Worst advice you ever got

[frackincygy]

I had a HS teacher in a required for graduation Senior course who'd always say "C's get degrees" and "What do you call a doctor who finishes last in their class? Doctor."... I took those a bit too literally my first few semesters in Ames.

In hindsight, I'm near certain he was talking to the students he was trying to drag across the finish line; not the ones who'd already finished the race.

 

[NWICY]

One time @cowgirl836 tried to tell me how to deal with some bees.

That thread is a classic though.

 

[NWICY]

Just have one more drink

The corollary to this is "hold my beer"

 

[Isualum13]

My parents convinced my not to buy any bitcoin in its infancy with my graduation money.

 

[gypsyroad]

"If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life"

Maybe there are some people that this works out for, that is great for them.

I wish I would have done a better job when I was younger of focusing on getting valuable skills instead of following what I was interested in. I eventually did career-pivot to a field I am less interested in and certainly do not love. But now I make more money + have a better work life balance + am much happier.

Better advice would be "everybody hates their job so you might as well hate your job and be rich"

(obviously more complicated than that but yeah)

A former boss of mine said "Don't make your hobby your job."

 

[Gunnerclone]

“Condoms are for sailors”

 

[Hoggins]

That you always have to be growing and striving for something. Just existing is fine. Settling is fine. Comfortable is fine. In fact, I love it.

 

[clones_jer]

College version: "I read somewhere that you can mix Ice 101 with chocolate milk!" (made me gag a little just remembering that)

Work version: "You can't be their boss and their friend"
- I very much kept my employees at arms length because of this (and because I was generally younger than them). But in hindsight it was bad advice, people work harder, answer their phones after hours, and cut through the BS a lot faster when they know you care about them as more than just a line on a spreadsheet.

 

[MJ29]

Choose a career doing something you love and you'll never work a day in your life.

What a load of crap. Unless you love doing something that earns you a good paycheck, you'll be working more than one job just to pay basic bills. And forget about any luxuries.

 

[MJ29]

"If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life"

Maybe there are some people that this works out for, that is great for them.

I wish I would have done a better job when I was younger of focusing on getting valuable skills instead of following what I was interested in. I eventually did career-pivot to a field I am less interested in and certainly do not love. But now I make more money + have a better work life balance + am much happier.

Better advice would be "everybody hates their job so you might as well hate your job and be rich"

(obviously more complicated than that but yeah)

I didn't read yours before I added mine, but yeah.

 

[KnappShack]

College version: "I read somewhere that you can mix Ice 101 with chocolate milk!" (made me gag a little just remembering that)

Work version: "You can't be their boss and their friend"
- I very much kept my employees at arms length because of this (and because I was generally younger than them). But in hindsight it was bad advice, people work harder, answer their phones after hours, and cut through the BS a lot faster when they know you care about them as more than just a line on a spreadsheet.

My teams knew we could be cool, but I'll terminate them if push came to shove.

Worst advice? I grew up in an Iowa river town. There's too much to think of just one.

 

[zumbro clones]

Three months salary on an engagement ring. If your spouse believes this, you may have more problems coming up in your relationship. A marriage doesn't need to start with a required gold band price.

 

[CascadeClone]

Work version: "You can't be their boss and their friend"
- I very much kept my employees at arms length because of this (and because I was generally younger than them). But in hindsight it was bad advice, people work harder, answer their phones after hours, and cut through the BS a lot faster when they know you care about them as more than just a line on a spreadsheet.

Disagree on this. You can't be their friend, not truly, when you have power over them. However, that doesn't mean you can't care about them. You can still care about someone, their health, their family, their ambitions and interests, without being a friend. Maybe I am just arguing semantics about the definition of friend, or the depth of the relationship.

I do agree it is important that people feel like they matter to the other humans they work with - it's hard to spend the time and energy 8 hours a day if you feel like a cog that no one cares about. People work a lot better when they are in a good mood, and a little social grease helps with that.

 

[coolerifyoudid]

Disagree on this. You can't be their friend, not truly, when you have power over them. However, that doesn't mean you can't care about them. You can still care about someone, their health, their family, their ambitions and interests, without being a friend. Maybe I am just arguing semantics about the definition of friend, or the depth of the relationship.

I do agree it is important that people feel like they matter to the other humans they work with - it's hard to spend the time and energy 8 hours a day if you feel like a cog that no one cares about. People work a lot better when they are in a good mood, and a little social grease helps with that.

I agree on this. In any job where I have managed people, I can't be a true friend to someone because there will always come a time where you have to do something they don't like or have to make them do something they don't like. I'm sure there are jobs where some of those lines are easier to navigate, but once a "friend" is telling another "friend" that they have to do something, things can go sideways. And if you are more of a friend to one employee and not another, claims of favoritism arise and things can get really dicey.

 

[dmclone]

My sister for the last 20+ years has had a financial theory that includes things like:

"I'm going to spend what I have now, I'll never live long enough to retire".....she just turned 65.

When her husband had a heart attack last year, I mentioned that the one big positive was that he worked at a good company and LTD should help a lot......"Oh we never signed up for that". Like every single person in his family has had a heart attack in their 50's.

They've been living in this house for at least 15 years. They have nearly zero equity because of 2nd mortgages to pay for things like horses, camaros, golf carts (don't golf), tanning beds, etc.

The sad part is that the husband's income has been good for decades but they have zero to show for it.

 

[SCNCY]

My dad took financial advice from Dave Ramsey and passed it along to me. I didn't have a credit card until I was out of college and having no credit history made buying a car, renting an apartment, and buying a home difficult. The person who passed along that advice to me had to co-sign for me on some of those things, ha

I suppose it was better than having a bunch of credit card debt to my name when graduating college, but I think I could have handled paying off a CC every month instead of using debit for everything.

I don't know, sounds like good advice to me. Getting all the benefits without any of the risk!

 

[2122]

My freshman advisor at ISU was useless. Saw him first week in Ames. Year-end meeting, about all I recall him saying is that he'd been sure I'd drop out, was quite surprised that not only had I not dropped out, I'd made the Dean's list 2 of the 3 trimesters (this is back when grading was real). Thx for all the support, chump.

 

[BCClone]

My sister for the last 20+ years has had a financial theory that includes things like:

"I'm going to spend what I have now, I'll never live long enough to retire".....she just turned 65.

When her husband had a heart attack last year, I mentioned that the one big positive was that he worked at a good company and LTD should help a lot......"Oh we never signed up for that". Like every single person in his family has had a heart attack in their 50's.

They've been living in this house for at least 15 years. They have nearly zero equity because of 2nd mortgages to pay for things like horses, camaros, golf carts (don't golf), tanning beds, etc.

The sad part is that the husband's income has been good for decades but they have zero to show for it.

There were several back in the cheap interest days that were refi'ing their houses for the increase in value and the equity they had accumulated. They took the cash and spent it on other things. Now they are 45-50 with a 30 year mortgage and the rates are too high to make that game work anymore. It's why the credit card balances have been exploding and are now higher than they ever have been.

 

[BoomerClone]

“You need to put a ring on that.”

 

[BCClone]

My freshman advisor at ISU was useless. Saw him first week in Ames. Year-end meeting, about all I recall him saying is that he'd been sure I'd drop out, was quite surprised that not only had I not dropped out, I'd made the Dean's list 2 of the 3 trimesters (this is back when grading was real). Thx for all the support, chump.

My first advisor told me it was best to gap my classes. Take a 9, then 11, skip another for lunch so 1 and then 3. That way I would go to the library and study between classes. Yeah right, I hated semester. I packed them in after that. I also never heard my advisor ever again until I changed majors going into my third year and my new one contacted me and I thought I was in trouble.