Hello friends!

Since the beginning of the year, I've been I've been writing a weekly blog called Bearz Repeating. This blog is primarily dedicated to sharing high-level ideas and concepts that…wait for it….bear repeating (groan).

Past articles have focused on a variety of topics, like organizing teams for large events, handling rules questions at Eternal events, setting goals, and handling investigations.

This week's post is called Alphabet Soup! In it, I break down the many acronyms that we judges use, such as PPTQ, IPG, MTR, DEC, and many more. I hope you find this a useful resource, especially for newer judges and judge candidates.

Bearz Repeating updates every Wednesday, so check back each week for new entries! If you want to make sure you stay up to date, you can follow me on Facebook as well.

Cheers,
Paul “Bearz” Baranay

Hi everyone!

This week's Bearz Repeating is all about The Power of Stories!

Last weekend, I head judged the StarCityGames Open in Providence, Rhode Island. Providence is a special city where I've judged a lot of events, so I have many fun stories about the area. In this post, I share some of these stories from days of yore, tell one important story from last weekend, and reflect on the power of stories to motivate and inspire. Check it out!

Hey folks!

Since the last time I posted, I've written about the following topics:

April 29 – If you're Head Judging a large event, great communication with your staff begins well before the first round of the event. Email is a great way of setting expectations for your Team Leads well in advance, as well as providing information about their team members. Following up on my previous post about SCG Providence, You've Got Mail breaks these ideas down in more detail.

May 6 – The Shirt Doesn't Matter. Really, it doesn't. Leadership isn't something you can put on or take off like a red shirt; it's something you are. This post examines my personal motivations for wanting to Head Judge big events, how my view of being Head Judge changed dramatically over time, and what leadership really means.

May 13 – Judging provides many opportunities for us to grow, and these personal developments can have far-reaching implications on our personal and professional lives. When you take something you've learned from the judge program and apply it to other aspects of your life, or vice versa, that's “entwining.” In Entwining Experiences, I talk about how training to become an EMT helped me become a better judge, how becoming a judge helped me become a better EMT, and what this all means for you.

This week's bearz Repeating is Three Tales! Last weekend, I organized a judge conference for the Northeast along judge and TO extraordinaire Nick Coss. This post shares three quick stories that taught me some valuable lessons about how to interact with others.

Have you ever wished you could go back in time? Well, judges can…in a Magic game, that is! This week's Bearz Repeating will test your judgment and challenge you to find the best solution for play errors, as we Backup to the Future!

Although I stopped posting updates to this forum, Bearz Repeating continued to update on Wednesdays in 2015 – and continuing now!

Last week's article was Radical Candor, a paradigm for delivering effective guidance to other judges. If you've ever found yourself wanting to tell someone something, but held back for some reason…this article is for you.

Have you ever received praise from your boss, only to discover that was just a lead-in to talk about the real issue: some negative piece of feedback they wanted to deliver?

My series of posts on feedback continues with Ruinous Empathy, a cautionary tale about when the best of intentions lead us astray. Learn some strategies for how to deliver difficult feedback!

This week's Bearz Repeating is all about how to (not) write reviews!

Looking for some judge blogs to add to your RSS reader? Here's my reading list!

Last week, I discussed the 12 judges I nominated for Exemplar and what those nominations meant to me. I also reflected on my nominations in aggregate, and ways I plan on adjusting my nominations in the future.

This week, in Time and Time Again, I shared a personal story about stepping back from a project that I started, and examined what the words “I'm too busy” really mean.

What can Google teach us about how to manage our time? Quite a lot, actually! Find out more in this week's Bearz Repeating on the Three Eyes: Iteration, Incubation, and Innovation.

You Make the Ruling returns! How would you handle these situations from the Legacy main event of Eternal Extravaganza 4?

This week's Bearz Repeating is about making delicious breakfast.