• Question: Have you been able to use skills that you have learnt from your work elsewhere in your life, excluding your job?

    Asked by cfgsgirls64 to Alex, Chris, Harriet, Jed, Ken on 20 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Ken Gibbs

      Ken Gibbs answered on 20 Mar 2012:

      Funny that you should ask that !

      My job frequently required me to train engineers in what, for them, was their second or third language. I thus was forced to slow down how fast I spoke and I particularly had to choose the simplest words possible to describe what I wanted to explain. I always tried to speak Queen’s English (or BBC English as it used to be before regional accents came into fashion), making it easy for my students to follow what I was saying.

      Recently, I have been asked by a number of different organisations to speak about the work that I used to do and many of the people in my audiences are not familiar with all the technical words I use in everyday life, so I have found it quite easy to take what I learned from my engineering into after-dinner-speaking.

    • Photo: Alexander Zacheshigriva

      Alexander Zacheshigriva answered on 20 Mar 2012:

      Yes. The technical bits come in everynow and than. Another day we have been setting a new outboard engine to work on our inflatable boat at the diving club, and we needed to use a metal pin to hold it in place when towing the boat around on a trailer. I had to do a quick calculation to make sure that the pin is strong enough and will hold it when we go over a speed bump.

      This weekend I am managing a diver training weekend with the uni diving club. There are 26 people on it. And we plan to do some 130 man-dives. To make all this happen smoothly and safely I need to coordinate things well and delegate. A lot of the things that I learned at managing projects at my work come in handy when running dive trips. Being able to estimate costs is very useful to.

Comments

  • Photo: Jed

    Jed commented on :

    Sure – I’ve helped my friends when they have been building extensions to their houses by giving bits of advice on construction, materials and so on.

    And my knowledge of the River Thames is great for whenever I want to be a tourist myself or show other people the sights.