Theme Week - How I Spent My Summer Vacation

[Aimee 1,150]

So. 500 words about General Managers and their general managing, huh? Shouldn’t be too hard. I’ve been fortunate enough in my almost 4 months in the VHL to have experiences regarding GMs and GM’ing. @Shindigs was an amazing mentor when I first joined, I had the fortunate opportunity to be picked as a JST GM, and now I work as an AGM under @jacobcarson877. Really, I couldn’t have asked for a better route to leadership. Maybe one day I’ll be a GM myself but for now, I’m happy to sit in the lower rung and learn from the best.

 

I have stated this before in previous articles that Shindigs really took me under his wing and took the time to teach me everything he could. Not just about the leadership but also the everyday basic stuff that most people would be bored of repeating over and over again to new players. I would ask what I thought was a simple question and instead of a few word answers, I would receive anywhere from a paragraph to a novella of an answer. At first it intimidated me that there would be so much to learn but really at the heart of those long responses was just a really good guy trying to explain as much as possible in order to help me best understand what I was asking. I don’t think I would be as far along with my player if it hadn’t been for him holding my hand those first two weeks. It really gave me an amazing start.

 

Now, when I was selected as a GM in the JST, I was honestly surprised. I know that it’s a way to help newer players understand leadership roles but I thought maybe I was too new. But I guess they saw something in me that I didn’t. It was an interesting experience and I wish I had had a bit more of an active team in order to get my social and leadership skills in order but I will take the lessons that I learned there and go with them. Hopefully I’ll have another chance to help the JST in another way the next time around.

 

And that all leads me to where I have been the last few weeks: AGMing for San Diego. It’s certainly been an interesting experience and I have been working on flexing my leadership muscles. Jacob has been great at delegating tasks to me of which I am able to use as an excuse to force myself to learn how to analyze games better. I know I could be better at conversing with my team but I think I’m getting better at including myself into a conversation. That’s a personal thing that the VHL has really allowed me to work on. Hopefully as we approach the VHLM playoffs I can have a better experience as an AGM than I had as a player.

 

Beyond Shindigs and Jacob, I just want to once again thank all the GMs and higher-ups who have ever made me a graphic, answered a question I had, or considered me for a job. I appreciate it all.

 

525 words for week ending 10/02/2022
 

[Shindigs 1,771]

Was a pleasure teaching you, very few members get as into the league as early as you did and take to the advice in the way you have. It's when you get that kind of response that being a VHLM GM really feels worth it. I was just sad we couldn't draft you to Vegas. Though in hindsight with how you ended up earning we would have just ended up with 2 capped goalie in the playoffs (again).