The Rest of the Trip

My last post related to the joy of a flat tire on the road to St. Louis, so I figured that it would be appropriate to sketch in the rest of the trip which went much smoother. The conference was People Management 1 and focused on management challenges especially in relation to our profession and each person's personality.

There is a lot of time spent in the professional training spectrum on personal growth and awareness. In the first level course everyone completes the DiSC profile of their personality. I personally came up a high "D", not quite uber-dictator, but close enough. For my last course it was a coaching profile that went well for me, apparently I am a decent coach at least that's what my survey respondents said. This class focused on the LS1 and LS2 Lifestyle Inventories. The first is the self-evaluation which we did in class, the second is the data from five surveys that others complete for you. The key to the whole thing is the system of comparing the data to see where you might have stumbling blocks (known weaknesses) or blind spots (unseen or unadmitted weaknesses). This was okay for me as I had only two blind spots and I knew them, but choose not to recognize them (oppositional and perfectionistic...). The chart actually translated alright for me since it was basically a high "D" again.

We also did an inventory on preferred communication styles and worked through a system of team problem solving (think group therapy). Overall the course content was good and I enjoyed the class. It most certainly has given me a lot to think about and came at a good time for me personally.

The best part about the class was more the people than the content. I knew the instructor from previous courses and think he's a swell guy (De Tan Nguyen) and had been in class previously with 3 of the other 13 participants. All of us had been in our jobs at least 3 and 1/2 years so we could relate reasonably well. The only one who annoyed me to any great extent was my roommate who seemed socially stunted--he liked to argue stupid things for the sake of it and is addicted to pop culture, oh yeah he snores too. He survived the week as I chose to avoid him outside of class the last two nights. I kept busy going out after class. Monday night was at a comedy club, Tuesday was watching the NBA game with a group in my room, Wednesday was downtown St. Louis, Thursday was at the sports bar watching the game. I was not in before 12:00am any night and up at 6:45am each morning.

On Wednesday we rearranged our schedule to have the afternoon off so that we could go downtown. I ended up as a ringleader and one of two drivers and somehow responsible for finding where we were going. The first stop was the Anheuser-Busch tour. Yes, I toured a beer plant. It was neat. We got to see the clydesdale horses, part of the factory and free samples (I declined, but did taste a Guiness with a dark chocolate shot in it). The horses have a really nice stable area and the whole place was amazingly clean. The tour focused more on the history of the company than on how beer is made, but it was well done. After everyone had their samples and I got a hat, we headed to the Arch navigating by sight to get there. It was cool and the Opening of the West Museum underneath the arch was neat. I did not go up in the Arch as it seemed like a waste of money. We walked 15 blocks (after much debate) to Union Station for dinner then headed back to the hotel where several of us moved to a local bar for the rest of the evening.

Thursday evening was notable because we were at Ozzie's Bar which is owned by Ozzie Smith (some great Cardinals baseball shortstop) and Michael Jordan was there watching the game with Ozzie and Charles Oakley (another basketball player). I was amused watching the folks drooling over his presence and trying to get by his guards to see him. One of the few successful people was a classmate who is a frat brother of his and previous acquaintance. I was more entertained by the Miller girls trying to get people to drink Miller in a Budweiser city, were I one prone to drink, I would have allowed them to convince me...

On the way home Friday I stopped at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, IL. It is very well done and has some neat presentations, one of which I couldn't quite figure out how they did the effects. The Civil War exhibit was one of the best I have seen including a neat animated map showing the battle lines as they moved and the major battles and campaigns of the conflict. I could have spent more time there, but needed to head home to sleep.

The trip was good and tiring as usual. I'm looking forward to next spring when I am due to go to the next course and possibly attending it in Portland, OR. We'll see if I can make that work.