Random Thoughts - 11/21

Graduate school is different. So far in one class this semester the professor just stopped grading, no longer providing any tangible feedback to students. At least there doesn’t seem to be any kind of ‘default’ grade but there is no way to know what will happen in these final weeks of the semester. I actually received a returned assignment that had no feedback at all, it was exactly as I turned it in, I wasn’t sure what to do with that. In my other class a slew of subjects were rushed through in time for the final exam which is maybe out tomorrow or perhaps next week. Class notes from last week mention multiple dates some from last year telling class that the slides weren’t all changed from the last time they were used. I tried to turn in the last class assignment, by email, only to be asked to resubmit at a later date when the professor would be back in town. No explanation was given for why the assignment would have to be turned in again to the same email address and why the current date’s email was insufficient. In this same class the midterm included a problem that had an inexplicable solution not found anywhere else, questions on it were not returned.

A difficult personality type is the egotist with little or no evidence of success. Recent experience has led me to really think about the things that I say or my approach to some things, hopefully leading to improvement. A person I know constantly criticizes others they work with for not taking his sage advice and methodology. Finding myself working with this person I learned a reason why they don’t take that advice. Hoping for constructive feedback and suggestions for improvement I got nothing but nebulous platitudes and was chided for requesting clarification. Perhaps I’m dense for not understanding just what to do with brilliant advice. I can’t help the feeling though that a person so enamored with their own business sense would be much more successful more than 40 years into a career. What I take from the experience is that it is very important to be as clear as possible and if someone doesn’t understand what it is that I am saying that it may not be them.