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Final blog post of this class

I'm writing this as my final blog post before I submit my link.  Honestly, this class has been interesting.  Dr. Englehart did a great job with the discussion questions and prompting us throughout the week.  I continue to enjoy the DQs because it gets people interacting. This is the kind of class that kids should get in high school.  Most of what we learn is things you already know, but they're put into a specific application which helps you really understand the impact of the knowledge. I think my favorite part was the negotiation chapters.  Learning about BATNA feels like a game changer as I start looking for a new job.  I know what I've got and I know what I can afford to give up if I have to.  It's a powerful position to be in because it informs your decision.  This is right up there with understanding opportunity cost.  They're really part of the same equation. I say this about every class, but I think it's particularly true of this one:  If you didn&
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6's and 7's

Everything is completely jacked up right now.  Work is a disaster.  I'm having to fight issues with people on multiple fronts.  My wife and I aren't particularly getting along.  And the dog is basically dying at this point.  Everything is sideways, at best. I'm having to take a different approach at work.  I'm feeling like I need to separate my personal and work lives more than I ever have.  I've taken most of the personal effects off my desk.  Honestly, if it wasn't for school I would already be in a different job.  I had a GREAT one offered to me earlier this year and couldn't take it due to school and tuition assistance.  But in 6 months I'll be done and then anything is possible. The one coworker I seem to be having problems with is because she's stressed.  Our SAP implementation is still garbage.  Almost all the consultants are gone, especially the two that really knew what they were doing.  Almost as soon as they left things started breakin
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Personal reflection with the help of another person as a mirror

I had a good talk with my manager yesterday.  Well, my former manager.  Someone was promoted to under her so we will be reporting to this new woman.  We all know her from a different department, but haven't worked directly under her before.  I think it will be more positive because she has more accounting experience. At any rate, my question was basically what can I do to improve myself so that I can get promoted to team lead.  The issue I had last week with one of my co-workers came up.  I was told that I was "borderline abusive" which struck me as being very heavy-handed.  I know in that situation I got to a point where I wasn't listening to my colleague.  I know I wasn't as willing to work on a mutual solution as I usually am, but I wasn't abusive.  I'm a bit shocked that someone viewed it that way.  I was stern because I knew I was right.  Where I failed was in explaining it properly.  At any rate, if someone is perceiving my action that way then I h
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Halfway through

This week puts us halfway through this cycle of classes.  I'm incredibly stressed between work and this school stuff.  I also just setup my remaining schedule so I can get done 2 months earlier.  I have to double up on two of my final three classes.  That may end up being a lot of work.  I really can't wait to be done with this. Yesterday, I managed to speak to all my teammates.  That was the first time in my MBA program that I've actually talked to another human being.  It was great to talk to everyone and get to know them better.  We're going to have a weekly chat so we can go over all the answers for the Handling Conflict exercises.  The good news is that my team is very engaged so there's lots of communication in the forum.  That should make this pretty easy.  I'm confident that we'll get an A on our team projects. I do think it's funny that we're basically all type A personalities.  I'm pretty sure that if all four of us had to work in a
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There's always one

In my previous post, I was talking about how good my team is.  I think that's accurate.  I've got one person who is more anxious about things than I am, and that's almost terrifying.  True, there's a lot of ambiguity in the syllabus with due dates, but you have to trust the professor knows what's up.  This is an interesting one to deal with because I can see that being disruptive to the team.
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Week 3

So far, I'm really enjoying this Handling Conflict deal.  I like seeing how this develops.  My team has had some good discussions on this as we've gone which has been helpful.  The people on this team are so much more proactive than other teams I've been on in this Master's program.  So many people just don't seem to care.  These folks certainly care.  It's not often I'm the least good on a team, but it feels that way.  It's nice for a change because it gets tiring to carry all the load. I'm having tons of conflict at work.  I'm just so burned out that I know I'm not reacting well.  I'm getting defensive.  I really don't like settling for less than the best and it feels like that's all we do.  I know that I can't stay at this company.  I'm hoping to finish my degree and then stay a year.  Then I only owe half of what they pay for my degree.  It's just stressful. I have one co-worker that I really like.  She's j
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Week 1 - Time to get resolving!

I'm excited for this class!  Oh, I should probably mention it's name, right?  Conflict Resolution and negotiation.  It probably sounds dorky, but I was excited for this class when I looked at my class plan when I was signing up for the program.  From October 2017 through February 2019, I had a co-worker who was just a giant source of aggravation and frustration.  I was really looking forward to this class to try and learn ways to deal with her, especially since it looked like I was going to end up being her manager.  Fortunately for the team, she quit two weeks ago.  That's made life WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY easier, but it's not all roses.  I'm still hoping that I'll learn a bunch of skills in this class that will help me in my day to day business life and maybe my personal life as well. The case studies look awesome.  I love case studies because I think it's one of the best ways to learn.  You have to apply the book theory to the real
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