This is a sensitive topic and some feelings may be hurt, so stop reading if you can’t handle it. I don’t have all the answers and my advice is based on my experiences and observations, but I hope this post will help at least one person realize they are hurting others and they will change their behavior.

I’ve been a women working in male dominated industries for more than 30 years. I’ve either been very lucky, clueless or naive, but I haven’t been subjected to any of the loathsome, boorish behavior of bullying, intimidation, and objectification of women in tech that I’ve been reading and hearing about lately. I think one thing that’s helped me be successful and enjoy my work in tech, is my understanding of men and their code of conduct. Sharing it with you might help you too.

Men – My Experiences

I grew up with 6 wild uncles and followed my father around on weekends where he played ball, hunted, fished, farmed, and occasionally went to the Eagles’ Club. I played pickup games with the neighbor boys. We had BB gun wars and the odd scuffle.

I’ve worked with men in the Army, electronics field, and IT. I went to college first in electronics, then EE, then CS. There weren’t a lot of women in any of those experiences. In general, I am far more comfortable dealing with men than I am dealing with women.

Hopefully I can provide some insight for women who haven’t spent the leisure time with men that I have.

Man Pressure

Men have this thing I call “Man Pressure”. It’s the pressure to perform and deliver and to maintain face. They are always in competition. They have this whole Lord of the Flies interaction with each other as boys, and that continues into adulthood. They find a way to either win or survive as boys, and later try to find a place where they can either excel or survive as adults.

Women tend to frighten the more insecure men because women can expose them to ridicule from the other guys. A women beating them at anything is sure to trigger this response from the group. Especially if the woman does anything to draw attention to her victory. Where it’s OK for a man to needle and boast in front of other men, a woman doing so will cause the man to lose face. From what I can tell, it’s like a woman calling out a fashion faux pax made by another woman.

A lot of men in tech weren’t the Alpha males in high school and have bad memories of being ridiculed and embarrassed. Now they have a comfortable club of men in tech where their skills matter more than their athletic ability, body shape, or hygiene. Teenage girls are mean, and the more insecure guys are afraid that the women entering their world are the same cruel creatures they escaped.

You can avoid triggering those insecurities. Show them you’re not the same kind of girl that was mean to them. Don’t make competition personal and don’t share personal judgements about them. Be a team mate, not a competitor. Celebrate their accomplishments with them.

How to Handle a Bully

Bullying can be a response to the insecurities that some of these men have about interacting with a woman in their workplace. It doesn’t matter whether you understand the code or not – bullying and aggressive language and behavior is unacceptable!

• Confront bullying and aggression head on. Call it out and let the aggressor know you won’t accept that behavior.
• If the bullying or aggression happens publicly, call it out in public. Do it at the first sign of trouble, accepting it is viewed as a sign of weakness.
• Don’t get personal in your judgements. Keep the conversation about expectations and the results.
• Be calm and factual. Take time to collect yourself if you can’t control your emotions
• Involve your management and HR department if the behavior continues

Wrap-Up

One of the toughest and frankly, most annoying aspects of being a leader is dealing with employees who aren’t meeting expectations. If you’re going to be in a people leading position, you’d better learn how to deal with it. Choosing not to deal with performance expectations means you’ve abdicated your job.

6 Steps to Deal with Employee Performance Problems

1. Be Honest

   Be honest with yourself and your employee. Are they meeting expectations? Check to make sure that they really understand the expectations. Most people want to meet the expectations of their company, boss and coworkers, so make sure it’s not just a misunderstanding. If they do understand the expectations, confront the problem immediately.

2. Avoid Conflict by Focusing on the Requirements Not the Personality

   Conflict avoidance is one of the biggest reasons people don’t hold people accountable. I wrote a couple articles on the techniques you can use to remove stress and conflict from these meetings. If you have trouble with conflict, I suggest you read those (they’re pretty good).

3. Document

   Take notes of your meetings with the person and keep the notes in a secure place. I know most people avoid this step, but the clock doesn’t start until you document that there is an issue. This documentation will be very important to demonstrate that there is a pattern of behavior that is unacceptable and that you have taken steps to correct it.

4. Work with HR

   I understand that is can be very frustrating, but they are there to protect the company and can help you avoid violating federal and state labor laws. Your company probably has other requirements that you need to meet, so get with them early to make sure you’ve got your bases covered. Work with them to resolve the issues one way or another.

5. Don’t Put the Booger on the Other Finger

   You may be tempted to move the person to another job, under another  supervisor, but that’s just moving the problem. It also shows that you’re not much of a leader.

6. Trust Your Gut

   How many times have you given someone a second or third chance and had it work out? Deal with every failure to meet expectations immediately. Putting it off will only make things worse for you, your team and the employee.

When Things Don’t Work Out

Sometimes things don’t work out. Sometimes it’s just a bad fit because of skills, culture, work schedule, or any number of things. I think it is far better to admit that and deal with it than try to ignore it, avoid it or move it. Business is tough enough without carrying people on the payroll who are ineffective or even toxic.

If you’ve been honest with the employee and honestly worked with them to improve their performance, then you’ve done all that you can do. There should be no surprises when the time comes to end the employment relationship.

What do you think? Do you think leaders should deal with these problems knowing that the employee could lose their job?

Blaming others may appear to be a good survival strategy, but it’s a career killer. We’ve all seen or worked for the person who is never at fault. They never accept the blame for a project falling behind; it’s always someone else’s fault. Here’s a secret, if you’re in charge, failures are always your fault.

Good leaders know this and hold their people accountable. They don’t accept excuses, especially excuses for failing to mange your team or project. Why are you there if not to manage your team and projects? Blaming others says you’re a victim and not in control. It’s weak.

Mistakes happen even when you’re doing your best to communicate and track progress. When mistakes happen, communicate. Let the stakeholders know what happened, the impact to the project and business, and what you’re doing to prevent it from happening again. That’s what matters to people who want results.

Act like a leader and people will see you as a leader. Act like a victim and the people above you on the org chart will see you as weak and ineffective, while the people below you on the org chart will see you as dangerous, deceitful, weak, and contemptible.

Related Posts

• How to Encourage Accountability
• Are You a Risk Taker
• Stop the Weeds of Discontent Before They Ruin Your Workplace

I continue to see people who have no idea how to prepare for an interview. I’m pretty sure they won’t read this, so do your young friends, siblings, students, kids, or grand kids a favor and give them a clue.

One reason you might not be landing a job is because you don’t have a clue how to show the hiring manager that you can do the job.

There are three job-specific assets you can bring to the interview table: experience, a degree, and vendor or industry certifications. I share my views on all three, and then conclude with how to prepare for what really gets you the job – the interview.

Experience

I’ll give the most preference to anyone who can demonstrate they’re capable of doing the job, and the best way to show you can do the job is to show that you’ve done the job. That doesn’t mean someone who has been in a job for X number of years. We all know seat warmers who’ve been in a job for years. I don’t care what temperature my seats are, I want someone who can get up to speed and do the job quickly. I want someone who’s demonstrated that they can learn and adapt.

Education or Degree

If you’re right out of school, you probably don’t have much experience. I expect that you’ve learned how to learn and that you have decent writing and verbal communication skills. I also expect that you have good time management skills because you’ve had to make choices while getting your degree. Unfortunately, you probably don’t have many skills that directly translate to what I’m looking for: network engineers, security engineers, or application integrators. You have to demonstrate that you have the attitude, maturity and mind to grow into the job.

Certifications

The certifications I’m looking for are Cisco, Juniper, RedHat, GIAC, CeH – nothing followed by a +

If you have experience and certifications, that’s a bonus. If you have education and certifications, that is good. If you have a certification and little or no experience and no education, you’ll have to work a bit harder to convince me that you can do the job. You’ll have to do a great job on your emails and phone calls with me. The thing you have in your favor is that you’re motivated enough to get a certification. Lazy people who lack passion usually don’t spend their time getting certifications.

Prepare for the Interview

The interview is your best shot to get the job, so prepare for it. You can bet at least one person you’re competing with will.

1. Research the company. In a recent poll, this was determined to be the biggest mistake job candidates make. Read the company’s website, know their products, have an idea how you can fit in and help them make money.
2. Sell Yourself. Why do you want the job? What skills do you bring? What can you do to help your future boss?
3. Demonstrate you have the skills for the job. Show your work. Show you have programming, networking, or documentation skills; show your hobby projects; show anything that helps demonstrate that you have the skills needed for the job.
4. Demonstrate that you have the maturity for the job. Follow up to get the interview. Follow up after the interview with a thank you note, email or phone call. Present your resume and business card at the start of the interview. (Yes, a business card. They’re cheap and an easy way to spread the word that you’re looking for a job)
5. Ask Questions. Think of 3 questions to ask. Write them down if you need to. Not asking questions reveals you to be unprepared and makes you look uninterested and that you don’t understand the purpose of an interview.  Read this list of 20 questions from The Ladders.com if you need some inspiration.
6. Connect with the people you meet. Interact, ask questions, initiate a conversation with the receptionist. People want to work with people they like, so show them you’ve got enough poise and confidence to behave like a human.
7. Polish your LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn is a great marketing tool to help you land a job. It is one of the first places I look when researching a candidate. I look for common connections and who has recommended you. You can use it to research your future company and coworkers. Find someone you know that works at your target company and see if you can get a good reference from them.

Things have changed and they’re not going back to the way they used to be. That means you have to adapt and train in order to compete with people from all over the world. People who worked their butts off in school. People who are hungry to have a lifestyle that we take for granted. People who have competed their whole lives to get into the right schools just to have a shot at a better life.

It’s scary. No doubt about it, but ignoring that fact won’t help you.

Train to Compete

Top athletes worker harder than their competition, and much harder than the weekend athlete. They hire coaches, nutritionists, mental coaches, and they work their butts off conditioning their bodies and working at their speciality.

You have to train as hard as a world-class athlete  if you want to be a world-class IT professional who never has to worry about being employed.

How to train to be a world-class IT professional

• Take care of your health. Burnout is rampant in our industry, so you have to take care of your health and manage your stress levels. This is a marathon and you’re going to need to be fit to compete. You aren’t going anywhere if you’re sluggish, foggy, or dead.
• Find an activity you enjoy and schedule time for it and give it the priority it deserves.
• Get up and take a walk. Schedule a morning and / or afternoon walk around the block or parking lot. It will give you a chance to de-stress and reset your mind.
• Walk, bike, or take the bus to work. This has the multiple benefits of getting you moving, avoiding the stress of driving, and giving you time to read or listen to a podcast.
• Eat right. Carbs from energy drinks, soda pop, pizza, candy and so forth are going to wreck your health over the long run. Drop these from your diet.
• Hire a personal trainer. They’ll prevent you from overtraining, or being too soft, and the money you spend on them will motivate you to get to moving.
• Train in your speciality. This is the obvious one. Get that training, build a lab, participate in industry groups. Get an account with a cloud provider, rent rack time or purchase used equipment to build your own lab. There is really no excuse not to have have a lab.
• Network – not the icky kind. You know, talk to people. Get out and work in co-working spaces, participate in your local Jelly, join a hackerspace, participate in online groups, write a blog. Do something to get out there and talk with other people. You’ll learn a lot, keep up with what’s going on in other companies, build your reputation, and get comfortable talking to others.
• Hire a coach or get a mentor. It’s amazing what a coach can see that we don’t. They can help you improve your performance fast and save you a lot of grief and frustration. Focus on an area where you are weak but need to get better. For many of us, that would be communication or understanding business. Find someone to help you with that.

“Boy, this looks like a lot of work, time and money.”

Yes it is. What do you think your competition is doing?

I’ve come a long way in my personal development, but still have a way to go. That’s why when I read this article by Bryce Christiansen, Tina Fey’s Rules For Improv…And Your Career, I knew I had to go to an improv class. In improv, there is no place to hide. There is no script, no director, no costumes, no lighting, no set – nothing but you, your partners, your wits, and an idea shouted from the audience. It sounds a lot like starting a business.

I have zero experience with theater or acting, so the thought of getting on stage wasn’t exactly comfortable for me. Fortunately, one of my coworkers is a theater grad and he said that he’d love to go. So we headed to class at the Onyx Theather, which by the way, has a fetish store as its lobby. Viva Las Vegas!

What I Took Away From the Experience

1. Changing your natural way of thinking and interacting with others requires purposeful effort and practice.
2. You can’t be judgmental and creative at the same time. Turn off the judgmental inner voice.
3. Improv requires openness, trust, cooperation, a sense of giving, and a complete lack of selfishness. Does this describe you or your workplace?
4. You have to go wherever the scene takes you. It might not be where you want to go, but go anyway. If it doesn’t work, it will be obvious. The point is to go there together and come to that conclusion together. You can review later and adjust the next time.
5. You help your partner and the scene by saying, “yes, and” to everything your partner says. When was the last time you saw this type of thinking in your workplace?
6. Asking questions or saying “no” brings the whole thing to a halt. It’s an inertia thing. You have to stop what you’re doing, come up with something new, and try to get the scene and your partners to go in that direction. Very tough to do on the fly. In business, saying “no” makes people shut down and stop participating.
7. Saying “yes and” would be a great way to improve brainstorming sessions.
8. Doing something new is good for your brain – try it!

While most of us aren’t actors or artists, our work requires an awful lot of creativity and cooperation. Imagine how powerful it would be to walk into your next meeting, presentation, or sales pitch with the improv mindset. Next time, change your goal from the perspective of winning and losing to one of cooperation and mutual benefit. And sign up for an improv class – it’s a lot of fun!

Thank you Bryce (and Tina) for your article and for giving me a new perpective and new hobby. I hope this article encourages others to try a new way of thinking and working together. Leave a comment or contact me on Twitter telling me what you are doing to help grow and adapt – I’d love to hear about it.

These are tough times, and only a fool would ignore high unemployment, mortgage defaults, tight credit, and the general uncertainty that surrounds us. Many if not most businesses are operating on tight budgets, putting even more pressure on employees. It’s tough to simply say, “Oh well, I’ll go get another job someplace else” because someplace else has most of the same problems your current employer has. Before jumping ship, take a look at your leadership team.

A good leader knows that fear is a destroyer. It closes down creativity and distracts from the solution. At times like these, a good leader will increase visibility to the company’s strategy, tactics and finances. A good leader will be visible, available and communicate, communicate, communicate. A good leader will stay on message and make sure the team stays on message. A good leader will answer tough questions openly, avoiding any trace of management speak.

Look around where you work. Is there a plan and are people focused on working the plan? Or are people sitting around, scared, keeping their heads down when management comes near and grumbling when they’re not around? The answer to that question clearly tells you the quality of your leadership team.

I am certain that my fellow Americans expect that on my induction into the Presidency I will address them with a candor and a decision which the present situation of our people impel. This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days. Franklin Roosevelt first inauguration speech

As early as my middle school years I’ve wondered when my generation would face its great challenge. We’re in the middle of it right now. This is more than an economic downturn. It’s more than a banking crisis. It’s more than an ill-defined war on terror. The ground under our feet has changed and we’re all trying to figure it out. The rules we were taught by our parents, family, and society have changed, but no one has told us how. I believe this is what the Occupy Wall Street protests are reacting to.

The Old Script

We were taught the script: go to school, do well, go to college, get a good job, do a good job, get married, buy a house, and save for your kids’ education and your retirement. Sure we had to borrow money for college and our mortgage, but we’d make it up over the years of employment with a good company. We’d need a lot of money for our retirement, but many good jobs had pensions and we could make up the difference with our 401Ks. We had hoped Social Security will be there, but we did not count on it.

That script might have worked for my parents’ generation, but it’s proven horribly wrong for mine, and many of us are so far down the road that we don’t have time to make up our financial losses. That’s downright scary for millions of people.

Learn the New Script

You’re an independent agent. You’re the product that you need to develop and market. Like an elite athlete you have to keep yourself in shape, keep your skills sharp, and be versatile doing whatever is needed to contribute to the success of your team. This isn’t easy and it isn’t passive.

You need to learn how to get things done, how to solve problems, and how to work with groups of people. Getting things done, things that show up on the scoreboard (the bottom line) is what gets you more salary. Will college degrees help you with that? If not, then don’t waste your time or money on them.

Find a job where you can learn and develop the skills you need to stay employed or to employ yourself. Keep learning and developing. Keep finding things you’re good at that people will pay you for. Learn how to market yourself and show your value.

Watch your debt. Debt is slavery. Cash gives you freedom to take a job at a lower salary, but one that will teach you valuable skills . Cash gives you the freedom to work the way you want or to walk away from a bad job. Cash gives you the freedom to start your own business.

What Are You Going to Do

That pain, that frustration, that confusion we’re feeling is because reality doesn’t match our frame of reference. It’s time to change our picture to match reality. It’s time to adapt. Those who adapt survive. That’s the way it’s always been.

Cisco Networking Academy Offers Health Information Networking Course

Per an email sent to Academy students, Cisco Networking Academy is offering a specialized Cisco Networking Academy Health Information Networking (HIN) course to help retrain workers in the area of healthcare IT through Cisco’s Workforce Retaining Initiative. This is supplemental material for students in the CCNA and it covers:

• Basic information on healthcare environments
• Principles of security and privacy in healthcare
• Fundamentals of electronic health record (EHR) systems
• Basic information on medical practice workflows and how to adjust workflows for EHR implementations
• Designing a network to support a medical group
• Securing a network for a medical group
• Troubleshooting a network for a medical group

Cisco Network Academy is the best value for your money if you want to get started with computer networking. Learn more and enroll with an Academy school if you are interested.

 ESET Offers Webinars on Securing Your SMB

ESET is celebrating Security Awareness Month by offering 4 free webinars on securing your SMB. Follow the links below to sign up.

• Simple Steps to Secure Your SMB (October 5th)
• Creating and Managing a Cybersecurity Policy (October 12)
• Securing Your Network: Safeguarding Your Business Data (October 19)
• The Impact of SMB Security on Our Nation’s Critical Infrastructure (October 26)

In the first three articles in the SMB Security series, I discussed some reasons why you should take computer security seriously.

In the next series of articles, I’ll discuss steps you can take right now to reduce the likelihood of suffering a data breach or loss. Help make your business more resilient and less attractive to computer thieves by implementing these basic steps. These are the same things larger companies do to protect their businesses.

And don’t think that just because you are small you are safe. The graph to the left indicates that small businesses are being targeted at a much hirer rate than larger businesses. Hackers are now targeting the little guy because they know small businesses are less secure than big businesses, and you have information worth stealing.

5 Simple Steps to Improve Your Computer Security

1. Backup your data
2. Patch your operating system and your applications
3. Use individual logins and passwords
4. Encrypt your wireless network
5. Protect remote access
6. BONUS: Shred printed documents that have sensitive customer or business data

Backup Your Data

How long can you stay in business if you lost your customer data, contracts, or financial information? How much time would you have to spend to try to recover that data? Can you afford that cost?

Do you have paper copies? Are they in the same building as your computers? What happens if there is a fire, flood or burglary?

• Keep a copy of your critical data offsite; far enough away that the same disaster cannot wipe out both copies.
• Make a backup as often as needed. How much data are you comfortable losing? One day? A Week? The answer is up to you, but you’ll need to make backups on a regular basis.
• Verify that things are working as you expect. Test your backups by trying to restore or build from your backups. Do this at least once a year.
• Consider using service like Iron Mountain.  They’ll help you get started and help you if you have to recover your data.

Patch Operating Systems and Applications

One way hackers steal information stored on computers is through known flaws in software. You can think of these flaws like open windows to your car or home; most people won’t take advantage, but some will.

• Set your operating system (Windows, Mac, Linux) to automatically check for patches. Make sure to backup your critical data before patching.
• Set your applications to automatically check for updates. Common applications are: Adobe Acrobat, MS Office, Outlook
• Set your browser software to automatically check for updates. (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Chrome)
• Do you have a website? You need to patch and back that up too.

Use Individual Logins and Passwords

• Make a login and require a password for everyone that uses a computer
• Do not give any user administrator rights
• Make an administrator account that is used for administrative work only. Do not share this account – make more if needed
• Delete any group login accounts
• Require strong passwords, but don’t go crazy. People will write down their passwords if you get too strict.
• Tips for creating a strong password

Encrypt Your Wireless Network

One of the largest and most expensive data breaches in history took advantage of weak wireless encryption. It is one of the easiest ways for computer criminals to steal your data.

• Set your wireless access points and clients to use WPA-2 encryption.
• Do not use WEP – it is too easy break the encryption
• I strongly recommend that you make the investment on new equipment if yours is too old to support WPA-2
• Use RADIUS if you have it, if not use a strong pass phrase if you are going to use WPA-2 Personal
• See instructions for your operating system and access points for details on how to set this up. There is a lot of information on the Internet.

Protect Remote Access

• Decide if you really need to allow anyone to access your computers from outside the office
• Disable remote access if not needed
• Use the firewall settings on your computers to block remote access for file sharing
• Require a VPN if you are going to allow remote access. This limits who has access to your computers and encrypts the connection making it difficult to eavesdrop on your communications.
• This step is more technical than some of you might feel comfortable tackling, so seek help from a security or computer network professional to help you. This is a very important step, so don’t skip it.

Shred Printed Documents

A couple years ago I went to a mortgage company to inquire about a loan, and I saw stacks and stacks of documents in the office, but not a single shredder or shredder bin. It made me very nervous about doing business with them. I suspected that all of those documents with personal and financial data would one day end up in the dumpster.

What information are you throwing in the trash? Anything with Personally Identifiable Information (PII)? Bank or credit card account information? Job applications? Customer contact information? Do you know you are responsible for protecting this data?

• Get a shredder if you have a few documents to shred
• Get a shredder service if you have a larger volume of documents to shred. Some will shred onsite in your parking lot, some will take the documents back to their office and shred there. Know how the service will handle the documents before you hire them.
• Make sure the shredder bin remains locked to protect the data from visitors or employees

Wrap Up

I hope this article helped you understand a few basic steps that will help you make your business more secure and less attractive to computer thieves. Most of these you can do on your own, but please seek assistance from a security or IT pro if you need help.

This is a start, there are many more things you can do, but it’s easier to do if you do a piece at a time. Get started today and do a little to get better every week.

Feel free to leave a comment, email me, or contact me on Twitter if you have any questions.