Bootstrappers guide to being successful.

This thread needs diapers.

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Only in Cad's world would someone would it be inappropriate to define someone who loses repeatedly as a loser.


I don't even need to get into the circular reasoning behind attacking Mist's argument about merit != monetary success by citing monetary success as an indicator of merit.

Talk to people who are older than you and have suceeded in your chosen business/industry.
Learn to talk to people who are odler than you comfortably.

I would say this is a huge stumbling block for a lot of people. There are a lot of older people in my industry who have "made it" and a lot of people who are younger who won't even converse with them and they really hold the key to getting ahead.

I literally bought the comany I owned for pennies on the dollar because the gentlemen that owned it didn't want to see it go to a bunch of "young punks" in his own words and all it took was talking to the guy on an equal basis like one of the guys, which he was.

IT may be an entirely different industy different than my own. I would say I've been sucessful and started with not a lot. Went to work doing manual labor with a GED working 16 hour days doing turnarounds, but had a background doing design/drafting/detailing (making shop drawings) from my dad in high school and conntinued to do that part time contract and saved up enough to go to college debt free and wound up with a masters degree in something not related to my industry.

Got out worked for one year for a company and the owner sold it to me for pennies on the dollar. Ran it for 10 years. Sold it. Worked for a few years as a desinger and now am VP of engineering in a $400 million/year business.

The biggest deal was talk to people 20-40 years older than I was in a normal conversation which seems to be a stumbling block for some. May not apply to a lot of industries.

A big help along the way was that you couldn't find but a few people who did what I did and only a handful even today on web job related sites. Of those only a small fraction wanted to do anything other than draw/design and had no desire to move into management. Very different than say hiring an IT person where you might get tons of applicants.

Dwindling number of opportunities? Mist you are smoking crack. There are more opportunities now than ever. I saw West Texas during the oil downturn/outsourcing of the 80s, THAT was a lack of opportunity. The tech sector needs qualified people so desperately they have to import them from overseas and sponsor them.

The problem I have now, and really the only thing holding me back in this industry, is that I'm not really that social. I am a grown ass man but still find myself feeling awkward or whatever. Guy I work with is dumb as a post but he is really nice and knows how to talk to people, that makes me jealous, i wish I could just walk into a room full of strangers and do that, but I can't. At leas, I haven't. I am forcing myself to do it more and more now because it is way past time.

I like what Borzak and Chaos are getting at with personability as a form of success.

It is also a form of what mist was getting at about bullshitting - in a figurative sense.

Has to be backed by actually knowing what you're talking about though.

chaos_sl said:

Dwindling number of opportunities? Mist you are smoking crack. There are more opportunities now than ever. I saw West Texas during the oil downturn/outsourcing of the 80s, THAT was a lack of opportunity. The tech sector needs qualified people so desperately they have to import them from overseas and sponsor them.

The problem I have now, and really the only thing holding me back in this industry, is that I'm not really that social. I am a grown ass man but still find myself feeling awkward or whatever. Guy I work with is dumb as a post but he is really nice and knows how to talk to people, that makes me jealous, i wish I could just walk into a room full of strangers and do that, but I can't. At leas, I haven't. I am forcing myself to do it more and more now because it is way past time.

Click to expand...

Funny you mention west Texas in the early 80's. My dad went thru it in the petro chemical industry as well and it served as a constant motivator to diversify and learn more than just doing X which seems to be a problem with a lot of people I have had to hire. Expand a little.

It was bad back then. I knew process and chemical engineers when I was young that were very GLAD to get a job sacking groceries at Winn Dixie back when unemployment lasted a month or two at most and paid a fraction of what it does now.

I know lots of detailers (people who make shop drawings from engineering/design drawings) that have never set foot in a shop or the field. They do OK but the big money has been in knowning the problems and seeing from start to finish what you are actually drawing. It's been a HUGE advantage for me.

Now that they have gone to 3D modeling there's been a large influx of IT types who have no clue what a beam looks like in the shop and what is required for the guy to actually fit it or erect it in the field and their drawings SUCK.

It wouldn't take an hour a week to go out to the shop and talk to the guys and find out what works and what doesn't. But a lot don't.

In a lot of ways this applies to engineers as well. They may be great at running numbers but have no real life experience in the shop/field to back it up. Now that I run the engineering department it really stands out. I have to lend my real world experience to them...and I have a GED and a degree in forest/wildlife management. Sad kinda.

Vitality_sl said:

I like what Borzak and Chaos are getting at with personability as a form of success.

It is also a form of what mist was getting at about bullshitting - in a figurative sense.

Has to be backed by actually knowing what you're talking about though.

Click to expand...

1000% yes. If you can't sell yourself it doesn't matter how qualified you are, there is a ceiling.