The Apple Maps Mishap App!

Everyone remembers the big fiasco over the Apple Maps. Yes? (http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/27/apple-fires-maps-manager/) Tim Cook even wrote an open letter to apologize to Apple users about it. Of course, brown nosers like NBC said the furor was “over blown” (http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/gadgetbox/apple-maps-furor-overblown-1B6071011). Well, I am here today to tell you that it wasn’t over blown. And contrary to what Wilson Rothman says, the US maps aren’t all that good.

I should have known better, really. After all, the last time I used the Apple Maps App, I ended being late for one of the most critical job interviews of my career. Not only was I late but the Executive Assistant had to explain to me how to get to the office from the very obscure place that the Apple Map had sent me.

But, after a rather embarrassing start, the interviews (all two days of them) went well and thankfully I got the job. Each day I acknowledge how fortunate I was that the folks at Altius and Ivy Bridge College, where I work, were able to look past my Apple Map mishap.

Despite of all that publicity, and even after having experience an Apple Map mishap myself, I am ashamed to say that last Thursday when I got into my rental car and realized that I had forgotten my GPS unit, I decided that I could just use my Apple Map.  I should have gone back for the darn GPS.

Ignoring the little voice inside my head, I thought, “Well I am only going to the Detroit Metro Airport.” Surely the Apple Map can’t get that wrong, as it’s a big and public place, right?

Wrong!

Now, I can’t blame it all on the app. I do have to take some of the credit. I did decide to use the thing. And when I saw the sign on the I-75 that said “Airport Exit,” I did decide to trust the technology instead of the sign. I also ignored the fact that it was estimating 1.5 hours from Toledo to the Detroit Metro, when usually I can get there in under an hour. But, hey I could have taken a wrong turn and caused the additional time through my own stupidity. I am probably one of the most geographically challenged people I know and that isn’t an exaggeration.

I also drove through an area of factories that I had never seen on the drive to the airport before. That was when I first started to become a little concerned that something might be off. When the freeway seemed to be going straight through down town Detroit I actually did start to become worried that something was seriously wrong. But again being as geographically challenged as I am, my lifeline was the darn Apple Maps App.

I didn’t want to call anyone because where I come from talking on my cell phone while driving because it is illegal where I come from and common sense tells me that it’s just plain dangerous, so I kept driving and hoping. But when the streets seemed to become filled with holes, and many of the buildings on either side of the road were completely burned out, I actually started to get frightened.

There were very few people out on the streets and those that were did not look like they were in very good condition. When the stupid Apple Maps App finally told me to turn onto Grinnell Street, I realized not only was I in a very dangerous place, but I was pretty sure that even if I managed to get myself to the airport, I wasn’t going to make my flight.

Forcing myself to calm, I pulled over and re-entered Detroit Metro Airport into the app. Perhaps I had just entered it wrong! NOPE! As far as the darn Apple Map App was concerned I was at the airport. So, I did the next best thing, I started to download the Google Maps App. Before it got half way through downloading, a very frightening looking person in ragged clothes, pockmarked face, and incredibly wild hair walked up to the car.

I was driving a rental car and in that moment of panic, I just couldn’t be sure that I had managed to activate the automatic door locks. So, I pulled out and started driving. I opened my contact list (that application actually works in the iPhone) and started blindly calling numbers. Abe Gruber, the Brand Manager at Altius was one of the first contacts in my list, so I clicked his number. Thankfully he answered.

Nearing the point of hysterics by now, I quickly blurted out my situation.  Thankfully, Abe, kept his calm and talked me out of the neighborhood. He stayed on the phone with me until I had calmed down and was able to re-orient myself. Not only that, he directed me to the airport, called the airlines on my behalf and rebooked me onto a later flight – which FYI came in at about an additional $1,000—thank you Apple.

Abe, I can’t thank you enough. Today, as I sit here grateful and humbled that I not only made it out of a very dangerous situation,  but that I got a flight to get me where I needed to be, is all thanks to you. Today, you are my hero. However, I am still left with the dilemma of the extra $1,000. What do you think I should do, send the invoice to Apple?

On Joy and my own Happiness Project

Last month I decided to start a happiness project (www.happiness-project.com). It almost seems a little silly to do this as I am actually very happy in my life right now. However, I am not always happy. I certainly wasn't very happy three months ago when Andrea Rhodes, the awesome Business Analyst in British Columbia, Canada gave me this book ironically titled "The Happiness Project!"

I think she was trying to tell me something and thank you, Andrea. Message received!

The thing is, I can sometimes behave in ways that aren't very conducive to the people around me being happy. AND, if I am honest with myself, there are occasions when I can be dark and moody when left to my own devices.

Some people would say, “that's normal” and quickly point to my high stress, high stakes job. They might also say, “look at all the people who depend on to make things work”. To keep things a float, and running smoothly, to make things happen. Some might even say, “look at the jobs that are dependent on your success”. Anyone would have dark moments under those kinds of conditions with all that stresses and adrenalin. Wouldn't they?

Some of that may be true, but sometimes I am not successful. This year before I left Thompson Rivers University, I tried very hard to create a permanent space for an incredibly talented manager that was working for me on a temporary basis and was unable to do so. Sometimes things just don't work out.

Currently I work for a startup. As indicated, high stakes for high potential rewards. But really you can’t let it stress you out and distract you because then you create your own self-fulfilling tragedy. And that's just not me--too stubborn for that. The important thing for me is how I handle all that stress and high stakes while not making it stressful for the people around me.

Which brings me back to the Happiness Project: I have decided to give Gretchen Rubin's tactical approach a try to see if it helps me be a better leader and to create an atmosphere of trust, clarity, and desire for those folks around me. After all, creating an atmosphere of trust, clarity, desire and without organizational inertia do tend to equal getting shit done (GSD). I do have a lot to do, and I think I can help my people have some fun and gain some valuable competencies along the way.

Now don't get me wrong this isn't some oh-so-altruistic endeavor. I totally buy into Rubin's notion that in order to be someone that other people are happy to be around, you have to be happy yourself. And I do want to be happy. It's one of those things that is selfish and not selfish at the same time. So here goes:

The focus of my Happiness Project will be to cultivate the following personal traits:
1. Forbearance
2. Mindfulness
3. Courage
4. Creativity
5. Humility

By forbearance, I mean the noun of patience, self-control; restraint, and tolerance, not the legal definition of not making someone pay back a loan. Mindfulness, to me is simply awareness, but I do think the traditional Buddhist perspective on mindfulness is also relevant to generally being aware. However, for my Happiness Project what I really mean is to be mindful of others feelings, situations, needs, etc. Courage is the ability to confront your fears, pain, and for my uncertainty. I also want have moral courage, which is the ability to do the right thing even in the face of opposition.  Creativity to me brings in a real higher order of thinking and being. Some people believe that creativity is a fundamental human compunction, but I want to be consciously creative and bring a creative spirit to those around me. Finally, I want to cultivate the quality of humility, the ability to be modest and to respect others. I think this one will be the hardest, which is why I have left it to the last.

Unlike Gretchen Rubin, whose Happiness Project lasted a year; mine will only last six months. One month for each virtue and the final month to bring it all together.

The basic rules are that once you start working a virtue, you can’t just stop practicing it because that month is over and you are moving on to the next virtue. The second rule is that in order to work on the virtue, you have to do practical things that you can track in a chart. Rubin also advises to come up with your own set of commandments around or truths that you have learned through living life. Those will have to wait. For now, here are the things I will practice between now and the end of March 2013 to build the virtue of forbearance:

1.      Listen without interrupting – this is a very bad habit of mine because I am pretty good at anticipating what someone will say next.

2.      Ask questions before or rather than give direction—I always want to fix peoples problems for them when really they will feel much more empowered and engaged if they formulate their own ideas about what do to

3.      Strive to understand the other person’s point of view before making a snap judgment by making sure they agree with my understanding before moving on to problem solving.

Impatience and the lack of tolerance tend to come from a lack of understanding of the other person. If I get these three things right then I should be able to be more patient and be sincerely tolerant of other people’s needs and perspectives. I will be tracking my progress on one of Rubin’s nifty charts off of her website, which I will use to summarize my progress at the end of March. In the meantime, I would be very interested in hearing about the things YOU do to bring happiness into your life!

When in San Francisco, it pays to kick off the six inch pointy heels and take a walk around

The first couple of times I came to San Francisco I wasn’t impressed. It was in the October-November time frame, apparently San Fran’s mid and late summer. It rained every day. On the days it wasn’t raining, there was fog each morning. I’ve been told there is an entire side of San Francisco that gets fog every day!

The place appeared dank, dirty, and filled with tall cold buildings and busy rushing people.  It seemed more like I would expect New York to be (I’ve never been to New York, only the New York airports). My dour perceptions probably weren’t helped by the fact that on previous trips I arrived late, went from hotel to sky scraper officer, back to the hotel, then out for dinner, usually via cab, with the occasional short walk thrown in there somewhere. Admittedly the restaurants were amazing.

I will also admit that this approach is simply NOT the way to experience San Francisco.  I am a bit of a work-a-holic, so getting me out and about is not always that easy. However, this trip I came out with a colleague and friend from Oxford Cambridge, whom I endearingly refer to as my Adventurous Brit. Fortunately for me, took pity on my aversion to adventures and dragged me along on his various journeys.

On our first night in the San Fran, we went to Greens at Fort Mason. Green’s (http://www.greensrestaurant.com/) is a gourmet vegetarian restaurant (the Adventurous Brit happens to be a vegetarian). It’s a beautiful restaurant with an amazing view of harbor and has a great reputation. I actually didn’t find the food lived up to all the hype, but dinner was nice (the wine… not so much). It was Sunday February 3, the night of the Super Bowl, and getting a cab became a bit of a challenge. After waiting in the restaurant for about 30 minutes we decided to walk out and find a bus. Before I go any further, I need to let you know that I was wearing designer boots with six inch pointy heels and it was some time after 10:30 pm.

Fortunately, the bus was only a block away. Unfortunately, it was going to be a 15 minute wait and my Adventurous Brit friend was not prepared to wait that long. I quickly found myself walking down an unlit path in what seemed to be a large dark park! Did I mention I was wearing six inch pointy heels? I was just about to dig those heels in and refuse to go any further when I noticed what I assumed was our cab out of the corner of my eye. Needless to say, it’s not the boots you’re wearing but the way you wear them, and I did manage to get to the road fast enough for the cab to see me(alright the Adventurous Brit probably arrived first) and we were able to secure a warm and safe ride back to the hotel.

The next night, after an exciting and exhausting day at the office, the Adventurous Brit and I headed towards the tram. He’s a bit of a tram nut and filled with loads of tram trivia and was thoroughly enjoying San Francisco’s diverse array of historical street cars. We got lucky and caught one of his favorite trams, and immediately after we realized we were waiting on the wrong side of the street. It is a tram from Milan Italy (http://www.streetcar.org/streetcars/1895/), built in the 1970’s and one of the last of its kind. The thing is all wooden seats and doors with big glass windows. It is beautiful inside and out. The tram ride was exciting, the twelve block walk in six inch pointy heels to the restaurant wasn’t so great, but I did start to notice some of the interesting architecture along the way (http://www.archdaily.com/99780/architecture-city-guide-san-francisco/). I will also admit here that the Adventurous Brit introduced me to a wonderful thing called J-walking. Have you ever tried it? Apparently Brits do all the time and so do San Franciscans it seems.

Dinner the second night was actually quite a bit more interesting. The restaurant? The Thai Idea Veggie restaurant (http://thaiideaveggie.com)(another vegetarian restaurant).  The food was excellent—cooked but not soft. The portions were generous, the spice was just enough, and the service was very good. Of course the price was about ¼ of the more expensive Greens.

We cabbed it back to the hotel because, ahem six inch pointy heels, and I wanted to stop at the Designer Shoe Warehouse—of course! For those of you who don’t know, the Designer Shoe Warehouse (www.dsw.com) is this amazing place where you can get designer shoes at a greatly reduced price. The DSW in San Francisco happens to be four stories high, and I was eager to work my way through each floor.  Unfortunately, the address for the DSW in San Francisco is 400 Post Street, which is actually the address for the Chase Manhattan Bank! If you are in the same situation I was (with the Adventurous Brit only along for the ride as far as the Shoe Warehouse so he could walk the rest of the way to the hotel, planning to leave me to indulge myself in shoe heaven) and you find yourself in a cab on a busy street with the meter running and no Designer Shoe Warehouse in sight. Well, disappointedly when I couldn’t see anything but the bank where the DSW was supposed to be, I asked the cabby to continue on to our hotel—my Adventurous Brit had already abandoned me.

However, not to be thwarted, I called the DSW and found out that the store is actually located on the 400 block along Post Street, but between Sutter and Powell. The following night I made a lone venture and, wearing runners –I was starting to really wise up and get the hang of this walking San Fran thing—made my way the 12 or so blocks from the hotel to the DSW. I must say it was more than worth the effort. I went into the DSW with a budget of $200 for a pair of shoes and a pair of boots. I spent $163 and left with two pairs of boots and three pairs of shoes, all with the help of two lovely young men who happened to be in the woman’s section trying on shoes for themselves.  

All those great shoe finds created an entirely new dilemma of how to get the shoes home. I did say my Adventurous Brit from Oxford was a rather nice bloke, yes? Thankfully, he had room in his travel case and agreed to take the two largest pairs back to the East Coast with him. At the time of writing I can tell you that they made it there safe and sound.

The final night with my Adventurous Brit found us taking  bus 14 a rather long way from the San Fran Financial District to a less touristy and slightly more risky part of town to the Udopia Palace Indian Restaurant. Again, the Adventurous Brit lived up to his growing reputation of adventure tour guide and found us the best restaurant yet. We knew we were on to something good by the lineup outside the restaurant. Once inside the smell of curry surrounded us and we were promptly seated. The food took a little long to arrive, that said they were packed from end-to-end, but it was definitely worth the wait—good, hot, authentic and filling. If you decide to give it a try, don’t forget cash or your checkbook as they don’t take Visa or Debit.

The last two nights I was on my own as my colleague, that Adventuresome Brit, had to head back to our eastern headquarters, but all that exploring made me a little more aware of how beautiful and interesting San Francisco actually was and caused me to have a second look at my surroundings . Admittedly I didn’t really look much farther than the hotel as I’m not that adventurous.  I had always enjoyed the Hyatt Regency at Embarcadero, but I’d never really enjoyed it beyond the obvious—open floor to ceiling atrium, glass elevators, spacious rooms, beautiful views. What I hadn’t noticed was that beautiful Embarcadero Park was right behind the hotel, or that you could rent a bike 10 meters from the front door. The trams are less than a block away and the waterfront about two—OK I knew that! There are also two museums and a “sort of museum” all within a block of the Hyatt.

The point of the story is simple? If it hadn’t been for my colleague the Adventuresome Brit, I might still think San Francisco was a dank and dreary place. I have come to the conclusion that when in San Francisco, it pays to kick off the six inch pointy heels and take a walk around.

“And you believe THAT because you read it in a book?”

“And you believe THAT because you read it in a book?” sniped an employee of mine in response to something I had shared as we were getting off a plane in some far away destination in Europe. Of course, anyone who knows me knows that I read A LOT of books, and learn something from most of them. I tend to have a passion for learning new things. So, the fact that I enthusiastically shared something new was nothing special on this particular day.  That person’s response to me not only discounted the hundreds and possibly thousands of books that I had read before and whose content would have gone into my thinking, but also the forty some years of life I had lived and brought to bear when considering the subject covered by this one book.

But what was the real intent this person was expressing?  Were they saying that getting knowledge from books is stupid? No! In fact, I have since come to understand this type of behavior for what it is—sniper behavior. Sniping behavior is typically something undertaken by a person who sees you as getting in their way or who resents you for some reason. They see you as opposition, or they have a grievance of some sort against you but can’t attack you directly so they do it in devious ways through rude comments, sarcastic humor, or a biting tone of voice.[i]

Did I know that this person resented and disrespected me? Absolutely, I had heard the nasty comments made when I wasn’t in the room from more than one source. However, I hadn’t really done anything to find out why this person had a grievance against me. So, the sniping behavior really shouldn’t have caught me off guard as much as it did at the time, but it certainly did.

According to Brinkman and Kirschner, authors of a great book called Dealing With People You Can’t Stand, the best way to handle a sniper is to develop an attitude of amused curiosity in the moment, then later try to understand what the real grievance is that underlies the behavior.  Instead of taking it personally, which I certainly did at the time, these experts advise you to “get curious enough to focus on the sniper instead of yourself.” According to these folks, people who snip are actually quite insecure and the best way to protect yourself from a sniper is to think of them as an insecure grade school kid teasing in a mean way—“I know you are but what am I?” Did I have the maturity and fortitude to understand my responsibility as the leader and senior person in the situation and respond accordingly? Absolutely not! I responded like the get it done, tank-like person that I can be and instead replied, “No, so and so, that would be STUPID, don’t you think!”

Of course I now know that a more reasonable and productive approach would be to stop and repeat back to this employee exactly what they had said to me, in order to bring attention to the bad behavior. Something like this, “So, you think that gaining knowledge from books is a bad thing?” Then, if I had my wits about me and had I read Brinkman’s and Krsichner’s book before-hand, I might have followed up with a few good “searchlight” type questions, such as, “do you think there is something wrong with getting knowledge from books?” “Do you never read books to gain knowledge?” “Why do you think it is bad for me to read books in order to gain knowledge?” These questions would have put a real spot light on the silliness of the snipe. And if I had been doing my job properly in the first place, I would have taken the time before the sniper behavior started appearing and done my best to understand and address this persons grievance before it grew into the ugly situation that it did.

I have often wished that had handled that particular situation better and not responded so hotly. That is why I was so excited when I recognized the behavior and situation in the Kirschner and Brinkman book. Yes, I am still getting hyped about cool stuff I read in books.  I will never know whether or not it would have helped the situation if I had used some of the strategies they write about. After all, there are always going to be some people whose expectations you can simply never live up to. That said, if I done what I knew was the right thing to do in the first place, and if had used some of the strategies outlined in Brinkman’s and Kirschner’s book, I would have certainly felt a lot better about my own behavior.

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[i] Brinkman R., and Kirschner R., Dealing With People You Can’t Stant, McGaw Hill, NY: 2002