Study Break

Yes, once again an inordinate amount of time has passed since my last blog post. Between work and school, there is so much going on that social networking and blogging are way, way down the list. I just don’t have mental room for them now.

I know not to go into too much detail on what is happening at work. Let’s just say that right now I am application lead for two huge strategic projects plus a major software upgrade. Both projects have executive level visibility and very tight timelines. In fact, both of them really should be spread out over three or more times what we need to get them done in. And, of course, there are all the other projects and assignments that the parties involved with them *think* are major. Need to stop there.

On the academic front, my thoughts at the moment are mixed. Just to keep everyone up to date, I started in January on my online Master of Health Administration program at Ohio University. As of tomorrow my cohort of 25 students will be halfway through the first of eight quarter-length modules. Each module is basically two four-quarter-hour graduate level courses. This module is called “Context of Leadership in the US Health System.”

On the bright side, so far my grades are very good. Individual assignments have gotten very high scores. Now that is with a certain amount of my Type A personality perfectionism, spending the time needed to get everything just so before submitting. There may be opportunity to figure out what lesser amount of time it may take to submit work that is still A quality, maybe not quite so stellar.

An interesting sidebar. I think back to my first undergraduate experience, where there was also lots of paper writing. I marvel at how much easier it is today. (Part of me also marvels at the difference in the grades.) Maybe it has to do with the bazillion e-mails I have had to craft at work in the intervening time. They have forced me to get specific and to the point. That’s a good thing.

But then there are the group assignments. Again, the right amount of effort vs. reward comes into play, perhaps even more so. The first one yielded my mates and me a score in the A- range, though below both the mean and median for the class. I was an average contributor, to be honest. My contributions were good, but I did not get as critical about my colleagues’ contributions as I might have. Now, we’re about to ramp up for the big group project for the quarter. The group members are different this time. We’ll see where it leads. All I know is, I’ll be plenty busy. Don’t expect to see many blog posts in the immediate future.