Mutual Mentoring and Reciprocity

Last week I had an interesting and thought provoking experience, I received a phone call from an acquaintance who like me is recently unemployed, in hi-tech and wants to find gainful employment.

We met up and discussed our respective situations having worked together for awhile in the past. During our chat I asked to see their resume and likewise my acquaintance politely asked to see mine.

We more or less at the same time began to offer suggestions and ideas to each other, brainstorming how we seek jobs, interview techniques, books and blogs we look at and people to network with.

Then it occurred to me that this kind of mutual mentoring, critiqueing resumes, cover letters, offering suggestions and guidance to each other was immensely beneficial.

I won't suggest this comes close to using a professional career or resume coach or benefiting from input and direction from a Headhunter/ Recruiter however our shared experiences and knowledge were certainly greater together than apart.

Simply put this was an application of a previous idea http://clanrossconcepts.blogspot.com/2008/12/shared-knowledge-or-skills-is-power.html that I had written of in this blog.

I want to expand on this idea and see if we can't build a strong and vital community/ network of professionals who even after they find their next job find a way to mutually mentor and contribute to others in this way. If you have ideas on the subject then do contact or comment. If you want to meet up then let me know too. Sometimes it might just be enough to help someone see things in a more positive light when the job search looks tough.

So now I one more thing to fit into my schedule but what could be better than an idea like this?

My Espresso Machine: Part 2 - A broken part

Last week I was tamping the coffee grinds into the portafilter cup ... the aluminum cup with a black insulated handle that holds the grinds and the heated water passes thru under pressure to make the espresso; I had been a little ill and not paying attention to how I was applying strength to things.

I placed the filled portafilter cup and rotated it and a rather loud snap left me with the handle in my hand and the rest of the aluminum part locked in place.

Had I been alone my first response would probably have been to let rip with a string of vernacular to make a sailor blush but my Mrs and the little guy always seem to help me control that urge just by being there. One brief visit into the laundy room later I was expletive free and of a mindset to resolve this issue until I could get a replacement part.

Oh sure, just manage without the coffee machine until the part arrives. Wait who said that? I'm not sure if my MacGyver like skills come from a natural ability, inherited from several generations back or simple necessity.

First attempt was to repair the handle using epoxy resin. Aluminum apparently is no great friend of this compound. The Mrs was ecstatic I didn't glue my fingers together in a caffeine withdrawal frenzy. After she managed to stop guffawing, sorry it was more of a giggle, she's way to lady-like to guffaw (especially at me) she reminded me that in the Sparta-like society that is Israel the ER woul probably just hacksaw my fingertips apart and better to find another solution.

I wrapped my cerebellum around several other trials with less than success until I arrived at an almost perfect solution: an adjustable locking wrench from my toolbox.

This was one of my earlier purchases for my toolbox and as such it was cheap. It's a tool I have been meaning to replace when I have the chance with one that works better. I can use the espresso machine now but once in awhile the wrench springs open of its own volition to a hearty and poorly timed crash.

Oh well until I get the replacement part.

My Espresso Machine: Part 1

For 7 months now I have had an Espresso machine at home. I know, you are thinking that my coffee consumption skyrocketed and I am mainlining caffeine.. nope actually the opposite, I savor my 2-3 cups a day. So thanks Mum and Dad for buying us this when you were visiting in the summer.

I have made it my business to explore the different coffee beans available here in Modiin and try each of them to see who gives me the best cup of coffee. There was a point where my wife was bringing me fresh ground beans back from an international coffee chain in Hertzliya where she works but frankly this coffee didn't stand up to my criteria.

Personally, its a balance of the following: -

• Flavor - I like my coffee strong and rich; I'm an espresso drinker so it can't be insipid.
• Not too strong - unlike some extended family members (u know who you are) I don't believe the coffee should be used for launching the shuttle, defibrillating heart attack victims or for stripping paint off the walls of the cellar when flood waters receed.
• Caffeine - recent research has shown multiple therapeutic benefits for caffeine/ coffee; for allergies, asthma and the like .. duhh!!! I've had medical professionals scoff at me saying that coffee helps me more than steroids during allergy season for years .. hate to say it but I told you so. Note: coffee and all caffeine should be used responsibly. This works for me but I don't recommend it to anyone else. Caffeine can and will interact negatively with certain medications.
• Strength - strong but not so strong you need to buy stock in antacid.

I'm kind of surprised that up until now there is no single social network out there solely based on a love of coffee.

Anyhow, for those of you familiar with Monty Python's Meaning of Life there are days when you might just find me in front of my Morphy Richards Espresso Machine chanting .. "Oh Espresso Machine, you are so big... you are so very great!"

If you didn't get it, this was a just a little bit tongue on cheek. lol.

Israeli Hi-tech, rapid exits, government and incentives

Israel has long been famous for its hi-tech know-how. Many companies have flourished here and most have raced for the rapid exit.

This seems to fit a profile along with the persona that Israeli hi-tech personnel are known for .. super assertive, strong willed and not afraid to state their case. There are corporations who purchase Israeli companies who then add to their corporate websites articles to employees explaining the cultural background to this to ensure that employees from other countries aren't too shocked by all this.

However, it is the rapid exit part that concerns me. Every private company, its founders and investors are in business to make money and who can criticize that but, as a country surely we also need hi-tech companies that grow long term and flourish here in Israel.

I read this week that our govenrment and obviously (in this case) PM Netanyahu amongst them wants to offer incentives for just this.

As a country we can ill afford to allow all this know-how and technology to migrate so rapidly to the US particularly given the attitudes of the current adminstration to Israel and the increasing talk of offshore R&D being bad for US employment (this being a misrepresentation at best and ignorant naivete at worst).

For our country to flourish and progress, to offer greater employment opportunities and open satellite offices or parterships abroad we need to find the best ways possible to show that the rapid exit is not always best.

My thoughts on spam or, the guy on the bus starts whispering to you about ... WHAT!

Having dealt with the issue of malware eating my C drive and reinstalling I took some time to clean my different email inboxes.

My webmail connected to this blog has been onset with spam comments (mainly in kanji) and a local Modiin politician who should really know better has repeatedly snubbed my requests for him to remove my Netvision email address from his mailing list.

1. If someone came up to you on a bus, train or in the street and started telling and selling this unsolicited stuff to you how would you respond? Those of you who know me well know exactly how I would respond to this.

2. Why do we have to put up with this? As consumers isn't it time we started yelling to the ISP's and anti-malware / anti-spam developers to create more offensive tools that allow us to fight back.

3. Why won't the ISP block specific email addresses or even domains on demand - there has to be money in it for them?

I remember installing my first antivirus and my first firewall and deleting my first spam mail.
I would like to remember after all this my first day where my mail is spam free and my web surfing is alert free, wouldn't you?

How malware ate my Desktop PC .. what I learnt.

Like any of us if enough time goes by in peace and quiet we get complacent and don't follow our own established procedures. That's what happened to me two weeks ago. My PC was infected with a particularly nasty bit of malware.. due to my complacency and probably a tired click on the wrong link.

It was very late and I was tired, already a recipe for IT disaster :-) and the next morning I booted up my PC none the wiser. I had been running my Antivirus as part of Panda Internet Security regularly but since all was reasonably quiet I had not been running an additional anti-spyware program frequently enough.

I had Windows Defender installed and MalwareBytes but was only getting around to running them about once a month.

As I said I booted the PC and after typing my password went to get a cup of coffee. On my return Windows XP was reporting a problem with OS files having been overwritten and this was the first sign that something was seriously wrong.

I couldn't run Panda or either of the anti-spyware programs, no executables or OS folders could be found throught search, Explorer or via DOS either locally, over the workgroup and finally no Disk On Key Apps could be run.

So I tried a System Restore .. nope.

Then I tried a Repair from the Boot Disk .. my Administrator password was not recognized.

Several inappropriate words later I deciced to try backing up my data, PST etc to an external drive .. luckilly this worked. Then of course I opened my laptop and used it to scan the external drive as deep as it could go using Panda, Spybot Search and Destroy and MalwareBytes.

I decided to cut my attempts at repairing the damage short and just reformat and reinstall the OS and programs.

To cut a long story short, the PC is up and running better than ever with more stringent security; what did I learn?

• 
  
  Complacency is one step before disaster.
  
  
  
• 
  
  Backup, backup, backup.
  
  
  
• 
  
  Keep all your data on a separate partition and preferably sync it to a remote or network store.
  
  
  
• 
  
  Keep a list safe (hardcopy in this case) of all your license keys for all your software.
  
  
  
• 
  
  It's worth having a reminder for scheduled antivirus and antispyware scans.
  
  
  
• 
  
  If you even suspect that you clicked on the wrong thing or the PC is acting strange then run your security programs. 
  
  
  

Cellular Hack *81

Yesterday I saw I had a message on my Windows Mobile phone and half paying attention dialed *80 to access my voicemail.

Actually I had dialled *81 and I hung up after several seconds and redialled to discover that by dialling *81 I had activated voicemail recording from my phone.

So the next time you want to have a spy moment or you are in a meeting/ interview you want to keep a discreet record of, try dialing *81 and for the cost of the call you can record the proceedings to your voicemail box.

Now to test other * codes on the phone and see what they do.