I hope you all had a very relaxing holiday break for Christmas and New Year. Above all, I hope you had ample time to spend with your loved ones – I have happened to spend a couple of holiday seasons away from my loved ones in the past, and I know how much it hurts to not have them close to you during these days.
For this year, we had decided to arrange a family gathering in Paris. Coming from a country with close to zero connectivity during winter, meant that I had to travel over half of Europe to reach my destination. During my travels I also witnessed quite a few strange behaviors from other passengers. One of them though, overshadowed everyone else:
We were landing at Vienna’s International Airport. The aircraft was still taxiing. I was in one of the last three rows, when all of the sudden, someone sitting behind me sprung out of his seat, trying to move as fast as possible to the front (let me remind you that the aircraft hadn’t completed taxiing yet) presumably to exit faster. However, by the time he had reached the middle of the aircraft, the plane had come to a standstill and other passengers started getting up. He got stuck somewhere in the middle. The problem for him of course, was, that unless airplanes are on a Passenger Boarding Bridge (“PBB”) they open both the front and back doors for passengers to enter/exit. Well, we weren’t on a PBB, which meant that had he not made such a harsh move, he would’ve been one of the first to disembark! If you don’t know something, ask! It’s that simple and it costs less than the potential embarrassment arising from an obvious (to others) mistake.
When I had first started my career, I wasn’t sure as to whether I should be asking things, or not. Until one day my mentor told me “One of the things that I like the most about you, is that you are always asking when you are unsure. I really like that. It makes you predictable and by extension, reliable!”
I remember being in a meeting, reviewing the KPIs of a certain business. I thought that everything was looking fine. These, after all, were cross-industry KPIs and I remember seeing much lower performance in other businesses and industries. But one of the directors of the company, who also possessed subject-matter expertise, pointed out that they should be doing much better, because their industry typically moves in parallel with the economic cycle and the economy at the time was expanding much faster than their business. I learned my lesson: If you don’t know an industry well-enough, ask for the opinion of an expert before reaching conclusions.
One thing that I have stopped asking about, is for directions on the road. With the omnipresence of GPS equipment, I must be honest, I feel like I have come from another era whenever considering asking for directions. Last summer, I wanted to visit the Castle of Karystos, in Greece. I found it on Google Maps, and started to happily follow the directions. The road was a complete mess, as if no one else had driven there in ages. I almost broke my car. When I reached my destination, I had realized that I had reached the castle from the back. All other visitors, who had just followed the signs on the road, had reached the castle from the front, by driving on a perfectly fine, asphalt road. Turns out, that even when it comes to directions, it is still not a bad idea at all to ask a local, even if you have access to a GPS!