how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteer mechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
We've had similar experiences in our space. I keep coming back to the same philosophy - you don't fight something by pushing against it, because resistance is met with resistance. There is a reason we have unskilled, but enthusiastic people, myself included at times - because they have not really learned the proper way to do things. And there are is a reason that they help others with wrong information - because they want to help and nobody else is there to do it. We all know how frantic it can get and they jump in and help because they really want to. So the solution we came up with is that we need to be more intentional about our volunteer training. Most organizations like ours rely on volunteers but don't really spend the time to really train them. It's always 'learn as you go' mentality and that can be pretty haphazard and incomplete. Many years later a core volunteer may never even know how to overhaul a headset or understand all the different types of brakes and how to adjust them. One way we are dealing with this is by creating a new volunteer only night, with no sales, no open shop and an organized agenda which includes instruction for volunteers. Part class, part work on bikes we need fixed. It's a good start. We are kicking it off with a volunteer appreciation party and then it will run every Monday night from 6-9pm. And we are looking for other ways to be more intentional about an internal training program for volunteers. The new progam will definately create more skilled volunteers and helps enthusiasm across the board. People like having the right information to pass on to others. It's empowering. Anyway, being intentional about helping our volunteers learn more and do things the right way creates a new thing and makes the old irrelevant. So any ideas for us also, on how all of you do internal training for volunteers/staff would be really helpful to us. Let us know your ideas! John Sibley Bike Depot St. Paul, MN
----- Original Message ----- From: veganboyjosh@gmail.com To: The Think Tank Sent: Tuesday, May 12, 2009 11:10 PM Subject: [TheThinkTank] how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteermechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
Thethinktank mailing list Thethinktank@bikecollectives.org To unsubscribe, send a blank email to TheThinkTank-leave@bikecollectives.org To manage your subscription, plase visit: http://lists.bikecollectives.org/listinfo.cgi/thethinktank-bikecollectives.o...
At Bike Saviours we've been doing an 8 week class session. We require it of new volunteers before they can wrench in our shop. The idea of the class is to expose them to good mechanic practices and teach the principles behind the systems. AFter they've taken the class they gain experience by working in the shop and helping others. These are the class topics in order: 1. Intro to our shop and bike basics, 2. headsets, 3. bottom brackets, 4. hub bearings and gears, 5. brakes and intro to cables, 6. derailleurs and shifters, 7. wheel truing, 8. extra topics (tire sizing, fixed gear, bar wrapping, bike style) and review. We cluster the bearing systems together and we teach that all open bearing systems are the same. We do a similar thing with cables, using brakes to teach the barrel adjuster which is very helpful when you do shifters.
We've been revising our class handouts using Google Docs, They are almost done, let me know if you're interested in checking them out. I'll also look into putting links on the wiki.
--Ryan
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 10:12 PM, John Carlson john.carlson@comcast.netwrote:
We've had similar experiences in our space. I keep coming back to the same philosophy - you don't fight something by pushing against it, because resistance is met with resistance. There is a reason we have unskilled, but enthusiastic people, myself included at times - because they have not really learned the proper way to do things. And there are is a reason that they help others with wrong information - because they want to help and nobody else is there to do it. We all know how frantic it can get and they jump in and help because they really want to. So the solution we came up with is that we need to be more intentional about our volunteer training. Most organizations like ours rely on volunteers but don't really spend the time to really train them. It's always 'learn as you go' mentality and that can be pretty haphazard and incomplete. Many years later a core volunteer may never even know how to overhaul a headset or understand all the different types of brakes and how to adjust them. One way we are dealing with this is by creating a new volunteer only night, with no sales, no open shop and an organized agenda which includes instruction for volunteers. Part class, part work on bikes we need fixed. It's a good start. We are kicking it off with a volunteer appreciation party and then it will run every Monday night from 6-9pm. And we are looking for other ways to be more intentional about an internal training program for volunteers. The new progam will definately create more skilled volunteers and helps enthusiasm across the board. People like having the right information to pass on to others. It's empowering. Anyway, being intentional about helping our volunteers learn more and do things the right way creates a new thing and makes the old irrelevant. So any ideas for us also, on how all of you do internal training for volunteers/staff would be really helpful to us. Let us know your ideas! John Sibley Bike Depot St. Paul, MN
----- Original Message -----
*From:* veganboyjosh@gmail.com *To:* The Think Tank thethinktank@bikecollectives.org *Sent:* Tuesday, May 12, 2009 11:10 PM *Subject:* [TheThinkTank] how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteermechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
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An enthusiastic and motivated volunteer may also turn out to be a good student. Is there time for volunteer training on a mechanical level either on an individual or small group basis? While correcting someone in front of the group is in poor form, it is important to disseminate safe and accurate information to other visitors and volunteers by finding a gentle way to step in and amend, if necessary. Otherwise, taking the volunteer aside for a private one-on-one/lesson would not be out of line.
I think it's really important to stress that it's ok for volunteers to say "i don't know" and ask another mechanic or find other resources and learn alongside the visitor.
Good luck!
Casey
Collective Member FM Community Bicycle Workshop www.fmbikeworkshop.org
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 11:10 PM, veganboyjosh@gmail.com wrote:
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
Thethinktank mailing list Thethinktank@bikecollectives.org To unsubscribe, send a blank email to TheThinkTank-leave@bikecollectives.org To manage your subscription, plase visit:
http://lists.bikecollectives.org/listinfo.cgi/thethinktank-bikecollectives.o...
Interesting that classes came up. The volunteer in question was actually shadowing in a class we teach, to get a feel for teaching bike mechanics, as well to learn the stuff. The incident where they gave incorrect mechanical instruction was in this setting. The instructor didn't want to correct the person in front of the class, and was uncomfortable even bringing it up, since he was the instructor, and he wasn't expecting to have to be correcting other "teachers" who are giving poor advice...
The situation needs more research, but I was speaking with another staff member about it tonight (after it was appropriate to contact volunteer), and we both decided you folks would be a good place to turn in the meantime.
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 11:54 PM, Ryan Guzy ryanguzy@gmail.com wrote:
At Bike Saviours we've been doing an 8 week class session. We require it of new volunteers before they can wrench in our shop. The idea of the class is to expose them to good mechanic practices and teach the principles behind the systems. AFter they've taken the class they gain experience by working in the shop and helping others. These are the class topics in order: 1. Intro to our shop and bike basics, 2. headsets, 3. bottom brackets, 4. hub bearings and gears, 5. brakes and intro to cables, 6. derailleurs and shifters, 7. wheel truing, 8. extra topics (tire sizing, fixed gear, bar wrapping, bike style) and review. We cluster the bearing systems together and we teach that all open bearing systems are the same. We do a similar thing with cables, using brakes to teach the barrel adjuster which is very helpful when you do shifters.
We've been revising our class handouts using Google Docs, They are almost done, let me know if you're interested in checking them out. I'll also look into putting links on the wiki.
--Ryan
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 10:12 PM, John Carlson john.carlson@comcast.netwrote:
We've had similar experiences in our space. I keep coming back to the same philosophy - you don't fight something by pushing against it, because resistance is met with resistance. There is a reason we have unskilled, but enthusiastic people, myself included at times - because they have not really learned the proper way to do things. And there are is a reason that they help others with wrong information - because they want to help and nobody else is there to do it. We all know how frantic it can get and they jump in and help because they really want to. So the solution we came up with is that we need to be more intentional about our volunteer training. Most organizations like ours rely on volunteers but don't really spend the time to really train them. It's always 'learn as you go' mentality and that can be pretty haphazard and incomplete. Many years later a core volunteer may never even know how to overhaul a headset or understand all the different types of brakes and how to adjust them. One way we are dealing with this is by creating a new volunteer only night, with no sales, no open shop and an organized agenda which includes instruction for volunteers. Part class, part work on bikes we need fixed. It's a good start. We are kicking it off with a volunteer appreciation party and then it will run every Monday night from 6-9pm. And we are looking for other ways to be more intentional about an internal training program for volunteers. The new progam will definately create more skilled volunteers and helps enthusiasm across the board. People like having the right information to pass on to others. It's empowering. Anyway, being intentional about helping our volunteers learn more and do things the right way creates a new thing and makes the old irrelevant. So any ideas for us also, on how all of you do internal training for volunteers/staff would be really helpful to us. Let us know your ideas! John Sibley Bike Depot St. Paul, MN
----- Original Message -----
*From:* veganboyjosh@gmail.com *To:* The Think Tank thethinktank@bikecollectives.org *Sent:* Tuesday, May 12, 2009 11:10 PM *Subject:* [TheThinkTank] how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteermechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
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I think in this case materials like class handouts help. It gives the helper/teacher something to work off so all teachers have a consistent message and stay on track. Also if all students have a handout for that class they can see for themselves that this person is giving wrong information. That way there is no need for confrontation during the class. If someone has trouble even when provided with materials it can be dealt with later through more training on how to teach. --Ryan On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 10:58 PM, veganboyjosh@gmail.com wrote:
Interesting that classes came up. The volunteer in question was actually shadowing in a class we teach, to get a feel for teaching bike mechanics, as well to learn the stuff. The incident where they gave incorrect mechanical instruction was in this setting. The instructor didn't want to correct the person in front of the class, and was uncomfortable even bringing it up, since he was the instructor, and he wasn't expecting to have to be correcting other "teachers" who are giving poor advice...
The situation needs more research, but I was speaking with another staff member about it tonight (after it was appropriate to contact volunteer), and we both decided you folks would be a good place to turn in the meantime.
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 11:54 PM, Ryan Guzy ryanguzy@gmail.com wrote:
At Bike Saviours we've been doing an 8 week class session. We require it of new volunteers before they can wrench in our shop. The idea of the class is to expose them to good mechanic practices and teach the principles behind the systems. AFter they've taken the class they gain experience by working in the shop and helping others. These are the class topics in order: 1. Intro to our shop and bike basics, 2. headsets, 3. bottom brackets, 4. hub bearings and gears, 5. brakes and intro to cables, 6. derailleurs and shifters, 7. wheel truing, 8. extra topics (tire sizing, fixed gear, bar wrapping, bike style) and review. We cluster the bearing systems together and we teach that all open bearing systems are the same. We do a similar thing with cables, using brakes to teach the barrel adjuster which is very helpful when you do shifters.
We've been revising our class handouts using Google Docs, They are almost done, let me know if you're interested in checking them out. I'll also look into putting links on the wiki.
--Ryan
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 10:12 PM, John Carlson john.carlson@comcast.netwrote:
We've had similar experiences in our space. I keep coming back to the same philosophy - you don't fight something by pushing against it, because resistance is met with resistance. There is a reason we have unskilled, but enthusiastic people, myself included at times - because they have not really learned the proper way to do things. And there are is a reason that they help others with wrong information - because they want to help and nobody else is there to do it. We all know how frantic it can get and they jump in and help because they really want to. So the solution we came up with is that we need to be more intentional about our volunteer training. Most organizations like ours rely on volunteers but don't really spend the time to really train them. It's always 'learn as you go' mentality and that can be pretty haphazard and incomplete. Many years later a core volunteer may never even know how to overhaul a headset or understand all the different types of brakes and how to adjust them. One way we are dealing with this is by creating a new volunteer only night, with no sales, no open shop and an organized agenda which includes instruction for volunteers. Part class, part work on bikes we need fixed. It's a good start. We are kicking it off with a volunteer appreciation party and then it will run every Monday night from 6-9pm. And we are looking for other ways to be more intentional about an internal training program for volunteers. The new progam will definately create more skilled volunteers and helps enthusiasm across the board. People like having the right information to pass on to others. It's empowering. Anyway, being intentional about helping our volunteers learn more and do things the right way creates a new thing and makes the old irrelevant. So any ideas for us also, on how all of you do internal training for volunteers/staff would be really helpful to us. Let us know your ideas! John Sibley Bike Depot St. Paul, MN
----- Original Message -----
*From:* veganboyjosh@gmail.com *To:* The Think Tank thethinktank@bikecollectives.org *Sent:* Tuesday, May 12, 2009 11:10 PM *Subject:* [TheThinkTank] how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteermechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
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Hello All,
In my experience of teaching classes and having coteachers and endless hours of running open shop, I can say that misinformatin does and will come up in the future.
I find that part of the fun/challenge of being an instructor and witnessing incorrect info is to be very creative in ways to correct the mistake within minutes of it being said. THis is tricky; as you don't want to come off in all the possible negative ways one can. It helps to try to put yourself in the brain of the person uttering the misinfo and play off their instruction. Correcting someone in front of others is generally considered a no-no (especially in the collared world of business), however I think in the setting of a community bike shop where we are all learning constantly, it is ok to explore situations and turn them into more positive learning experiences. Again, the priceles "people skills" aspect comes into major play.
As for inexperienced but highly enthusiastic volunteers in general, I'd say; Encourage their bikecitement and at the same time invest a little extra time in guiding them.
I think other folks have given some pretty good suggestions on training and whatnot in this thread, but I'd like to add that its really important to kind of groom these enthusiastic volunteers in their mechanic skills. Having intelligent excited mechanics helps spread bikecitement. Granted, some folks are just plain hard to work with and or don't listen, but again it is a challenge and rewarding to have a novice excited individual grow into an expert who is still excited.
Cheers and good luck-
SteveM
Chicago
Date: Tue, 12 May 2009 22:10:53 -0600 From: veganboyjosh@gmail.com To: thethinktank@bikecollectives.org Subject: [TheThinkTank] how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteer mechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
Insert movie times and more without leaving Hotmail®. http://windowslive.com/Tutorial/Hotmail/QuickAdd?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_HM_Tutori...
Here at the Durham Bike Co-op, we've been trying out a "team system". Basically the idea is that all projects involve a "mechanic team". Usually the team will include 2 volunteers plus the person needing help on the bike. At least one of the volunteer mechanics will be more experienced. The feedback we have gotten has been positive.
Best, -Dave
On Wed, May 13, 2009 at 10:34 AM, steve marsala smarsa1@hotmail.com wrote:
Hello All,
In my experience of teaching classes and having coteachers and endless hours of running open shop, I can say that misinformatin does and will come up in the future.
I find that part of the fun/challenge of being an instructor and witnessing incorrect info is to be very creative in ways to correct the mistake within minutes of it being said. THis is tricky; as you don't want to come off in all the possible negative ways one can. It helps to try to put yourself in the brain of the person uttering the misinfo and play off their instruction. Correcting someone in front of others is generally considered a no-no (especially in the collared world of business), however I think in the setting of a community bike shop where we are all learning constantly, it is ok to explore situations and turn them into more positive learning experiences. Again, the priceles "people skills" aspect comes into major play.
As for inexperienced but highly enthusiastic volunteers in general, I'd say; Encourage their bikecitement and at the same time invest a little extra time in guiding them.
I think other folks have given some pretty good suggestions on training and whatnot in this thread, but I'd like to add that its really important to kind of groom these enthusiastic volunteers in their mechanic skills. Having intelligent excited mechanics helps spread bikecitement. Granted, some folks are just plain hard to work with and or don't listen, but again it is a challenge and rewarding to have a novice excited individual grow into an expert who is still excited.
Cheers and good luck- SteveM Chicago
Date: Tue, 12 May 2009 22:10:53 -0600 From: veganboyjosh@gmail.com To: thethinktank@bikecollectives.org Subject: [TheThinkTank] how to deal with enthusiastic but wrong volunteer mechanics?
Sorry for dominating the emails, folks. Community Cycles is in all kinds of transition, and we're looking for help.
I don't know all the details right now, so I'll keep this general.
We've been lucky enough to have a volunteer show up who's very motivated and enthusiastic about our mission and our programs. This person has gotten really involved in existing programs and even helped work on and start a new one. Recently, this person was asked by another shop visitor a mechanical question, since it was clear that the volunteer was more staff like, and less client. The answer given was very incorrect (one of the details I'm missing is what the quesiton/answer were), but this was witnessed by another very competent experienced mechanic, who was uncomfortable correcting the misstatement in front of the group. In another situation, the same volunteer was seen making very basic mistakes when working alone on a bike. From what I understand, the big one was being asked to install cables on a bike, and neglecting to include housing.
We would like to continue having this person as a part of our team, but we also need to make sure the advice and work they do is correct, safe, and appropriate.
One other wrinkle, is that the two incidents were witnessed by two different staff members, both very skilled mechanics.
How to approach the volunteer? Any help or experience you folks have would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
josh.
Insert movie times and more without leaving Hotmail®. See how. _______________________________________________ Thethinktank mailing list Thethinktank@bikecollectives.org To unsubscribe, send a blank email to TheThinkTank-leave@bikecollectives.org To manage your subscription, plase visit: http://lists.bikecollectives.org/listinfo.cgi/thethinktank-bikecollectives.o...
participants (6)
-
Casey -
David J. Zielinski -
John Carlson -
Ryan Guzy -
steve marsala -
veganboyjosh＠gmail.com