His classic film “Top Gun” is one that I have watched many times, and at times in my career I have pictured myself up in that cockpit, duelling it out with the Russian MiGs. I worked in Russia for a few years, so I was literally gunning them down for a while there…..
His character Maverick was an F-14 pilot who knew what he wanted and generally got it – in the skies and the bedroom. However, after his co-pilot Goose was tragically killed, Maverick was forced to reassess his outlook on life. If you are living life at Mach 2, sometimes you can’t do everything on your own. You need a wingman, someone to watch your back and keep you flying straight.
5 comments:
I thought this was going to be more of an article about how collaboration is mutually beneficial or how having a close companion can help you advance in your career. Instead, it turned out to be more of a series of anecdotes by the author about when people have helped him in his life. That mixed with a series of fight club references, all combine to make this "article" pretty lackluster. I've honestly gotten more out of buzzfeed lists. Like as I was reading through, he just kept presenting obvious information, like "having no friends sucks" and "sometimes you have to win over your boss". Yeah, duh. Not very insightful.
Jess and I have used this strategy with (I hope) reasonable success this semester. In addition to following the the same curriculum path within the School of Drama, we're taking two of the same electives. One, Growing Theater, involves getting up really early on Friday mornings, often after we've been in rehearsal or tech till midnight the night before. The other is Writing for the Professions, which is a rather dry class taught by a rhetoric Phd candidate with a less than stellar gift for rhetorical discourse. Having someone else who shares the same courseload and keeps me accountable has been incredibly helpful both for my grades and morale. I disagree with a previous comment that acknowledging that having a supporters within your career isn't insightful. It's easy to take for granted in school, particularly this program, where freshmen are penned in a cesspool of creativity and feelings for an entire year, necessitating strong friendships and working relationships, but in the work force there's often an "every man for himself" mentality as a relatively small group of people compete for the same job opportunities, promotions, and grant funding. Though this may not be an earth-shattering discovery in an academic context, it absolutely is important to remember that while job markets are competitive, being a lone wolf may not be the most fulfilling outlook to maintain in the work place.
I think the sentiment here is good, that you should always have someone there to look out for you and keep you on track, but I think the term "wingman" is a little misleading. Generally, a wingman is defined as a person who presents his/her friend in the best light without any personal gain, and I think the most important thing when choosing friends within a career is ensuring that each person is able to benefit from the relationship. You should be able to look out for each other and make sure each of you is on track. I also found it a little strange that the author should tell us about his experience without friends. I don't know what to say: I'm sorry? We all know what it's like to be somewhere without a buddy, and I think life experience sort of speaks for itself on that front. I don't need anyone to tell me that companions are a good thing, though like I said, I appreciate the sentiment.
I think that this is something extremely critical to our industry. Our entire careers really rest on the people we know, and the opportunities we receive based on our relationships with the people we have met. In a nutshell everyone we meet is a future wingman. And it is up to you to cultivate those relationships and nurture them just like you would your own career. Additionally it's important to have that support system behind you, and help you grow and succeed, because though you are responsible for your career path there is a force that drives you, and part of that is compromised of your personal and professional relationships.
I'm with Trent on this, I was expecting either lists, an explanation, or something to that effect. However, it was just stories or anecdotes by the author and things that helped him and really just one experience/job he had. He did have some useful information and I can relate to the having a boss/manager dislike you, granted they didn't "hate me with a passion". But overall, this article didn't catch my attention or give as much as I thought it would.
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