation consultants are overworked.  That's why our HR head decided to threw us newbies into the fray as well.  I certainly don't mind for now.  I'm also banking on it translating to a few trips to INSEAD for me too.

The weekend was great, the first full weekend spent in NY since over two weeks.  But those two weeks felt like ages.  I'm finding myself growing to enjoy sunny but coldish (50 degrees, 12ish Celsius) weather.  And while I didn't get to spend any time in Central Park, the guys and I went for a taste of the nightlife on Saturday.  I'm looking forward to the next two weekends in the city.

Just wanted to get the word out for Can-Am Week, happening for the Fonty folks in P2/P5.  Have a great time!

I'm writing on the flight from Frankfurt to New York City right now, feeling utterly defeated.  What originally was a brilliantly planned trip back, starting at 4am this morning, became a nightmare.  I scheduled my return to New York on Singapore's Frankfurt to JFK flight at 8:30am, meaning I had to take the regional Lufthansa flight from Munich at 6am.  Sure, I was sacrificing sleep, but I figured I would be tired enough to sleep in luxurious SingAir biz class, leaving me fully refreshed by my 10:30am arrival, just early enough to run some errands and relax a little on my precious Sunday.  

But plans are always meant to be broken.  My flight got canceled due to mechanical problems.  Without reliving all the painful details, let's just say my colleagues and I scrambled around the airport all day, running from counter to counter, including clearing customs three times, just to get on this Lufthansa flight so I can be back to unpack, pack, sleep, wake up at 5am and fly to Orlando.  I hate it.

Some random thoughts in no coherent form:
- Lufthansa is like the German version of United.  During the whole ordeal (our original flights were booked through them), they failed to make sure we'd get home ok, and all of their ticket agents lack the imagination of ticket agents in the US in terms of re-routing people back.  For instance, a first class customer who asked to be put on a Newark flight was asked, “Are you sure you're willing to go to Newark instead of JFK?”  Cluelessness abound.
- Lufthansa business class – at least where I'm sitting in the bulkhead section, reminds me very much of United biz class, nothing special, preset entertainment programming.  The airport lounges (both at Munich and Frankfurt) were equal to United in every sense of the way.
- There is no wireless Internet on this plane as my colleagues promised.
- Munich is an amazingly rich city.  Beyond the countless Mercedes, BMWs, I saw Ferraris, Porches, everything.  My colleague commented on its rich car culture here and all accounts seem to confirm that.
- In Munich, I was lucky enough to stay at two separate luxury hotels at corporate rates: Le Meridien, which was modern and chic; The Kempenski on Maximillian Strasse which was a classic, with world class friendliness (an extra place given it's in Germany).
- The 2.5 days spent in Italy was way too short and I didn't get to enjoy much of their fine dining, although I did have a fantastic gelato in hazelnut and pistachio flavors.
- The autobahn in Germany has a system that controls the speed limit.  When it detects little traffic, all limits are lifted.  We hit 210 km/h going to the airport, ;)
- My work itinerary didn't allow me to visit any friends from INSEAD.  At least I met one of my classmates who joined the Beijing office.

I realize I sound like a spoiled brat, after all I went to Europe.  But right now, physically I feel like crap.  Exactly one week ago on Sunday, I flew to Orlando.  Then to JFK on Tuesday night to connect to Munich in cattle class.  Arriving in Germany, I went straight to work, and then flew back and forth between there and Italy.  Woke up at 4am on Sunday morning only to take another 24 hours before getting home.  Weekend gone.  Energy gone.  Work week coming.

Leaving for a short business trip to Munich in a couple hours, so the blogging will be light for the next few days.  You can still reach me via the usual channels if you need to get a hold of me.

So many people in the office are simply overwhelmed with the recruiting season.  In a few weeks, full day interviews begin, and will take place once a week, every week, for two months.  And on the student front, the December promotion folks at INSEAD are in full recruiting swing for the final two periods.

My project leader finished the first round interviews at INSEAD just a few hours ago in Fontainebleau.  I put a few good words for my December promotion friends and my PL was pretty happy talking with them.  I just want to say great job everyone and enjoy the weekend.  (I wonder what national week party is happening tonight?)  Hopefully you'll hear some good news soon.

For those of you stressing out, don't.  My advice is that interviews go both ways.  You absolutely must figure out if your potential employer is a good fit for you, both in the nature of the work and if you can see yourself liking the people.  In the consulting industry where teams spend enormous amounts of time working together, not getting along just makes life miserable.  So take your time, figure out to the best of your ability what you want, and just be yourself (albeit prepared).

Today marks the end of the 4th week of my new career.  Some things have met my expectations, others have not.  And for some of those that did turn up the way I expected, I misjudged how I thought I would have reacted to them. 

The bad.  My background makes me very demanding about IT.  My personality makes me very intolerant of lack of productivity tools.  So finally today, 4 weeks into my job, I finally get my Blackberry and security badge (for VPN access).  What does all the jargon mean?  It means outside of the office, I have no access to any of the things I need for work, such as email.  Yes, it could be a blessing in disguise, this process shouldn't have taken this long.  The good news is that both my coach and my project leader (who is in charge of first day process) have assured me that the process has improved and will continue to do so.  This is the one area that caught me off guard.  One of the things I failed to successfully negotiate for in my contract was to exert more control over my IT.  I relented to the stringent corporate standards here (no Skype, encryption for sensitive emails, etc) that could only be enforced by predefined hardware.  I thought I would be ok, but in all honestly, I have been resisting taking a liking to my laptop.  And the old model Blackberries we got don't inspire any energy in me to figure it out.  I told the IT guy (who I am convinced hates me) that I'm willing to splurge on my own to upgrade to the latest device, but he convinced me to hold off as he's talking to the higher-ups about an equipment upgrade.

The pitfalls.  The clients we interact with make such a big difference.  Obviously I'm still on my first project and I've talked about this particular client before.  According to my colleagues, there exist client teams out there that are built from extremely talented and motivated leaders who are willing to listen and get their hands dirty.  And then on the other spectrum, there are clients that are completely hands-off, unmotivated, untalented, and just don't care (which is rare).  All in all, the quality of the clients will determine the quality of the work, as well as your motivation to contribute.  This I did anticipate before starting here and has been in line with expectations.  Regarding our current situation, our interaction with the client has increased a lot and I expect this progression to continue.

The good.  The learning of this project for me so far has been the methodology employed to keep the defined initiatives on track, and how to measure progress and distance to the goal.  The other side is the human factor of working with numerous groups, each with its own agenda, and motivating/whipping them into delivering.  This isn't exactly what I envisioned learning - financial models, market entry strategy, global sourcing.  Then again, it's still my first project and I am learning something of value.

The push.  Received my second paycheck, which is on par with my past paycheck.  The only difference my skyhigh rent negating it.  Ah, the price to pay to live in style, :)  Ok, sometimes it's tilted out of balance against me when having to travel to the client site on Sunday nights instead of Monday mornings - one more night of rent lost into oblivion.

On the reminiscing side of things, I came across two little things on the web that reminded me what I love so much about Silicon Valley.  Both of them involve the leaders in academia and industry.  The first was a little blurb about these people's passion to constantly innovate and research.  The second was a video interview of Judy Estrin, who talks about her career path from Computer Science academia to industry leader.  The passion for achieving great things with technology really resonated with me.  These people care about excellence and delivering value through research and creativity.  Hopefully, my next few projects will involve more exciting industries with a push for quality innovation.

Is there a little sense of panic, as in what the hell did I get myself into?  Definitely yes.  Does the fact that I walked away from Cisco's skyrocketing stock options to zero stock options sting a bit?  Yup.  But I do still feel optimistic about my choice?  Living in New York is like a dream, and will take me years (at this rate) to get to know.  Going forward, I'm staying upbeat in my approach to work with the intent of being productive in both work and growing myself with a clear direction.  Otherwise years will have passed and I will have unknowingly accepted the prescribed path without considering my fit for it.  Because we expend so much time and energy at work that when we're free, the last thing we want to think about is work, falling into the trap of just following the defined career ladder is just too easy.

Some of you may have heard about the tragedy today, where a Major League Baseball player and his flying instructor crashed a plane into one of the high rises in Manhattan today.  I just wanted to thank everyone who sent me a note or called, and to say that I'm ok (obviously since I'm in Orlando), and that my apartment is pretty far, about 2.5 miles away.  The details of the cause of the accident are still unclear, but let's hope that these mishaps don't happen too frequently again.  My prayers go out to the families of the victims and injured.

It's been a tough few days since arriving on Sunday night.  I burned the midnight oil last night studying on some methodology and then got into the office early to prepare for a short meeting with the project leader.  Honestly, I'm feeling a bit drained right now after the frustrations of not being able to find good documentation for what I want to learn, and having to prepare PowerPoint slides for my 1-on-1 meeting.

All meetings and references have to be documented in PowerPoint.  I find it excessive to slap together slides for a 1-on-1 status meeting, and it frustrates me more to have to read slides to learn a concept that requires depth and detail.  My project leader told me the sooner I get used to it the better, since there's no fighting against it.  Well, my mood has yet to move into resigned acceptance, so I will dwell in frustration for now.

Here's the pond at the company campus I mentioned before.  I'm going to take a walk.

Walmart saved my butt, well, strictly speaking, my feet.

I arrived at the hotel late last night.  While I was unpacking my things, getting my clothes ready, I realized that I neglected to bring any socks.  It was midnight, and I had to be in the office by 7:30 the next day.  Wearing black shoes, dark slacks, and my dirty pair of cotton white socks didn't seem like the best idea, especially in front of these big shots who would presumably be grumpy if all that money they paid us couldn't even cover proper attire.

So I run down to the front desk, knowing that they have a small sales table, selling miscellaneous items to the guests, the typical toothpaste, condoms, cheap American beer, and other TSA banned items.  Maybe they'd carry socks as well.  They didn't, not dangerous enough... yet.  But the front desk guy referred me to Walmart.  Still open?  After all the Walgreens next door closes at 11pm.  The gods of fortune smiled down and this store was 24/7, woohoo!

Half a mile away, I arrive at this behemoth of a store, the super version of Walmart that I just loathe.  They had everything from socks to fruits to fresh fried chicken.  Yuck.  Nonetheless, I got my socks.  We complain about the evils of Walmart and yet we benefit from it immensely.  I'm such a hypocrite.

Up until 5pm yesterday, the workload was overwhelming.  We ate almost all our meals in the windowless office, and pounded away at our oh-so-cheesy Dell laptops.

But what I really want to talk about is the concept of a Team Contract.  At the beginning of the project, we get together and discuss the things we want to get out of the project, rules, expectations, anything and everything.  It’s important because each project comprises different people, many times working together for the first time.  So for example, if you have a strong aversion to eating delivered Pizza, it’s the perfect forum to voice your must-have (or have-nots).  And for the most part, depending on the project leader, this contract is upheld.

In this particular project, we didn’t have anything serious.  Being my first project, I only had one request, which is to make it back to the hotel on Wednesday nights early enough for me to spend an hour at the gym, something to keep maintain my energy and sanity.  The other things we wanted to accomplish was a specific work schedule: team dinners on Monday’s outside of the office, work long and hard on Tuesdays and accomplish a lot, get back to the hotel early (as in before 10pm) on Wednesdays so I can work out and others can pack their bags (since we leave for NY the next day).

This week was weird though.  One of my colleagues had a trip and didn’t come back to Orlando until late Tuesday night.  My project leader had to leave at Thursday noon instead of the usual 6pm.  And we have the big bad meeting coming up on Monday.  So due to these circumstances, our contract went out the door.  Honestly I don’t have any complaints about that.  And since we did such a great job finishing our work yesterday, it’s been relaxing today.

I’m going to think of more requests for the next team contract.  Some ideas so far:

1.    Stock the team room with bottled water so I don’t have to drink from the toilette.
2.    Have dinner at the restaurant of my choice at least once every two weeks.
3.    Heaven forbid, have the option of flying to the client site on Sunday instead of Monday morning.
4.    Have private phone breaks every other night (just wanted to get this out so once the expectations are set, I don’t look like I’m goofing off and disappearing for 30 minutes.)
5.    My most productive hours are after 3pm – I’m definitely more vampire than early bird.

Thoughts and suggestions welcome.

Made it back to the hotel early tonight, around 8:30.  It’s weird being so busy and all of a sudden feeling like you have all this free time.  So what better way to spend it than to blog down a couple thoughts.

The vital task weighing down on us this week is the big meeting scheduled for next Monday morning.  Since we always fly back to NY on Thursday night, we try to finish all our work before leaving the client site.  What we have to prepare for this meeting with the big shots of the organization, is a summary of what we’ve done so far and where we’re heading.  So yes, our work is essentially preparing a PowerPoint presentation for our client (who will continue this project) after we consultants leave.

So how is making a presentation so time consuming and how is that considered real work?  Well, I had this conversation with our project leader yesterday.  While the medium is PowerPoint, the deliverable is actual data and know-how.  The deliverable is a set of slides that act as documentation.  And in the process of making it, we gather information, crunch numbers, and persuade various groups to do their jobs and hand over the necessary information.

On a side note, I am experiencing first hand how scarily competent my colleagues are at PowerPoint and Excel.  I saw it in action in b-school, but these folks put me to shame.  I feel slow like molasses when I operate, compared to these guys working their shortcuts, macros, and personalized toolbars.  My analogy from b-school to here is like learning the Dark side of the Force, powerful, sinister, and no turning back.

Now about our client, I’ve made one observation, specifically the person in charge of the program we’re putting in place, who will be delivering the presentation, is a perceived lack of interaction.  The consultants were in the office until midnight yesterday while the client clocked out around 6.  The result is that we make a lot of decisions about what to present and how to present it.  Not only that, but I’m gaining a lot of on hand experience that will be essential after I leave.  It leaves me scratching my head a little.  After all, should they risk taking the chance of not learning everything that’s necessary to sustain the project?

Again, I asked my project leader and he said most of the clients are slightly more interactive, but not by much.  They have to lead their own lives, whereas our day (and night?) job is to be in the office for countless hours.  And it’s a shame that we do a lot of things they’ll never learn, but that’s their choice.  I secretly wonder if that’s a result of my client’s industry, one whose culture is comparatively conservative and slow moving.  For certain, Silicon Valley start-ups can’t run this way.  Then again, it’s not clear to me how many high-tech start-ups hire consultants.  I would imagine that they would expect the consultants to work in parallel, probably working on market strategy or customer analysis.

Since I make so many trips to Orlando, I thought about all the things I can enjoy in Florida other than Disney World.  After talking to our local experts, I discovered that there are many incredible dive sites in Florida, with the caves being one of the most distinct and enthralling aspects of Florida diving.  It's been a few months since I've gone scuba diving, and it would just be a horrible waste if I let my certifications go to waste by lack of practice.  So if you know if any great sites, or dive shops that organize trips, let me know!