Poem

You start the semester in the best city ever.
You meet prof. Kurpis and know this aint no circus.
You work very hard and see its not bad,
Cause when it was over you feel like Grover (Sesame Street).
To finish this poem I'll end with a quote,
This definitely was the best class in the world.3

Shay S. Marom

Blogging – it's not a real word

When the assignment of writing a blog came up, I was very excited. This gave me a chance to write my thoughts and tell the readers about my different experiences. This was definitely fun.
It was really interesting to read about other student’s thoughts and ambitions. However, not many of the students put pictures in their blogs so it was really hard to know whose blog I’m reading. And even if they did put a picture, I don’t really know them so their post didn’t mean much to me. However, when I read the blog’s of students that sit around me in class or ones that I worked in groups with, it was much easier to relate the story to the person and comment on it.
The blog assignments definitely provide a way for thinking of the activities we did in class and you really get a better understanding of what each module was about. That said, I like talking and getting immediate feedback and be able to answer back; in real life conversation it is easy and the adrenalin rushes through your body. In the blog you lose much of that effect and when people do respond they write whatever they want, sometimes not even relating it to what you wrote.
In addition, I felt that some of the assignments were a little to personal. For example, the second assignment was about goals that we want to achieve; sometimes our most important goals are very interesting but also very personal - at least too personal to share it with a class of 100 students that you don’t know (especially not in the 2nd week of class).
These assignments definitely made it easy to take control of 20% of the grade. They were not difficult to accomplish and they were very fun to do.
I’ll concluded by saying that I would have never thought of starting a blog if it wasn’t for this class. I believe that I will keep on using it.

Special Mission – Code Name “I’m Lovin’ It”

The title says it all; this is about a special operation in the fast-food restaurant chain McDonald’s. The reason this is a special mission is because mission is very complicated and the outcomes are uncertain. Some might ask “what could be so complicated in McDonald’s?” Well, nothing is complicated in McDonald’s, as long as you do not ask for something out of the ordinary. Now that we are on the same page, and you understand the mission, I will explain the objective: go to McDonald’s, order a cheeseburger with four extra pickles and a small well-done fries with no salt and have all this printed on the receipt.

It was a beautiful spring day and I started it with a big smile on my face. All this was true until I went into the McDonald’s to initiate my mission. I went straight to the register and asked for a cheeseburger with four extra pickles and a small fries, well-done without salt. Until this point everything was going according to plan. After placing my order I asked the cashier to make sure that all my requests be written on the receipt. She nodded with her head so I assumed she understood. At this point the guy in the kitchen shouts out “a cheeseburger without pickles?” and the cashier replays “not without pickles, with four pickles.” I understood that something was going not according to plan, so I asked her again to make sure that my request will be printed on the receipt. Again she nodded her head but now I began to get a little bit of an attitude. At this point, the girl in charge of making the fries asks “fries no salt!?” as if she was amazed that someone in the world would eat fries without salt. The cashier replayed “no salt!” I immediately added “I want them well done”. Again I had to make sure that all my requests will be printed on the receipt. I was pretty surprised that almost two minutes have passed from the time I made my order and the cashier never asked me to pay. Sure enough I saw another employee joining the cashier. This one was the manager. The cashier explained the manager what I had requested and the manager replayed “so what is the problem…? You do this and this and that….” while pushing some keys on the computer screen. Again I had to make sure that this will be printed on the receipt and of course I received a positive reply with a little attitude. At this point the guy in the kitchen shouts “four extra pickles or four pickles?” I already knew that things are not going to go according to plan and the mission is on the verge of failure. I could not let that happen so I called the manager and explained her how important it is for me to have exactly what I had asked for and have a receipt to prove it. At this point I had to pay my three dollars and twelve cents. As you might guess by now, the receipt did not show anything close to what I have asked. I called the manager again and explained her that I need to have things written on the receipt. She insisted that she cannot do that because the system will not allow it. The only way to do this she said is by ordering four cheeseburgers. I told her that I have been ordering this for a while and I have never had a problem with this in any other McDonald’s. She replayed that she cannot do it. I have now become a little more aggressive with her so she said “OK, I will have it on the receipt”, the manager took the receipt and wrote the number 4 besides the extra pickle. At this moment I understood that I am dealing with a manager that doesn’t really care for what I am asking for. I explained her again that this will not work and I need to have it printed. The manager started to become very angry, she was also very big physically, so I thought that it might be better if I leave the place. I said “thank you” and left the restaurant. I was very disappointed that the mission has failed, however, at this point I still did not understand how bad the failure was.

It was not a real surprise for me that this mission did not work. I knew that the odds were very low. However, I have learned a valuable lesson; when it comes to customer service, if the person that is providing the service does not care for what you want, you will never be treated well. I will probably not get credit for this project, but I had a good time doing it. The thing that most amazed me in this entire interaction was that the manager never even tried to help me. She just said that she can’t do it. A good manager or employee would at least try, but they both never really cared for what I asked for. I do not eat McDonald’s so I gave the hamburger to a homeless in the street, but before I did that, I had to check if I got four pickles. Without much surprise I saw that I have only three pickles in my cheeseburger.

What kind of a DISC are you?

I have taken many personality tests throughout my life, but this one was different.
First, this was the first test that I had to choose what is the most and what is the least I identify with.
Second, this was the first test that I actually received results for; usually your tests are evaluated by the people that test you, but you never know what the results are and what they say about you.
Now about the results - I have been leading people through the last 10 years; It started when I was in the army, I had a team of about 15 soldiers. I also managed a bar/restaurant, and finally, I managed the security in a division of a foreign consulate.
Now that you all know my resume, you can understand that I have been leading people for a while, therefore, nothing in this profiling system surprised me. I am an "I" high "S" and I wouldn't think otherwise.
I am fully aware of myself and I knew that I am not a "D" because I have been managed by "D" people and I hated the way they move things around and I promised myself that I would never be like that. Don't get me wrong, in some situations I wish I was a "D" because they don't really care of how things are done, as long as they happen. I am not like that; I care too much about other peoples feelings - I must make sure everyone is happy, or at least make sure they understand a certain decision. I like motivating people, because I believe that when your employees are motivated, they will bring better results. I do this by explaining.
I think that this test can help a potential employer get an in-depth look at the person being tested. This test will give quick and pretty accurate results about the person.
Just to make things a little bit more interesting, I showed a few of my friends the definition of each letter in the DISC system, and asked them where they think I fit. No surprise, they all hit it right on the head, and they did it without much deliberation.
As mentioned in the beginning, I am well aware of my leadership style. I don't think that one is better than the other. I think that it depends on the situation; if you bring a leader to a place or organization that needs a face lift or some major improvements, you should get a "D" kind of leader - the one that gets things done and will remove anyone that interferes with his goal.
If I was stranded, I would probably want to be with a "D". That said, I think that a good "I" could take the lead in a damn good way, because people like to get information of what is going on or what the plan is, especially if they don't know anyone in the group. Sometimes people have the tendency to object a decision just because they don't know if they can trust the person making the decision. If you give them enough info (doesn't have to be all the info) it will be easier to convince them. You can obviously notice that I am an "I".
I'll finish this very long post and point out that I think leadership skills are built by looking and learning from the people that manage and lead us; we learn from them the positive and the negative ways of management, and decide how we want to be.
Remember, no one way is better than another - just be true to yourself.
Believe in your way and people will believe in you!

Vis...Visio....Vision

This is the second time I am writing this post. The first one was not saved for some reason, so currently my vision is that the post somehow reappears. Well, that obviously won't happen but at least I tried.
We all have a vision, and these visions change as we go trough life. For example, I wanted to be a pilot (who didn't), but as you grow up you understand and see things differently.
I have a few visions for the future and I will share them with you (again). They are all somehow connected, but they don't really depend on one another.
First, I want to have a large family. Before I do that I need to get married (hopefully she will say yes, and hopefully she's not reading this post). By large family I mean five children at least; I grew up with three siblings and I had a great childhood and I still enjoy it. I want my children to have the same great experience.
My other vision, is opening my own business. I cannot provide too much info on this (don't want you to take away my idea), but it is in the process and I hope it will be successful.
I don't know what you think about my visions but I think I'm pretty modest with my visions. All I want is to be happy, and make sure my family is happy. If you can throw there an extra few $$, I'll be even happier...

Best Test For The Student and The Rest

What will happen if a professor asks his students to design their own test?
You would think that they would design a test and have the answers written upside down on the bottom of the page; just like a crossword-puzzle.
Not in this class. Here, we made a test that might be easier then the first one, but definitely not easy. That's integrity for you!
The entire process started out when the professor gave us the chance to design a test and vote on it. All this with only one condition - there has to be an absolute agreement of the class.
All in all, the process went pretty well; it was lead by one person who wrote the ideas that were brought up and then we all voted on it. People were pretty fair, they listened to one another (most of the time) and they were very flexible and gave up when they had to.
I took a pretty active part in the decision making process (maybe a bit too active..). I would argue that most of the students that took part in the process (yeah, those that were yelling), including myself, at some point were in all the different stages of conflict handling. In the beginning we all wanted to get our own agenda to the room, and then some of us just withdrew from the entire thing, and the rest kept on. After a while we started to compromise and collaborate with the rest of the class. Some student (probably those who got an A on the test) accommodated others' ideas because they didn't care much.
I think that the way we handled this as a class was quite remarkable. The entire process was done in a way that at the end, everyone in class (besides the professor), was happy with the decision.
Could we have done this better? Maybe shouting a little stronger.....
Well, we could have divided the class into smaller groups, and then one person from each group would give their decision. With this, we might have been able to get more ideas out. This way we could have filtered the first ideas that were unrealistic or irrelevant, and stick to the better ones. In addition, some students would have found it easier to raise their own ideas in these smaller groups.
Anyway, I had a lot of fun and I think the we rocked with our decision!
Happy testing to all!

Egg-otopia

There are many ways to evaluate a good planning process, but what do eggs have to do with planning, and does a broken egg signify bad planning?
Well, if the plan was to prevent the egg from breaking - then the answer is a obviously YES!
Our group was given the task to design and build some sort of contraption for an egg, and then release it from approximately 10 feet high. The objection was to prevent the egg from breaking. All this sounds too easy, but when you are introduced to a totally new team and the team has only 30 minutes to complete the task, the word "easy" breaks along with the egg.
In spite of the constraints mentioned, our team worked pretty well in getting this done; we had some arguments (AKA brainstorming) in the beginning about what is the best contraption to design, but at the end we somewhat combined all our ideas to create the best contraption ever made. Or so we thought.... The contraption didn't work and our planned failed. The question is why did it fail and how can we improve?
Our team didn't go through the planning process as listed, but it is very natural to go through most, if not all of the steps without even thinking about it. You cannot have a good plan if you bypass any one of the steps. For example, you will not be able to do anything without knowing your objective first, and you will not be able to succeed in the future if you do not evaluate your results at the end.
Our group was pretty well organized, but it is pretty hard to work in a team where you do not know one another, and you do not know which one of the members you can trust; if you work with a team that you have worked with in the past, and you know the members, then you feel more comfortable with other members' ideas. That said, even in a new team like this, it was very easy to differentiate between those who knew and cared about what will happen, and those who didn't and only created panic.
As a conclusion, our planning process was good and if we will work in the future in the same team, things will be much easier and more successful. Regarding the egg process, a different plan would have probably worked out better, but the most important thing is to learn from past results and improve for future planning.

Recession Hitting Hard

Everyone, in some way, has been hit by this tough recession; lost a job, lost money in the market, lost a home and so on. I myself have been looking for a job for quite a long time - with no success. This issue has been pushing me to make a decision whether my girlfriend and I should keep struggling over here or just go back to our home country, Israel.
This is probably one of the hardest personal decision I need to make this decade. We both love living here, but this has just been a very rough year for the both of us and it doesn't seem to be getting any better.
Is it possible to leave this wonderful city?
The decision has yet to be made and it wont be an easy one.

ABC's Life on Mars - set

Last night my girlfriend and I went to a late-night movie show. On our way back we noticed that the street we live on was closed for traffic. As any curious New Yorker would do, we went in to see what had happened. For our surprise we saw that they were filming a scene from ABC's Life On Mars.
ONLY in NYC can you walk home at 1am and see famous actors in the midst of filming a movie or a TV show.
Here's a picture and video from the set.
We hope you enjoy this!
Love Anat and Shay

Viewer discretion is advised:)

A word from the New Yorker

My lovely girlfriend and I (and furry cat), have been living in New York City for over five years. With so many stuff to do, places to eat, stores to spend money in and things to see, I want to share my experience so other people can enjoy this most amazing place in the world.
This blog's aim is to share information about good restaurants, Broadway shows, city sites and all the other great stuff to do in the city that never sleeps.
It's not only for visitors in NYC but also for New Yorkers who want to share their experience and the places they most liked.

Now lets have some FUN!

Shay