Four Factors that Influence Career Choices

Interests, personality, skills, and work values are the four factors that govern one's career choice according to the career counsellor in the career center at UofT. She also suggests that the question I need to ask myself when choosing a career is that WILL MY JOB FULFILL THE REQUIREMENTS DERIVED FROM MY VALUES, MY PERSONALITIES, MY INTERESTS, AND MY SKILLS?

For me, values and personalities have a stronger influence than the rest two. I need a period of time to figure out exactly what my values and personalities are. Luckily, I gained an insightful comments of my personalities by completing the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) test. Here is a list of requirements of a satisfying job based on my personality.

1. The opportunity to be a leader while interacting with a variety of people, on a variety of projects throughout the day.
   
2. A competitive and challenging environment where advancements are available and promotions given on the basis of demonstrated merit and competence.
   
3. Work that lets me solve complex problems in creative yet logical ways, working with other people I respect.
   
4. The opportunity to do long range planning and develop strategies that will perfect or improve the efficiency of systems.
5. An environment where I am respected for my contributions of ideas and actions, and where I am evaluated and compensated in a fair and consistent manner.
6. Projects that let me constantly increase my knowledge and competence and develop original solutions to new problems.
   

My Personality Test Results

I attended the Career Choice and Your Personality workshop in UofT career center at the end of last semester. During the workshop, the host first guided us to self-select our personalities, and then compared the self-selected results with the results from the standard Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) tests which we had previously completed. MBTI divides personalities by four dichotomies. Each of them indicates the personal preference of the direction of focus (Extroversion - Introversion), ways of acquiring information (Sensing - iNtuition), ways of deciding and evaluating (Thinking - Feeling), and ways of interacting with the outer world (Judging - Perceiving).

My self-selected result is EI/N/T/J. I had a hard time deciding whether I prefer E or I. My reported result is slight E/ clear N/ Moderate T/ Moderate J. And based on the two results, I found my personality analyses. They give descriptions on potential strengths and weaknesses, what I am good at, where might be my pit-fall, what kind of career I might find satisfying, as well as recommendations for the job search.

Since I have a tendency to look at the good side of everything including me, the reported weakness and potential pit-falls are more valuable to me than the rest. Here are some of them.

INTJ weakness/potential pitfalls:

1. Because of their sometimes impossibly high standards, INTJs tend to be perfectionists. They are such complex people that their ideas are sometimes too complicated for others to understand.
   
2. Most interested in their ideas and plans for the future, INTJs can miss some of the important practical concerns or realities that need to be considered to make their plans really workable.
   
3. I need to watch my tendency to lose interest in projects after the creative problem solving is over.
   
4. I need to watch my tendency to be impatient and disrespectful of those I consider less competent.
   
5. I need to watch my tendency to be unwilling to adapt to other environments or work styles.
   
6. I need to watch my tendency to be rigid in my viewpoints, dismissing opposing ones without full consideration.
   

ENTJ weakness/potential pitfalls:

1. Given their strong and authoritative style, ENTJs can easily run over others and take charge of situations that are not theirs to direct.
2. They can be harsh and blunt in their criticism.
3. They sometimes don't listen or finish other people's sentences when they erroneously assume they know what weas going to be said.
   
4. ENTJs run the risk of being all-business and not spending adequate time and energy on their personal lives.
   
5. In their eagerness to move ahead with new challenges, ENTJs sometimes make decisions too quickly, especially missing important practical information or considering how their decisions may affect other people.
6. While they pride themselves on their ability and intellect, ENTJs sometimes do not invite the input or suggestions of other people and can unknowingly communicate a superior attitude that may offend others.
   
7. I need to watch my tendency to consider only creative or unusual approaches to problems.
8. I need to watch my tendency to be critical and demanding with others.
9. I need to watch my tendency to forget to appreciate others or express encouragement.
   
10. I need to watch my tendency to lose sight of the personal side of my life while chasing my ambitions.
    

Do things in order of importance

One of my major problems is that there are too many things I want to do, but there is too little time to do them. I have a list of books I want to read, a list of skills I want to develop or improve, and a list of experiments I want to run. It's impossible to do all at the same time. The only way to solve this problem, I have found so far, is to prioritize things on the lists, and do them according to their priorities.

Be specific of what you want so that people can help you better

We all need people's help. The most effective way of getting help from others, I have found so far, is to be as specific as possible of what I want. Say, when asking Sue for help about the metal work the other day, "I want to connect this tube with this flask". Then she taught me several ways to do so, and solved my problem. Being specific of what I want clarifies my problem, prevents misunderstanding, and consequently makes the communication effective.

A Dinner on Etiquette

When I was in college, I learned that in the old days, European people has a set of strict etiquette rules. If one violates the rules, he or she will not be considered as gentleman or lady, and consequently not be accepted in so-called upper class. Last Thursday, the Institute of Optical Science in UofT organized a dinner on continental etiquette. I joined that dinner to have an experience how Victorian people lived.

The dinner is actually a workshop. There was an instructor,who is a certified etiquette counsel, talking throughout the entire dinner. She "teached" us how to act properly from entering a dinner table till leaving the table. I guess only royal family had the luxury to enjoy such dinner for some of the rules only apply to a formal dinner comprising several dishes. Also, from those rules comes a sense of dignity and pride, which suggests royalty. But the royal class are "gone with the wind". For me, those rules are like chains on the body as well as on the mind. Thank goodness I do not live in Victorian times.

For amusement, here is a list of several interesting rules the certified etiquette counsel talked.

• Enter a table from the left of the chair.
• Put the napkin on top the chair during temporary leaving.
• BMW: bread on the left, meal in the middle, water on the right.
• When replying thanks, say my pleasure instead of no problem.
• The rule of eating: SMALL bite.
• Use the leftmost forks and rightmost knives first if multiple sets are provided.
• Never do the clean-up. Call waiters or hostess.
• When leaving the table temporarily, put the forks and knives in 7:20 position; when finishing the dinner, put the forks and knives in 12:00 position.

Websign

It's so true.

Critical Self-assessment 1 cont.

Second of all, research. It is the main reason of my being here. I joined Prof. Geoffrey Ozin's group at the end of September after the supervisor selection period. It is a materials chemistry group which focuses on inorganic nanomaterials. I have been involved in three projects since then, and am still in the process of training on related technical skills. I have taken a chemistry course related to my research; its name is nanochemistry: a chemical approach to nanomaterials. It provides a broad view of current research endeavor on nanoscience, and such a helicopter view is just what I want and need in this beginning period. In summary, either in lab or in class, I am still in the process of training, and I have not yet been able to produce anything creative and novel. In the self-assessments that come afterwards, I should gauge my research performance by how creative my work is, not by how much work I have done.

Thirdly, non-major courses. I took three courses that are not related to my major in this semester: two English courses and one course on entrepreneurial skills. They are pretty informative, and I have summarized important sessions in my previous posts.

As for spare time, gosh, I hardly had any real spare time. But I went to a concert once, visit a distance relative once, chatting in pub, having fun with other group members. Seems not a too dull life.

Silly things and mistakes. I certainly made lots of mistakes. But most of them are about food, and have little worth for recording: wasting food because I store them too long, poor cooking, etc. There are also silly things I have done in getting alone with people. But it seems that I forgot them quickly, and now I cannot recollect any of them. I should keep a list of silly things I have done and update the list more frequently than self-assessing.

So here ends my first self-assessment.

Negotiation Style

I took a course on entrepreneurship here in Toronto, and a recent talk is on negotiation. The speaker is from either a law firm or a consulting firm. During the talk, he mentioned various aspects of negotiation, such as goals, styles, value distribution VS. value creation, dispute resolution (negotiation, mediation, arbitration or litigation). What I found most valuable is the three styles of negotiation he said, which are competitive, accommodating, and avoidance.

People with competitive negotiation style tend to push, push and push until the other part says NO. Accommodating people are often soft, and tend to say "OK" and make concession. Avoidance people will not negotiate at all. The negotiation styles are actually determined by personality. And there is no best style. The most effective negotiators have the style of their own, and are always assertive and empathic.

I have been through a competitive negotiation. It was during the FACES conference, and it was a mock negotiation between the Chinese and US governments on Taiwan issue. Both parties tend to push their lines and want the other party to concede. The negotiation is like a hell, but in the end, we made some deals. Afterwards, when I met people from the negotiation group on trade and economy, I was surprised that the negotiation went so "friendly" because each parties voluntarily make concessions. I had no idea why two negotiation were so different, and I know now that it is just two different style.

The blog entry for that class is here.

Critical Self-Assessment 1

In 23 Aug 2006, I left my hometown Nanjing, where I lived for almost 22 years, and arrived in Toronto to begin a new life. I rented a room in a house near University of Toronto. I joined the Prof. Ozin's research group, and involved in several research projects. I take chemistry courses as well as English Skill courses. I do laundry, shopping, and cooking regularly. Now, I have lived on my own for almost 2 months. How good am I in the past 2 months? Did I perform good in coursework? Did I do a good job in research project? Did I spend my spare time meaningfully? Did I recover from the health breakdown last year and keep a good health? What mistakes did I make? What are the silly things I have done? In a word, I need to evaluate myself.

First of all, health. In general, I have kept a healthy life for the last 2 months. I eat as much vegetables and organic food as possible. I eat 2 apples a day, exercise a hour, and rest as frequent as I can during the day. My new goal of a day, in terms of health, is how tired I am not at the end of the day. But still, I eat unhealthy things like artificial flavor added candies and biscuits; I do not eat my meals at the same time each day; I feel dizzy sometimes after lunch or dinner. So I am still in the process of recovery, and I believe there is still a long way to go before I reach my optimum health state.

To be continued.

Image from: http://www-old.cs.st-andrews.ac.uk/~ipg/sarah/MovieStills1/mirror.jpg

What kind of scientist you want to be?

On the nanochemistry course this week, my prof. raised a fairly interesting statement. He said that there are scientist that are (destructively) creative, and scientists that are deeply analytical, and scientists that are both. He said that one of the main question out of one's Ph.D is what kind of scientist one wants to be?

Given all kinds of creative experiment and ideas presented in the nanochemistry course and admiring them, I should say becoming a creative inventor is almost an irresistible choice.

Image is from wikipedia.

Learning Pyramid - Active learning

That's what impressed me the most in the TA training session. It reminds me how boring lectures are. Learning actually should involve conversation, should involve direct communication. That's how I find knowledge is alive in person, not dead in book.

Notes taken while watching a speach by Robert Kiyosaki

Robert T. Kiyosaki is the author of Rich dad, Poor dad. He is famous for his idea of creating cashflow through passive income, the income that is generated while one does not need to work. I watched a video of his speech in Beijing.

1. Money is an idea: never say I cannot afford it, but ask how can I afford it.

2. Money doesn't make you rich-->high pay job doesn't make you rich. Money management is what make you rich.

3. Two kinds of money problem: not enough and too much.

4. Getting rich is a team sports! Who is on your team? Attorney, accountant, and lots of other people. (The hardest thing "I" have ever had is talking with my attorney and accoutant when I have no money.) Who is your friend? Getting touch with other rich people.

5. The vocabulary rich people use and poor people use is different.

6. Three kinds of income: earned income (50% Tax in US); portfolio income (20% Tax in US); passive income (0% tax in US). The first one is that you work for money; last two are that money works for you. It's impossible to get rich by earned income. In China, the exact tax maybe different, but rich people getting rich is because the last two.

7. How to read a financial statement? The key is paying attention to the cash flow.

Asset is what put money into your wallet whether you work or not. Liability is what put money out of your wallet whether you work or not. So a house can be asset or liability depending on whether it makes money or consumes money, so is a car.

8. The boss, banker may trap in the mouse circle, too. If you have lots of liabilities, like house, car, nice furniture, nice clothes, watch(which is on your liability part in your financial statement), it is very difficult to get rich.

9. Asset: business, real estate, paper asset.

10. Getting into the game of investment: the fundamentals in $4,000 deal and $4,000,000 deal is the same, it is the financial statement.

11. We (Robert Kiyosaki) look 100 deal and do 1 deal in real estate.

12.Most people spend their lifetime in rat race. If you do not have enough money, (100,000 passive income), you will not allow to invest in the fast track according to the US laws.

13. Stock Market has three trends. Bull market (which goes up slowly), bear market (which goes down very quickly), and channel market (which vibrates at a certain price). Professional investor will make money in all three kinds of market through put and call options and short. You must know what you are dong.

14. Continue to push the education, change the mindset. The highest level of investment: make money with no money input and with no risk.

Reason cannot handle everything

The statement seems to be simple and obvious, but it took me nearly twenty years to discover.

I was very good at maths in primary school, and then very good at physics and chemistry in middle school. I admired the power of deductive reasoning, and was fascinated by the beauty and elegance how Newton's law explain motions, and how thermodynamic laws explain thermal phenomenon. The elegance of how these fundamental laws explain physics phenomena gave me the impression that we may explain everything if we found those several laws that govern the nature. However, it is not true.

In my third year of college, I was exchanged to National University of Singapore and had a little break from usual hard science training. I was free to choose the course so I took a course in philosophy. In that course, I was asked to compose an essay on the question: under what condition it is acceptable to play favor to those closest to us. The question originates from a story in the Dialogue, in which a man named Euthyphro rushed to the court to prosecute his father, and was stopped by Socrates who ask him the question of why. In the essay assignment, I tried, very hard, to find a principle that can apply to all possible cases including the case of Euthyphro, but I cannot. And it turns out that this very one principle that governs all ethical questions has never been found; I was astonished when I was told so.

On reflection, I realized that I fell into the habitual deductive reasoning unknowingly, because I was good at it and used to it, as the proverb said, "when you are a hammer, every problem seems like a nail". As a result, I was more prone to look for principles that I can apply deductive reasoning to in order to understand facts. This realization subtly but profoundly changes the way I looked at the relationship between natural laws and the world. Before, I am more inclined to think that principles are absolute and governs the world; now I am more inclined to think that the principles are necessary to the extent of helping us to understand the world, but they are not absolute. This realization also enriched my life; I do not seek only principles and natural laws, but rather learn to appreciate facts as they are.

Image credit: www.mathworks.com

notes taken in Stanford ATI Entrepreneurial Conference

Opening Speech by John Bravman, Vice Provost, Stanford University

Stanford is "a wellspring of innovation": HP, Cisco, Sun, Yahoo!, MIPS, Atheros, DOLBY, Google, CHIRON.

How difficulty is to prodict the future: the prediction of the no. of computer the world needs.

Entrepreneur will play a key role in answering questions of future: nine times out of ten, they fail; but the ten percent of success will change the world.

ACM report on Globalization and Offshoring of software: the world will continue to shrink.

Welcome Speech by director of Pudong Zhangjiang High Tech Park

Pudong Zhangjiang is to be a centre of Microelectronics, Biopharmaceutics, Software design in China.

Alternative Energy Panel

What is alternative energy: the bottle neck in solar cells is cost; how much energy do you actually consume in manufactoring the device? The efficiency of energy use, energy storage, and energy supply.

What are the drivers for alternative energy and clean technology? Profit, short of conventional energy, environment, people's health, global warming.

Is ther hope in coal? Coal is the no. 1 source of energy in China. clean coal tech, energy efficiency.

Technology aside, what else is holding up clean technology? Policy setting, energy price (current mature industry in US and Europe is based on low-cost oil, with the price of oil soaring, much more opportunities in alternative energy will come up in the booming industry in China.) , entrepreneur, profit.

What's next? Lithium battery, coal, nuclear, solar, geothermo, hydros.

The current solar power company in China: 天威保电, 无锡尚德(Suntech), 航天机电, 江苏阳光. Company (upriver industry chain: polycrystaline silicon, downriver industry chain: product).

Keynote Speech by Jim Boettcher, General Partner, Focus Ventures

China: A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity here and now.

Private Equity Participation; pre-IPO.

Valuing Revenue-stage companies is different from valuing venture companies.

Value=P*S*E, P=size of the problem, S=solution, E=entrepreneur team;

Value=P*S*E*CPF; CPF=China Paradigm Factor, which include a strong government leadership, high GDP growth, reconstruction of capital market, risk-taking culture, genius people, innovation environment, cooperation with the west(investment flowing rapidly into China).

Web2.0 panel

ucool.com: personnel database, city8.com: city virtual tour,

Webcompany need to find a revenue module-->identify clients. Successful module includes ebay.com, qq;

Google is technology-based, easy to globalize. Yahoo! is culture-based, difficult to globalize.

web2.0: interactive, user-generated content.

IP panel

manufactory driven country-->innovation driven country.

Enforcement of the legal power in IP protection.

Business model ocean.

In China, 149 law firms that could provide patent protection. they are of different quality, and price.

One-product company VS. Platform technology (a series of patent--patent strategy)

In the beginning of the start-up, a law firm is needed to work hand-in-hand with entrepreneurs, not only in providing legal support, but also human network support.

Laywer selection: interview 3-4 law firms, find a particular laywer in the firm, also building network.

Stanford ATI Entrepreneurial Conference - Shanghai 2006

Stanford ATI Entrepreneurial Conference - Shanghai 2006. I really wish I could be there. Please give me a chance.

Observation of me

Multiculture society is a society that has people with different culture backgrounds. I was raised up in a single culture society, and never thought that people could be totally different, collectively, until I lived in Singapore for five months as an exchange student.

My most important discovery is that Singaporean students regard extracurricular activities (EA) as important as their studies. They could spend a whole summer preparing for the exhibition of the Flag Day, a university-wide competition among residential halls in the beginning of fall semester, and the committee member could have a meeting for ten hours coordinating this event. They put as much time in EA as in their studies or even more in school time also. Various activities, in block, in hall, in faculty and in university, requires commitment of time. They have a complicated points system to evaluate a student's performance in a hall in order to determine whether he or she could stay for the next year. And to stay in a hall for all four years is a honor, comparable to a faculty dean's list. The people, students as well as teachers, in my home university never think like that. Back home, study is always the first priority.

When I began to think about why the practice is so different in Singapore from that in my home university, the first answer seems to be that the systems are different. But then I realized it is people who make the system. So maybe it is the difference of people's attitudes towards EA and studies in a society leads to the different systems and, in turn, different practice. So further comes the question: how come the different attitudes? History, culture, or level of development? I am not sure.

As I am thinking about these questions, I am trying to find the reasons for my own practices, not only in my time arrangement, but also in other aspects of life, such as the way I talk, diet, and pace of life. It turns out that some of them are just imitation of people around me: I did as people around me all did. This finding strikes me: in a sense, I had been doing things unconsciously for about twenty years.

Luckily, now I begins to think about the reason for my daily practice, and if there could be any alternative. I began to be aware of many things which I had unconsciously ignored. In a word, I began to observe myself. And that is interesting. I found that when my pride is hurt, I might argue; I found I like to get things done as soon as I receive them, and if not, I began to worry. There is so much I learn just by pay attention to what I do and how I feel, and there are so many things that I realize I can improve by learning how bad I had done.

Updated 15 June 2007

Image credit: www.windows.ucar.edu

Health

When I was travelling in Hangzhou, I met two girls from Denmark in Youth Hostel. They once slept in the room for a whole day. Since I was used to believe when traveling, daytime should not be slept away. So It seems to me a bit surprising. When I asked them the next day, they told me that because they had done too many things in a too short time, they felt tired and needed more rests. Travel, for them, is not only for tourism, but also for knowing the limit of themselves.

We all have our limit: the longest distance we could run, or the heaviest weight we can lift. From the two Denish girls, I found a limit that I never thought about before: the limit of how many things one could do at one time. Without the knowledge of this limit in me, I foolishly piled up six tasks last year. Later when I found I may not be able to finish them, I began to feel worried and anxious. And that worry, together with the pressure of work, leads to a breakdown of my health.

This breakdown lasted for one year. In the worst time, I could not read, write or even think for more than half a hour. This breakdown forces me to change my diet, my living habit, and my attitude towards the body. I eat more fruits than before; I cook food with traditional Chinese medicine; I practice breathing exercises; and I learn how to monitor health through signs in the body, like tongue diagnose. Beside, I began to estimate how much time each task could cost before actually doing it, and I also began to learn how to manage my pressure and stop worrying. Most importantly, I learn that health is a dynamic state of body which, if I do not pay attention to maintain, will decline.

I am now in the process of recovery. Now and then I think about that, if I have not experienced such a breakdown, what will change in my life. Obviously, the tasks in last year could have been done better. But in the long run, say in a ten years, if I do not reconsider my attitude and practice towards my body, if I still do not know the limit of my body, I will surely have a breakdown of health. Comparing having it early with having it late, I prefer to have it early, when I still have the courage to cope with it.

Updated 15 June 2007

Image credit: www.healthshaper.com

Institutionalized control

Morpheus: "The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around. What do you see. Business men, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inert, so hopelessly dependent on the system that they will fight to protect it. ..."

In the movie Matrix, machines turned humans into the energy source through the matrix, an interactive neurosystem that is assimulated to control human minds. Recently, I watched a documentary that explains the philosophy behind the movie. It said that the interactive neurosystem can be seen as a symbol that resemble a society that runs a institutionalized control over its people, and people in such a society sumbit their life forces to run the society. If the society is a system of control, who is the one that controls? Government? Captialist? J.S. Mill digs much deeper and says that the people who are in the society can collectively control the individual in it.

A recent dissusion with three friends gives me some real-life samples of the control by society over individuals. Simon says 26, 27 and 29 are the ages at which most girls get married. Ben describes that, influenced by one of his classmates, he once dreamed in getting a high-paid job instead a meaningful one. Clara said about her anxieties when she was asked what kind of job she get when, in fact, she still has another year to finish. Clearly, my friends are all fighting against such a control. Some, luckily, succeed temporarily.

I think the strongest control by society seems to be the prearranged route of life: receive education, get a job, get married, and have a child. The constant nagging from parents, grandparents and other people around that warns us to follow that pattern only make such a pattern more boring than it actually is. After all, we cannot defy the rule of nature: we are getting older. Luckily, we have something else in control: how we get old. But how? How do I know I am not a monotonous mold shaped by the society? How do I know where I differ from anyone else? To how much extent I am actually myself, not a mold? To how much extent I know which part of me is the real me and which part is just a mirror of the society?

Evolutionary Psychology

Introducing Evolutionary Psychology, by Dylan Evans and Oscar Zarate, is a required reading for Keanu Reeves, the actor of Neo in the Matrix Trilogy, before he opened up the script. It is a book with illustrations on every page; reading it is fun.

Evolutionary Psychology (EP) is the discipline that explains the mental processes, the cause of human behaviors, in the light of the idea that these mental processes are adaptations of the environment human ancestors live 100,000 years ago. It combines cognitive psychology and evolutionary biology. From cognitive psychology, it adopts the idea that human behaviors are caused by mental processes and the idea that the mind is a computer, by which the cognitive psychologists mean a set of operations for processing information. From evolutionary biology, it adopts the idea of evolution and extends evolution to the formation of human mind.

Evolutionary psychologists call the special-purpose programs in human mind, modules, which collectively constitute the mind. Examples of these special purpose programs include vision, hearing, and memory. Other interesting examples, which are usually controversial, include language acquisition module, alliance-formation module and mate selection module. It is fascinating to learn enlightening ideas that our mind is preprogrammed to learn language and that logic is a byproduct of the cheat-detecting function of the mind. But it is a bit sad to learn that nepotism is a phenomenon due to human nature.

At the end of the book, the author warns that EP does not justify status quo: it "describes what human nature is -- it does not prescribe what human should do". Knowing what human nature is will, on the one hand, help us "know ourselves" better so as to make improvements, and, on the other hand, help us understand the fallible nature of human being so as to be tolerant to each other's faults.

Google in China: The Big Disconnect

Google in China: The Big Disconnect: "While Baidu appealed to young MP3 hunters, Google became popular with a different set: white-collar urban professionals in the major Chinese cities, aspirational types who follow Western styles and sprinkle English words into conversation, a class that prides itself on being cosmopolitan rather than nationalistic."

By contrasting with "cosmopolitan", the author probably uses the negative meaning of the word nationalism --"The belief that nations will benefit from acting independently rather than collectively, emphasizing national rather than international goals" (From American Heritage Dictionary). I wonder, however, whether it is possible for one to be cosmopolitan and nationalistic at the same time. The neutral meaning of nationalism-- "Devotion to the interests or culture of a particular nation--provides such a possibility. So if one who has a global view devotes to the interests or culture of a particular nation, one is possible to achieve a balance between being cosmopolitan and nationalistic.