People Matter ∴ Do Good

Lead a vivid life that does good

Tag: Hamilton (Page 1 of 3)

What makes me an entrepreneur?

7 March 2007 /

I have almost finished "Winning: the Answers" by Jack & Suzy Welch.

In one of the questions Jack is asked "How do I know if I have what it takes to be an entrepreneur?" Jack answers by posing four great questions:

– Do you have a great new idea that makes your product or service compelling?
– Do you have the stamina to hear "no" over and over again and keep smiling?
– Do you hate uncertainty?
– Do you have the personality to attract bright people to chase your dream with you?

Interesting that all four of them really excite me. I mean really really excite me. Number 3 is my favourite. Here is the whole paragraph:

Do you hate uncertainty? If you do stop reading here. Entrepreneurs spend more time in blind alleys than stray cats, if not chasing dollars, chasing new technology or new service concepts, not to mention everything else they need to build a business. If not in blind alleys, they're aboard a leaky boat on choppy seas – or put it more plainly, they are often running out of money while betting on the unknown. If you're an entrepreneur, that actually sounds like, well, fun!

It is fun!

I suspect a few of my team will nod their heads and say yip thats Andrew. I can also understand why a lot of people would not like to answer to these 4 questions, but I'm glad I can and do!

Hard Work

8 February 2007 /

Alan McDiarmid, a Kiwi and Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry, died today aged 79.

I saw an interview with him last year on Campbell live and he said this quote

" I am a very lucky person. And the harder I work, they luckier I seem to be"

Alan McDiarmid – 2006

Teamwork: Backyard Soccer

6 February 2007 /

Backyardsoccer "We did it Kyla, we got a goal!" Talia hollers with excitement after she kicks the ball between the trampoline legs that have become the goal posts for our backyard soccer game.

Its kids verses Dad and there is a lesson in play for the girls. Its called Teamwork! Their tendency, their predisposition if you will, is to play as individuals, to both run around trying to get the ball off Dad and then each other, even though they are on the same team.

I explain to them that if Kyla comes to get the ball off me and Talia waits by the goal,they will get goals easier. Talia of course very offside but it is not a lesson in soccer rules. Now, because Dads are always really bad at soccer when playing with 5 and 7 year olds, Kyla easily manages to get the ball off me and kicks it to Talia. The distance of 3 metres is simply to enormous for me to cover in the 15 seconds it takes for Talia to line-up and score the goal which is met with shouts of pleasure from both girls. "Kyla and Talia 5 points, Daddy 1" they yell.

Anyway, I was thinking about grown up kids, like the kind I work with. Our tendency, our predisposition is to play as individuals. We often want to score the goal and have our turn and be in the limelight of success, rather than making sure that first and foremost the team wins!

Within our company team we have a number of smaller teams. Some of the teams function really well as… well teams. They pass their ball off to each other, which are off course the various aspects of their jobs. They don't really care who does what as long as the team gets the goal and the team wins!  Some other teams function more as individuals, they own just their part, don't pass the ball and continually try to just get goals themselves and often fail to keep up.

I guess it is no surprise which teams achieve the best results, have the most victories and generally win the most. It is of course the groups of people that realise they need each other and scoring a goal for the team is more important than getting a goal as an individual. They help each other out and have few lines drawn about who does what. They do what it takes to make sure the team wins.

Incidentally the winning teams, have heaps more fun, get a buzz out of winning and 'holler with excitement' when they get their goals.

Which 'team' would you rather be on?

Is it a rock, a stone or a pebble?

14 January 2007 /

Smallrock When you look at this picture what do you see? What does it bring to mind?

I found this rock/stone/pebble while sitting on the sea wall at the Tauranga Marina the other day watching the world go by.

I wondered if the rock used to be a part of a bigger rock. I wondered if it was man made or how it was created. I wondered how old it was and what it weighs. I wondered what its composite materials were?

When you look at it what do you see?

Do you think I should try and sell it on Trade Me?

I post another day about what I thought after I wondered all these things. (Maybe)

Flying an Alpha 160A

31 December 2006 /

Zkwkf_cockpit "It is like climbing into a new car when you have been used to driving a car that is 25 years old." citied Roger (CFI) when I asked him about the new Alpha 160A (R2160) that the Waikato Aero Club has replaced the Cessna 152's with.

A week or so later he is proven correct when I go for my first type intro flight. The first thing I noticed when I clambered into ZK-WKF, doing my level best not to stand on the plush leather seats, was that everything looks new, there are actually some digital gauges and a GPS unit.

Marie kindly explains the various features and start-up procedure and before long we are off to the eastern training area for some stalls and a forced landing. Zkwkf_ext

I have now completed 3 type introduction lessons in the Alpha 160A and here are my brief observations (from a novice perspective)

  • The view and the sunburn! The view is stunning on a fine day. My first flight out I could see down to Mt Ruapehu. With that comes the glass house effect, sunburn and heat. An interesting trade off.
  • It has a control stick as opposed to a control wheel. Feels really natural straight away (must be the experience of computer joysticks from my younger days)
  • HEAPS more right rudder. The larger engine and huge tail rudder means it takes a lot of right rudder to keep the aircraft in balance. It requires it so much so that you would almost expect it to have a rudder trim. Alias trim isn't there so its off to the gym to work on my right leg muscles.
  • The STALL warning sounds way to early. You are flying a well configured aircraft on approach and suddenly the stall warning goes when you theoretically are 20 kts above stall speed. Scares the crap out of me.
  • It glides like a rock (or slightly better). At the recommended 80 IAS you are dropping 1000 fpm, which doesn't leave a lot of time for a Forced Landing from 2500 ft. The club is teaching Forced Landings at around 72-75 IAS, but then the stall warning kicks in every 10 – 20 secs.
  • Gone are the long flares on landing that I have been taught about in the C152. You basically point the Alpha at the ground and do a small flare just before touch down. If you were to flare at the same angle as the Cessna that rear of the plane scraps along the runner (no brownie points earned if you do that)
  • GRUNT. The 160 hp Alpha verses the 110 hp Cessna can mean some pretty quick trips in the downwind portion of the circuit.

All in all a great asset to the club and a fun plane to fly. I'm looking forward to my cross country flights in it!

[Hat Tips]
Photos – Chris Nielsen
Waikato Aero Club
Alpha Aviation

John Keys Speech

29 November 2006 /

This is a part of John Keys speech yesterday.

My father died when I was a young child. I do not remember him.I was raised, along with my sisters, by my mother, in a state house in Christchurch. Back then I thought I was poor and, by most standards, we were. As I grew up, though, I recognised that what my mother gave to my sisters and I was far more valuable than money.

She instilled in us the desire to improve ourselves by our own hard work, the confidence that we were able to do it, and the hope that it was possible to do so. She instilled in me an ethic of hard work and determination and a genuine belief that "you get out of life what you put into it".

How many kids in New Zealand are never taught these values? How many kids will grow up not knowing that anything is possible and not knowing anything but dependence on the state.

Imagine if we could teach parents to inspire their kids again! Imagine if they regained the appreciation for hard work that I think is getting lost in the youth of today.

John Keys impresses me. If he gets to be PM, what a hard job he has before him.

Finally I am reminded that I am so blessed to have the parents I have. They have always believed in us, supported us, taught us to work hard and encouraged us.

The perfect cafe

23 November 2006 /

AriomI have blogged before about the interactive mocca that you buy from the 'Naked Grape' in Tauranga.

Well, now I have found an interactive Muesli in Hamilton. It's a new cafe that opened in Te Rapa called AGIO, which is Italian for 'relax'. It does average coffee, but a great Muesli. Check out the photo from my cellphone. Just pour it into your plate and you are away!

Anyway, just because there is no point to this post, I got to thinking about the perfect cafe. I think the perfect cafe would be on leisure island, I have no idea of its real name, with a view like the one taken from my PDA below, and sell interactive mocca's and muesli.

How cool would that be?

The_mount_1

Oh and I think there is a lesson to this post and my previous one. I really need to buy a small digital camera that I can take with me wherever I go. My 1 megapixel PDA with a dirty lens simply doesn't cut it.

Woolgathering at 17,000 ft about the Marlborough Sounds.

22 November 2006 /

There they are! The Marlborough Sounds. Msounds

The picture from my PDA does it little or no justice, but I simply had to take some photos. The lady in front of me had a real digital camera and I thought of asking her to email them to me, but my courageous contemplation turned to weak actions.

I sit in the ATR, transfixed at the sight of the Marlborough Sounds out my window and grateful for the relief from a tiring day that woolgathering about the Sounds allows.

I have long dreamed of chartering a yacht and sailing around the Sounds. I dream of waking up on a still, warm, sunlit and cloudless morning surrounded by little islands covered in bush and farmland. The only sound is the sound of water lapping enchantingly against the side of the boat. I dream of jumping from the side of the boat for a quick swim to remind my body it is alive. Then I dream of the mandatory cooked breakfast that has smells and aromas and tastes that can only be experienced in location such as this.

It's a dream. A long held dream. Hopefully one day it will become a reality.

One person makes all the difference!

8 November 2006 /

Just one person in any one company can make it or blow it. One person can sent you away feeling like the most important person in the world or make you feel like they don’t value your business.

Yesterday Alf & I were flying to Christchurch for the day. We had a heap to discuss prior to getting their so I left Hamilton on the 6am flight to Auckland to connect with the 6:50 flight to Christchurch. Alf was on this flight joining me in Auckland and I had preallocated a seat for him next to me, because we were checking-in in different cities.

My Hamilton flight always gets in after the Christchurch Flight is boarding and I am one of the last on the plane. I get onboard and some other guy is in the seat next to me! So texting Alf I find out he is in 17d. I explain to the cabin assistant Alf had been preallocated into the seat next to me, and could me be moved into the seat opposite. He said he will check with the Captain and while he is doing that some other guy comes from the back and sits in that seat.

Now the cabin assistant has a choice. Does he try to make something work, or just walk away. There are after all spare seats in row 2 behind me, and I’m sure one of them wouldn’t mind moving forward to row 1. He can help me or bug the snot out of me and do nothing.

He does nothing and says nothing further.

Alf and I missed out on really quality time together that we will never again enjoy 🙁 (secretly I think alf planned it to get some sleep) and we arrived in Christchurch less prepared than we should have.

Oh, the airline was Air NZ, not that this is a surprise because there is no other alternative for me out of Hamilton.

It all comes down to one person. How often does one person blow it in agoge and we don’t know or care? How often do I blow it?

Oh one last point. The guy sitting next to me heard all of this. He could have offered to move to the seat opposite (before the other guy came up), and been closer to the door, and had more leg room. Personally I would have offered to do that. But he said nothing and in a funny way I feel sorry for that guy.

Wasted Food.

5 November 2006 /

By means of introduction, a gobblelygook is a device that sits in your sink, that you run water through and it mashes up the food into waste water. From there it is mixed with all sorts of waste water delights like #1’s and #2’s and other stuff and pumped to the sewage treatment plant. In Hamilton’s case the water is then pumped back out into the Waikato River upstream of the Auckland domestic water supply intact.

Auckland water … yummy yummy. The Wiggles should rerecord there song!

Anyway, the other day I was putting some left over food down the gobblelygook and a guest said I should save it for another day. They then said “think of all the staving people in Africa”. Now this is not a dig at that person, because I have heard this statement a number of times in my life and I am sure it is more about not being wasteful than anything else.

But if we were really to stop and think about all the staving people in Africa, would it really change what we throw away.  For me personally eating stale bread the next day is not my idea of fun and if I did it would not help the staving people in Africa or another place one iota.

I guess the point of this post is that there are heaps of statements that we make that really mean very little unless we are actually prepared to follow through on them. If I really thought of the staving people anywhere, and was compelled as a result, I would do stuff and give stuff (not left over bread) that would actually make a difference in their lives. If I don’t then there is little point raising it as an issue.

The person who made the comment may already do all of that, I don’t know, but I was challenged about the throw-away phrases I use that do the same thing.

« Older posts

Recent Posts

Follow

I'd love to hear from you.

Connect at one of the following:

Subscribe

* indicates required

Intuit Mailchimp

© 2024 People Matter ∴ Do Good

Theme by Anders Norén — Up ↑