Joe Sabado – Higher Education & Technology Leadership

I recently became more interested in Yik Yak, the anonymous and location-based social network, a couple of weeks ago when controversy arose from its use of it by some student affairs professionals attending the NASPA national conference in New Orleans. I read through the comments, and different types of comments were posted from what could be considered sexist, unprofessional, and provocative. There were also other comments that some would consider fun and positive. Most of the discussions revolved around the first set of comments I described above. I also read the reactions of other student affairs folks on the matter, and their perspectives varied from their interpretations of the comments as well as pointing out related topics (social justice, professionalism, etc.) and even the motivations behind the comments.

Since two weeks ago, I’ve begun to check YikYak more often just to observe what our students are posting. In addition, my team did an April Fool joke on the students by re-introducing a checkbox feature on our student information system’s login screen, a feature that was not too popular when we had it available two years ago. I wanted to see the student’s reactions to our joke. What I noticed was overwhelmingly positive. Students found them funny. One of the students even posted this – “Props to the people running GOLD for having a sense of humor. I wish I knew who you were to bring your cookies. :P”

\There’s another major event in the town next to our campus (Isla Vista) called “Deltopia” happening this weekend. Google the term, and you won’t see too many positive comments about the event. One of the major factors attributed to the problems at last year’s event was the tremendous number of out-of-towners that came to UCSB as the event became well-known throughout California and beyond through social media. A theme I’ve noticed the last few days is how UCSB students are very strong in their opinions about not having “oot” (out-of-towners) visiting Isla Vista this weekend. As one of the comments shows, “The fact that OOTs are so ignorant about what’s happened in our town and have no respect for it really upsets me. Blaming a lot of things on us when most of it is the cause of them.”

Other general comments I notice are related to expressions of wanting connections and loneliness (“I don’t have any friends, and I don’t know how to meet people.”) and most, if not all, of the responses to these comments were offers of help. There are also comments about their lack of personal confidence (body image), sex, and other topics that I would guess would not be shared if they were not anonymous.

As I read through the comments, I find most of them to be of a positive tone though I read some crass comments from time to time. Another thought that also comes to mind is – Is my perception/interpretation of YikYak different from others, even if we are reading the same comments? Is how we perceive the comments on social media and their use based on our personal biases? Certainly, as I mentioned at the top of my post, there are different comments on YikYak, but do we focus on the comments that resonate with us?

As the saying goes – “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Is our interpretation of social media and its use of them based on our perceptions shaped by our experience and value systems? I was reminded of a situation many years ago when I was still a student. I was the President of our student organization, so I was the coach for our basketball team at a tournament. I wanted to represent our organization well, so I was in a suit and tie.  A few friends complimented me, but one called me a “poser,” a not-so-positive term. I don’t know why these friends of mine, who were looking at the same person (me), had different reactions.

Another analogy applicable to how we perceive social media is that some folks will somehow see something negative in every situation. A story that I’ve read is something called “negative farmer,” and it goes something like this:

A (positive) farmer who had a dog with an unusual skill invited one of his friends (negative farmer) one day to go duck hunting. The positive farmer was excited to show his friend what his dog could do. So, they hopped on a boat with the dog onto the middle of a lake. The positive farmer shoots a duck, and the duck lands a few yards away from their boat and on the water. The positive farmer commanded his dog to retrieve the duck. The dog miraculously walked on water. When the dog returned to the boat, the positive farmer excitedly asked his friend what he thought of his dog. The negative farmer just shook his head and says, “I knew it; your dog doesn’t know how to swim.”

Going back to YikYak and my observations, perhaps my view of YikYak is more positive than others because of the types of comments that resonate with me. I don’t know. What do you think?

It seems silly for me to be complaining about this given where this happened – at a golf course. It is a privilege to be playing a sport/activity that costs quite a lot of money. So, in that sense, I do recognize the socio-economic privilege I hold. But, this incident I will share below is one of those head scratchers on how I am treated in a certain way. Maybe it’s all in my head, but experience tells me, probably not.

I was playing golf with a work friend of mine. He’s one of the top administrators on campus and he’s white male. We were riding on the same golf cart. At one of the holes, one of the golf marshalls approached us from afar and asked if one of us had left a golf club. As I looked in my bag, I realized that it could have been one of mine. I responded, “yes, I think it’s mine. Does it have a blue/black grip?” He responded with “where did you leave it?” I responded with “I’m not sure. ” I also provided him with another piece of detail about the club. He still had that look like he didn’t believe me based on the look on his face and he wasn’t going to give it to me. It is that very moment when the thought of “if I’m white, would he be asking all these questions?” My friend, after noticing my reaction, immediately said something like “I wonder if you’re white, he wouldn’t have done that to you.”  Again, it could just be all in my head, but it’s these kinds of moments that trigger some thoughts about other incidents in my life when I wonder why I’m treated differently.

We actually wanted to do an experiment to see if the same marshall would react differently if my buddy had left his club and how he would act when he returns it to us. But, we continued to play on.

As I read the reactions on Twitter and blog posts by student affairs folks on the comments made on Yik Yak, random thoughts/questions came to mind. This post by Paul Gordon Brown provides a good collection of the reactions to this incident. A session was held at the conference to discuss the incident, and here are the tweets from the session. They may be wrong/right from your perspective, but here are some random thoughts that came to mind.

• How much of the strong reactions against the Yik Yak posts are based on the need for validation/proof of the credibility of the student affairs profession? From time to time, I read the frustration of how those outside student affairs don’t seem to understand what we do, and that’s why we need to do a better job telling our stories. For some, is it about protecting the reputation of the student affairs profession?
• When students make mistakes, some folks talk about these mistakes as teachable/learning moments and opportunities for growth. I think there’s a sense that students are still developing as people. What if we apply the same mindset to professionals? It’s not like we all become perfect individuals once we become professionals or when we get the letters after our names. No one is perfect, and the development process lasts a lifetime, me included.
• Even before this Yik Yak controversy, I’ve heard of the topics of “hooking up” at conferences and participants using conferences as paid vacations. It’s not as if Yik Yak introduced these issues, but it just made them more public, and when I mean public, the whole internet to see.
• With the topic of “hooking up,” I’ve also seen moral judgments on another person’s sexual activities (“slut shaming”) before Yik Yak, and I think there’s a sense that it’s happening here as well.
• Even professionals must understand how to be good digital citizens -by understanding the pitfalls and opportunities provided by social media and how their participation (positive/negative) impacts themselves and their communities.
• Not all comments were negative.
• I can’t believe anyone would even post some of the comments I read. SMH.
• How many of those comments came from student affairs attending the conference? Is there a chance that there are individuals who posted comments to further exploit the situation for fun or malicious intent?
• I refrained from providing my reaction on Twitter as I wasn’t quite sure how it would be taken. I didn’t feel safe offering my opinions. Sometimes, Twitter isn’t always the best place to have productive conversations, even in a community that promotes itself as being open to conflicting ideas.

I’m also reminded of a conversation I had with a student on one benefit of Yik Yak. I asked this student about social media and how students view and use social media. We came to the topic of Yik Yak. She responded that Yik Yak, because of its anonymity, is a good venue for students to express their opinions honestly. She talked about masturbation and how students shared their opinions without feeling judged.

As a manager/leader, one of our most important responsibilities is to build leaders and productive colleagues by providing them the environment to think for themselves and grow. The confidence to pursue ideas and actions beyond their comfort zones is a big part of this process towards leadership and towards our co-workers’ ability to do their job. I also believe having an environment where people can confidently do their jobs is part of having an engaged staff. Engagement to me means a staff feels maximum personal satisfaction with the work they do. Secondly, they also contribute to the organization to the best of their willingness and ability. From experience, here are some ways we can build the confidence of others:

1. Communicate goals clearly but leave room for staff to find ways to accomplish them. Do not micro-manage, especially when working with talented and creative folks. Unless we work in an environment that doesn’t require much thinking, providing our co-workers room to explore ideas and come up with their own ways to accomplish the goals you’ve given them is the way to go. However, those goals and expectations must be communicated to save those assigned the tasks from spending emotional energy and wasted time and effort.
2. Allow room for “failure” as part of the learning/growth process. The world is changing rapidly, and we encounter new experiences/ideas every day, and we may not necessarily know how to always respond to them in the right ways. Personally, the biggest moments of growth I’ve experienced have been through my mistakes. These mistakes encouraged me to re-evaluate my approach, and these mistakes helped me improve the quality of my work. Luckily, I had bosses in the past who understood that making mistakes is all part of the learning process. So while they helped me understand how to eliminate those mistakes, they also did not admonish me to the point I stopped trying new ideas. Don’t rob your co-workers of these opportunities to grow by not allowing them to make mistakes.
3. Set higher expectations and standards beyond their comfort zones and abilities. This requires that you are intimately familiar with your co-workers’ skills, knowledge, and interests. Understand their areas of strengths and weaknesses and challenge them to further utilize their strengths and improve their weaknesses. You may encounter resistance as this will require more work from them, and they may not understand why you are challenging them, but growth isn’t always comfortable.
4. Praise in public and criticize in private. How demoralizing is it to have your ideas interrupted by your boss in public settings because he/she just happens to believe their ways are better, and does it look incompetent? There are situations when a manager does need to intervene because the information is incorrect. But even then, there’s a diplomatic method to point out the error and/or to suggest different ideas. This point relates to point 1 above in that, as leaders. managers, we need to be clear about our expectations and goals. If our colleagues don’t understand what they are, they may share their ideas contrary to what we have in mind. In these cases of confusion, it’s best to speak with your colleagues behind closed doors, clarify your expectations, and understand their perspectives so you are both on the same page. As I wrote in this blog post, as a manager, your words matter. You can use them to “praise or curse” your colleagues.
5. Lead via influence, not command and control. Treat your colleagues as human beings and not machines or resources. Build relationships with them, so they feel they matter. While ordering your colleagues to perform tasks may yield short-term results, the command and control approach can result in a workforce that will not go above and beyond what is expected. This approach could also lead to unhappy employees and, worse, emotional and physical ailments. However, by leading through influence, you can build a work environment that is more positive and sustainable in the long run. You have a workforce that will go above and beyond what is asked of them because they feel a sense of autonomy, growth and a sense that they are respected.
6. Model confidence. As a leader/manager, your co-workers watch your actions and words. You play the role of the victim/complainer, and soon, they will adapt your attitudes and behaviors. Work is not always ideal, and we are all presented with challenges from time to time. While I’m not suggesting that we always look and feel invincible, we must display the attitude of solution seekers and optimism, even in the lowest moments.

What other methods have you used to build the confidence of your colleagues?

As I sit here at home in California and participate on the Twitter back channel for the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA) 2015 national conference in New Orleans, it dawned on me that this conference and other higher ed conferences are like higher education in some ways. This post is not an analysis of what’s right or what’s wrong with higher education or the NASPA and other similar conferences. They’re just observations.

The purpose for attending varies. For some, it’s to get a job by interviewing with campuses at The Placement Exchange (TPE) or connecting with potential employers at other universities during the conference. For some to learn new ideas via the sessions, for some to network and build their social capital, and maybe for some, they were asked to attend by their organizations, and yet for others, a chance to vacation and visit a nice city.

The cost of attendance can be considered expensive. I can’t attend this year because of the combined cost of attendance. There are no shortage of literature and stories about the rising cost of tuition and attending higher education. Also, a big portion of attendance costs is travel, accommodation, food, and clothes. Some folks paid independently, while others received assistance from their organizations or sponsors.

The conference is bound by time and location. While there are virtual sessions and recorded sessions are available after the event, it’s not the same as being in New Orleans. The sessions are generally presentations for about 50 minutes, just like lectures, and the level of interaction between the speakers and the audience can be limited. Technology is used to extend the conference but as it is used, is it considered transformative when it comes to using it for learning/education?

Learning is hard to measure. If one of the conference’s goals is to learn new ideas, how does one know how much and what they have learned? What’s the proof/measure of learning? Colleges provide diplomas as proof that the students met the course requirements, and while tests may provide some assessment of what they’ve learned, is there any definitive way to measure learning? How about personal development, which is one of the goals of student affairs?

The benefits you receive are based on how much effort you put into it. I am guilty of skipping sessions in past conferences (not NASPA) because they didn’t interest me or I had other activities planned. I felt guilty for doing that, given that my campus paid for my trip. This is not to suggest that learning also doesn’t happen outside those sessions. For this conference, I’m taking advantage of Twitter to learn and engage with those in attendance.

As I mentioned above, these are just observations. What do you think about the state of higher ed and how conferences are held?