Ghost Squad Show-Off

This is from my notes on Facebook, now I decided to post this on my public blog.

Well, that day I saw someone made fool of himself. I was playing Ghost Squad, and due to the broken slot, I can't use my IC Card. Well, it's not really broken actually, it was just a little bit hard to insert the card, and I don't want to lose the data the same way again. So there I was, only with a standard weapon with my regular single-shots.

So came this guy out of nowhere, without even a glance or smile, inserted his IC Card, and played along. A bit reckless, though, shooting CONTINUOUS bursts on the hapless enemies using the TR14. I managed to get most of Quick Shots, though.

This is TR14. Good penetration, good fire rate, low recoil, gives higher accuracy in fully automatic mode. This is the feature he abused a LOT. Slow reload thime is the drawback I don’t like.

Continuing to Stage 2, he set the game to level 16!!! Oh, crap . . . me with a standard weapon against level 16 enemies. Even with a full-piercing SPR11 I'm having quite a difficult time on level 16. But again, I managed to survive, this time stealing head shots between his bursts. And he died FAR BEFORE the stage ended. And, yes, I finished the level 16 Stage 2. I was already in the yellow on the Life Bar.

SPR11. Sniper rifle, superior penetration, reloads instantaneously. Its major drag is the small 10-shots clip, and limited only to 3-shots burst, no fully automatic mode.

So at the end of the Stage 2 I took out my IC Card, and asked him for another round. I took a bullet at the beginning of Stage 3 for an instant death . . . hey, it's SOOO difficult playing alone with a standard weapon on a level 16 Stage 3, you know. Later, I forced the card in, and the machine successfully loaded the data when it's in. And now I'm happy, with my favorite weapon, the CPG7.

CPG7. Same penetration power as TR14. Slower fire rate, high recoil that gives lower accuracy in fully automatic mode. But hey, I use single-shots, so these things have tiny effects on my performance.

Faster reload time = Faster recovery to continue ass-kickeries.

Set the stages 1 and 2 to level 16, I played quite a smooth one with two shots or head shots to kill the red ones and single shots on the rest of them. He was still with continuous bursts, by the way, and the score was not even half of mine. Oh, I didn't set the Stage 3 to level 16 out of concern that he was already red on his Life Bar. I only set it to level 10, a level where I find it fun to play the game.

At the end of Stage 3, I noticed that he was just promoted to LEVEL 6 . . . lucky I didn't set it to level 16, it'd be a hell playing it with someone who never pass stage level 5.

Two things I missed : His FACE when he found that I'm a Marshall with a Gold Suit at the beginning of the game, and his FACE again when I noticed that he's still at level 71, compared to my level 99, at the end of the game.

The Gold Suit, obtained at the character level 99.

He started the game all over again, and I noticed that he has level 16 for Stages 1 and 2, and level 6 for Stage 3 . . . you're welcome, dude B)

The moral of the story : Never barge in, AND show off, when you don't know the other guy . . . you don't know what the other guy is capable of. Even if you KNOW the guy, or have the SKILLS, show off is quite annoying. And I believe this applies to other aspects of life . . . never look down to others, respect each other.

Same thing when you just joined with a new company. You may have a good experience, you may also a summa cum-laude graduate from a top, well-known college. But that’s not a reason to look down to others.

(Pictures courtesy of http://www.sega-ghostsquad.com)

Mafia

We got a card game called “Mafia” which had been quite addictive among us, sometimes ago.

It’s quite simple. A group of 8-10 people (sometimes it got bigger) gather around in a circle, with one guy acts as the facilitator. He shuffles a pre-arranged set of cards equal to the number of the people playing, and deals it to the players. Players who’s got aces play the role of Mafia, as well as Sheriffs with Kings and Doctors with Queens. After the whole card set is dealt, the facilitator instructs the players to shut their eyes. Usually, we set up 2 Mafias, 1 Sheriff, 1 Doctor, and citizens for the rest. Citizens have no powers, they are just sitting ducks :D

The first step, quietly Mafias lift their head and agree upon selecting one victim among players to kill. The facilitator takes notes of the victims, and tells the Mafias to close their eyes again.

Next step : The Sheriffs lift their head and try to figure out and agree upon one person who they believe as the Mafia. The facilitator, again, takes note of the accused, tells the Sherrifs whether or not their choice is right, and tells the Sheriffs to close their eyes again.

The third step is for Doctors : They lift their head, and try to figure out and agree upon one person who they believe a victim to the Mafia, to safe them from death. The facilitator takes note of the saved player, and tells the Doctors to close their eyes again.

The final step is revealing the truth : If the Doctors fail to save a victim, as in selecting any other player rather than the one who’s been selected / killed by the Mafias, then the victim dies, steps out of the circle and becomes ghost (haha)

The group must have a consensus to accuse the Mafia / killer, put him on trial and execute him – in other words, make him leave the game. These steps must be repeated until all the Mafias left the game.

Here are the cases that might happen during the game :

1. The Sheriff finally able to guess / identify a Mafia, and vigorously provoke others to accuse the suspect, in the final voting / trial. This might bring both positive benefit to him – people will believe him and successfully kick out the Mafia – or negative impact to him – people would turn against him and wrongly accuse him as the Mafia, and kick him out of the game.


2. The Doctor, instead of healing others to prevent their death upon the Mafias’ shootout, heal themselves to prevent dying and to keep them playing.

By now, you might be compelled to ask me, “how it’s supposed to relate to anything ‘management’?”

Here’s the thing:

The Mafias represent power. These are the people who have the options, opportunity and decisive power to make people stay in the game or kick them out. In other words, the life of each of the players are in their hands.

In an organization, there are powerful people who possess similar characteristics. They can be someone of higher level in management hierarchy, a senior (who has been in the organization for years, or one of the original / first member), or someone with charisma so great, he can influence the decisions made by the entire organization.

So, what’s wrong with power? Nothing. In fact, power can be used for good intentions. But, sadly, people with power are usually tempted to abuse the power to their own benefit. Thus, power can make things go wrong when it’s being abused.

And what should we do with it? Well . . . we can start by teaching ourselves the paradigm that power gives us the opportunity to do more goodness. With power, we may have the chance to make things right, help more people, or make people do things correctly.

The Sheriffs represent righteous people. Well, different from the cowboys who uphold justice by the way of the gun, the “Sheriffs” of an organization are people who know the rules, walk the rules, and points out if there’s a breach to the rule. They sometimes do it verbally.

But, sometimes, they get too frontal. They even gather others to back them up, and assemble a mob to crucify the transgressor, no matter if it’s the most helpless kid, or someone of a higher level in the hierarchy. And, by doing this, they tend to put the matter into a worse situation. It might make them end up kicked out themselves.

So what’s wrong with being righteous? Nothing. In fact, we encourage people to learn the rules, uphold it, and work together with others to preserve it. It’s just that when we reprimand others, we should do it persuasively. There’s actually a step to it : First, do it in private. Tell the guy that he’s wrong, and try to get commitment not to do it again. If it doesn’t work, try again in front of a witness or two. If it doesn’t work either, then put him on trial in front of a group of people. But, usually people get the point in step two :D

So, remember, being righteous does not make us judges. Being righteous gives us opportunity to prevent others making mistakes and worsen the situation.

The Doctors represent people with supportive characteristics. They provide psychological healing should there’s a victim through abused power. They have the opportunity to stand up for the victim to protect them. They may even have the power and opportunity to get close to the abusive person, deal with them and undo the damage. But sometimes they tend to be neutral. They don’t want to look that they are taking sides, they don’t want to make enemies, thus they put themselves out of the battlefield. They can say “I feel your pain, but I believe there’s nothing we can do but submit to the decision. They also put some pressure to me, and believe me I’ve tried my best to reason with them, but they just don’t listen. But hey, I’m on your side. I’m always here for you if you want to talk”, and at the same time say something like “You make the right decision, sir. I may not be 100% happy with your decision, but it’s for the benefit of the majority. I agree with you.” Seems like hypocrisy, but to me it’s more diplomacy. They might do the worse : Keep silent, wash hands, and keep a safe distance from the conflict.

So, what’s wrong with diplomacy? Nothing. But diplomacy can also be used to help uphold the rule and keep things right. Don’t just stand away and avoid getting tangled with the conflict, but get involved in the conflict and provide support to help resolve it. And do this with a sincere heart.

Well, it’s just basic : Do good to others. Know our role, and play nice. That way, we take the first step in making a good teamwork.

The Thaw – Freeze Concept

If I ask you how to change the shape of an ice cube into a cone-shaped ice? It's as simple as thawing the ice cube, and put its liquid form into a cone-shaped container, and store it in the freezer. Then, after an hour we'll have the cone-shaped ice.

Simple.

So, what does it have to do with continuous improvement? You see, most of the time people tend to feel comfortable with the work they have been doing for years, or people feel that there's nothing wrong with the thing they've been doing all this time. They don't know (or being ignorant of the fact) that they can do more, or something better. It's just about being aware of our room for improvement. And this is when the thaw-freeze concept might help.

Here's an analogy to explain it : There was a guy who always go to his office walking. He felt nothing wrong with it, and he was happy. Someday, a friend told him that if he buy a bike, it'd make him reach his office faster, it'd safe his time. At first, the guy felt that it's not an urgent necessity, and it's a bit expensive, so he put it aside and kept his walking routine; but the thought of the bike was still there and bugged him, sometimes.

Later, the friend, upon knowing that the guy still walk to his office, told him the benefit of having a bike : He can travel everywhere faster, which would save his time AND money, and there's also the workout element on it : It's also a healthy option. So finally, the guy felt that it's a necessity, a good workout, and he made a calculation and found that indeed it'd save his money, and then went to buy the bike. The learning process was quite fast, and now he's happy with his bike, and travel faster to the office.

Same thing with our everyday life at work. As mentioned before, people tend to feel "okay" with the current situation, which is one of the major barriers in change management. In this state, people are like the ice cube : They just don't know exactly the benefit of improvements, "unconscious incompetence". All we have to do is to make them realize that they can do more and improve, by simply showing the fact that there's a room for improvement. Make people realize it. Make people see the mutual benefit of the improvement. Sometimes we might want to bug and annoy people to make them feel the need to change and improve themselves. This is what we call the "thawing" process : Make people KNOW that they can change and improve, and that the improvement might bring mutual benefits, so they would have a "conscious incompetence". They know that they can improve, but they don't know how to do it properly.

At this point, you might think that this is all about selling technique. Well, you're right . . . to some extent. A salesperson is able to make even ignorant people feel the need to buy his products, and make him finally buy the product.

But here's how it differs.

Now, the teachings begin. We teach the people on how to improve, make them learn from their mistakes, and help them up when they fail. Guide them through the change process. We teach them the how-to's and we do this until they have what we call a "conscious competence" : They KNOW how to improve and they are doing it.

Then, we help them maintain the new behavior, and keep ourselves open if there's a need for help. Soon, if they do it consistently, they would do it autonomously, which we call it an "unconscious competence" : They know how to do it, and they just do it.

And when we want to improve further, do the cycle all over again. And there's no end to this . . . there's always room for improvement. People might think WHY it has to be this complicated. I can simply answer it : It's human we are dealing with.

So now . . . what will it be if I want the guy up there to buy a car. An automatic transmission car. A "green" car :D

Hey It Gotta Start Somewhere, Right?

Well, I think it' might be the best time to start a blog about everyday’s life at work. Just finished a 6-month project, and now I’m in-between projects, so I DO have a spare time to do it.

I got a friend at office who asked me to do him a favor in developing ideas on how to integrate our methodologies with the Lean Manufacturing ideology. So, there I was, starting to lurk over the net and look for ideas, materials and pictures to provide preliminaries for me to be able to create a good and simple presentation, and I got the idea to share my views on the matter. And it’s getting better : I just thought, why don’t I share my work experience as a management consultant to the world? And, why not now? I got time. ENOUGH time, that is . . . :)

So, it gotta start somewhere . . . and I think this is the time to start. And it’s also a good time to test the Microsoft Live Writer . . . ;)