Bryan Craft

I am not exactly sure what Bryan Craft came to class to lecture on, but I enjoyed his presentation none the less. If I could give a over-arching theme it would be how about how to treat your customers.

Bryan gave us a little back story about his past employments. The two jobs that really shaped his ideals was Disney and the software development company Knowledge Universe. Disney is notorious for giving its quest and customers the best treatment possible. While working at Disney Bryan said that he took a lot of these ideals to heart. Treating the customer with respect and making them feel as though they are your number on priority.

Bryan then went on to talk about his next employments. At Disney, Bryan said he learned everything that you need to do right when dealing with customers and employees; however at Knowledge Universe, Bryan learned everything that you should not do. Bryan talked about how he was hired on to do a job, only to later be fired once the job was finished. It sounds as though Knowledge Universe was a very generous company while he was there, but they lacked loyalty towards their employees. Bryan talked about how he received a letter from upper management telling him that he was fired, but they had ended up sending it too soon! It was suppose to be received after Bryan launched the project. This ended up being a large wake up call for Bryan.

I particularly enjoyed Bryan's presentation because he is working in an industry that I have a growing interest in. Web development seems like it might be where I want to continue my education. I asked Bryan for his business card so that I can set up an information interview and I plan on asking for an appointment soon. It was cool for me to hear more about Bryan's industry being that I am interested in it.

Finally, I enjoyed the topic that Bryan kinda subtle mentioned on. Bryan kinda talked about employment in a small company vs a large corporation. It is definitely something worth thinking about and Bryan's talk put the idea back in my head. I worked at a small company before, and while it wasn't perfect, I think that I might ultimately prefer it to a larger corporation. One of the things that I didn't like at the smaller company that I worked for was that they lacked an HR division. It made certain things hard to deal with, however I think that working for a large corporation can cause you to lose some of your identity.  You're just another cog in the wheel. I think that there might be more room for growth at a smaller company, and I think it would be certainly easier to get noticed!