SWE - Spring 2009 - (Page 67)

CAREER TOOLBOX appropriate, depend on your courage (yes, you have it) to enable you to speak to that person, explain calmly and rationally how the behavior affects you, and ask for a change. Similarly, when you believe you deserve a promotion or a raise, collect all of the necessary information to support your position, schedule a meeting with your boss, and demonstrate why you deserve it. Yes, hard work is always necessary — although not always sufficient — often you have to take it a step further and ask for what you deserve. SHOWING EMOTION. If you do react, is it OK to show emotion? When can you get angry? Is it ever acceptable for you to cry at the workplace? Yes, you can get angry, but we would strongly counsel against any yelling. If you do raise your voice, you will be branded forever with the “b” word and categorized as not being a team player. You can express your anger through the words you use and the boundaries you set. Tears are understandable when there has been a death in your family. But they are not appropriate when an insult is directed at you, when you do not get a project, receive a promotion you expected, or a performance evaluation does not go as well as you had hoped. HOW TO RECOVER. What if you do make a faux pas — either you yelled or cried or got your nose out of joint over a seemingly harmless comment from one of your coworkers? Like a violation of trust, you will have to work hard to earn back the respect of your colleagues one occasion at a time, one day at a time. Continuously act and speak professionally, though, and it will be possible to recover. self to take a moment to think first, before responding or perhaps purposefully choosing not to respond at all. Appropriate use of humor can help diffuse tension and lower the risk of an unbefitting emotional reaction. And, using your core values as a foundation to your behaviors will help you do this as readily as you say “please” or “thank you.” Using these tools (with the exception of your shovel!) will certainly help you find your voice. I Jill S. Tietjen, P.E., is a fellow life member of the Rocky Mountain Section. The president and CEO of Technically Speaking Inc., she served as the 1991-1992 national president of SWE. Mary D. Petryszyn is a life member of the Rocky Mountain Section. She serves as vice president of Civil Security and Response Programs at Raytheon and was the 2005 recipient of SWE’s Upward Mobility Award. Conclusion Expressing yourself can come more easily if you condition your- AWE? Inspiring. Outreach Assesment Tools Are Within Your Reach. Validate the Impact of your K-16 engineering outreach programs with AWE’s integrated suite of assessment products. These powerful tools, which cost you nothing, provide a number of key benefits that help you: - Identify and integrate best practices - Collect results that underpin guided decision making - Justify your activities or program to attract and sustain funding - Access expert-developed surveys that are off-the-shelf, straight-forward and easy for students to complete - Collect data on intended outcomes of a specific activity (e.g. pre-college, mentoring, self efficacy) through the use of targeted AWE instruments Make your outreach more effective and less time consuming today—visit www.swe.org/awe. Funded by the National Science Foundation: HRD 0120642, 0607081, 0010224, 0734072. SWE SPRING 2009 67 http://www.swe.org/awe http://www.swe.org/awe http://www.swe.org/awe

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of SWE - Spring 2009

SWE - Spring 2009 Heritage Club Contents President's Note View from the Executive Suite Editor’s Page Honoring Women’s History Public Policy Update First Lady: The “Second-Hardest Job in America” Bringing Science and Engineering into Public Policy At the Intersection of Engineering and Public Policy From Research to Reality Coffee Table Dialogues Membership Information & Calendar A&B Winning Essays from the Lava Lounge Engineering World: Issues • Events • Technology • People Point of View: Your Role in Public Policy Career Toolbox: Communicating with Congress; Finding Your Voice Corporate Partnership Council Media Shelf: Women’s History Opportunity Index SWE Scrapbook: Dressed for Success

SWE - Spring 2009

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