Leaderboard

It seems like we've been seeing a lot of new faces lately, and from them gaining a lot of strong, smart new members. In the spirit of the City I thought maybe we could throw out some ideas on how to be successful here? Here are a few of mine.. 1) Welcome. We're glad to have you no matter what your certification level, experience, education or what type of service you happen to work at. The fact that we're glad to have you doesn't mean we don't argue these points, it simply means that we value thoughts, and the people brave and kind enough to share them, from every point on the compass and political spectrum. 2) You can gain very little here if you don't participate. Learn here, where it's safe, to air your ideas and encourage constructive criticism. If you can't push yourself out front here then you need to question if you'll have what it takes to push yourself to the front when people are suffering. Also, doing so causes most of us some pressure, allowing you to learn to think with that pressure and accept the consequences of those decisions. 3) No one here, regardless of how it may sometimes seem, wants to see you fail, here or in your career. Too often it seems that criticism is considered derision when in fact the exact opposite is true. We thrash each other's ideas to make each other stronger, not to try and prove our superiority. There is nothing that makes the smartest people here happier than to see those that have been mentored here succeed and even surpass the high standards most often expected here. I'm always very aware when someone has commented on one of my thoughts that this is a smart, successful person that had better things to do, yet made time to help me try and get smarter. I try and remember to be grateful for that. Nothing makes me happier than to lose an argument, because it means that I've fought with every tool in my toolbox to defend something that seemed perfectly logical and evident to me, yet...I was wrong. And now, thanks to someone smarter, that fought harder, I don't have to continue to be wrong tomorrow. 4) Do not Google your answers and then pretend that they are yours so that you don't feel stupid. Being wrong isn't stupid. Being afraid of being wrong, and so allowing yourself to remain wrong is stupid. Give answers from your head, use your own brain, create your own logic trees, that is how you grow and become stronger. Think I'm kidding? Follow my posting history and you'll see some of the most idiotic thoughts you can imagine, but many didn't remain idiotic because I was allowed to work them out with help from my friends here. And when I say friends? I'm talking about some really smart folks that left my ego bruised and bleeding at the end of some gnarly discussions. 5) Please understand that when we critique your spelling and grammar that it is not to belittle you but to help you grow as a professional and separate yourself from the significant number of your peers that everyone else is laughing at every day. Hanging out is fine, but use that time to improve yourself. We all make mistakes. We're looking not for perfection, but for the effort that says you're trying. Spelling and grammar are a practiced skill. We all make mistakes, that's why we push each other to constantly keep practicing. 6) Chat is chat and the forums are the forums though often the two overlap. Please don't bring your playful chat dialog and insert it into forum conversations. Not because 'chat is stupid' because of course it's not. It's just easy sometimes to take the fun, carefree familiar attitude of chat and allow it to distract from conversation in the forums. Besides, most of the people reading the threads won't get your references anyway. One's not better than the other necessarily, they just don't often mix well. 7) Have fun, be brave, make friends, find mentors, ask for help, help others…but most importantly, use this as a resource. This isn't a place that you come to prove how smart you are, but to prove that you want to be smarter. Almost everyone here respects that. Some of the most intelligent people I've ever met I've met here and my life will never be the same because I was gifted with their patience and advice. Use them, but as you do, remember to be grateful and give back. And in case I was somehow not clear...If you see my posts, and you find a bad idea, wrong thinking, bad attitude, poor logic, spelling, grammar, and choose to ignore it to 'be nice?' I will never thank you for that. I will never be grateful that you allowed me to be weaker today than I needed to be..Just sayin'... I'm hoping that many here will add to my silly little list…what do you think guys and gals? Dwayne Edited about a gazillion times because, for some reason, the text I see in my edit window isn't translating well when posted. I don't think I'll cut and paste from Word next time. No contextual changes made. Formating only.