A Bigger Team Would Be Nice
I haven't blogged in a long time. Although I've been meaning to, I'm just too tired to write my thoughts. That's why I'm more active my Twitter account than here.
There are a lot of things happening in the office. I think I have about eight projects lined up, with priority levels that start from medium, and it's starting to take its toll. I really need to beef up the web development team for this, and that doesn't mean just hiring a lot of designers. For it to be truly more robust, I would need web architects who can double as project officers, graphic designers, usability officers and coders.
Online Operations invades Punta Fuego
Now what you're about to see here is a Rotten Boy video. Dennis and I, together with the Online Operations team (well, at least those who can pay for P40.00), did a day trip to Punta Fuego for our unofficial company outing. Yes, you read that right - it's unofficial. That's because we're doing some belt-tightening measures so cannot afford to go out on an outing this year.
Check out the video and don't forget to put your comments!
Coming from a nine-day holiday break, going to work yesterday was a big shock to my system. At just 3:00 p.m., I was so sleepy that I had to go to the food stalls to get a recharge.
So how was your first day at work after the Holy Week break?
Please Make It Stop
Please make the meetings stop. That would be a great gift for anyone in the office.
After the big re-org, I can't help but notice how many meetings I've been attending everyday. It's actually getting to be too much that I end up doing nothing when the day ends.
What do you guys think about having a no-meeting day so that everyone can sit down and finish their work?
What? January's not over yet?!
I was going to blog and say something like "And that was January" until I figured it's still January today. The 31st to be exact. So this darn month isn't over yet and there's still one more day to go before we start with a clean slate, more or less.
I'm glad the last day fell on a weekend or the madness would've been unbearable. The stress of this re-org with me heading a totally brand new team is slowly setting in and getting into my nerves. There are tons of things to do - sit down with News to know their process, write down the final individual job descriptions, cascade the new T.O., lay down the individual development plan, work on the big projects - the list goes on and on.
I'm glad that our tandem has this unwritten code of taking things lightly. This makes the job at hand easier to swallow. I'm also happy that there's no bad blood between us. Being friends, it's actually quite hard to be officially reporting to someone even if it's just on paper, and I'm relieved that we went through this process as maturely as we both can. We went through five T.O. drafts to finalize things, but at least we didn't end up killing each other.
Bittersweet
Yesterday was the day when told members of my team that I'm transferring to handle another team. I tried very hard not to show it but the whole experience was a bit sad for me. I've been with them for more than a year and, before this new table of organization was announced, I had plans for them. Now that I'm tasked to head the online operations team, I turn over the reins to Domi. I'm sure he will treat them well.
As for my new job, Dennis and I finally had our team organization table approved after five long drafting sessions. The original assignments given to us were IPTV and TFC Now for him and ABS-CBN.com and News for me, and so this is where we based our individual TOs in the first draft. How are we supposed to find out that it's not like that at all? Anyway, now it's all finished with me heading the group and him leading the publishing team. With a battle cry to make things as efficient as possible, we now head into the fray.
The Zoobic Adventure
We were supposed to go to Enchanted Kingdom after our long storycon, but we had to change our plans on the last minute because of the weather. The team was thinking of just going to the mall or maybe just having lunch at a nice resto but I figured there was still a lot that we can do for the day. The CR-V's all ready and everyone's all packed. Naturally, there's one logical thing to do - ROADTRIP!
They had no idea where to go, so being the drive-happy person that I am, I told them we're going to Subic. Now as to what we're going to do there, we'd figure that out on the way.
Part of the highlight of the trip was actually trying out the new SCTEX. It was such a pleasure driving on that immaculate stretch of highway. Too bad it had a 100 kph speed limit or I would've given our ride a nasty cleaning exercise of its carbon build-up.
After some thinking, we decided we're going to Zoobic.
So how was the adventure? It was so fun. We all had a blast! We managed to catch the last trip for the day and we made sure we've milked it for all it's worth, taking lots of pictures whenever we can.
On Celebrators and Celebrants
I got pissed with our HR today when I saw the list of birthday celebrators for the month of November. Not only was it posted late, it was also incomplete.
It's Pink's birthday on the 12th but it wasn't there on the list. This is not the first time it happened. Nap and EJ's birthdays weren't on the lists they posted a few months back.
So what is this? Do they draw lots to see which IJMs' names get posted there? Is it because of the limited space? Just imagine yourself in the shoes of an IJM who's not getting paid a lot. I wonder how you would feel when you see your name not on the list.
We don't want a fancy birthday list on our company bulletin board. An excel sheet with the names and the dates will do. We're all grown ups anyway. What's important is that this list is posted on time and that everyone who should be there should be there, regardless if that person is the managing director or the office cleaner.
Down from the hill
I'm glad I'm finally home after the two-day planning for our initiatives next year. Even though we were all seated in the room almost the whole time, it was tiring and quite draining. We had to line up our plans, put timelines, know what type of technology we need, and then, of course, project how much revenue we have to generate from these.
From this exercise, I realized that I'm happy to be planning for online now. With all the web 2.0 technologies around, there is so much we can do to deliver our content to our customer. Comparing this with my previous stint in mobile, It's quite refreshing to have no third-party restrictions.
Down from the hill that is Antipolo, the next thing to do is the most dificult part - making these happen. I'm planning to cascade all the learnings to my team next week (since most of them are on vacation this week). Then it would be time to sit down with the various groups and talk about the nitty gritty part.
The Return of Magasin?
From web we came and to web we shall return.
Oh dear oldies, remember Magasin - your little community section in dear old ABS-CBN.com, which we ported to PinoyCentral? Well, now that we're absorbing ABS-CBN Global's website, I'm bring back this section, albeit with a different title.
No timelines yet as we're still presenting the wireframes for tomorrow's meeting, but it will be very soon.
Storycon Mania
Tomorrow is the great storycon day for the team. From Monday to Thursday, we only plan for the next day's content. Fridays are different. During this day, we have to plan for the next three days - Saturday, Sunday and Monday. The exercise really drains you especially on slow showbiz news days. I'm just glad that Paolo finally approved on getting contributors to get the hotter stories for us. Now we can focus more on the other sections of the site.
Hello Sillypore!
I set the alarm to 7:30 a.m. but I woke up early. It's not a big surprise for me right now. It happened to me the last time I was here. I guess being in another country gives me a built-in alarm clock.
So I'm here again in Singapore, or as my friend calls it, "Sillypore". I'll be attending the Asian Publishing Convention for two days starting today till Friday. My first impression after getting the email was it's more for the magazine guys than us, but after reading the sessions I knew that there are a lot of interesting things here that I can learn (hopefully) and bring back to the Philippines.
The trip's been pretty good so far.
From coach, I was upgraded to Mabuhay class without me knowing it. I probably wasn't paying attention, and at 5:00 in the morning, who would be? My seat number was 14K and I was looking for it in my usual Fiesta Class area when it dawned on me that the count for the economy rows start at 30. And so yes, I travelled three and a half hours to Singapore enjoying better food, bottomless drinks (orange juice for me), a nicer, cushier and bigger seat, a tad bit better in-flight entertainment (I watched Iron Man again) and more legroom.
When I arrived at Changi Airport, I was worried about my cellphone. I had to turn it off when I boarded the plane in Manila but the power button's damaged, and so there's a big chance I won't be having a working cellphone for the whole trip. After immigration, I pulled out my mechanical pencil and started to press the power button. Nothing happened. But after a few minutes of practically pressing every point of that power button, it finally turned on. Whew!
Taking a cab from the airport to the city is a bit too expensive for me. It can set you off about S$20+ (roughly P600). The cheapest alternative would be the MRT but that would have been more viable if I wasn't lugging around with a behemoth of a suitcase (yes, blame the Pinoy in me). The next best thing is the airport shuttle. At S$9 a ride from the airport to the hotel, it's a bargain. The downside of that is you will have to share the coach with other travelers going to their hotels and wait for your turn for them to drop you off yours. Well, yesterday, I only had to wait for 10 minutes for the shuttle to arrive and - here's the good part - I was the only passenger! Oh yeah baby! So for S$9 I was traveling to my hotel with just me and the driver in a vehicle bigger than a limo!
And so yeah, I may be traveling alone but I really feel that someone's watching after me.
Yesterday's free day was mainly spent hunting and shopping for everyone's bilin and pakiusap. I met up with Carl in HMV at the Citylink Mall and bought Karen her Coldplay album. Then after having lunch at Pepper Lunch in Funan, we went up to Challenger to buy Tec's earphones, laptop cleaners for Eric and Cherry, and a 4GB thumbdrive for Gerry. We traveled by train to Orchard after and went to Kinokuniya in Takashimaya to buy Charo's Watchmen graphic novel, Uniball pens, and Tec's Hana Yori Dango Volume 37. I also met up with Irene to give her her shoes and Yay's instant pancit canton. Carl had to leave to pick up Kyan and so it was a solo flight for me from that point to Paragon for Muji stuff.
I went back to the hotel by cab after that. I was too tired (and lazy?) to take the train to Outram and walk 15 minutes.
Dinner was with my friend Ken from my previous company. It was in this nice Japanese restaurant along one of the side streets near Orchard. It was his treat. Well that and the cab ride back.
So today's the convention day. It starts at 9:00 a.m. and so I'll be getting ready in a few minutes. I just have to cross the street to get to the convention venue and so I have enough time to grab something to eat at the hotel lobby.
Lazy
I'm up already but I'm still having a hard time pushing myself to take a shower. It's probably the cold weather.
So today's Project Management day for me. It's a 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. gig at the 13th floor together with Magic Tiongson. I'm praying it would be as fun as my last workshop.
Reminds me of college when finals and the deadlines all pile up in the last week of semester. Well, it's been eleven years since college but today feels kinda like that.
What's good is that they've finally taken notice (well, at least she did) of what we're doing and how important we are now in the overall picture. What's bad is it means more work to us.
Normally, I'd be groaning by now, but I guess I've matured a bit. It's weird but I want to plunge into this challenge head first.
Sosyal! Networking!
Tomorrow, I'll be attending the Social Networking and eBusiness Conference Philippines 2008 at the Hotel Intercontinental in Makati City. It's the first of its kind in this country so I'm sure it's going to be pretty refreshing. I just hope that the speakers stay away from just reading the Powerpoints and make it more radically interactive.
Being in Makati, I'm looking forward to having breakfast at Heaven and Eggs in Glorietta 4 as well as getting myself a couple pairs of jeans during the breaks.
Goin' Nuts on Apple
It seems the Apple bug is slowly infecting people in the office. First, it was the now-defunct Big Dipper with their Power Mac G4s, then it was Gramps with his iBook. Now there are more and more people in the office using Macs. There's me, Gwen, Mia, Charles, a couple of guys from Solucient and one or two from News/Newsbreak using MacBooks or PowerBooks. What's so cool is Connie's thinking of getting a MacBook Air for work and Miguel had exploratory talks with Apple on using Macs in the workplace. Really good news.
Fact of Office Life Number 01
I just finished the first of one and a half days of the Kepner-Tregoe Engineering the Performance System workshop and I came into this realization - the HR department will be the first one to panic if Microsoft pulls out clip-art from their Office suite.
A Herd Roasted Chicken
"And I'm getting the HERD roasted chicken, please!"
So this must be good for a group of four to eight people. It's a herd, right? Oh wait! It's the herd that roasted the chicken. Ahhh! I get it!
Don't you just love the Philippines for their humor? This was taken from the menu of Petrus Cafe, a restaurant opposite the Eugenio Lopez Jr. Communications Center along Mother Ignacia Avenue in Quezon City.
What services do they offer again?!
I'm filing this under the Am I seeing that right?! category. I noticed this while we were on our way to Mini-Stop, and I just had to stop and take a picture.
I understand what they do when they offer their dry cleaning, laundry and alterations services. What I don't know are their leather bags and leather jackets services.
My Pucha Incident
I won’t exactly say that I blew it. On the contrary, I found it hilarious – an out-of-the-box presentation, something I’m sure he wasn’t expecting.
I am talking, of course, about my first time to present to the company’s CEO. Yes, I did a nice presentation to the big man himself about the launch of the new website as well as what we’re doing with Multiply.
At first I was telling him how cool the new website is with all the new multimedia features. I showed him the main pages of the three main sections and then told him about the timelines. It went pretty well as there were no comments and I can see that he was looking intently at each of the pages I show in the slide.
This made me so hyped up and excited – which caused my big booboo. As I presented the first thing we did with Multiply, my energy was at its peak that I blurted the word “pucha” when I was describing how active the community was.
The room was silent for about a couple of seconds and then everyone laughed!
Ooops!
Good thing he was in a good mood at that time. And so he asked, “O Pucha! Saan ba galling ang mga ‘yan?”
Hehehehe!
After the presentation, he asked me where I learned to use that word. He thought all the while that it was an old word already and that only the oldies were using it.
I just smiled.
Ayus! I’m sure I made an impression. Now as to whether Paolo will allow me to present to him again is another question.
The Office
It's evil, I know, but it's my way of fighting for those whom she borrowed money from. There's no solid company policy against this because it's between two parties who initially agreed on it, but if we can prevent her from further victimizing other people in the office then this campaign would be a success.
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You
know how it is when you get bitten by the Pilosopo bug?
Well, I get those sometimes. And the random thought is...
