Quote #13: It Is Better To Believe

Some of you may know that I've recently spent 2 weeks in Rio working on a project. Now, in my field, you don't often find yourself among other women and it's almost unheard of to work in a group that contains only women, but during my first week, this was my reality. Myself, our client technical lead and two of the engineers in Rio spent our first week finalising items for our project and tying up loose ends in preparation for the plant go-live. It was such a privilege to work almost exclusively with a group of ladies for the first week and it coincided with me reading a very interesting book on women's confidence (The Confidence Code by Katty Kay and Claire Shipman). 

I really enjoyed this book for a number of reasons, but the main reason is that it has made me aware of differences between the way that men and women approach their jobs. I think the most important thing that it's made me aware of is that, women on the whole are much more risk averse and much less willing to jump into something that they have minimal skill/exposure/experience in. In other words, us ladies will only jump into the deep end when we've learnt how float and then how to swim, when we've learnt all the different swimming strokes and when we're sure that we need to be swimming free-style and not butterfly. On the opposite end of the scale, men on the whole are much more likely to jump into the deep end without any idea of how to swim, they'll somehow learn doggy paddle in order to keep their heads above water and then they'll improvise their style until they're swimming free-style with everyone else. 

At this stage of my career and for so many other young, professional women out there, I think it's really important to know that often, in order to move to the next position, we don't need to know exactly how to do the job. Instead we need to be willing to jump into the deep end without knowing how to swim. We need to remember that we're not the only ones in the pool/dam/sea and that there are people and things out there that will help us to swim as we go along. 

If you're interested in reading the Confidence Code, click here (it's worth the read, I promise!)

Finally, I hope that for the ladies out there who are wondering whether they're ready for that next role, this has inspired you to just go for it and dive into the deep end. And for the gents out there who are reading this - please keep in mind that you may need to give some extra encouragement to your girlfriends, wives, female friends or female colleagues to jump into that next role even though they don't feel quite ready for it.

The Reality of Work Travel

Reflection of cars in the building across from my hotel.
I thought this pertinent since we had a +- 1 hour commute from out hotel to the pant every day.
And the same on our way back.

So, you've been working for a while and you find out that you're going to need to do some travelling for work. You find out you're going to an awesome location and start getting exited, imagining sunning yourself on the beach after work or walking along snow-brushed cobblestone streets admiring the architecture and having time to sightsee. Your friends are all jealous and wish that they could come along in your suitcase to have fun with you.

This, my friends is a myth, reserved for holiday travel and is very definitely not what work travel is all about. I've been incredibly lucky to travel to some amazing places in the last little while for work and so I thought I'd share my experiences of what work travel is really all about - it's fun as long as your expectations are not the same as that of holiday travel!

• The probability of early mornings and late nights is high, especially if you're not the only one staying at the hotel.

• You're going to spend 70-90% of your time inside. Most likely the same office.

• You're going to spend 60-80% of your time in that same office, with the same people.

• You're going to eat a lot of restaurant food, which is delicious, but you will grow to miss a simple home-cooked meal.

• If you have people hosting you, they'll be able to advise you on some typical meals and drinks of the area - so you'll get to taste the "real" food of the place that you're visiting and not some tourist equivalent.

• If you're lucky, you will be able to squeeze in some sight-seeing between travelling to and from the office - an hour here and there to catch the main tourist attractions of the area, squished in between leaving the office and going out to dinner. 

• Most of your touristy photos will be from those squeezed-in-sightseeing-tours.

• If you're an introvert like me, you're going to get home and go into hibernation-mode and not want to socialise with anyone other than the people you live with for a few days.

• If you're working in a place that doesn't speak your language, you'll be excited to get back home to hear people speaking in your home language(s).

• You're going to, most probably, get to interact and chat with colleagues/clients that you've talked to over the phone a lot - so you will finally be able to put a face to a voice and name!

• Most of your pictures with colleagues will show you either in the office working, or at a restaurant eating.

• You'll get a chance to build relationships, make new friends and get to know people outside the office. It will be fun, just a different type of fun to holiday fun!

This is me, on the only completely sunny day we had in Rio.
Luckily, it also happened to be a Saturday - so this is me,
doing some fun touristy things in Rio.

Quote #12: Opportunities are Usually...

Years ago I was recommended a great book to read. It's called Outliers and is written by a chap called Malcolm Gladwell. I had high expectations for this book* and I wasn't disappointed when I finally got around to reading it. I think that one of the most important messages Outliers delivers is that success doesn't just come to people - success is a combination of circumstance, experience and hard work. People who grab those opportunities (and who have a bit of luck on their side by being born at the right time, in the right year, or having the right cultural background) and work hard at making the most of these opportunities (it's said that around 10,000 hours of practice makes you an expert at something) are the ones who become successful. If you get a chance to read this book, definitely give it a try!

* I have also read a book called The Tipping Point by the same author, which is also another interesting read!

Quote #11: The Secret of...

I read a great article a while ago about a stock-broker who joined a company based in the middle of no-where and within months had grown his portion of the business so substantially that people were taking notice of him. The secret to his success? Paperclips. He started every day with 2 jars and 120 paperclips. One jar was empty but every day, he would make telephone calls and after each call he would move one paperclip into the other jar until his original jar was empty. 

It seems like such a simple thing to do, but he did it consistently and without fail, every single day. Often we see successful people only once they have already become successful. We don't see the months (or years) of consistent work that went in before the success came about. Instead, it seems as though people become successes overnight, which is not an accurate representation at all. In terms of blogging, over the years I've learnt that the blogs who do well and keep growing do one thing right - they post consistently. It's something I'm trying to get better at, one blog post at a time. And so, here's to those who work consistently, who work with purpose and who keep the end goal in mind!

PS - Instagram and Layouts let me create the background for this quote and I think I'm going to be using more of this concept in future posts, so keep an eye out for new improved images! It's amazing what mirroring an image can do and what pretty patterns you're able to create - give it a try!

A Hike and Some Flowers

A while ago Frosty and I had an awesome weekend hiking up Table Mountain and then we took a family drive to try and find some flowers in Darling with his brother and brother's girlfriend (it was overcast and there weren't many flowers out), but we did manage to find a stunning orchid farm and spent the morning walking around. And we had the cutest puppy join us for our day out - here are some pics.

View half way up Table Mountain

Pretty scenes at the top of Table Mountain.

The Conebush Protea (I think).

Frosty at the to of the mountain

Karoo Prinia

Karoo Prinia in black and white

Orchids from Duckitt Nurseries.

Orchids from Duckitt Nurseries.

Orchids from Duckitt Nurseries.

Orchids from Duckitt Nurseries.

Having some fun at Duckitt Nurseries.

Having some fun at Duckitt Nurseries.

Happiness is... running through long grass so fast that your ears stream out behind you :)

Quote #10: Experience is One...

I found this quote amongst my images just now and I can so clearly remember thinking that this is quote was incredibly applicable to my life in the week that I created it. And now I can't remember why I thought it was applicable to that week - so instead I'm just going to let you enjoy the quote! 

Life Lately

You may have noticed that I haven't had a chance to blog much recently, but I finally managed to put up the rest of my pictures from my trip to Germany and I'm hoping to get around to editing and getting through some of the other pictures that I've taken this month, so watch this space in case I find a few more good pics to share. Since I haven't had much of a chance to blog, I thought I'd update you on what's been happening in my life lately.

Basically my life has been a whole lot of work since I got back from Germany. Not overtime work, just busy-every-day work. It feels like I'm finally getting on top of everything that I need to do which is a really exciting feeling! In between work, the weekends have also been rather busy - for the last two weekends Frosty's folks have been in Cape Town and so we spent some wonderful times with them - chilling in Stellies and exploring Babylonstoren this last weekend and visiting Kagga Kamma Nature Reserve the weekend before last. Then the weekend before that, some very special friends of ours got married in Elgin and we had a fantastic party at the wedding reception and a lovely weekend away re-connecting with friends who we hadn't seen for a while. I always underestimate how busy October gets - the last two years it's probably been my busiest month of the entire year.

Exciting news on the work front is that in just under a month I'm going to be heading off to Rio for work (I definitely landed with my bum in the butter with the project I'm working on and this is the third awesome place that I get to go to for this project!). One exciting thing that I have learnt is that South Africans don't need a visa to go to Brazil. However, we do need to have updated Yellow Fever vaccines. They have to be done no later than 10 days before you leave, so I'm going to be getting mine either this week or next week.

In between all of this business, I've followed the student protests against fee increases last week with interest. I've read a bunch of articles, read status updates of students and wondered if I would have been part of the protests, either getting involved or watching from the sidelines, had I still been at UCT...I'll never know, but one of my favourite bloggers wrote this piece after attending the protests in Stellies on Friday, which is so beautiful.