AUGIWorld Magazine November/December 2007

Is there room to advance at your firm? As you investigate the possibility of moving higher in the ranks, you need to find out if there is anywhere you can go. Is there a higher level in your current area of expertise? CAD managers are often the highest ranking person in CAD for your office. If that is true for you, then you may need to think about moving to another firm or moving into another area of technology. Can you oversee all of IT? Are there multiple offices that need oversight? Can you support software packages other than CAD? CAD Standard is ignored? Can’t you be just a little more lenient in your devotion to quality? Are you the only one who cares? If you find that you are the lone voice of reason among chaos, then focus on changing people’s perspectives, one person at a time. Is your life in balance? Are you advancing your skills? This question needs to stay at the forefront of your thoughts. You got to the level of CAD manager through a series of everexpanding skills. This isn’t the time to rest on your laurels—you need to keep moving ahead. How long has it been since you spent money or time on training yourself? How many new talents have you added in the last year? What have you done to increase your understanding of technology and your people skills? If you have been reading anything I have been writing in this publication or on my blog, you know that people skills will take you to the next level only when they are built on an everexpanding base of technical skills. Are you sharpening your skills? This may be the most important question you need to ask yourself. Are you working too much? Is your family playing second fiddle to your work life? Are there some things that can wait until later to complete so you can go home before the sun sets? Do your family and friends think you work too much? Is there a game that your kids are involved in that you need to go watch? Are you spending time at the dinner table with the family or eating cold chicken while your spouse tucks the kids in bed because you came home late…again? Maybe this is the first area of questions you need to answer. When you take the time to start thinking about all areas of work and life you may come up with some areas that need to be redefined, refocused, or re-energized. Take the time to think. Take a lunch period away from your desk, away from your office, and away from your co-workers. Think about one area from the list above. Maybe you should turn off the radio on the way to work in the morning, or get up a little earlier to stop for a cup of coffee at (Fill in your favorite coffee spot.) Sit in the back booth and take a few minutes to think. Make notes on what you are thinking. Don’t let the time be wasted by not having a record of what you decided to do. Keep on asking yourself tough questions. Challenge your own ideas. Don’t settle for “good enough” unless it actually is good enough. Ponder the process you have set up. Probe the procedures you have in place. Look for areas to improve in yourself, your environment, and your firm. Mark W. Kiker is a member-at-large on the AUGI Board of Directors. Mark is a National CAD Standards Project Team Member and team member of the National BIM Standard. He is the General Editor of BLAUGI and also publishes caddmanager.com, the CADD Managers Journal, and the caddmanager.com blog. He is a returning faculty member at Autodesk University. He is currently Chief Information Officer for HMC Architects in Ontario, California. 5 Making time to think What is wrong with this picture? Looking for something that is not there is difficult. Finding what is missing can be tedious. Take a good long look at everything you do at work. Act as if you were someone else, such as a coworker who interacts with you. Look at yourself from your boss’s perspective. Answer the following questions as if you were someone else filling out a questionnaire on your work life. Is he (meaning “you”) providing value to the firm? Is she a model employee? Is he making an impact on others? Is she making an impact on the bottom line? Do people like her? Is he dependable? Is there anything about her that annoys you? Is he doing what you expect him to do? Are you disappointed with her level of productivity and progress? Are you living in reality? Get real—you don’t really think that all this CAD stuff matters so much, right? Sometimes you just need to do a reality check. Are you focused on the right things? Do these issues really matter to anyone else? Does it really matter if the Nov/Dec 2007 http://www.trainingtutorial.com http://caddmanager.com http://caddmanager.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of AUGIWorld Magazine November/December 2007

AUGIWorld Magazine November/December 2007 Table of Contents The CAD Manager Education & Training Finance Training Google Earth: Now Showing in AutoCAD Civil 3D Get Your Input Here A Good First Impression, Part 2 Share and Share Alike Who's Using Revit MEP? Ready… Get Set… Properties! On the Back Page: The Brazilian Model

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