Damian got me:

Christian Long’s summer vacation is off to a bang with the development of the first meme of the season, in which he asks:

What was the “worst job” you ever had that ironically helped prepare you to one day become an educator?

This one is pretty easy. I haven’t had a lot of jobs, but the year before I entered grad school to become certified as an English teacher, I worked as a technical writer for S——. I don’t want to cast aspersion on the company or the people who worked there (bygones are bygones, I say), but the job really wasn’t for me.

I’m not really a detail-oriented guy. I like to work quickly.  I like to write something and leave it and come back to it later.  I like to plow through my work as soon as I can, so as to enjoy the time after it’s done at my leisure.  I like to be left alone with my headphones on so I can block out all other distractions.

None of this really went down well with the people at S——.  I’d finish a week’s worth of writing assignments on Tuesday morning, then sit around not doing much of anything for the rest of the week.  When I was fired laid off, they tried telling me that it was because I hadn’t got enough done, which I easily disproved.  In fact, I’d gotten so much done so quickly that I had no choice but to sit around waiting for the engineers to program more stuff for me to write about.

So what did I learn?  I learned a lot about pacing, boredom, and assumptions.  I learned a lot about delegating tasks and trusts.  And I learned a TON about why I was the happiest boy on Earth when I lost my job and got to go to grad school.

–jw,

who thinks little hiccups are the key to future success