As some of you in the states may know, yesterday, 18 February, was President’s Day.

If you’re not familiar with the origin of this…holiday…here’s a little snippet from the source du jour:

Presidents Day (or Presidents’ Day), is a commonly used, but erroneous, name for the federal holiday officially designated as Washington’s Birthday. It is also the official name of a concurrent state holiday celebrated on the same day in a small number of states. It is celebrated on the third Monday of February. [Link]

Yes, you read it right. It’s a false named holiday. It started as a celebration of our “Founding Father”, but then through a failed initial attempt to combine Washington’s and Lincoln’s birthdays, the retail industry stepped in and made the decision for us. President’s Day would celebrate ALL presidents, and it would be a shopping day for everyone who works at a company that recognizes the federal holiday (basically anyone but retail).

What that furthermore means, is that everyone who works retail is working on the 18th, while everyone who doesn’t work retail is SHOPPING on the 18th. It’s a win-win for everyone, in my opinion.

Now, I did not do much shopping on the 18th - only grocery shopping because I wanted to prepare a special dinner in celebration of yet another fake holiday. Instead of being a retail whore, I accomplished two primary things while I was at home on the 18th.

First, I solved our 4×4 Rubik’s Cube, which was not much of a challenge since we pretended it was a 2×2 and only scrambled it in groupings. I solved it using the exact same process as one uses on a 3×3 cube, but I was none the less impressed with myself.

Second, I finished the last edits on a short that I wrote last year, called The Peregryn. It will be available on the Amazon Kindle, and in downloadable e-Book format.

Third, ok so I did more than 2 things on the 18th, I did about 25% of the initial edit of the humorous adventure story that I wrote back in 2006. It’s around 58k words, so it’s taking me a bit longer to make the first pass, but I’m hoping to have it ready for publishing by end of year.

In other book news, David is actively editing The Venus Diary, and I hope to have his first round of edits incorporated by mid-March, in preparation for publishing by end of April. I have also submitted the first book in the series, Box of Hair: A Fairy Tale, to Barnes & Noble, Borders, and a local children’s book store for possibly inclusion in their brick & mortar locations. We’ll see what happens there.

So all-in-all, I worked on President’s Day just like many of you out there. But I did celebrate by cooking a yummy steak dinner, complete with asparagus and a festive salad.

Happy Birthday all ya’ll, except for he who must not be named.

(A VERY old picture of me in office #2)

12 years and 1 day - that’s how long I’ve been at my current job, which I started right out of college.

Those of you who read my blog regularly know that I really do not talk about work that often. I have posted about some of the conferences I’ve gone to with work, clothing issues in the office, and about previous jobs I’ve had, but in general, I try to keep work posts on my work blog, and home posts on my homo blog. But sometimes the two do cross paths.

It’s really not that difficult to figure out where I work, especially since I have provided links to my work blog on several occasions ;-). That blog tends to be more technical in nature, and provides the “world” a view of what it’s like to work at a high tech company in the IT department. I sometimes talk about building technical communities, mobile devices (and what I wish they would do), social networking, and most recently about geeking out with Linux.

But let me come back to my point. It has been exactly 12 years and 1 day since I started with the company, and I have had many jobs during that time. Many of my friends have moved from company to company after graduation, but I have been at the same place. In that time, I have had 6 or so jobs, but only 3 offices.

I started in a group called Database Services doing DBA type work, which eventually led into project and program management. It was hard-core IT work that I absolutely loved - product engineering, 24×7 production support, etc. After about 4.5 years I moved into another part of IT managing a team that did decision support for data gathered by marketing programs on the corporate website. This was also my first office move, from one building to another. It was a fun and challenging job, but I burned out quickly on some of the internal politics.

A silly logo I created for the Global Teams Program

For that, and the next two jobs, I stayed in the same office location but moved from managing the DSS activities to a brief stint supporting corporate marketing then to an HR type job doing organization development. I trained managers on how to effectively handle change and transition in their teams, and I also performed team interventions and workshops to help groups improve their performance. I was also responsible for building the 2.0 version of a Team Effectiveness Toolkit and a Global Teams Program, which I somehow still own today.

During that time in IT HR, I realized that my real passion was management, and I found a job managing a team of systems analysts and snapped it up. This was office move number 3 as well. And so, since 2003 (I think), in some form or fashion I have managed analysts who support some major enterprise software that we use.

And now I am embarking on job #7 (or is it 8). Same office, same responsibilities, different team, different manager, and 75% different employees. One thing that is constant is change, and I’m looking forward to seeing where this will take my career.

So after 12 years and 1 day, I’m still at the same company having survived layoffs, redeployments, reorganizations and the like, and still chugging along.

So what about you? Have you always been at the same company since graduation / post-high school? Have you moved around companies or within the same company? Share your story with us in the comments, or provide a link to your own blog where you may have shared the story in the past.

(And don’t forget to check out the latest on American Idol 2008 while you’re here)

Wahoo, David got a new job today!

He’ll be doing IT “stuff” for a local family-owned business called Goore’s - Furniture and Accessories for Babies to Teens. So everyone go do some baby shopping right away :-).

We’re going to Tapa the World to celebrate (while I cough all through dinner), and then we’ll be enjoying some delicious Domaine Chandon champagne.

What a nice surprise for an otherwise crappy Wednesday!

My head hurts.

Someone in site services decided I no longer needed the filter in the light over my desk and so they removed it.

Why oh why do people not look at the reason it was there in the first place before removing it?

My eyes are killing me!

If you don’t know what a migraine is like, you can read about it here.

Today was the final day of the conference. After a mostly enjoyable evening at the Gala Awards Dinner, we awoke refreshed and ready for the last round of workshops and the final plenary.

Unfortunately, that refreshing feeling did not last long.

The conference rooms were incredibly cramped, and before long, I was getting so hot that I felt nauseous. I had to keep going back to the hotel room in preparation for losing my morning coffee. Thankfully, I was able to maintain my composure long enough to get through the morning.

The lunch plenary, which ends the conference, featured a guest presentation from Brian Graden, President of Entertainment at MTV and President of the Logo channel. His presentation was very entertaining, and included clips from many shows he helped create, GLBT target advertisements he championed, and important takeaways about following your dreams.

Oh, before I forget, again the hotel served chicken for the meal.

Finally, they announced the location for the 2008 Summit - Austin, TX. Now don’t get me wrong, I love Austin, but I do not love Texas. It’s a ridiculously RED state, with a tiny sea of blue around the Austin area. I have been there many times on college recruiting trips and I really do like the city - but I really don’t see how a GLBT person could stand to live in that state.

The passing of the torch, or in this case some kind of fairy wand, happened, and the chairpersons for the 2008 Summit did a little song and dance presentation about their wonderful city.

The 2007 Summit wrapped up with the entire O&E staff coming up on stage and singing some song I’d never heard before that was apparently inspirational.

All-in-all, I’m not sure if this summit was better than 2006 in Chicago. Some parts were very interesting, some workshops were very good, but it feels like the event is getting so big that it’s not able to accommodate real learning. I really hope next year’s event gets back to workshops that are insightful and inspiring, and give tangible action plans we can use at our places of work.

Tomorrow, Sunday, we fly back to Sacramento.

Oh, and it’s my birthday today.

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On the evening of Day 3 of our trip (Day 2 of the conference itself), is the Gala Awards Dinner. This event celebrates accomplishments from employee groups, straight allies, and leaders in the area of diversity.

The evening started with a mediocre fancy dinner, some wine, some entertainment, then the awards ceremony. There was also a live auction, where one could bid on things like an RSVP cruise, an HP laptop/printer/camera package, and this year, a signed script from the hit TV show Ugly Betty (a hit show that I’ve never seen).

Dinner was adequate. Unfortunately they seemed very unprepared for vegetarian dishes. Once again, the meat eaters around me had chicken. It seemed like the hotel could only serve chicken for their meals. I waited, and waited, and waiting, until eventually they brought me a plate of steamed vegetables and some mashed potato. I seriously think I need to go back to eating meat.

Kate Clinton was once again the MC for the evening, and as always, she did an excellent job of entertaining the crowd. She’s hilarious, topical, and a sassy broad. Love a bunch of her.

The Outie Awards, presented by Out and Equal were really not much of a surprise. You can pretty much tell which company is going to win, and USUALLY, the companies that have been nominated are very close in terms of the good things they have done to get the nomination in the first place. Except for the last one. That was the workplace excellence award. Frankly, I don’t know how on earth we were nominated for that award. We don’t deserve it, especially compared to the winner, Wells Fargo.

I can’t even relay the types of support that Wells Fargo provides to its GLBT employees at a group and a personal level. It astounds me. The person who accepted the award spoke of going to her second line manager, telling him that she was going to have to quit to move to another state because her partner got a new job. The manager told her they would create a position for her wherever she needed to move. That would never happen here. So long - farewell - auf wiedersehen - goodbye - we’ll just eliminate your position and find someone else to do it because we don’t value GLBT employees like our peers do.

Anyway - one highlight of the evening was Barney Frank presenting the Trailblazer Award to a real pioneer for GLBT rights, Frank Kameny.

I know absolutely nothing about this dear old man except he’s a wonderful speaker, a very genuine person, and he deeply cares about equality for ALL people. You can find out more information about him here.

The evening ended with drinks and dancing, and me going back to the room because I was feeling sick.

Tomorrow - Day 4, the final day of the conference.

Although Day 1 and Day 2 are busy and interesting, Day 3 is usually the main day of the conference, since it culminates in the Gala Awards dinner. The morning started off as well as can be expected, with us still battling PST while being in EST.

Breakfast and the plenary session started off with a piano player who struggled to be heard over the constant clang of dishes and rude people talking - but with a crowd of over 2000 people, it’s really tough for them to be quiet, especially while eating.

After breakfast, John Amaechi, former NBA player (and Brit), took the stage (all 6 foot 9 of him) for the plenary speech.

He is a very eloquent and engaging person, and shared a lot of great thoughts and quotes with us - some his, others borrowed.

Here’s a sample:

“It only takes a tiny light to scare the monster under bed.” - in reference to his mother, who used her inner light to bring change to the world / spread joy to the people around her.

“Why speak if not to change the world.” - he did not remember who told him this quote, but it’s a good one.

“Before you, I didn’t realize black people could be gay.” - this from an old woman who came to one of his book signings.

“What John Amaechi doesn’t realize is that being gay doesn’t make him any more interesting.” - this from a British reporter who has covered John’s career in the past.

John’s main message was about writing our future history. He likened it to sci-fi writers who create elaborate visions of the future, writing in such great detail you would think they had actually lived there and were writing a history book. He also shared a good statistic - only 5%-10% of the people in an organization need to innovate and change, 80%-85% will follow if led properly, and 5% will never change and will likely leave. Which percentage are you?

After the plenary we were off to the next round of workshops. The first one I attended was a feature panel on Workplace Equality in the American Spotlight. The presenters were a mix of media moguls, including editors and reporters from the Washington Blade, Fortune Magazine, Washington Post, Metro Weekly, a blogger, and the president of GLAAD (who also happens to be the former mayor of Tempe, AZ). It was an excellent session on the impacts of ENDA - Employment Non-Discrimination Act (just a note here - we are one of the only companies in our sector who did NOT publicly support this bill and one of the few companies in our sector who do not provide or require mandatory diversity training for employees and managers), the Hate Crimes bill, and the roll of the media in sharing GLBT information.

In case you do not know what this really means - in 33 states it is legal to fire someone for no other reason than their sexual orientation. This means that regardless of whether your company guidelines prohibit discrimination based on GLBT, you could be fired for it and have zero legal protection.

Next up - Visibility and Profitability, Marketing to the GLBT Consumer. More and more, companies are realizing the massive consumer opportunities from the GLBT population. Some of this comes from the “DINK” phenomenon - Dual Income No Kids. Basically it means that the GLBT population has a LOT of discretionary money available for purchases. This session included representatives from Nike, Fannie Mae, and Winmark Concepts. They showed various new advertising campaigns which have allowed their companies to target market a new segment of the population who has money to spend. One interesting thing I would point out here is that stockholders in companies need to start caring not only about return on investment, but also whether the company treats its employees and environment with integrity. Do the companies you invest in support employees of all diverse groups? If not, why are you investing in them?

The last workshop I attended today was Executive Sponsors - Use ‘em or Lose ‘em. This was the best session so far, and was filled with a panel of very senior execs from Ernst & Young, Raytheon, and PepsiCo.

The executive sponsors of these employee groups attend Out & Equal, participate in Pride events, actively work with the employee groups for change, and one of them even joined the group on the AIDS Lifecycle Ride in California. This was a huge wakeup call that we are not effectively using our executive sponsor to help raise visibility and awareness, and to educate senior management on the issues we face.

After a quick break we were off to the Gala Awards Dinner.