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04 Dec 2006, 18:20
Kudos
Bookmarks
Ok I really need some help with essay 1...
1. Describe your greatest professional achievement and how you were able to add value to your organization. (400 words)
I think I am really scared by "greatest professional achievement" because, to be honest, I don't think I have achieved anything "great". Now I know this is all about marketing myself and if I really have to I can think of a project and make it sound like my "greatest achievement", but...
What if... I try to talk about how I started out with a very technical degree and background in Computer Science, and slowly but surely started moving my career to what I really want to do, which is business related stuff? Would that work? Suppose I say that my greatest achievement was really figuring out what I want to do with my career and moving in the right direction and applying to MBA, etc...
My only alternative is to use a pretty typical IT project and talk about how I managed this testing lab and held meetings and made things run better blah blah blah...
Any advice would be really helpful. thanks!!
1. Describe your greatest professional achievement and how you were able to add value to your organization. (400 words)
I think I am really scared by "greatest professional achievement" because, to be honest, I don't think I have achieved anything "great". Now I know this is all about marketing myself and if I really have to I can think of a project and make it sound like my "greatest achievement", but...
What if... I try to talk about how I started out with a very technical degree and background in Computer Science, and slowly but surely started moving my career to what I really want to do, which is business related stuff? Would that work? Suppose I say that my greatest achievement was really figuring out what I want to do with my career and moving in the right direction and applying to MBA, etc...
My only alternative is to use a pretty typical IT project and talk about how I managed this testing lab and held meetings and made things run better blah blah blah...
Any advice would be really helpful. thanks!!
04 Dec 2006, 20:53
Kudos
Bookmarks
IMO what they mean by professional acheivement is how you made a positive impact on your company.
Coming from a computer science background myself, I can relate to what you are going through. We IT geeks just do our part and sometimes forget to look at the bigger picture. I suggest you take all the projects you have been involved with and look at them from the business perspective. Ask yourself....Did this project create anything of value for the company? Did it help the client to realize savings (savings that affected the bottomline)? etc.
Coming from a computer science background myself, I can relate to what you are going through. We IT geeks just do our part and sometimes forget to look at the bigger picture. I suggest you take all the projects you have been involved with and look at them from the business perspective. Ask yourself....Did this project create anything of value for the company? Did it help the client to realize savings (savings that affected the bottomline)? etc.
Here's what I wrote, basically:
I'd avoid really boring subject on IT if you can. Now, not all IT stories are boring. I read one recently about a guy coming up with an idea and the struggles he fought to obtain buy in - I think that's a great story (he has $ figures too, and quite a bit of introspection in it, and it shows initiative and leadership in anticipating issues or solutions), but a lot of stories are really really really boring.
A story about how you saved the EMC cluster from a raid-array failure on node six is about exciting as watching paint dry. Or how you were asked to write a UNIX script to "debug the mainframe cobol code from the obfuscated and deprecated ISDN link", or "Properly instantiating an AJAX interface to the non-compliant XML" make me want to shoot myself. In part because I have no fricking clue what it really means, and in part because it's usually fabulously boring stuff.
But worst of all, its usually really really hard to tie these kinds of things back to value add. So what, you wrote a unix script? Who gives a sh? Anyone even notice at your firm? So what does that really mean? Nine times out of ten, the value add to the company really isn't there. It's just a tactical issue - a task that had to be completed and you completed it. It's ok if the task is tactical, but the outcome should be strategic in value. Again, nine times out of ten, the big spin on why the "EMC cluster problem" was soooooo big and impressive is that "I completed it under budget and under tight timelines". Meh, kinda iffy. Where's the value add? And think about the message that sends - your best accomplishment is finishing something on time? Why, do you normally finish late?
And M, since I know your reading this, no, its not your story. Yours was fine. I know you'll still email, but I'll tell you now anyway
I'd avoid really boring subject on IT if you can. Now, not all IT stories are boring. I read one recently about a guy coming up with an idea and the struggles he fought to obtain buy in - I think that's a great story (he has $ figures too, and quite a bit of introspection in it, and it shows initiative and leadership in anticipating issues or solutions), but a lot of stories are really really really boring.
A story about how you saved the EMC cluster from a raid-array failure on node six is about exciting as watching paint dry. Or how you were asked to write a UNIX script to "debug the mainframe cobol code from the obfuscated and deprecated ISDN link", or "Properly instantiating an AJAX interface to the non-compliant XML" make me want to shoot myself. In part because I have no fricking clue what it really means, and in part because it's usually fabulously boring stuff.
But worst of all, its usually really really hard to tie these kinds of things back to value add. So what, you wrote a unix script? Who gives a sh? Anyone even notice at your firm? So what does that really mean? Nine times out of ten, the value add to the company really isn't there. It's just a tactical issue - a task that had to be completed and you completed it. It's ok if the task is tactical, but the outcome should be strategic in value. Again, nine times out of ten, the big spin on why the "EMC cluster problem" was soooooo big and impressive is that "I completed it under budget and under tight timelines". Meh, kinda iffy. Where's the value add? And think about the message that sends - your best accomplishment is finishing something on time? Why, do you normally finish late?
And M, since I know your reading this, no, its not your story. Yours was fine. I know you'll still email, but I'll tell you now anyway
