Category Archives: Character

Character, Problem Solving, Risk

Phishing Victim…..Me?

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I enjoy writing my blog. I really enjoy getting comments. That means that someone has read my Blog, and thought enough about it to take the time and write a comment. I put an effort into thinking about topics to write on and for the most part it appeared that the people that wrote comments did also. That was until recently.

In the last few months I started to get a significant number of comments. At first I thought this was pretty neat. We all like a little recognition and this increase in comments seemed to indicate that I might be getting some.

Not…

Upon closer inspection of this newfound number of comments I noticed that they all seemed to be based from “Russian” servers. This is only an assumption, but it is based on the URL nomenclature of the site that generating the comment. Russian? Really? Could I really be generating a following in Russia?

Still something about this seemed “Phishy”. So I decided that I would Google one of the more reasonable sounding sights to see if they truly existed. It generated another Blog site. I then decided to go to one of this more reputable sounding site. I went, I saw, and I read. No big deal.

That’s when it started. The next day I got notification from my site hosting service that they had complied with my wish to have my domain changed. My domain changed? Who requested that?

I then went to my site to see what this all meant. What is meant was my site was no longer where I had bookmarked it. My site had been hijacked.

I then called (not emailed, not IM’ed, called) my hosting provider and asked what was going on. They said that they had complied with my email request to relocate my site to another domain/server. This was obviously news to me.

After verifying (via security questions and the like) that I was in fact who I said I was, and that the site in question was indeed mine, we started down the road to reclaiming my site. After the appropriate programming magic was accomplished, we started back-tracking what had happened.

It appears that by even going to the supposedly acceptable site of one of my commenter’s I had somehow enabled them to get into my hosting account through the information I had left (like they leave at my site) at their site. They then hacked my account and hijacked my site.

This was again, and interesting and somewhat unsettling experience. But the greater question to me is: Why would someone want my site? There is not a significant amount of traffic there (from internet standards), nor are there any secrets. I guess I will have to be vigilant and watch for any issues that may arrive at a later date. In the mean time, I would ask and suggest that all who receive any of these strange / anomalous emails or comments to beware.

Character, Leadership

Sometimes You Are Wrong

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When I was younger my dad had 2 rules for life around our house: Rule 1 – Dad was never wrong. Rule 2 –Whenever dad was wrong, see Rule 1. This worked pretty well until I became a teenager, and like all teenagers I knew better….usually…I thought.

 

In business however, unlike my formative years, no one gets to be right all the time. We all work hard to make sure we are right as often as possible. It is the way you matriculate upward in management. Being right more often than not is a hallmark of the successful manager. There are times when despite your best efforts, you are not right. What you do now will tell many people a lot about your character as a leader.

 

If you are wrong, accept that things did not go as you had planned. It happens. Don’t equivocate – “We were 75% correct”. Don’t try and spin doctor the results – “We met our commitments, but didn’t reach the objectives…” Learn from it.

 

Identify what did go right,and also identify what did not. Specifically identify what needs to be done in the future to assure that when the same or similar issues arise in the future,the outcome will be different. The idea is to focus on the future and not waste cycles trying to explain, or bury the past. What is learned and assimilated into the business and how it is prepared to move forward is far more important than the protection of your ego over some perceived “failing”.

 

If at some point it turns out that you are wrong, despite however unlikely an occurrence this is believed to be, identify the issue, get it right and move on. In both the short and long term it will be better for you and the business for you to be the leader that corrected the issue and moved forward, and not the manager who tried to recast the past.

 

My dad still likes to remind me about Rule 1 though.