It is with pleasure and amusement that I accepted an invitation to write a short opinion
piece for the Berkeley GeoEngineer Newsletter, although I am not so amused right now
because I must meet the deadline.
Since I get to write the first article, I get to name the column: The Motley View. The
word “motley” is appropriate for several reasons: “motley” means an assemblage of
various fabrics and colors, as used by Jacques, a character in Act II, Scene VI of
Shakespeare’s “As You Like It”: “… I met a fool i' the forest, a motley fool…”. Motley
thus describes a clown, a harlequin, a tricky buffoon dressed in the patchwork garb of
the Court Jester.
“Motley” could also describe the complexity of geoengineering, which encompasses
geotechnical engineering, geological engineering, engineering geophysics,
geoenvironmental engineering and many other geo-whatevers. (Note to myself: we
need some guidance on when and where we stick the prefix “geo”)
Motley also describes the heterogeneous appearance of chaotic melanges, fault rocks,
weathered rocks and other complex geological mixtures: such messes are my
professional specialty (for more see http://bimrocks.geoengineer.org/). And, my
professional career is a motley patchwork of experiences gained during over 35 years
of mineral exploration prospecting, geological engineering, geotechnical engineering,
and world travel. The current patch in my motley career is as a Senior Consultant with
Geosyntec Consultants, in Oakland, California.
So: Medley (mixture) is not a bad name for someone writing a Motley column, is it??
My hope is that this neighborhood of the newsletter will periodically present opinions,
advice, and harangues with professional and practitioner hues. Many of you also have a
rich quilt of experiences from which to write articles useful to alumni just starting their
own wanderings. Please contribute them!! Contact me at emedley@geosyntec.com.
The Motley View: The Vitality of Good Contacts
My career evolved because of my vital network of contacts: by “vital” I mean both life-
sustaining and necessary. Over the 40-year random walk of my adult life, the
suggestions, encouragements, ideas, insults, challenges, job leads and personal
introductions from other people nudged me bit-by-bit from my first full-time job in 1966
(as a clerk for a UK food company) to my current position. That is what a “contact” is:
someone who can prompt movement in our way of thinking or our careers.
Because of the vital importance of contacts in my career, I am happy to share with
younger alumni some thoughts on the importance of making and sharing contacts in
professional life. Those of you who are more experienced will have your own, perhaps
very different opinions: share them with your younger colleagues or post them on the
Berkeley GeoEngineer Alumni Website!
Record Your Contacts in a Database. Stacks of business cards are intimidating to
search! Use Outlook, or some other digital contact database, and enter the personal
details of people who call and email you, or gather them from the business cards of
people you meet. Scribble where and under what circumstances you talked to them,
and other particulars, such as details you glean from the Web. Sometimes your contacts
may be useful to someone else in your network, so share!
Contacts Abound. There are many
resources available to you to make
contacts. You now have a great
resource in the Berkeley
Geoengineering Alumni Association.
At work, your boss may be the closest
resource, but still seek out the most
outgoing members of your firm. You
meet other people all the time - clients,
structural engineers, geologists,
plumbers, real estate agents.
On occasion I have provided the
names of a couple of real estate agents
to colleagues and clients (including one
remarkably adventurous realtor friend who is a geotechnical engineer, with a PhD in
Geotechnical Engineering from Berkeley).
Network in Your Office. The simplest network is the one you weave at work. Your
colleagues are your most intimate contacts. Do you know all the names of the people in
your office? What do you know about them? Do you ever discuss their projects with
them? Are they structural engineers or environmental geologists, disinterested in
geotech? Try interesting them by making a geotechnical connection for them. To do that
you first must be interested in what they do.
Contact unto others as you would have them make contacts for you. Be a Golden
Rule Contact: share your ideas when you see an opportunity that you cannot take
advantage of, but other people may. Giving contacts ideas is akin to giving Lego to kids
and then watching them build something with the pieces, even if you don’t get to play.
Golden Rule Contacts are rare: few people will send unsolicited ideas, contacts and
thoughts. Value those contacts immensely and try now and again to send them ideas in
return.
Be a Knowledge Node. A network is a mesh of interconnected lines, with the cross-
overs being nodes (people), some of whom are more vital than others. Strive to be one
of those vital nodes, a Knowledge Node, a person that other people come to with
questions, or for advice, contacts and ideas. And if you cannot answer a question,
maybe you know another Knowledge Node in your network that can.
What Goes Around Comes Around (Sometimes as a new project or a new job).
Sometimes the rewards of networking are indeed circular: the path to my current job
started with a lunch conversation with an attorney client who also worked with
Geosyntec. In earlier times I had made introductions between him and other attorneys
looking to change their positions. At other times there is no apparent direct reward for
chattering with people. For instance: I have had scores of phone calls over the years
from people looking for jobs. I willingly give advice and connections to them even if I
cannot hire them, because I enjoy talking to strangers. But I am also repaying all the
help I have had myself in my career from many contacts. Yet, every now and again, I
may get a referral or kind words from someone I once helped.
You may think that networking, and making contacts is “socializing” and has little to do
with geoengineering. But geoengineering practice depends on a heritage of shared
experiences, whether through reports, papers, lectures, videos, brown bag lunch
seminars or Friday afternoon “attitude adjustment sessions”. So, increasing your
network of contacts may benefit you even more when you hear tales of their
geoengineering triumphs and follies.
Thanks to the Berkeley GeoEngineering Alumni web site and newsletter, I look forward
to catching up on recent history with old Berkeley friends, and weaving new names into
my network. Let’s connect!
Regards
Ed Medley
Biography: Dr. Ed Medley is a Senior Consultant in the Oakland, California office of
Geosyntec Consultants, Inc. With about 30 years experience as a geological
engineer, he specializes in the investigation of geo-failure, and the geotechnical
and geological characterization of bimrocks (block-in-matrix rocks) such as fault
rocks, weathered rocks and melanges (www.bimrocks.geoengineer.org).
Contact Dr. Medley at emedley@geosyntec.com or by phone: (510) 836-3034
ext. 222
piece for the Berkeley GeoEngineer Newsletter, although I am not so amused right now
because I must meet the deadline.
Since I get to write the first article, I get to name the column: The Motley View. The
word “motley” is appropriate for several reasons: “motley” means an assemblage of
various fabrics and colors, as used by Jacques, a character in Act II, Scene VI of
Shakespeare’s “As You Like It”: “… I met a fool i' the forest, a motley fool…”. Motley
thus describes a clown, a harlequin, a tricky buffoon dressed in the patchwork garb of
the Court Jester.
“Motley” could also describe the complexity of geoengineering, which encompasses
geotechnical engineering, geological engineering, engineering geophysics,
geoenvironmental engineering and many other geo-whatevers. (Note to myself: we
need some guidance on when and where we stick the prefix “geo”)
Motley also describes the heterogeneous appearance of chaotic melanges, fault rocks,
weathered rocks and other complex geological mixtures: such messes are my
professional specialty (for more see http://bimrocks.geoengineer.org/). And, my
professional career is a motley patchwork of experiences gained during over 35 years
of mineral exploration prospecting, geological engineering, geotechnical engineering,
and world travel. The current patch in my motley career is as a Senior Consultant with
Geosyntec Consultants, in Oakland, California.
So: Medley (mixture) is not a bad name for someone writing a Motley column, is it??
My hope is that this neighborhood of the newsletter will periodically present opinions,
advice, and harangues with professional and practitioner hues. Many of you also have a
rich quilt of experiences from which to write articles useful to alumni just starting their
own wanderings. Please contribute them!! Contact me at emedley@geosyntec.com.
The Motley View: The Vitality of Good Contacts
My career evolved because of my vital network of contacts: by “vital” I mean both life-
sustaining and necessary. Over the 40-year random walk of my adult life, the
suggestions, encouragements, ideas, insults, challenges, job leads and personal
introductions from other people nudged me bit-by-bit from my first full-time job in 1966
(as a clerk for a UK food company) to my current position. That is what a “contact” is:
someone who can prompt movement in our way of thinking or our careers.
Because of the vital importance of contacts in my career, I am happy to share with
younger alumni some thoughts on the importance of making and sharing contacts in
professional life. Those of you who are more experienced will have your own, perhaps
very different opinions: share them with your younger colleagues or post them on the
Berkeley GeoEngineer Alumni Website!
Record Your Contacts in a Database. Stacks of business cards are intimidating to
search! Use Outlook, or some other digital contact database, and enter the personal
details of people who call and email you, or gather them from the business cards of
people you meet. Scribble where and under what circumstances you talked to them,
and other particulars, such as details you glean from the Web. Sometimes your contacts
may be useful to someone else in your network, so share!
Contacts Abound. There are many
resources available to you to make
contacts. You now have a great
resource in the Berkeley
Geoengineering Alumni Association.
At work, your boss may be the closest
resource, but still seek out the most
outgoing members of your firm. You
meet other people all the time - clients,
structural engineers, geologists,
plumbers, real estate agents.
On occasion I have provided the
names of a couple of real estate agents
to colleagues and clients (including one
remarkably adventurous realtor friend who is a geotechnical engineer, with a PhD in
Geotechnical Engineering from Berkeley).
Network in Your Office. The simplest network is the one you weave at work. Your
colleagues are your most intimate contacts. Do you know all the names of the people in
your office? What do you know about them? Do you ever discuss their projects with
them? Are they structural engineers or environmental geologists, disinterested in
geotech? Try interesting them by making a geotechnical connection for them. To do that
you first must be interested in what they do.
Contact unto others as you would have them make contacts for you. Be a Golden
Rule Contact: share your ideas when you see an opportunity that you cannot take
advantage of, but other people may. Giving contacts ideas is akin to giving Lego to kids
and then watching them build something with the pieces, even if you don’t get to play.
Golden Rule Contacts are rare: few people will send unsolicited ideas, contacts and
thoughts. Value those contacts immensely and try now and again to send them ideas in
return.
Be a Knowledge Node. A network is a mesh of interconnected lines, with the cross-
overs being nodes (people), some of whom are more vital than others. Strive to be one
of those vital nodes, a Knowledge Node, a person that other people come to with
questions, or for advice, contacts and ideas. And if you cannot answer a question,
maybe you know another Knowledge Node in your network that can.
What Goes Around Comes Around (Sometimes as a new project or a new job).
Sometimes the rewards of networking are indeed circular: the path to my current job
started with a lunch conversation with an attorney client who also worked with
Geosyntec. In earlier times I had made introductions between him and other attorneys
looking to change their positions. At other times there is no apparent direct reward for
chattering with people. For instance: I have had scores of phone calls over the years
from people looking for jobs. I willingly give advice and connections to them even if I
cannot hire them, because I enjoy talking to strangers. But I am also repaying all the
help I have had myself in my career from many contacts. Yet, every now and again, I
may get a referral or kind words from someone I once helped.
You may think that networking, and making contacts is “socializing” and has little to do
with geoengineering. But geoengineering practice depends on a heritage of shared
experiences, whether through reports, papers, lectures, videos, brown bag lunch
seminars or Friday afternoon “attitude adjustment sessions”. So, increasing your
network of contacts may benefit you even more when you hear tales of their
geoengineering triumphs and follies.
Thanks to the Berkeley GeoEngineering Alumni web site and newsletter, I look forward
to catching up on recent history with old Berkeley friends, and weaving new names into
my network. Let’s connect!
Regards
Ed Medley
Biography: Dr. Ed Medley is a Senior Consultant in the Oakland, California office of
Geosyntec Consultants, Inc. With about 30 years experience as a geological
engineer, he specializes in the investigation of geo-failure, and the geotechnical
and geological characterization of bimrocks (block-in-matrix rocks) such as fault
rocks, weathered rocks and melanges (www.bimrocks.geoengineer.org).
Contact Dr. Medley at emedley@geosyntec.com or by phone: (510) 836-3034
ext. 222
| The Motley View ...a melange of irregular comments on professional life |
| Berkeley Geoengineering Alumni Association Newsletter Issue #2 |
| ALL ALUMNI ARE INVITED TO AUTHOR ARTICLES FOR THE BERKELEY GEOENGINEERING ALUMNI ASSOCIATION NEWSLETTER. Contact us for more details. |
| by Dr. Edmund Medley, PE, CEG (MS 1991, PhD, 1994) |
| Making Good Contacts is Vital in GeoEngineering |