Jennifer Dulski

President & COO at Change.org

昨天是父親節，Dulski 分享在她父親身上學到的 5 個學問：

1. Don’t work with jerks.

life is too short to spend it working with people you don’t respect or who don’t respect you. The thing to remember is that you have a choice and a voice in who you work with. If someone is treating you poorly, and attempts to resolve the situation don’t improve it, you can always consider moving to another team or even another company.

2. Break down questions.

The ability to break down big questions into smaller parts and to estimate the answers to questions you don’t yet have enough data to solve is extremely useful in a wide variety of careers and general life moments.

My team and I use this skill regularly now in choosing which projects to prioritize. Since we rarely know the impact of something before we build and launch it, we first estimate impact and then test to see if our hypothesis was correct.

3. Never start a sentence with an apology.

When people begin a presentation, a pitch, or really any sentence with an apology, like, “This might be a bad idea, but…,” or “I’m not an expert, but….” My dad says it immediately removes your credibility with others such that.

We should do our best to make sure our ideas were good, base them on data & insights, make them creative, etc. – but no matter what, we shouldn’t apologize for them before stating them. Some ideas may be better than others, and that is ok.

4. Disappointment can be more effective than anger.

When managers comes to me asking how to handle a situation where someone on their team has underperformed their expectations, I tell them that sometimes just expressing your disappointment in that person can be a more effective strategy than getting upset. Be expressing disappointment, you also express that you believe the person can do better. It shows you do have faith in them and in their potential.

5. Be present.

When I look back on my childhood and young adult years, in addition to all the tips and lessons my dad taught me, one of the things I remember so clearly is that he was always there. He showed his love for me and his appreciation for the things I did by showing up to support me. Even in the middle of a work day, if I had an important event, my dad was almost always there.