Procrastination Central

A Smile on a Stressful Day

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Tue, 06 May 2008 22:01:20 -0400

My boss is off at a conference she (admittedly) should not have agreed to attend. This is leaving me and our associate running around to handle earnings - our busy season. Luckily, we only had two so far, but one is the biggest stock in our sector - and the stock was down 6%+ today on the news - which is a big deal. The other is an "unloved" stock that I can finally upgrade because results were good... So, both notes are really important and have to get published ASAP. I'm sitting here at 10pm with at least an hour of work ahead of me. AND, I have to get up at 5am because my boss is only available until 5:30am, because that's when she leaves for the airport.

ANYWAY, in the course of our IM conversation today, she mentioned that she had gotten positive feedback from industry folks that had attended my speech in FL a few weeks ago. (editted, obviously, IM below). YEAH ME!!!!

BOSS (6:35:33 PM): I meant to tell you that and to tell you that XXX and XXX said you did a GREAT job at the Florida forum
BOSS (6:35:47 PM): so now you can leave with a smile
XXXHeike (6:35:54 PM): oh good - i didn't hear a peep from anyone after my panel.
XXXHeike (6:36:00 PM): yes indeed - :-)
BOSS (6:36:13 PM): XXX really raved about how well you did

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This Can't Be Happenening... AGAIN!

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 21:40:12 -0400

Got a phone call from the student we selected to be our summer intern. SHE'S BAILING ON US!

YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING - It's freakin' deja-vu -- this is exactly what happened last year... After an insane amount of work to hire everyone interns, I end up with the strongest candidate, who then bails at the last minute and I am left with nothing. UNBELIEVABLE!

You are not going to believe this.... I just dug up the post from when my intern did this last year and it is dated on the EXACT SAME DATE - down right freaky!

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Intense... Me?

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 21:38:46 -0400

I have lots to share today. Let's start here......

My current intern has been a nightmare - I have ZERO luck on this (more to come) - lately, she's been completely useless and "checked out" so I stopped giving her any *real* work. Today was her last day and she gave me a card thanking me for the experience. In the card, she said wished we had hit it off better (she's a little, shy chinese girl that we could barely get to talk) because I seemed really nice, if not intense..... the card was full of wacky grammar and word choice and I never really thought anything of it.

My Associate read the card after she left today and kind of snickered when he got to the part where she called me intense - I said I thought it was funny too and he asked, "you are being sarcastic, right?" To which I replied, "I'm not intense" and he said "Yes you are!" What! Me??? I don't think I'm intense.... he tried to backpedal his way out of it with an explanation that only pseudo-worked...

Adam thought the whole thing was comical.... he said he totally thought I was intense at work - not that it was a bad thing.... Am I?

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No End in Sight....

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 21:34:32 -0400

So the conference was last week... I had planned to do a little blog-recap, but I'm just too tired from the event and frustrated by it to do a blow-by-blow. The short version is this: to guests, the event was a raving success and went off without a hitch. To me, it was one annoyance after another and too much to have on my plate to organize, host, and speak at - with a group of people that had the attitude it was "our" event not "theirs" - regardless that we all work for the same company and that ultimately it benefits everyone's bonus if the event goes well...

It would be nice if life slowed down now that the event is behind us, BUT, I have a basic report I am trying to complete, an IPO on a stock in our sector, earnings season just around the corner and a handful of speaking engagements (which would ordinarily be VERY cool!) that are out of town... All of this, before June..... Office politics have been tough... I've felt that my boss is throwing a lot on my way (ie - dropping the ball), and I'm feeling like I don't have any respect within the organization, as people keeping going to her for stuff I could very well be handling (visibility with clients, etc).... Ho hum...

Trying not to sound bitchy about it - just feeling a bit deflated.... It's not easy being on a three person team, when she's the visible "face" of our team, even though I am more than capable to do sore of the high-profile stuff. At times I feel like an over-paid Associate and not a rising Analyst - not a great feeling... especially when I'm working 11+ hour days and weekends to boot! I tried to talk to her about it a bit today, but it turned into her telling me that "this" was part of why she is no longer on good terms with her old Jr Associate -- her Associate feelign in her shadow -- and I shouldn't get too anxious or feel offended when it happens. People will naturally turn to the "leader" of the team. I get that, I really do. And to be fair, its never that she's not allowing me the exposure. On the one hand, she's trying to hand off things I could handle (client calls and speaking engagments) which is nice, but on the other hand, she's giving me the stuff she doesn't really want to bother with -- Oklahoma City anyone??? I'm going there to speak in June. When I'm of reasonable-mind, I know that it each of these occassions is a great opportunity for me to get my feet wet and sharpen my skills, but at the same time, I hate feeling like I am just waiting for her to throw me a bone..... One of my strengths, I think, is that I don't pretend to know stuff I don't - and to defer to her when I am in over my head. But, I'm coming to realize that one of my weaknesses is that I'm not being more aggressive to do these types of calls/events that I konw I am capable of (in some cases, I've followed the stocks for 6+ years, and she just picked them up when she joined the firm a year and a half ago). I need to push/encourage both her, and our Salesforce to become more visible....

I'm also realizing that the biggest drawback to her working in a remote office and not in HQ with us is that it limits my growth - I used to learn by overhearing my old boss on the phone with clients. You pick up small stuff here and there (We call it "osmosis" when we explain this phenomenon of learning to interns). I don't get an opportunity for that when she's not around. And she's not really realizing it, because I can handle plenty of the office stuff so she doesn't have to bother, AND, I'm training our Associate - so he's learning from me.... just feeling like I am getting the short-end of the stick on this one. And I haven't found a remedy either - I honestly, don't think there is one. I wish I thought of this when we were on the phone together this afternoon... not quite sure how to bring this up. Don't want to sound whiny about feeling like my learning curve has disappeared...

On the bright side, someone got hired to fill the position above my creepy sexual-harassing boss's head (Director of Dept). The new guy will oversee research, sales, & trading... looks like there will be some housecleaning going on in our and other departments (any guesses on the first guy I want fired?). We're about to pick up a bunch of new stocks, coincidentally timed right after his start date (next week) - so we'll have great visibility. Always nice ahead of salary reviews in July! Trying to keep my chin up....

Wow, that was quite a ramble out of me tonight.

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Women making more $$$ than men

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 13:10:45 -0400

Interesting article on AOL/CareerBuilder discussing fields where women outearn men - YEAH!. I was expecting the 10 fields they highlighted to be things that are female-dominant (like nursing or teaching) and with a neglible percentage change, because they weren't high-earnings positions to begin with. I was pleasantly surprised to see that at least a few of the following 10 are decent jobs with realistic pay (although librarian - at 23K is on the list).

Field	Women's	Men's	Women's Pay as % of Men's
Sales engineers	$89,908	$62,660	143%
Statisticians	$49,140	$36,296	135%
Legislators	$43,316	$32,656	133%
Automotive service technicians and mechanics	$40,664	$31,460	129%
Library assistants, clerical	$23,608	$18,512	128%
Baggage porters, bellhops, and concierges	$26,468	$21,684	122%
Financial analysts	$69,004	$58,604	118%
Aerospace engineers	$78,416	$70,356	111%
Human resources assistants, except payroll and timekeeping	$30,420	$28,028	109%
Advertising and promotions managers	$42,068	$40,144	105%

10 Careers Where Women Earn More Than Men

Field Women's Men's Women's Pay as % of Men's

Sales engineers $89,908 $62,660 143%

Statisticians $49,140 $36,296 135%

Legislators $43,316 $32,656 133%

Automotive service technicians and mechanics $40,664 $31,460 129%

Library assistants, clerical $23,608 $18,512 128%

Baggage porters, bellhops, and concierges $26,468 $21,684 122%

Financial analysts $69,004 $58,604 118%

Aerospace engineers $78,416 $70,356 111%

Human resources assistants, except payroll and timekeeping $30,420 $28,028 109%

Advertising and promotions managers $42,068 $40,144 105%

Financial Analyst: Women tend to excel whenever a field such as this requires technical skills plus the ability to communicate and pay attention to details, Farrell explains. "Add to this the fact that top-level executive males would prefer to be presented to by a woman than by a man … and also that female financial analysts are in shorter supply … and you have a blend of characteristics that are likely to make a female financial analyst, on average, more valued," he says

My job isn't really "Financial Analyst" but its damn similar... A blend of technical skills (financial modeling) and communication abilities (talking to investors).

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Still Alive... still busy

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 10:05:06 -0400

HELLO PEOPLE!!! Yes, I'm alive... hard to tell by my blog though.... life is busy, what can I say?

My conference was on Monday/Tuesday this week. It was stressful, to say the least. I think I did prety well - speaking in front of 200-250 people is never easy. My boss was on CNBC on the topic on Wednesday, which was pretty cool....

Still plenty of work to do, unfortunately. Reports to write, research to do... I'll procrastinate more later.....

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Inappropriate Boss Strikes Again

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 10:43:05 -0400

Men... trust me, you just want to ignore this post.

So, I get this daily email of funny web-videos. I don't watch them religously, but occasionally they are pretty comical. It is mostly SNL clips and old commercials. As I am watching today's (video below), my creepy, always socially-inappropriate boss walks by....

He stops in my doorway and asks how I'm doing. I stop the video to chat with him. He asks what I am watching, I reply "stupid crap". He asks to see to watch, I say "I don't think it would be appropriate". Then he walks around my desk to see my screen (I have already minimized by now). He persists in watching with me and I finally have to say "It's about feminine products".

Dude - once I say it woudn't be appropriate, you should stop persisting!!!! Idiot. I got a big kick out of him turning beet red as he left my office......

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Analyzing Media Hype

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 20:48:16 -0400

I see articles like this published weekly across the country. I don't quite understand why this is a popular topic, but the media tends to hype it up anytime they come across one of these studies. I follow the very companies that are responsible for distributing drinking water to millions of Americans. It is a VERY RESGULATED industry. Honestly, I have ZERO CONCERNS that we are drinking contaminated water - AND NEITHER SHOULD YOU!!! The amount of chemicals that they are talking about is measured in "parts per billion". They used to be measured in "parts per million". Recently the way they measured the allowable amount of arsenic in drinking water got changed from 50 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion - you would need to drink 5 gallons a day for over 50 years for this to have a detrimental impact on your health. Is there a meaningful health benefit from the legislative change - No, not really.

For anything like this to truely impact the health of the public/consumers, you would need to consume an INSANE amount of water. To gauge if something like this really impacts you (ala Erin Brockovich) they assess what the impact is during a lifetime of usage. In that movie, the amount of MTBE was INSANE compared to current standards. All public utilities are operating within the limits that the FDA has stipulated. That doesn't mean that the water is 100% pure - it means that there isn't enough of these chemicals in the water to have a negaitve impact during your lifetime.

In actuality, it BENEFITS water utilities when something like this is written. It gives them a reason to spend more money on infrastructure to take contaminants out of the water that they otherwise wouldn't need to. Who pays those costs? The consumers, of course. Hey, that's not bad for the utility, this gives them a reason to increase rates. So, everytime an article like this is published, our companies have an excuse to spend more money on purification remedies and then pass the cost on to the users....

While this is good for the companies I follow, it creates unnecessary fear and concern in the public, and ultimately drives up the cost of water.... Personally, I find this to be a very interesting topic, and one that comes up often when I talk to investors.

Please, please, please DO NOT be frightened about your water supply when you read articles like this.

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What's my job again???

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 11:33:32 -0500

I've been so busy with non-research job responsibilities for the last two weeks.... it's really starting to get on my nerves.

We are hosting a swanky dinner in DC at a conference and I was in charge of picking the restaurant and the menu, managing the budget, sending out invites, accepting RSVPs etc...... We were aiming for a group of about 10-12. When it looked like we weren't going to get that many, we started inviting more people. Looks like we will have about 24 people now. Craziness!

We also have this water conference in April.... TIME VACUUM!!!

Lastly, I'm in charge of our summer internship. We have over 60 students apply so far - for 4 slots and the resume cut-off date isn't until next Friday! I have started delegating some of the student-tracking to my admin, but there's no way to push the selection process off on to someone else. I'm spending a day at Dickinson and Villanova interviewing students. We'll interview approximately roughly half of the candidates that apply in the first round. Excluding the two trips to college campuses, I will conduct about 30 interviews at 15min a pop. That's over 7 hours of interviewing and its just the first round!!!! This isn't my job - does our HR dept even exist??? About half of those students make it to the second round. Luckily, at that point, I will only have to interview the students for my intern-slot. I match a few candidates to each of the other teams hosting interns and they are responsible for making the final selection for each of their teams. We should have a great bunch of students with this many people to choose from - that part is amazing!

I was supposed to publish an industry piece during the first week of January..... I'm finally getting to it now.

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My ears are going to be ringing today....

nobody@vox.com(Heike) — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 11:09:26 -0500

My boss and I got asked to be on a panel for a bunch of regulators (talking about water). We were also asked if we could suggest another analyst to speak on the topic of electric and/or gas utilities. With that having been my previous coverage I have some contacts. I put some calls in to mgmt teams I know and got some names.

The first person I thought I should call was my boss from my brief stint in NYC. I knew that they had been trying to make some headway with regulators (my experience in this is partly why I was hired) so I called his office and got his secretary. We chit-chatted for a few minutes and I left my digits for my old boss to call back.

I KNOW that the second she got off the phone she walked in to the office where the ladies sit..... I'm sure my sudden departure is being rehashed (again). Wasn't a lot of love floatin' around when I left....

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