I feel that I have been powerful in the context of my profession, based on my knowledge, experience, expertise, hard-work, and creativity. Due to these qualities, I had many opportunities to participate in projects that made significant contributions to the advancement of structural/earthquake engineering. I feel that because of my work fewer people will die or be injured in a future earthquake somewhere in the World, and there will be less of a social/financial impact on societies from disastrous earthquakes. I feel that the structures I personally designed will perform better than most others in future earthquakes. I have reviewed others people’s projects and have helped them to improve their projects, and have trained several good engineers over the years. From these, I derive a feeling of accomplishment.
I also feel that I have not fully achieved my power potential. I have not built a network and form meaningful relationships with others; I have not made an effort to be charismatic, learn how to stand in “power posture,” and learn how to be a good public speaker; and, I have not learned how to earn and trade “currencies” in the influence market.
Looking to the future, I am interested in expanding my business activities into real estate brokerage and development. I realize that the skill set required for these new activities are significantly different than for engineering. These include building personal relationships, social and professional networking, being charismatic, spending time and energy to get involved in community affairs, public speaking, and carrying on a conversation with someone on the telephone that lasts more than thirty seconds. I do not expect that I will have a personality change overnight. However, I feel that I have taken the first step in the right direction by taking this course. I know now what I need to do and I will start doing it one-step-at-a-time. Having learned that success can be achieved in small increments, I think the one-step-at-a-time will work just fine.
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