Earlyin my career I had a battle with the head of manufacturing...

Earlyin my career I had a battle with the head of manufacturing that was causingproblems for political reasons for a product I was trying to release.
A manger that I consider a friend took me to lunch. Theadvice he gave me was always listen more intently to those who do not like youand disagree with you than those that do. They will go for your weakestpoint. An area you should work on improving. An area most ofyour friends will never bring up. If a friend brings up a problem then listenintently it is a very good friend that will point out faults most willnot.

Even when they are wrong your detractors help you. Recently someonepointed out what they thought was an error in how I handled changes in receivables. They were wrong but in thinking about what they said I realized that I had to include the delta between sales and collections for Q3 that were large because of no sales in Q2. I had not.

I was a week supporter of Mild Hybrids when AUS made a statement about US trucks using Mild hybrids which Iknew was wrong except RAM. Investigations led me to understand the weight limit for Mild hybrid was much lower than I thought. Comments by AUS and Edie led me to redo the energy neededto stop a 1 Kilo vehicle from 100 KPH I have now said Mild Hybrids will only have about a 5%, 8% max fuel savings and emissions reduction. So even when they are wrong your detractorshelp to refine your understanding if you pay attention to them.

It is a free world you can do what you want. Your loss if you use the ignore button.