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canyonwalkerNYC Quickie Travelog #1
OAK airport - Sun, 23 Mar 2025, 8:30am
This morning I'm off to New York City. For work. Yes, on a Sunday morning. And not even comfortably late morning. To catch my 9:20am departure out of Oakland Airport— not the closest to home— I set my alarm for 6:30am.
Why NYC? And why sacrifice half of my weekend for work— especially when I haven't yet caught up on taking comp time for when I sacrificed my weekend two weeks ago? Would you believe I volunteered for it. In fact I didn't just volunteer, I basically demanded it. 😣
My company's doing a sales training program Monday and Tuesday in NYC. It's not for everyone; it's for a small, hand-picked tiger team. I heard about it last Monday from a colleague, Mike, who was chosen for the team and asked if I'd be there. "I haven't heard anything about it,' I answered, "Holy shit, you're not on the list," Mike said, checking the calendar. "I can't believe they didn't invite you."
Mike and I discussed it a bit and decided it would really make sense for me to go. I ran by him a 3- or 4 sentence request I'd send to my department head. He agreed with my wording and added he'd tell his sales VP that not including me was "nuts". The VP would be sure to add... persuasion. I sent the message off to my department head right away, while Mike delayed in pinging his VP to give my director time to do the right thing.
Long story short, an invite came through to me by the end of the day. My director was kind of a dick about it, though. 🙄 Maybe the sales VP was too... persuasive... with him. 😅
Once I was invited to the meeting, though, I started to have second thoughts about it. I made my case for going because I hate being left out. This training is for our new product, and people who participate in it this week will be the tip of the spear. We'll be the first to scale up selling it— and in the process we'll learn what works and what doesn't work, and communicate that back to improve the training, and possibly even the product, before they scale out to the rest of the sales organization. Blazing the trail and then paving a path for others to follow in sales is what I do.
But once I got the invite I felt a bit like the dog who always chases cars and finally catches one. Did I really want this? Did I really want to burn half my weekend just to be first? I could lay back like the other 80% of the team and take things as they come— and enjoy my damn weekend. The weather's going to be beautiful back home today, 72° and sunny. I would've gone hiking. Instead I got up early, trudged to the airport, and will spend most of the day playing Planes, Trains, and Automobiles to get to New York where the high temp is in the low 50s and it's supposed to rain tomorrow.
OAK airport - Sun, 23 Mar 2025, 8:30am
This morning I'm off to New York City. For work. Yes, on a Sunday morning. And not even comfortably late morning. To catch my 9:20am departure out of Oakland Airport— not the closest to home— I set my alarm for 6:30am.
Why NYC? And why sacrifice half of my weekend for work— especially when I haven't yet caught up on taking comp time for when I sacrificed my weekend two weeks ago? Would you believe I volunteered for it. In fact I didn't just volunteer, I basically demanded it. 😣
My company's doing a sales training program Monday and Tuesday in NYC. It's not for everyone; it's for a small, hand-picked tiger team. I heard about it last Monday from a colleague, Mike, who was chosen for the team and asked if I'd be there. "I haven't heard anything about it,' I answered, "Holy shit, you're not on the list," Mike said, checking the calendar. "I can't believe they didn't invite you."
Mike and I discussed it a bit and decided it would really make sense for me to go. I ran by him a 3- or 4 sentence request I'd send to my department head. He agreed with my wording and added he'd tell his sales VP that not including me was "nuts". The VP would be sure to add... persuasion. I sent the message off to my department head right away, while Mike delayed in pinging his VP to give my director time to do the right thing.
Long story short, an invite came through to me by the end of the day. My director was kind of a dick about it, though. 🙄 Maybe the sales VP was too... persuasive... with him. 😅
Once I was invited to the meeting, though, I started to have second thoughts about it. I made my case for going because I hate being left out. This training is for our new product, and people who participate in it this week will be the tip of the spear. We'll be the first to scale up selling it— and in the process we'll learn what works and what doesn't work, and communicate that back to improve the training, and possibly even the product, before they scale out to the rest of the sales organization. Blazing the trail and then paving a path for others to follow in sales is what I do.
But once I got the invite I felt a bit like the dog who always chases cars and finally catches one. Did I really want this? Did I really want to burn half my weekend just to be first? I could lay back like the other 80% of the team and take things as they come— and enjoy my damn weekend. The weather's going to be beautiful back home today, 72° and sunny. I would've gone hiking. Instead I got up early, trudged to the airport, and will spend most of the day playing Planes, Trains, and Automobiles to get to New York where the high temp is in the low 50s and it's supposed to rain tomorrow.
no subject
Date: 2025-03-25 10:55 am (UTC)(Or that you send some to us! It's been like a week of horrible grey days, and it's starting to wear).
~Sor
no subject
Date: 2025-03-25 11:41 am (UTC)