Bettica Services, LLC

Dave and I have officially started an LLC, coined Bettica Services after the name of our shipduring the test in Italy. For more information, check out my old post on the Italy trial at the old web site.

I've been thinking a lot lately that negative experiences, particularly extremely negative experiences, end up making us who we are and giving us clearer pictures of our goals in life. For instance, I hadn't really thought deeply about what the hell I was still doing in my old job, wasting my life and effort away as a technical test engineer, until I was diving solo underneath the hull of the Bettica while the dry dock was half full. For those of you who don't know, half full would mean that a good deal of the weight holding the 400 foot ship on it's makeshift wooden stands was displaced while I dove into a cramped space directly under an entire warship and all its inhabitants, who were good enough to keep running heavy machinery while I was underneath the ship. Plus, the wind was bad that day, you could feel the drydock moving, and the waves were pretty rough too.

I have to say the act of tying a safety line before filling the drydock and wondering how much time I would have between hearing a crack in one of the supports and the whole shebang squishing me into human nutella to grab the line and attempt an escape. My one saving thought that if the ship came off its rocker and I survived, I would immediately exit the water, run up to the room where the test equipment was stored, and strangle the test lead with my bare hands. But I digress . . .

The fact is, that this experience, piled upon all the bad experiences in Italy and afterwards, ultimately had a very positive effect on my life. Even though it took a year of a hatred-filled haze and months of frustration, it payed off in the end. I got out of killing myself to do technical work that made other people feel good. I got a 10% raise to go to my new job that I enjoy in an environment that actually cares about it's employees.

It also provides perspective, and calibrates you to find out exactly how much you can take and still be standing.

I never considered myself a leader. But after experiencing such bad leadership, I am compelled to jump into every situation and ensure it is being performed to a level of my satisfaction and to my standards. I used to dread picking up the phone, still stuck in my old "highest-scoring introvert" phase. Now I call meetings that involve highly technical, political, social, and economic issues and feel at home doing it on a daily, if not hourly, basis.

The total incompetence of the people at my old job is another motivational tool. When I was still there, I used to believe that being the best in an environment of incompetence was enough. Now, I realize that in order to derive satisfaction from such a place, there has to be a place to go. What good is it being the best if the worthless people surrounding you are paid an identical amount? But if you find a place that actually rewards performance and does not just pay lip service to it, you can stay motivated.

Weakness is another trait of the people I worked with before. The majority of people were merely leeches on society and perfectly happy to be that way. They had lost all point in their work life. They were just riding the check for their whole lives. I can understand how you reach this point, particularly if you have no self esteem and are too weak to stand up for yourself. But how can you live with yourself, just going to work, not having any redeeming qualities, accomplishing nothing day in and day out? Even if you are working hard and producing results, all of the goals of your work were hollow, confused, and utterly pointless. Do you really want to spend most of your life in a concrete building, wasting away to nothing and accomplishing nothing except the excrement you leave in the bathroom?

I'm so glad I got out of there. But in all, my previous work experience was very rewarding in developing my new work mantra. You need to focus your efforts on your goals, and be sure that the goals you are setting are your own. You have to be strong and never hesitate. And you have to have some goal that is worth achieving in your work.

Unless I find and keep these things in my work, I can finally be happy in what I do. And of course, to satisfy my technical, hands-on needs, we have started the an aborist service under Bettica Services, LLC (see habit hobbies below). Yet another outlet to keep the dream alive.

Finally . . . . .