how to deal with mistakes...

[iamconscious]

Hi. I am known to make a lot of mistakes during my early years. But what really bothered me is the habit of feeling bad when I make mistakes. I am preoccupied with what other people say or think about me. I am working for my aunt's printing press now where I encode names, address and other informations on the ID(identification cards) of some schools. It turned out that I made a lot of errors in encoding the information.

This is not a new situation for me though. I shifted from accountancy to an easy course since I repeatedly make mistakes in the computation of the financial statements. I just can't understand why there are others who can accurately do it but not me.

How will I deal about this? Just allow the problem to be and continue making a lot of mistakes? Isn't it unfair in the part of my aunt because it could raise the expenses? It's not right to strive for perfection, is it? How can I be more accurate?

How do you deal with mistakes so that you could be effective?

[Kevin Kleen]

The kinds of mistakes you're describing involve work which most people would consider pretty boring. When I do tasks like computations and transcribing my mind tends to wander to more interesting subjects, and errors result because I'm not paying full attention.

I would not beat yourself up over these kind of errors; anyone with an active imagination has trouble focusing during this kind of work. The only way I know to stamp them out these errors is to recheck your work (which is itself a challenge, because it's even more boring the second time around). You might try logging the type of errors you make - do you transpose numbers or words, skip lines, etc. This might reveal some patterns you can focus on.

My best advice qould be to try to move on to some work that you find more interesting and challenging.

[apteryx01]

Originally Posted by iamconscious

I am working for my aunt's printing press now where I encode names, address and other informations on the ID(identification cards) of some schools. It turned out that I made a lot of errors in encoding the information.

I shifted from accountancy to an easy course since I repeatedly make mistakes in the computation of the financial statements. I just can't understand why there are others who can accurately do it but not me.

Performing detail-oriented financial computations might not be work that suits you. Different people's brains are made differently.

I am also terrible at computation, but I got a degree in math. I used to sit down and do homework with a classmate who was a natural at stuff like accounting. He would do big bunches of algebraic manipulations without making a mistake, but he found setting up problems to be extremely difficult and error-prone. I, on the other hand, was a natural at setting up problems and coming up with an approach to a problem. We were a good team.

One day, we were doing a problem that looked tedious and error-prone. I suggested a different way of writing out the problem, to make it easier. My friend asked me, "How did you come up with that?" I said, "I noticed that the problem looked tedious, so I called upon the spirit of laziness, and that's what it gave me." He did things methodically, and couldn't come up with off-the-wall approaches like this. I, on the other hand, could never do things methodically without making mistakes. As I said, we were a good team. After college, he became an accountant.

The mistakes you're making might be very good information: they could be telling you to go learn to play a different position on a team, one where you'll excel and enjoy it.

[iamconscious]

Thanks for the ideas...

[iamconscious]

Originally Posted by Kevin Kleen

I would not beat yourself up over these kind of errors; anyone with an active imagination has trouble focusing during this kind of work. The only way I know to stamp them out these errors is to recheck your work (which is itself a challenge, because it's even more boring the second time around).

I indeed have an active imagination. I guess it contributed much to the mistakes made especially thinking about how angry my aunt will be after discovering them.

thanks for the ideas....