I then joined the Air Force because my boss and I got into an argument, and I joined because he said I didn’t have the discipline to go in the military. After 4 years of Air Force life, I went to work for the National Weather Service as a meteorologist, but once again, they wanted me to get a degree if I wanted to go any further then I was. I then went into business for myself, I bought a sporting goods store. That was cool, then I realized that you have to work weekends and holidays! What?

I then got into IT because a friend of mine was configuring something called ATM’s, and he made a lot of money doing it. I thought it was the cash machines, and he was taking some of the money. He got me some info on what he does, and I thought I would give it a shot. I went back to school, or a technical school, and earned a Microsoft certification. Wooooo!!!! Then someone(sucker)offered me a job in the IT field. Here I am 10 years later still in the IT field.

I still don’t consider myself to be all that technical, but I can read a manual. I have had plenty of practice with the ’social networking’ aspect of the corporate world, and I can still make people laugh. I do believe my wit has kept my neck off the chopping block several times as I have survived numerous lay-offs. Folks with 10 times the knowledge have been let go, and I still remain. I totally agree with what you are saying. One more thing you might want to add is if you walk around with a clip board with papers on it, and have a real worried look on your face, no one will question what you are doing. Even talking out loud to yourself about some ‘work related’ issue will earn you the title of ‘a real hard worker’.

Well, it has been fun reading your blog, now I need to get back to work (ha ha ha).

In my experience with people, it’s the one’s who prove themselves through their actions instead of their words that usually have the most going for themselves. I don’t know if this is because as I’ve felt, the more I learn, the more I realize I don’t know and still have to learn. Or, perhaps, it’s a simple sense of humility and self confidence that keeps people from boasting about all their possible success and accomplishment.

I’ve found there’s a time and place where self promotion is important. I tended(or tend) to play down some of my experience or success sometimes, and after people have gotten to know me they wondered why it took so long to learn I had experience in X or Y or did A, B, and C. So, I’d say some humility and listening instead of always talking is in order, but there comes a time and place to stand up and be proud of who you and what you’ve done, are doing, and will do.