The Disengaged

I read a constructive post earlier today by Emotional Intelligence thought leader Daniel Goleman and thought perhaps you'd appreciate it as much as I did.
&nbsp;
Positive Outlook: Optimism is a Choice
How many times has a &ldquo;setback&rdquo; led to a positive opportunity?
According to research, 86% of U.S. adults say the coronavirus will lead to important lessons for humanity. These range from practical lessons, such as handwashing; to personal lessons, such as grasping the importance of our family and loved ones; to societal lessons, like the value of social-emotional learning or universal health care.
This ability&mdash;to see the good in an inherently challenging situation&mdash;is the Emotional Intelligence competence called Positive Outlook. One of four self-management competencies in [Goleman&rsquo;s] framework of emotional intelligence, Positive Outlook refers to our ability to see the best in people, situations, and events. When people have Positive Outlook they:
<ul style="list-style-type: circle;">
<li>See the &ldquo;glass half full&rdquo;</li>
<li>Cultivate positive emotions in challenging moments</li>
<li>Pursue their goals no matter what life throws their way</li>
<li>Focus on what&rsquo;s working</li>
<li>See the best in themselves and others</li>
<li>Leverage strengths in order to solve problems and create productive outcomes</li>
</ul>
Positive Outlook is a prerequisite for effective leadership.
On a team level, Positive Outlook leads to higher levels of engagement, lower levels of conflict, and greater overall effectiveness. Part of this has to do with &ldquo;emotional contagion&rdquo;&mdash;when people in power dictate the mood of everyone around them.

Positive Outlook

Ego, "the 'I' that distinguishes us from others," including "our self-esteem and self-image," but also "our conceit and self-importance" is a tricky, tricky&nbsp;beast.&nbsp; A devil on our shoulder, a gremlin in the machinery.
On the one hand, it is necessary, essential.&nbsp; Without it, we are paper dolls, folded by the least life has to offer or brings our way.&nbsp; But too much of it and we are rigid, always right, enrobed in our self-righteousness and sense of entitlement or destiny.
In its extremes<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;too much and too little<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;it is&nbsp;as easy to spot as the peacock.&nbsp;
Too Little, Exhibit A: The abused, who apologizes for her abuse.
Too Much, Exhibit A:&nbsp;The tyrant, whose way is the only way.
In between, we find a&nbsp;diorama of figurines, from the insecure who, like the puffer fish, make themselves appear larger than they really are as an act of self-protection.&nbsp; Or bullies,&nbsp;the&nbsp;hyenas of humankind, who identify those whom they perceive as a step slower or out of sync with the herd, catching them alone at the watering hole or in a wild turn on an open field.&nbsp; Or the indignant.&nbsp; Or&nbsp;sometimes even martyrs, who originally felt called to champion a cause in someone else's name, or on behalf of others, but who&nbsp;may lose their way once they close their ears and become tone-deaf to the changing landscape or situation at hand.
There are dozens and dozens of archetypes smeared across&nbsp;our little&nbsp;stage, each of us&nbsp;having played many such parts in the course of our life.
I see it every day; we all do.&nbsp; For all his "honesty" and "straight talk," Donald Trump is periodically behaving&nbsp;rather badly: mean, divisive, sometimes employing hateful speech that borders on bullying, leaving very little room for the gray of life and which is, to my way of thinking at least, sexist, racist, superior, bigoted.&nbsp; I'm as ready as the next guy for a transparent leader, for spin-free and politics-free zones.&nbsp; Gosh, our country needs&nbsp;this desperately.&nbsp; We are lost; marooned.&nbsp;&nbsp;There is no America, just islands, camps, tribes, parties, factions, lobbyists, separatists.&nbsp; And Trump's absolutely&nbsp;right: political&nbsp;correctness can be a blight.&nbsp; But to lump entire people into&nbsp;categories, to deride said&nbsp;categories, to marginalize others, to be dismissive about what Warren Buffett succinctly describes as "the lottery of birth" (having been blessed, due to grace or chance alone, to be born in the United States or any progressive country) is absolute foolishness.&nbsp; Trump's&nbsp;name is so fitting, because his ego trumps everything.&nbsp; He appears to believe that he is right about everything and is equally intolerant of&nbsp;contrary opinions.&nbsp; I cannot fathom the circus his governance style would&nbsp;create.&nbsp;&nbsp;As much as people might like it&nbsp;to be&nbsp;the case, government does not operate like business.&nbsp; There are times I&nbsp;absolutely wish it did, but our government is a legislative democracy, not an autocracy or private venture or profitably oriented enterprise with shareholders and so, on the face of it, his approach will always be unsuitable.&nbsp; We need a statesman or stateswoman, but one who can, in fact, effect change to create unity, whether through the next figurative moonshot or something else larger than partisan politics.
But he is not alone, for if we are not careful, and when we are our worst selves rather than our best selves,&nbsp;a great many of us could be castigated for our example.&nbsp; It's not just politicians who believe they are above the law, or professional athletes, or celebrities.&nbsp; No, in&nbsp;a world that Andy Warhol would have loved, we are each enticed to create, proliferate, and maintain a cult of personality, be it through Facebook or Instagram or Twitter or&nbsp;Tumblr or wherever.&nbsp;&nbsp;
And the irony is not lost on this writer,&nbsp;who named a company after himself.
But we shall get to that.
Whether we lack ego, and&nbsp;forfeit ourselves to others' pleasures or dominion, or overcompensate for our shortcomings by bullying, or believe we are the smartest person in the room...chosen, designated, called, destined, whatever...and adopt a narrow-minded and "me-centric" worldview, we all fall short.
When things must be our way, or our way is the only way, or our way is the right way, well,&nbsp;one's world becomes very tiny indeed.&nbsp; It is inclusion, involvement, collaboration,&nbsp;diversity, delegation,&nbsp;even situationally appropriate submission that&nbsp;returns oxygen to the room, enlarges the table, leads to variety and better ideas and more amazing outcomes.
The "heroic manager" (be it a command-and-control throwback to 1955 or Steve Jobs himself in his early days before his dismissal and wandering in the desert which led to contrition)&nbsp;is a dying breed.&nbsp; I still stumble across it now and again, but even in the&nbsp;military, and paramilitary organizations, and the church itself<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;organizations which have every right to practice bureaucracy, considering they are among our oldest and were originally designed as hierarchies<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;I see&nbsp;autocratic management&nbsp;becoming all the more pass&eacute;.&nbsp; People are simply too aware, too educated, too empowered to abide it.
So where does this leave the leader?&nbsp; How does he or she strike the right balance, the right chord?&nbsp; How much ego is too little, and how much is too much?
As was put to me yesterday in conversation, "Perhaps like all things, Blake, it's a matter of moderation.&nbsp; One must constantly shift and find the right gear."
Well said.&nbsp; I couldn't agree more.
In hindsight, and with foresight, this is true.&nbsp; There are certainly issues in life which are black and white, but it is also true that most are quite complicated, and with complication comes&nbsp;different perspectives on&nbsp;the same issues, alternative paths up and out and, therefore, a whole lotta gray.
Among others, which are arguably too esoteric or spiritual for a business blog, two northern stars which have often guided my own sensibilities are derivatives of The Golden Rule and&nbsp;The Craftsman's Pride.
Regarding the former, I often ask myself, "In this situation, how would I want someone to treat my daughter?&nbsp; If she were to come home and share this scenario with me, to describe others' treatment of her, how would I feel about that, about them, about her behavior in this situation?&nbsp; And what would I do if the shoe were on the other foot...if I was 'the jerk' in her story?"&nbsp; It is true: only at my best am I so enlightened, but it's a star nonetheless, one which usually compels me to pause, to breathe deep, to ponder, and which later convicts me to re-think my ego, stance, position, or sense of self-righteousness or indignation.
Regarding the latter, a craftsman's pride, the company is called Leath Group because we are a group.&nbsp;&nbsp;And foremost, one that stands behind&nbsp;its work<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;so much so that we are willing to sign our name to it, like a silversmith or cobbler of old who put his initials on the bottom of his&nbsp;wares or inside a pair of boots he'd lovingly stitched.&nbsp; It's not&nbsp;ego behind the name, its personalization and accountability and a nod to simpler times.&nbsp; We could have named ourselves ACME Inc. or Consortium Consulting but, honestly, I prefer buying from Jim or Bob or Steve, not some faceless conglomerate, and so we began our work in that vein, and it stuck.
Our ethos, however, which may fly in the face of our branding<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;and gosh, I hope it does not<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;is generally one of anonymity.&nbsp; We are, at our core, creators and cultivators commissioned to plant and grow something small which, if successful,&nbsp;becomes our client's, not our own.&nbsp; Like any parent, our ultimate success and joy&nbsp;are best revealed in the well-being of our child.&nbsp; Try as we might, there are always genetics and internal/external forces beyond our control with which we must contend, but we strive mightily to be good examples, good role models, and to love unconditionally and without bias.&nbsp; To create great work products, deliver great services, then let them go.
Along the way, whether one is a politician, business leader, military leader, church leader, parent, you name it, one is constantly shifting gears while also remaining consistent and directed and pulled toward a northern star.&nbsp; This creates the much needed sense of stability, for oneself and others, while also fostering adaptability, malleableness, suppleness to bend in the wind without breaking.
To know oneself, one's strengths and weaknesses, and to be confident in his or her being, while also being willing to become invisible when it is the right thing to do, or to take the reins and grab the mic and take the stage when it is the right thing to do is precisely the shifting of gears that I'm describing.&nbsp; And as you know from personal experience, there is no rulebook, it is often gray, and it requires a deft touch, an ability to read the room and the situation, and the courage to vanish or show-up and absolutely represent.
Sometimes, it even requires we, as told to me by a former mentor, "Know when to lay it down and walk away."
I find, and perhaps you'll agree, that sometimes "the I" that is in each of us can become an Idol.&nbsp;&nbsp;Or, something that we do, or are, or perceive we stand for can become idolatrous because it means too much to us, it defines us, is addictive to us, or we cannot walk away from it when we should.&nbsp; We become obstinate, intractable, stubborn; we cannot let it go.&nbsp;&nbsp;
Consider these examples, all of which are complicated and have 50/50 sides:
If the day came, weeks or months from now, that Donald Trump found himself unsupportable or unelectable as the Republican nominee, would he fade quietly into the sunset, returning to his enterprises, supportive of those who remain, or would he bash the remaining and perhaps choose to run Independent, thereby splintering the country further and weakening his professed party in the process?&nbsp; In his rulebook, what comes first: self or the greater good?&nbsp; And what is right?&nbsp; Is there a right?
If a County Clerk found herself in violation of the Supreme Court's ruling and refused to issue marriage licenses to&nbsp;same-sex couples, should she stand her moral ground or yield to public opinion and let someone else do the job?&nbsp; What is right in this situation, who determines it, and what's the proper gear for the terrain?&nbsp; These are thorny issues for our Republic, the sort that define church, state, and the separation thereof.
If a hygienist in a dentist's office found herself to be the source of division and gossip, should she walk away for the health and betterment of the practice, or remain?&nbsp; Should she be loyal to the hand that feeds her, or loyal to her own personal convictions, cause, and sense of justice or injustice?&nbsp;
If a corporation becomes a cult of personality, or is represented in the public sphere by a spokesperson who generates hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue then does bad things in his or her personal life, should this person remain the spokesperson?&nbsp; What is the cost of collateral damage, the price of&nbsp;a corporate soul, and how does&nbsp;an organization&nbsp;tally it?&nbsp; There is a sea of examples to represent this conundrum, from Evel Knievel and Ideal Toys to Tiger Woods and Nike.&nbsp;
In each of these scenarios, one's ego is relevant.&nbsp; The candidate, the clerk, the employee, the representative: each&nbsp;is forced by circumstance to&nbsp;take stock, every conceivable&nbsp;path forward&nbsp;having gray alleys and obstacles, each alternative leading to personal consequences, some of which result in more or less polarization and none of which are simple, easy, or politically unambiguous.
In David Simon's HBO miniseries, Show Me a Hero, Yonkers' mayor Nich Wasicsko initially finds himself victorious, largely because of an unpopular political issue, public housing, which creates an opportunity for him to be the alternative candidate and steal the race.&nbsp; Two years later, the same thing happens to him, and for six more years he pursues the idol of political fame and purpose, repeatedly falling short and, rather than simply walking away and starting a legal practice, he clings to the past, fails to see it for what it was, becomes chronically depressed, and takes his own life standing at his father's grave during the week of his final election loss.&nbsp; It is a searing, heartbreaking story; a Greek tragedy of epic proportion, but set rather intimately in the fourth most populous city in the state of New York.
Kenny Rogers crooned, "You gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, and know when to run."&nbsp; It's good advice, and we only wish the gears were thusly labeled.&nbsp; They are often inscrutable, caked in mud, clogged with debris from life's trails, and impossible to free.
I have walked away, and I have doubled down.&nbsp; I've won some, and lost many more.&nbsp; There were rarely buzzing, directional neon signs pointing the way; it was often a sense of intuition that necessitated a light touch (which is in contrast to being grabby-grabby, like the raccoon in Where the Red Fern Grows who won't release the shiny silver object within the log and gets scooped up by Billy and placed in a burlap sack).&nbsp; The illusions of power, of control are precisely that, as Anthony Hopkins&nbsp;reminds Cuba Gooding, Jr. in 1999's Instinct.&nbsp; 
Most everyone learns this lesson, eventually.&nbsp; Our sense of importance, of power, they can become idols in our heart, things which&nbsp;over-inflate our sense of self, distracting us from what is right,&nbsp;or pure,&nbsp;or good.&nbsp; Virtuous.
Left to one's own devices, he or she can lose sight of the big picture, or the long game, or the fact that our lives are but brief sparks, and legacy casts the longer shadow.
So stand for something, and be up for something, possessing a strong and firm foundation of ego that is not subject to whims, or peer pressure, or bullying, or popularity, or the transient in life like fad or fashion, but also be as selfless as possible, as modest and humble and quiet in spirit, knowing that one's works and craftsmanship and contributions to others and to causes greater than oneself are what matter far more, benefit multitudes more, and ultimately lead to greater peace, fulfillment, and contentment in this world.
###

Ego: Destroyer of Worlds

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<div class="_uaw clearfix _uaw" style="text-align: left;">&ldquo;You just have to decide whether you are Tigger or Eeyore.&nbsp;&nbsp;You have to be clear where you stand on the Tigger/Eeyore debate.&rdquo;</div>
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&nbsp;
Ten months before succumbing to pancreatic cancer at age 47, Carnegie Mellon&rsquo;s Randy Pausch made it clear where he stood on the Tigger/Eeyore debate in his final lecture, which ultimately sold 4 &frac12; million copies in the U.S. alone when committed to paper as The Last Lecture.&nbsp; The runaway bestseller has now been translated into 46 languages. 
 It seems the world loves Tigger, in part because he&mdash;like each of us at our very best&mdash;bounces rather than breaks.&nbsp; He&rsquo;s the ultimate proprietor of the proverbial lemonade stand, always making the very best from the worst life has to offer.
 In a world besotted with news, soundbytes, spin and social media, we are similarly saturated in hyperbole and hysteria, much of it negative.&nbsp;&nbsp;It&rsquo;s difficult to turn on and tune in without soon wishing to tune out.&nbsp; Terrorism, &ldquo;fearbola,&rdquo; the long tail of 2008, Congressional gridlock, wars without end, crime, thoughtlessness, selfishness, shallowness&hellip;it&rsquo;s understandable that after prolonged exposure to virtually any newscast, one finds him or herself slowly devolving into Eeyore. 
 Be they good or bad, our attitudes and behaviors&mdash;like yawning and laughing&mdash;are often contagious, and all the more so when they are extreme.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s not the lukewarm and middlers who influence us most, it&rsquo;s the superstars and the slugs, the hot and the cold, the zealots and the absolutely catatonic who seem to motivate or demotivate us the most.&nbsp; The tiggers cajole, challenge and champion, often bringing out our best, while the eeyores serve as cautionary tales, reminding us what happens when one loses his passion, purpose or hope. 
 Any time one finds herself discouraged, daunted or down, it&rsquo;s helpful to consider &ldquo;The Six P&rsquo;s,&rdquo; each and every one of which was demonstrated by Pausch and admittedly run like an undercurrent throughout the entire philosophies of Pooh himself, but which you&rsquo;ll similarly find in any optimistic archetype, from Terry Fox and Viktor Frankl and King George VI and Helen Keller and Winston Churchill to Clara Barton and Rosa Parks and Abraham Lincoln and Susan B. Anthony and George Washington Carver and Teddy Roosevelt, who captured the sentiment of tiggerness so perfectly on April 23, 1910 when he spoke at the Sorbonnes in Paris, saying, in part:
&ldquo;It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.&nbsp; The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.&rdquo;
 Both optimism and pessimism are incontrovertibly contagious, but the former bolsters our immune system, while the latter simply makes us&mdash;and those around us&mdash;ill.&nbsp; But if one were to journey toward optimism, by what stars would he chart his course?&nbsp; Is there such a constellation?&nbsp; Indeed there is, as demonstrated by the aforementioned superstars, so many others like them, and enumerated here:
 1. Perspective. The primary difference between the dour and the dynamic is perspective.&nbsp; It is from perspective that we see the following flow. 
2. Proportion. When bad things happen, the pessimist (Eeyore) blows things out of proportion.&nbsp; The optimist (Tigger) keeps things in proportion. 
3. Pervasiveness. For the pessimist, one bad thing becomes universal, leaking and tainting everything it touches.&nbsp; The optimist partitions &ldquo;that one bad thing.&rdquo; 
4. Permanence. For the pessimist, bad things become lasting, while optimists see them for what they generally are: temporary. 
5. Personalization. Pessimists are blamers, waving their accusatory finger at others, and pointing out the window at those whom they perceive as responsible for their own problems.&nbsp; Optimists are owners, taking responsibility for their choices, the consequences, and staring in the mirror at the captain of their ship (or, as described in Invictus and recounted by Nelson Mandela day after day for the majority of his adult life, &ldquo;the captain of my soul&rdquo;). 
6. Power. Pessimists behave as if they are hapless and helpless victims to a buggy code that lost a zero or one somewhere along the way, while optimists assume control of their own software and rewrite it to achieve a new and better outcome.
&nbsp;
We do well to remember Tolstoy who wrote, &ldquo;Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself&rdquo; because, ultimately, regardless our role, each and every one of us is in charge of us&hellip;and is an influencer in his/her own right.&nbsp; A force for good, positivity and possibility, or for negativity, criticism or despair. 
 Far better, it seems, to be realistic, of course&mdash;but optimistically so.&nbsp; After all, the perils of pessimism are well-documented and undesirable all the way down the line.&nbsp; Doom and gloom may sell tickets and lather crowds, but they never win elections, rarely rally, and have a very poor track record for catalyzing communities or companies toward any sustainable change or culture.
 But Pausch, or Tigger himself, why, they seem to have tails so springy and levers so long that&mdash;time and again&mdash;the world is moved.
&nbsp;
*** Please forgive any errors, omissions or abruptness; this post was conceived around midnight, completed on an iPhone, and uploaded while being jostled in line at TGI Friday's in an airport. But I CHOSE to upload it nonetheless, so any shortcomings are mine and mine alone.
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The Perils of Pessimism & The Power of Positivity

The following (also) comes to me via email from a dear friend and client.&nbsp; In the words of Mark Twain, "I am repeating it word for word as I heard it."&nbsp;&nbsp;I hope it informs you as much as it informed me. &nbsp;Happy Reading, &mdash;blake.
-------------------
&nbsp;
Fortune has good piece about Amazon.com, noting that &ldquo;If such a thing as corporate DNA exists, it has animated the rise of the last decade's most successful technology companies. Google had a relentless focus on data, Apple a Zen-like obsession with simplicity, and Facebook a world of social connections to mine.&nbsp; Amazon has relied on an altogether more prosaic trait: thriftiness.&rdquo; The theory is that by being frugal internally, Amazon can charge its customers less, which becomes one of its keystone competitive advantages. &ldquo;For Amazon, savings are more than a competitive matter,&rdquo; the story says.&nbsp; &ldquo;Indeed, the company holds &lsquo;frugality&rsquo; up as one of 14 leadership principles.&nbsp; (It &lsquo;breeds resourcefulness, self-sufficiency and invention,&rsquo; the company says on its corporate site.)&nbsp; That goes back to 1994, when CEO Jeff Bezos jump-started the e-commerce company and jury-rigged a desk out of a door.&nbsp; &lsquo;Door desks&rsquo; became a popular staple within the company years after it went public, and remained &lsquo;the quintessential example&rsquo; of Amazon's frugality, ex-employee Greg Linden explained in 2006.&nbsp; The company still hands out the &lsquo;Door Desk Award,&rsquo; a title given internally to select employees who have a &lsquo;well-built idea&rsquo; that creates a significant savings for the company and enables lower prices for customers.&rdquo;
&nbsp;
KC's View: The complete story is worth reading by <a href="https://fortune.com/2012/11/16/amazons-jeff-bezos-the-ultimate-disrupter/">clicking here</a>. Frugality is not a new corporate virtue; it certainly has been a core value at Walmart for decades.&nbsp; But at a time when there are a lot of stories out there about companies where top executives seem more concerned with their own compensation packages and the trappings of office than they are with the people on the front lines and the very real day-to-day problems that they face, maybe it is fair to suggest that some folks ought to rethink their priorities.

The Power of Frugality

I&#39;ve shared <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/divided/etc/view.html">this story</a> (also known as &quot;Blue Eyes, Brown Eyes&quot;) so many times when discussing <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_effect">the Pygmalion Effect</a>; I was delighted to find it online.&nbsp; I suppose now I can&nbsp;shelve my&nbsp;warbly VHS copy.


More delightful, by far, is how increasingly anachronistic it feels just four short decades after it was filmed.&nbsp; Society has a long, long way to go--but my, oh my--how far we&#39;ve come in recent years.


When you can spare 49 minutes, consider watching it again.


Your skin will crawl and, to my way of thinking, that&#39;s your conscience, without which we are rudderless.


And with, we are guided.

Eye of the Storm: A Class Divided

The&nbsp;matter of 'workplace' and 'personal' motivation comes up a lot.
Here's one of the more pleasurable explanations that I've come across.&nbsp; My thanks to a dear colleague for sharing it.
Enjoy!&nbsp;
<iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/u6XAPnuFjJc" width="290" height="150" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<a title="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc</a>

Authentic Motivation

I stumbled across <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2010/02/01/news/companies/dov_seidman_lrn.fortune/index.htm">an&nbsp;interesting article</a> in a recent European issue of Fortune that explores the dollar-value of corporate virtue and, in particular, trust.&nbsp; Perhaps you&#39;ll find it interesting, too. 

But can you really measure the impact of good behavior? One promising area of research is around trust. In his book, Seidman discusses Jeffrey H. Dyer and Wujin Chu&#39;s landmark 2003 study of buyer/supplier relationships among eight major automakers in the U.S., Japan, and South Korea. Dyer and Chu found a strong correlation between trust and procurement costs. The least trusted buyers in the study incurred procurement costs that were five times higher than the costs of the most trusted buyers. Moreover, the least trusted companies in the study were also the least profitable. And companies that trusted each other were more likely to share valuable information like new product designs. &ldquo;Trust between companies leads to more trust,&rdquo; Seidman says. &ldquo;It sets off an upward spiral of cooperative, value-creating behaviors.&rdquo;

Valuating Corporate Virtue?

Like ants in a mound, we all sense the vibrations of impending change.
In particular, I am feeling in my bones, perhaps for the first time ever,&nbsp;bona fide (sorry for the pun) traction in the Green Movement. Similarly, I also sense the early tremors of a tectonic shift in Workplace Expectations in smaller, more nimble organizations.
The minority of "crackpots" are now becoming the mainstream, and with them... the trains are beginning to steam-up, rumble, and leave their respective stations. The 'get on board' or 'get left behind' decision-point is now becoming less theoretical and more tangible.
On the topic of the green movement, the media is dripping with books like The World Without Us, The Earth After Us, and The Last Human and 'thought-experiment-documentaries' like Life After People are springing up through the cracks of every sidewalk. Long overdue regulatory emissions and fuel economy standards have just passed, and now more and more grocery stores are charging a tax for consumers who use paper or plastic sacks at checkout. (Even Michael Moore has joined the proverbial greenpeace parade, with his latest entreaty on what should be created in the wake of GM's bankruptcy.&nbsp; <a href="../../blogging/file.axd?file=2009%2f6%2fGoodbyeGM%2cMichaelMoore.pdf">GoodbyeGM,MichaelMoore.pdf (15.29 kb)</a>)
On the topic of shifting workplace expectations, there is a trove of research -- two decades old now -- that has tracked and highlighted and forecasted all the varying expectations between 'generations' in the workplace. Given the recession and an average 40% loss in wealth among those with retirement plans, the 'social contract' between employees and employers is under assault and will result in a renegotiation of what truly matters.
I am running into more and more people, often in their sixties and seventies, who spent some fifty years away from their families to create a nest egg which barely remains. "Why?" is pretty much all they can ask. The 'deal' they made with the devil was a house of cards and, as the economy melts down, much of their 'earthly treasure' has become tragically diluted.
For all the parents who worked tirelessly, barely seeing their spouse or children in the mornings or evenings or on weekends, "why?" indeed. The then-logical, selfless, and sacrificial decision by these millions to create income as a means to secure financial and familial stability has been wholly undermined by a few reckless risk-takers in the most opulent buildings in NYC.
As a result of coming to terms with 'the casino sets the rules,' more and more employees are accepting that 'the house always wins.' And so, as Wall Street lands on featherbeds of bailout dollars and safety nets while Main Street shutters its windows and closes too many doors, individuals are taking stock and starting to reclaim what they can -- their lives -- for the benefit of their families and&nbsp;the sake of their own sanity.
I witnessed it just last night on <a href="https://charlierose.com/videos/17398">Charlie Rose as he interviewed Claire Shipman and Katty Kay</a> about their new book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw_0_6?url=search-alias%3Daps&amp;field-keywords=womenomics&amp;sprefix=womeno">Womenomics: Write Your Own Rules for Success</a>. In it, many startling admissions that, hitherto, would have been blasphemous. But in the harsh sunlight of 2009, many people will say, "Of course." Read it and decide for yourself, but I predict it will be one of a raft of such books to follow in coming months. Books about owning reality, speaking truth, and reclaiming one's life on her or his own terms.
I am also hearing and reading more and more about such things as ROWE, Results-Only Work Environment as espoused by <a href="https://www.gorowe.com/">CultureRx</a> and embraced by clients like BestBuy. This is a trend I have seen coming for years, and it goes hand-in-hand with expectations held by many Generation X-ers, Y-ers, and Millennials (20-somethings). Few within these generations will agree to be chained to a desk, tracked or monitored to within an inch of their life, or to serve as a cog within a large, cold machine. Most of them will commit to accomplish results and be accountable, but not in exchange for balance, community, or altruism. And most of them studied <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&amp;field-keywords=george+orwell%2C+1984">George Orwell's 1984</a> as required reading&nbsp;somewhere in high school.&nbsp;
With all implosions and explosions, there is debris and fallout. And following forest fires, be they accidental or prescribed, there is regeneration and new life. New growth is the 'creative' that follows 'destruction.' What will the Recession of 2009+ yield? Only time will tell, but if the hairs on my arm are any indication, Bob Dylan's line was spot-on: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowin'_in_the_Wind">the answer, my friend,&nbsp;is blowin' in the wind.</a> People are questioning.&nbsp;
As is the case every hundred years or so, this will likely prove to be a season, nothing more. In time, the pendulum has a tendency to swing back.
But it is also possible that rather than a Season, we are dealing with a Genie or Pandora. And they, once out of the bottle, lamp, or box, prefer to stay out.
Either way, I'm sure the questions and changes are welcome. The way we worked throughout the Industrial Revolution is neither sustainable nor compatible with what is coming.&nbsp;
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, with new and fervent questions come better answers. And this, in the words of the "venerable" Martha Stewart, is a good thing.&nbsp;
<blockquote>
"The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them."
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; - Albert Einstein
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</blockquote>
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Creative Destruction

Workplaces are grapevines; that&#39;s just the way it is.&nbsp; Sadly, there are too few exceptions to&nbsp;the hypothesis that, &quot;Where there are three, there gossip be.&quot; 


Turn on practically any&nbsp;TV channel or Radio station: innuendo, rumor, speculation, gossip. 


See countless Websites... 


Countless News programs... 


Countless &#39;Reality&#39; programs... 


My feeble Blog entry for today won&#39;t do one iota to&nbsp;stop gossip from metastasizing, but if it underscores the importance of not gossiping, abiding gossip, or feeding the gossip machine for even &#39;one day,&#39; all the better.&nbsp; A chain only works when each link does its part.&nbsp; By refusing to engage or tolerate gossip in your workplace, you not only differentiate what IS and IS NOT appropriate, productive, and right, but you sometimes preserve a person&#39;s reputation. 


And THAT is something which, once tarnished, dented, or broken, suffers from Humpty Dumpty Syndrome: 

<dd>Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, </dd><dd>Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. </dd><dd>All the king&#39;s horses, </dd><dd>And all the king&#39;s men, </dd><dd>Couldn&#39;t put Humpty together again.</dd>

In Doubt, the haunting play and film by&nbsp;John Patrick Shanley, there is a wonderful sermon delivered by the character Father Flynn.&nbsp; I will close with it, as it so powerfully captures the viral and infectious nature of gossip: 


A woman was gossiping with a friend about a man she hardly knew - I know none of you have ever done this - that night she had a dream. A great hand appeared over her and pointed down at her. She was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day she went to confession. She got the old parish priest, Father O&rsquo;Rourke, and she told him the whole thing. 
 
&lsquo;Is gossiping a sin?&rsquo; she asked the old man. &lsquo;Was that the hand of God Almighty pointing a finger at me? Should I be asking your absolution? Father, tell me, have I done something wrong?&rsquo; 
 
(Irish Brogue) 
&lsquo;Yes!&rsquo; Father O&rsquo;Rourke answered her. &lsquo;Yes! You have borne false witness against your neighbor, you have played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed!&rsquo; 
 
So the woman said she was sorry and asked for forgiveness. 
 
&lsquo;Not so fast!&rsquo; says O&rsquo;Rourke. &lsquo;I want you to go home, take a pillow up on your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me!&rsquo; 
 
So the woman went home, took a pillow off her bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to the roof, and stabbed the pillow. Then she went back to the old parish priest as instructed. 
 
&lsquo;Did you gut the pillow with the knife?&rsquo; he says. 
 
&lsquo;Yes, Father.&rsquo; 
 
&lsquo;And what was the result?&rsquo; 
 
&lsquo;Feathers,&rsquo; she said. 
 
&lsquo;Feathers?&rsquo; he repeated. 
 
&lsquo;Feathers everywhere, Father!&rsquo; 
 
&lsquo;Now I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out on the wind!&rsquo; 
 
&lsquo;Well,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;it can&rsquo;t be done. I don&rsquo;t know where they went. The wind took them all over.&rsquo; 
 
&lsquo;And that,&rsquo; said Father O&rsquo;Rourke, &lsquo;is GOSSIP!&rsquo;

The Insidiousness of Workplace Gossip

What a difference seven months make.
In October, as the unwinding of our world's economy became crystal clear, so many perceived it as 'temporary.' "The prey must make its way through the python, then all will be well in the end," they seemed to say.
And perhaps that is entirely true. 2010, 2011, 2012... I suppose things could return to 'normal' by then.
But I think not.
I think what's done is done, what was was, and we've entered a New World Order. I believe the 'unwinding' was, in fact, a re-calibrating.&nbsp;
I believe the waterline of the former market was, for all intents and purposes... former.&nbsp;And we may not see Dow Jones at 14,000+ for another generation. Call me a heretic, an idiot, or a doomsday-sourpuss-naysayer; I've been called worse. But I believe the snake oil salesmen who are selling fiction disguised as hope are unrealistically optimistic or altogether deceptive. (I see the difference as their 'knowledge' x their 'intent.')
I attended an economic conference several weeks ago, and ALL the economists were prophesying, "This will blow over in a few months. Q3 2009 will see a return to business as usual," guess-hypothesis-theory-lie. I'm sorry; I just don't buy it. While I fully understand FDR's lamentations about 'fear itself' and the need for positive psychology to lead the market, I believe it's time to come to terms with reality and adapt rather than hope for stable sand castles found primarily in Utopia.&nbsp;
I imagine the market as we knew it before --&nbsp;with easy loans,&nbsp;bottomless debt, and raging home sales --&nbsp;is a thing of the past.&nbsp;
Is the bottom near? Perhaps, though I agree with Warren Buffett's sentiment that we probably won't experience it until the Government stops reaching in and tweaking the knobs. At some point, probably where 'rescue' and 'reality' intersect, we will indeed experience a legitimate transition, but I don't think 'bottoming, leveling out, and climbing' are synomymous with 'back to business as usual.' (At least, not for everyone. One of the great ironies of this current economy is the disparity between the haves and have-nots. While many people and clients and states I interact with are STARVING, many others are THRIVING. On the one extreme I hear, "The sky is falling!" while on the other extreme I hear, "Crisis, what crisis? We have so much money we don't know where to spend it all!")
Some might argue that I am sounding a bit like Chicken Little, but I believe that history and conventional wisdom will reveal that I am among an unintentional chorus of Shepherd Boys who would rather be wrong. And by unintentional, I mean to say, "non-economic types" who wind up being in the majority and on the side of right, not because of knowledge, but because of intuition.&nbsp;
I believe we're entering an era of Business as Unusual or, said another way, The 'New' Economy is The Economy.
2,600 years ago, the Greek slave, Aesop, wrote well over 200 brief fables, and many of them specifically for children (though they apply to most everyone). Among them is The Shepherd Boy &amp; the Wolf, more commonly remembered as The Boy Who Cried Wolf.&nbsp;The theme of the story is best recalled in the final line of the fable: "Even when liars tell the truth, they are never believed. The liar will lie once, twice, and then perish when he tells the truth."
Only time will reveal whether the 'renowned and expert economists' are right (and Q3 2009 will reveal a miraculous, magical,&nbsp;and unheralded 'market bounce' that eventually leads us back to earlier Dow Jones health, employment, and worldwide productivity as before) or&nbsp;if those who said once and twice (without&nbsp;knowing why), "the world is changed for a generation" will be deemed right.
Again, I would&nbsp;prefer to be wrong.
At this point in life, most of us have endured one sort of surgery or another. I equate today's Shepherd Boys as those who scratch at our scar tissue. What was once sensitive and irritated (October 2008) is slowly becoming thick and numb (May 2009). The 'jump' in our step has faded a bit, we've ignored the alarms for too long, and many are awakening and coming to grips with a potentially new reality. A sense of, "Okay. Um. So, this REALLY isn't going away next month? It wasn't just a drill? All righty then, let's see... what shall I do now?"
History has an enviable way of efficiently and accurately sorting the misfits and malcontents from the rest. I know most of us would LOVE to see a return to a pre-9/11 or pre-2009 economic world order, but the hairs on the back of my neck just don't sense that coming anytime soon. Do yours?&nbsp;
Meanwhile, whether it's only a few years or an entire generation plus, I suppose we should return to our work, reprioritize, rebalance, and find ways to survive through and thrive within a minor economic winter. There is plenty of work to be done, there are many fields still lacking qualified applicants, and as Nature reminds us, life is binary. It's either 'find a way to Grow' time, or 'embrace the slumber that has no end' (e.g., die).&nbsp;
I elect to fight, as I'm sure you do, too. It's buckle-down time. Not for an illusory and fabled 'comeback' of lore, but in pursuit of creating a more sustainable future for our children, our customers, our constituents, and all those we hope will follow.
Onward. Perge. Semper fidelis. It's on. Let's roll. Bring it. Go time. All that jazz.

Aesop & Scar Tissue Times

In recent months, the &lsquo;noise&rsquo; regarding the eroding viability and the non-future of Newspapers has reached an all-time-high decibel level.&nbsp;&nbsp;The crescendo&nbsp;is now practically deafening.&nbsp;&nbsp;
And yet there are no&nbsp;accordant answers.&nbsp;
A lifelong friend and colleague of mine (who resides vocationally at the nexus between &ldquo;what was&rdquo; and &ldquo;what may be&rdquo;) forwarded this absolutely salient blog entry by Clay Shirky,&nbsp;who&nbsp;shares&nbsp;his&nbsp;prognostications on the matter.&nbsp; Like my friend, Clay has also been thinking about the internet since before the internet.
Though arguably a bit long for&nbsp;today's microwave-mentality, I am certain you will find&nbsp;his&nbsp;perspectives&nbsp;fascinating and hope you will read to the end.&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.edge.org/conversation/clay_shirky-newspapers-and-thinking-the-unthinkable">NEWSPAPERS AND THINKING THE UNTHINKABLE</a>