Ah... as an online teacher, this is about the only week that life feels somewhat normal. Most schools (not all) are on break. That leaves time for reading, too much time for the gym (exhaustion anyone?), too much time for thinking, and for many of my friends in this profession a lot of guilt that they didn't spend that one week of "quarter time" with family.
I don't believe in feeling guilty for that (and thankfully my husband doesn't hold it against me); most of the time I have a limit on how much time I can spend with humans I'm related to that I don't have much in common with anyway (something many of us feel but don't think is okay to say), so life is good on this week-long quarter-break time. :)
Always the writer (for fun, believe it or not) I've spent quite a bit of time this past 10 days or so since returning from NYC to California thinking and writing about lots of things.. from e-greetings to how electronics have changed the way we communicate and our expectations of others to blogging to narcissism to personalities to holidays and so on. I've noted a few generalities that have been 'proven' (those of us that teach stats know there is no such thing.. and if you took my class, you better know it! :) ) throughout the past week by behavior so repetitive I am certain I could predict it with nearly 100% accuracy. Some of it depressing; most of it enlightening about the human spirit.
But it all makes for an interesting sociology study during this online teacher's "downtime". So, notes written for the day, squeeze cheese (finally) out of my bangs (don't ask), calls taken, interviews done, everything I have spilled this morning cleaned up and schools taught, I can explain what I mean.
I've noticed a pattern with friends and family over the holiday season. I believe that people have an entirely different set of expectations for those that they love (or are related to - which may be mutually exclusive or not) over the holiday season.. beginning around mid December going a few days after New Years. I no longer, after this year, will spend my holidays with someone or people out of obligation. They sense it, you know it, and it isn't right. It isn't worth it.
I posted on Twitter once after reading a Medline study that people who travel most often tend to have difficulty maintaining intimacy. I counted myself among them; not so much after analyzing my ability to maintain intimacy but my frequency of travel and the stats used in the article. While I'm "home" for the holidays, a part of me cannot wait to get back to what has become the norm, and that is not being home - even though it leads to different types of discomforts (like noise).
Which leads this inquisitive mind to wonder what home is anyway really.. perhaps a few-day reconnection with a loved one; perhaps it's a place where your stuff is (a majority of it anyway); maybe it's a place your family is or maybe it's no where at all for some of us. Maybe we spend so much time trying to build a home that we really don't need one anyway and it's fruitless. I haven't figured out where my home is yet. I have a hypothesis but not one I will share here. Not now anyway.
So the pattern. There seem to be a few kind of friends. I've wondered what kind of friend I am over the holidays too.. and I see a little bit of myself in every one of these -- depending on who I am the friend I'm associating with. (confused yet?)
Non Holiday-Friends - Friends that, for the holiday part of the year, disappear and reappear again around mid January and want to go to Starbux as though nothing ever happened. I've concluded that they are either over worked at home and have no time (at least half my friends like this in my view struggle with this) or that they don't know what to say or what to do that is appropriate to them so they disappear and reappear. The other friend of course wonders why they never bothered to say hello or Merry Christmas; but that goes back to expectations.. who says a friend has to say that? Well, most of us.. not for social norming, just out of kindness. The other friend wonders if you even gave them a second thought. I analyze my friends who disappeared and know most of them didn't do so out of malice, they're socially inept. LOL
The over-"electronicized" friends. These are the friends that take the week or two they have off, and read everything, every blog, every twitter and every post and watch every interview you did in the last 350 days. That's cool - but then they apply it all to themselves in a narcissistic fashion. I know all about narcissism, I was married to it in the early 2000s. I have friends that drink too much and think everything you wrote about CEOs in their home state means you think they are losers. I delete their messages knowing that they will come around when they've put down the booze. The friends that think none of anything you wrote had anything to do with them, and it did - at least you were on their mind when you wrote it. Most of what we write, even in specific scholarly disciplines, has something to do with life in general. The friends that want you to explain what you wrote last January in context when you haven't a clue.. you're too busy focusing on your new posts. Maybe they do it out of boredom, or maybe they want to know "what you really thought of them" all year and are a bit paranoid. Chances are, it wasn't about them. I actually lost a friend this year because someone thought a twitter was about them - and it was anything but. If they are that sensitive, they have to go in the prior to 2009-friend-bucket anyway. Time to clean house, as they say.. and figure out who our real friends are. I don't believe in New Years resolutions, but this year I will have one, and that is mine.
Then there are the friends that go out of their way to do and be everything they can be for you. I believe we all have only 1 or 2 of these friends. They are amazing; they make you feel special out of the Love Language (great basic book) of "doing things". They are do'ers and big time. Every gift has meaning, every act has meaning. I believe this is nothing more than their mere love language; as long as they don't expect you to be able to do the same in return.
The gift-phobic friends - that freak out if you give them a gift. (remember these aren't mutually exclusive.. most of my friends have more than one of these elements!) They feel that their gift wont live up to yours.. admittedly I love to buy things for people. That is one of my love languages. I learned many years ago that most people don't enjoy it, and always always give with no expectation of anything in return. But these gift phobic people freak. I had a friend one year beg me never to buy him anything again. I haven't and that is my gift to him. He doesn't realize it's far more difficult than if I did buy him one. But that is the meaning of gift giving anyway perhaps!
There are of course just the regular friends .. we might have lunch a few days before Christmas, they call on Christmas, we say hello and wish one another a great day, and they are in our thoughts all day. We touch bases again the next day to see how things went... and we might see one another again right around the New Year. Most of my friends are rather accustomed to finding that time while I'm in California as my friends are here - NYC, while a big place, is quite hard to make real friends in.
I find it fascinating how electronics have changed the way and the acceptability of being distant.. in the mid 90s greeting cards printed from online services with a picture tried to personalize things; we seem to have come full circle to the most impersonal. This year the night before Christmas I cleaned out all of my texts and the next morning all 100 my phone is capable of handling were filled.... with Merry Christmas's ... about half the people I know and the other were not in my phone. I have no idea who they are. I appreciate the thought though! Then of course e-greetings.. sending e-cards instead of cards, entirely replacing cards.. using the recession or lack of time as an excuse. I don't know whether I believe it's a valid one, even as a technologist. There are those of us that combined technologies; emailing family and friends but also sending traditional cards (well my cards aren't exactly "traditional".. if you've received one, you know what I mean LOL). I think that texting and emailing and e-cards has made it far too easy for all of the types of friends above to make life easy on themselves.
Then there are the people that focus on a small handful of people in their lives and ignore the rest. They're very intimate with those that they're with over the holidays, but "forget about" everyone else - perhaps completely - I haven't figured that part out yet. They give as much as, in their mind, they can.. but my belief has always been "where there is a will, there is a way." I email that reply to everyone that asks how I started and built my career. It holds true in life in all aspects.
Given that last phrase.. it would be and is easy and accurate for my family and friends to say "well you didn't visit me and you were disconnected.. but where there is a will, there is a way.??" Yes, precisely. I believe that we have far too much pressure on us to see and be with people we really don't want to be with or to act and behave in a manner consistent with some fantasy rather than reality. This entire holiday season I've been highly preoccupied - with work, with relationship matters, with 'stuff' in my head, with reading, with trying to take my ground school test, with kicking my butt back into pre-1st-marriage shape (mission accomplished - a hard feat as I was 25 and quite athletic). I've chosen to spend it with people that understand I'm preoccupied, and therefore, probably not "acting normal" or behaving in a manner they would like. That is okay with them because they love me anyway and know I have a lot of 'stuff' happening that is life altering. So I didn't visit the people I might normally have visited, and spent time with ones that I could sit on their bed with them and share our most intimate feelings. That after all in my view is what the holidays should be about. Which basically requires zero expectations.
Dani
Monday, December 29, 2008
Friday, December 12, 2008
Bogus Bailouts Benefit Only Bozo’s
Bogus Bailouts Benefit Only Bozo’s
10 Reasons we should abolish bridge loans to bankruptcy, bailouts, and revoke TARP
I explained in another blog post tonight why I'm not so worried about unemployment and that is one of many cases I can make for why we should not bail out the auto makers. It is vital to keep perspective in context for this to all make sense.
A friend of mine recently said that the greater the obstacles (I'm paraphrasing and taking this a bit out of context but I believe it applies) to some outcome the greater its value or its “wonderfulness” if or when an outcome is achieved. I have a reflex tendency to disagree with most people (for a few minutes anyway), but applied to business, he may well be right. Obviously my initial knee jerk reaction has changed, since it’s the introduction to this blog. Not everything can come down to costs and benefits – sometimes you just do what you want to do and hope all the cards fall into the right places because you follow something deeper within than cost-benefit analysis. Business owners all over the country are using their gut to make the tough decisions and make it through this market turmoil without bailouts, handouts, and without the pathetic demoralizing groveling required to get either.
The bailout bunnies and bridge loan to bankruptcy buddies have the opposite view; they believe that the only way to “save” companies is with intervention due to the “drastic times” theory – drastic times call for drastic measures. Drastic measures must come from within the free market enterprise and innovation within private companies, not moron politicians or specific Treasury Department people with very precise histories quite used to throwing money at a problem to make it go away.
So why won’t the bailouts work?
1. There is an inherent sense of self worth brought on by how hard you fought for something. When you fight for something, it has value to you. If your business means something, you fight for it. I would hypothesize that these automaker CEOs and bank CEOs etc etc don’t care about their companies; they care only about their own asses. Small business companies aren’t groveling; they care.
When we bail out companies, people want their share of the pie, too – at least those with no self dignity.
2. There is moral hazard in bailing out companies and it trickles all the way down to the individual level. I'm starting to see this more in housing as well. People who CAN afford their mortgage just fine becoming delinquent on purpose, throwing their pride, moral obligations (and credit scores) out the window simply because the banks will negotiate with them only if they are late. Cry me a river, you people are pathetic. Quite a bit of my housing portfolio is “upside down”. I took risky loans to leverage the heck out of properties that lost some value. I get how that feels. Tough shit. Markets go up, markets go down. You have to work harder to compensate and eventually, you’ll be fine.
We are also seeing people buy and bail, turn in their keys screwing their neighbors’ values when they can afford their payments just fine.
3. There can be NO REAL success without the opportunity to fail. The universe if created in such a way where every action has an equal and opposite reaction; every “thing” has an ‘opposite’. If you are only given an option to succeed, what pleasure is there in doing so? If you don’t risk something, then when you get it all, it’s value is nothing. I believe that is why those born with a silver spoon value their wealth far less than those who worked their butt off for it.
4. Quite simply, bailouts don’t work. Banks hoard the cash “just in case” and to meet reserves, BofA takes $25 billion it didn’t even ask for and then lays off 35,000 workers anyway, auto makers need the money to sustain themselves “just for a couple of months” with salaries that make them unable to compete and union bosses unwilling to sacrifice anything to make it work (why should they? Their leaders wont sacrifice either – see blog about unemployment!) and companies will continue the exact same business practices that they had before the bailout that got them into deep water to begin with. Ultimately, they’ll either go bankrupt – or need another bailout.
5. This isn’t company’s money or earned revenue; it is the tax payer’s money. There is little to no oversight, and who would trust government oversight anyway? Taxpayers have shown in polls overwhelmingly (including in the case of Detroit) that they prefer NOT bailing out companies. It’s our money, listen to us.
6. We must revoke TARP immediately. This is a nightmare. The White House and Treasury think they can bend the rules and do whatever they want with the money. Well unfortunately our Congressional leaders granted them the power to do so. Now they need to take it back. Last I checked survival of the fittest is still at play in all aspects of life – business included.
7. Perhaps most importantly of all, useless companies and companies that cannot adapt to change eat up the resources that good, viable companies need to survive. This includes human capital, motivation, grant money, small business loans and so on. The faster the bad eggs get out of the system, the quicker we will be on the road to recovery. People are left with little capital to start up businesses to innovate if they’re paying more in taxes and banks won’t lend to pay for idiots that didn’t run their businesses well and think it’s the tax payer’s job to bail them out.
8. Markets correct, but only if they are allowed to. We, unfortunately, need a significant recession – the 9th I believe since the end of the last World War, to get ourselves out of this. And we will – if government does its job and stays out. You don’t give a guy trying to quit smoking a pack of cigarettes and expect him to quit.
9. Bailouts are creating new scams. Don’t believe me? Read up on the new FHA scams that look all too much like the Subprime scams of the 2004-2006 era; even the same mortgage brokers are re-filing with the FHA to sell mortgages – it’s the same fraud with a new name (all including faking W2s and so on.. just like we saw in the last setup for disaster) and the government is granting these people licenses after revoking them for fraud the first time. If this continues, in 5 years it will cost taxpayers about $500 billion in yet another round of FHA-backed foreclosures.
10. Under pinning the capital markets is a deflation in house prices. Throwing money at companies won’t fix housing – once prices in housing stabilize, banks can value assets, and we will be on a road to recovery. For now, banks will pass their worst loans onto the tax payers; not loans that will recoup money for Americans.
10 Reasons we should abolish bridge loans to bankruptcy, bailouts, and revoke TARP
I explained in another blog post tonight why I'm not so worried about unemployment and that is one of many cases I can make for why we should not bail out the auto makers. It is vital to keep perspective in context for this to all make sense.
A friend of mine recently said that the greater the obstacles (I'm paraphrasing and taking this a bit out of context but I believe it applies) to some outcome the greater its value or its “wonderfulness” if or when an outcome is achieved. I have a reflex tendency to disagree with most people (for a few minutes anyway), but applied to business, he may well be right. Obviously my initial knee jerk reaction has changed, since it’s the introduction to this blog. Not everything can come down to costs and benefits – sometimes you just do what you want to do and hope all the cards fall into the right places because you follow something deeper within than cost-benefit analysis. Business owners all over the country are using their gut to make the tough decisions and make it through this market turmoil without bailouts, handouts, and without the pathetic demoralizing groveling required to get either.
The bailout bunnies and bridge loan to bankruptcy buddies have the opposite view; they believe that the only way to “save” companies is with intervention due to the “drastic times” theory – drastic times call for drastic measures. Drastic measures must come from within the free market enterprise and innovation within private companies, not moron politicians or specific Treasury Department people with very precise histories quite used to throwing money at a problem to make it go away.
So why won’t the bailouts work?
1. There is an inherent sense of self worth brought on by how hard you fought for something. When you fight for something, it has value to you. If your business means something, you fight for it. I would hypothesize that these automaker CEOs and bank CEOs etc etc don’t care about their companies; they care only about their own asses. Small business companies aren’t groveling; they care.
When we bail out companies, people want their share of the pie, too – at least those with no self dignity.
2. There is moral hazard in bailing out companies and it trickles all the way down to the individual level. I'm starting to see this more in housing as well. People who CAN afford their mortgage just fine becoming delinquent on purpose, throwing their pride, moral obligations (and credit scores) out the window simply because the banks will negotiate with them only if they are late. Cry me a river, you people are pathetic. Quite a bit of my housing portfolio is “upside down”. I took risky loans to leverage the heck out of properties that lost some value. I get how that feels. Tough shit. Markets go up, markets go down. You have to work harder to compensate and eventually, you’ll be fine.
We are also seeing people buy and bail, turn in their keys screwing their neighbors’ values when they can afford their payments just fine.
3. There can be NO REAL success without the opportunity to fail. The universe if created in such a way where every action has an equal and opposite reaction; every “thing” has an ‘opposite’. If you are only given an option to succeed, what pleasure is there in doing so? If you don’t risk something, then when you get it all, it’s value is nothing. I believe that is why those born with a silver spoon value their wealth far less than those who worked their butt off for it.
4. Quite simply, bailouts don’t work. Banks hoard the cash “just in case” and to meet reserves, BofA takes $25 billion it didn’t even ask for and then lays off 35,000 workers anyway, auto makers need the money to sustain themselves “just for a couple of months” with salaries that make them unable to compete and union bosses unwilling to sacrifice anything to make it work (why should they? Their leaders wont sacrifice either – see blog about unemployment!) and companies will continue the exact same business practices that they had before the bailout that got them into deep water to begin with. Ultimately, they’ll either go bankrupt – or need another bailout.
5. This isn’t company’s money or earned revenue; it is the tax payer’s money. There is little to no oversight, and who would trust government oversight anyway? Taxpayers have shown in polls overwhelmingly (including in the case of Detroit) that they prefer NOT bailing out companies. It’s our money, listen to us.
6. We must revoke TARP immediately. This is a nightmare. The White House and Treasury think they can bend the rules and do whatever they want with the money. Well unfortunately our Congressional leaders granted them the power to do so. Now they need to take it back. Last I checked survival of the fittest is still at play in all aspects of life – business included.
7. Perhaps most importantly of all, useless companies and companies that cannot adapt to change eat up the resources that good, viable companies need to survive. This includes human capital, motivation, grant money, small business loans and so on. The faster the bad eggs get out of the system, the quicker we will be on the road to recovery. People are left with little capital to start up businesses to innovate if they’re paying more in taxes and banks won’t lend to pay for idiots that didn’t run their businesses well and think it’s the tax payer’s job to bail them out.
8. Markets correct, but only if they are allowed to. We, unfortunately, need a significant recession – the 9th I believe since the end of the last World War, to get ourselves out of this. And we will – if government does its job and stays out. You don’t give a guy trying to quit smoking a pack of cigarettes and expect him to quit.
9. Bailouts are creating new scams. Don’t believe me? Read up on the new FHA scams that look all too much like the Subprime scams of the 2004-2006 era; even the same mortgage brokers are re-filing with the FHA to sell mortgages – it’s the same fraud with a new name (all including faking W2s and so on.. just like we saw in the last setup for disaster) and the government is granting these people licenses after revoking them for fraud the first time. If this continues, in 5 years it will cost taxpayers about $500 billion in yet another round of FHA-backed foreclosures.
10. Under pinning the capital markets is a deflation in house prices. Throwing money at companies won’t fix housing – once prices in housing stabilize, banks can value assets, and we will be on a road to recovery. For now, banks will pass their worst loans onto the tax payers; not loans that will recoup money for Americans.
Layoffs and Unemployment Can Be the Best Thing to Happen to You.
Layoffs and Unemployment Can Be the Best Thing to Happen to You.
The United Auto Workers (united for what? I wont answer that.. just yet) today said that there are “enough sane people” left in Washington that they are certain the government will eventually loan GM money. Let’s hope there are enough sane people left in Washington that they convince the White House not to override the Senate’s decision today. After all, we are supposed to still be a democracy.
Now before I get the email bashers saying that I'm anti-worker and don’t care about people being unemployed, let me just stop you right there. You’re right. But not for the reason you might think. Being unemployed can lead to great things.
The reason is simple – I’ve been unemployed - both intentionally, unintentionally, and “unintentionally intentional”. The world doesn’t end. Life can in fact actually be better than it was before. Anxiety can (and probably will) set in; but more learning takes place in the end and doors open IF you create opportunity. In fact, I believe it’s the only way that many people, myself at one point included, realize the truth – that working for someone else isn’t all it’s cracked up to be and the only real job security any of us have is that which we make for ourselves. Even if you do want to continue working for “the man”, it might just be time to get a kick in the pants and do something different, re-educate, re-tool, learn a new trade or work for someone different anyway – fear is an amazing motivator. The only way for me to explain why the bailouts wont work and why people shouldn’t be afraid of being fired, laid off or anything else that happens along the way is to describe my own experience, so that is what I will do.
My “long” years in Corporate America (by my definition, they were far too long) were spent making someone else rich so I could pay my rent/credit card bills/car payments and eventually mortgage(s). I was left unintentionally unemployed during my very first venture into the Corporate world from “safe academia” (an on ground institution with a dual faculty appointment in a place where no one ever got fired) into a company that was exciting, fun, and just far enough away from the place I grew up. I had a blast for a bit with a terrific boss that taught me many lessons; a fantastic team I led who were easily all ten-plus years my elders (and loved open debate), and a jackass “President” that knew absolutely nothing about running a business. Starting to sound familiar? I cannot compare him to Big 3 CEOs because I don’t know those guys (although it is ironic they’re all from Michigan). But I knew this guy – Ken Kozminski – looking back I realize just how stupid this coward was. He ran a company called IPC Communication Services; I ran the Information Tech Departments in the Western and Eastern regions. I was their only IT Director to ever create a profit center out of IT (and bring on new clients for them because of our IT capabilities), and I had a blast doing it. Unfortunately, IPC was a part of the Journal Communications Family, and Mr. Ken was rather protected and insulated from his stupid decisions by the good ole’ boys network. He was a wuss (I'm being kind), which is worse than stupid. He came in, flew under the radar, laid off the entire Western Region because of poor management decisions dating back years, and flew back to Michigan before the shit hit the fan. He was the epitome of what I never wanted to be. In the 60 or so days my respected boss and I had there, we spent it finding our team member’s jobs – and ourselves jobs – and we moved on. I took some of my team with me to the next position; he took some with him – we were ALL better off – although demoralized and anxious. The way in which he threw those hard working people under the bus, many of whom would have given anything to save that business (and tried), was pathetic and disgraceful. But what happened for us all? Forced change led to a better job; some people even met their future spouses at their next company -- and forced change will lead to something better for everyone else if they give their job search their all and put everything they have into it – including the auto workers. No one is protected from dumb management, or greedy union bosses. Unemployment here was definitely unintentional.
My disdain for stupidity (and lack of leadership) grew just a bit; and I was still very young, working on a master’s degree. I began working for a homebuilder in Southern California and landed a great job with a lot of flexibility and another absolutely fantastic boss. I was quite content there; I had a fabulous team, did a ton of traveling, had the support of the best in the business, and integrated at least one new business every 30 days somewhere around the country – life was good (this was during the heyday of the building boom). Until - one day, that boss became the fall guy for a pathetic Chief Financial Officer, and I watched him go down with only his dignity remaining. His team literally mourned; they trusted him and it was now our job to explain why the rest of the team was safe – and keep morale up. In this business, the CFO owed a favor to the CMO, and in came – another idiot – a friend of his – to take over the role of CIO. This idiot wanted to make changes – primarily to my team – while he knew nothing about technology (he was an accountant). He needed to lighten the financial load, and what better way to do it than by cutting the people out that keep the systems running? Ultimately I told him where to stick his stupid ideas, and so the attitude began to develop just a bit further. I wasn’t going to watch this happen again and I flat out refused to make the changes he wanted. With a few weeks I found myself out on technicalities just like my former boss, and nearly everyone on my team got “laid off” anyway. This was the unintentional unemployment thing yet again – somehow I thought he might think it was cool for someone to stick up for what they believed. Boy was I wrong. He wanted his wishes turned into orders, which I refused to do.
Now I was really sick and tired of watching the little guy get pummeled. Thinking at this point I’d chosen the wrong field and should have been an attorney, I was thankful to begin my next new job with a masters and the beginning of my PhD (making progress on at least one front)– moving on yet again to another business. It was okay – because life goes on. I had a mortgage to pay and did everything (to quote a CFO I interviewed with) short of “parachuting into the offices of the companies I wanted to work for” to move on – and most importantly – up. This is what all of those facing unemployment today will have to do in this economy. Parachute into the companies you want to work for… or better yet… give them a one finger salute.
So I moved on.. again…– great job – well respected company that, purely out of the respect I have for a few people that still work there, I won’t name (today anyway – same goes for the aforementioned). Good boss, we made great headway.. then in came another moron about 8 months after I was hired who had no clue how to run a business – in fact I found out later he lied about most of what was on his resume. He tried to damage mostly all the little guys (my theory is it made him feel good) – particularly those that he felt threatened by – and particularly a “woman who wouldn’t get a PhD on ‘his watch’” – I did the same thing and told him where to put his ideas, only with a lot more attitude (all 5’4” of it), and within weeks, had a severance package. This was unintentional intentional unemployment – an oxymoron I know – but I had already known the risks of saying “absolutely no you are not doing this” to a jerk on a power trip, so I knew what I’d be facing (along with several other personal things occurring simultaneously that took my anxiety to another level). Trust me, you can survive unemployment. But.. the team was spared, because I told human resources what this guy was doing, what he had really done in his former life (along with the associated proof), and he was promptly fired. I was glad to be given the title of martyr by several team members that had their jobs saved as a result.
I took my resume to yet another company, CB Richard Ellis in Newport Beach. I enjoyed a short year there, made friends for life, and worked for a person with a good heart. He wasn’t always the best manager and couldn’t make a decision to save his life, but his heart was golden and that was what I needed.. something to remind me that not all people suck at the core in business.
After a year or so at CB (with a perfectly fine job), I decided to become unemployed again – only this time, intentionally. I had started a business that was gaining in strength (starting it part time while working in corporate America, something I recommend to entrepreneurs) and I wanted to give it more of myself. About 3 years ago, I realized I didn’t need Corporate America – I needed my own sense of self worth and the knowledge that no one could screw me anymore. Several of my colleagues did the same thing. I believe we are all happier now.
What’s the point of all of this? The UAW workers will be fine. The millions of people (if in fact those aren’t just scare tactics) that will lose their jobs if the auto companies go under will be fine. Those unemployed today will be fine. Many of them may just need the kick in the pants to do something else and may find it was the best thing that ever happened to them. Every time I’ve been fired, unintentionally or intentionally, it led to far greater, better things. The key is to not be afraid to risk it all. No one taught me this, but I know it is true.. from experience, and from consulting with so many people in this situation that got through it and wound up better at the end. Life can be better if you take the road your brain fears most.
The United Auto Workers (united for what? I wont answer that.. just yet) today said that there are “enough sane people” left in Washington that they are certain the government will eventually loan GM money. Let’s hope there are enough sane people left in Washington that they convince the White House not to override the Senate’s decision today. After all, we are supposed to still be a democracy.
Now before I get the email bashers saying that I'm anti-worker and don’t care about people being unemployed, let me just stop you right there. You’re right. But not for the reason you might think. Being unemployed can lead to great things.
The reason is simple – I’ve been unemployed - both intentionally, unintentionally, and “unintentionally intentional”. The world doesn’t end. Life can in fact actually be better than it was before. Anxiety can (and probably will) set in; but more learning takes place in the end and doors open IF you create opportunity. In fact, I believe it’s the only way that many people, myself at one point included, realize the truth – that working for someone else isn’t all it’s cracked up to be and the only real job security any of us have is that which we make for ourselves. Even if you do want to continue working for “the man”, it might just be time to get a kick in the pants and do something different, re-educate, re-tool, learn a new trade or work for someone different anyway – fear is an amazing motivator. The only way for me to explain why the bailouts wont work and why people shouldn’t be afraid of being fired, laid off or anything else that happens along the way is to describe my own experience, so that is what I will do.
My “long” years in Corporate America (by my definition, they were far too long) were spent making someone else rich so I could pay my rent/credit card bills/car payments and eventually mortgage(s). I was left unintentionally unemployed during my very first venture into the Corporate world from “safe academia” (an on ground institution with a dual faculty appointment in a place where no one ever got fired) into a company that was exciting, fun, and just far enough away from the place I grew up. I had a blast for a bit with a terrific boss that taught me many lessons; a fantastic team I led who were easily all ten-plus years my elders (and loved open debate), and a jackass “President” that knew absolutely nothing about running a business. Starting to sound familiar? I cannot compare him to Big 3 CEOs because I don’t know those guys (although it is ironic they’re all from Michigan). But I knew this guy – Ken Kozminski – looking back I realize just how stupid this coward was. He ran a company called IPC Communication Services; I ran the Information Tech Departments in the Western and Eastern regions. I was their only IT Director to ever create a profit center out of IT (and bring on new clients for them because of our IT capabilities), and I had a blast doing it. Unfortunately, IPC was a part of the Journal Communications Family, and Mr. Ken was rather protected and insulated from his stupid decisions by the good ole’ boys network. He was a wuss (I'm being kind), which is worse than stupid. He came in, flew under the radar, laid off the entire Western Region because of poor management decisions dating back years, and flew back to Michigan before the shit hit the fan. He was the epitome of what I never wanted to be. In the 60 or so days my respected boss and I had there, we spent it finding our team member’s jobs – and ourselves jobs – and we moved on. I took some of my team with me to the next position; he took some with him – we were ALL better off – although demoralized and anxious. The way in which he threw those hard working people under the bus, many of whom would have given anything to save that business (and tried), was pathetic and disgraceful. But what happened for us all? Forced change led to a better job; some people even met their future spouses at their next company -- and forced change will lead to something better for everyone else if they give their job search their all and put everything they have into it – including the auto workers. No one is protected from dumb management, or greedy union bosses. Unemployment here was definitely unintentional.
My disdain for stupidity (and lack of leadership) grew just a bit; and I was still very young, working on a master’s degree. I began working for a homebuilder in Southern California and landed a great job with a lot of flexibility and another absolutely fantastic boss. I was quite content there; I had a fabulous team, did a ton of traveling, had the support of the best in the business, and integrated at least one new business every 30 days somewhere around the country – life was good (this was during the heyday of the building boom). Until - one day, that boss became the fall guy for a pathetic Chief Financial Officer, and I watched him go down with only his dignity remaining. His team literally mourned; they trusted him and it was now our job to explain why the rest of the team was safe – and keep morale up. In this business, the CFO owed a favor to the CMO, and in came – another idiot – a friend of his – to take over the role of CIO. This idiot wanted to make changes – primarily to my team – while he knew nothing about technology (he was an accountant). He needed to lighten the financial load, and what better way to do it than by cutting the people out that keep the systems running? Ultimately I told him where to stick his stupid ideas, and so the attitude began to develop just a bit further. I wasn’t going to watch this happen again and I flat out refused to make the changes he wanted. With a few weeks I found myself out on technicalities just like my former boss, and nearly everyone on my team got “laid off” anyway. This was the unintentional unemployment thing yet again – somehow I thought he might think it was cool for someone to stick up for what they believed. Boy was I wrong. He wanted his wishes turned into orders, which I refused to do.
Now I was really sick and tired of watching the little guy get pummeled. Thinking at this point I’d chosen the wrong field and should have been an attorney, I was thankful to begin my next new job with a masters and the beginning of my PhD (making progress on at least one front)– moving on yet again to another business. It was okay – because life goes on. I had a mortgage to pay and did everything (to quote a CFO I interviewed with) short of “parachuting into the offices of the companies I wanted to work for” to move on – and most importantly – up. This is what all of those facing unemployment today will have to do in this economy. Parachute into the companies you want to work for… or better yet… give them a one finger salute.
So I moved on.. again…– great job – well respected company that, purely out of the respect I have for a few people that still work there, I won’t name (today anyway – same goes for the aforementioned). Good boss, we made great headway.. then in came another moron about 8 months after I was hired who had no clue how to run a business – in fact I found out later he lied about most of what was on his resume. He tried to damage mostly all the little guys (my theory is it made him feel good) – particularly those that he felt threatened by – and particularly a “woman who wouldn’t get a PhD on ‘his watch’” – I did the same thing and told him where to put his ideas, only with a lot more attitude (all 5’4” of it), and within weeks, had a severance package. This was unintentional intentional unemployment – an oxymoron I know – but I had already known the risks of saying “absolutely no you are not doing this” to a jerk on a power trip, so I knew what I’d be facing (along with several other personal things occurring simultaneously that took my anxiety to another level). Trust me, you can survive unemployment. But.. the team was spared, because I told human resources what this guy was doing, what he had really done in his former life (along with the associated proof), and he was promptly fired. I was glad to be given the title of martyr by several team members that had their jobs saved as a result.
I took my resume to yet another company, CB Richard Ellis in Newport Beach. I enjoyed a short year there, made friends for life, and worked for a person with a good heart. He wasn’t always the best manager and couldn’t make a decision to save his life, but his heart was golden and that was what I needed.. something to remind me that not all people suck at the core in business.
After a year or so at CB (with a perfectly fine job), I decided to become unemployed again – only this time, intentionally. I had started a business that was gaining in strength (starting it part time while working in corporate America, something I recommend to entrepreneurs) and I wanted to give it more of myself. About 3 years ago, I realized I didn’t need Corporate America – I needed my own sense of self worth and the knowledge that no one could screw me anymore. Several of my colleagues did the same thing. I believe we are all happier now.
What’s the point of all of this? The UAW workers will be fine. The millions of people (if in fact those aren’t just scare tactics) that will lose their jobs if the auto companies go under will be fine. Those unemployed today will be fine. Many of them may just need the kick in the pants to do something else and may find it was the best thing that ever happened to them. Every time I’ve been fired, unintentionally or intentionally, it led to far greater, better things. The key is to not be afraid to risk it all. No one taught me this, but I know it is true.. from experience, and from consulting with so many people in this situation that got through it and wound up better at the end. Life can be better if you take the road your brain fears most.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Desire, Drive, Economics, Materialism and Generational Learning
Have you written a piece that really should be separated out into many short excerpts or blogs; you do so only to combine them again; realizing there is too much overlap to continue in that method? That is this post. :) A friend recently said that most movies and songs will always come back to where they started (I believe to keep people comfortable - the happy ending story); this blog post will certainly not invoke those thoughts. Ive never found full circle to be reality unless the individual, the character, the writer never really wanted to move beyond current existence to begin with. If that's the case, why write the play, the song, or the movie? Yeah yeah...
I've spent the weekend thinking about many things; among them, desire, human drive, intervention, interaction, economics, materialism, the human brain, "starters" versus maintainers and their gap; homeostasis or the psychological desire to maintain status quo to reduce tension, equilibrium points, internal stability, core responses, and the brain - particularly the fear many have of neuroscience ... that understanding it at its core might document what many suspect.. that humans have less free will than we think and are a product of our environment and our minds' perception of it rather than free thinking, useful, pragmatic organisms.
I am convinced these are all highly related to one another. It might take me years to figure out precisely how but we all have to start somewhere. ;) Perhaps this thought process started with the many friends, acquaintainces and business partners I have that seem to be terrific "starters"; they love creating something new. Yet several months into it, the desire to complete the project, book, company, relationship etc and drive to do the same seem to be disconnected. Some argue that it is because homeostasis (or in economics, equilibrium) is boring - so although any objects natural state is to try to expend the least amount of energy (and thereby stay at equilibrium), sometimes the desire and excitement of something new creates enough momentum and energy to move beyond this point into actual action. As something becomes the norm, it, too, is equilibrium and no longer requires the energy expense. This explains many things in life I believe.
Yet how do we explain then how objects that are in motion (baseballs included), including the human energy element, tend to slow over time.. beyond the physics involved. It would seem natural that the further along we as humans get into something and the more of a challenge it becomes (growing is hard), the more we'd continue to persevere until the mission is accomplished; yet the opposite seems to happen in real life. This is explained through physics and quick studies of the brain, but it seems illogical and a bit maladaptive to successful strategy of any sorts.
Many people put just as much energy into staying at equilibrium as they do getting out of equilibrium. I have many friends that do their best to maintain status quo and pour their heart and soul into it; and friends that seem to get themselves into situations just to create disequilibrium to get some sort of temporary satisfaction and high, only to go back to equilibrium when things become a bit too hectic or, to use a non scientific word, scary for them. Humans have too many motivations to begin to try to evaluate why this is the case; but it does lead to a great question - who should those who try to create disequilibrium but want to constantly maintain that status pair up with in business, in relationships, and in learning? It is rare to find someone that likes disequilibrium to the point that their version of homeostasis is constant change. I find them a lot in technology because change is the only constant; yet many fight it even in that field.
Constant change is where all the fun happens. There are few people I believe in this world that can make no change into fun constant change.
But this brings up so many other important points for our markets, our friendships, materialism and so on. Many people are great at beginning new things; not so great at maintaining them. Few possess the ability to do both and do them both with drive and passion. Zizek describes many theories and demystifies some; complicates others; debunks many more. He notes the Parallax View in a book titled the same as shifting perspectives between two points. In this particular case, because the individuals or the situation are on exact opposite sides of precisely the same phenomenon - they can never meet and therefore will never do more than be connected; they will never share space or find a point of mediation. But what I find more fascinating is the parallax nature of the "gap" between ones' drive, and ones' desire. If an individual is attempting to do something rather mundane but can never accomplish it, his attitude about that act often changes to the point where he finds excitement and even pleasure in repeating the same failed task! This is when we shift from drive to desire, to desire to drive.
Ultimately drive will then become its own strategy to profit from each failed attempt to reach that particular goal that is now merely desire. When looked at from a variety of perspectives, we can see this in failed businesses; in businesses that continue to operate without success; in personal relationships that are beyond homeostasis to flat out boring yet they are maintained - perhaps merely for the incremental profit (in this case it can be physical, mental, or literally, dollars) gained from repeating that same failed task. This is all fascinating stuff.
I believe that in good businesses, good relationships, in good friendships, in good partnerships, in good models and in good entrepreneurial activities there must be inherent tension. This can take all sorts of forms, but without it our natural tendency to maintain equilibrium is fulfilled; and life takes on a new meaning - going back to what the brain originally "knows" as intuition rather than intention, and not expanding to the point of drive + desire simultaneously. What a great anything this would be if we could combine the two and keep it there!
Greene and Cohen speculated once that neuroscience will toss out the window all intuitive sense of free will and we will be left realizing that very little of what we do is actually intentional; but more or less the product of outside influences - and that which is outside of our control. That has drastic implications; from the way we treat those that commit serious crimes to the way in which we run our businesses. They speculate that individuals are rarely consciously aware of what is driving their own behavior; and that we are not rational creatures. If the brain truly is the most complex living structure in the universe, then perhaps one day (well after I'm no longer living on this planet) we will understand the impact of this theory.
But I think more interestingly is the parallax gap which indicates (albeit using two entirely different areas of study) that the confrontation of two closely linked perspectives can never find neutral ground; if this is the case, we can apply it to markets and probably more importantly, to people (since ultimately they really make up markets). Perhaps then the effects of materialism and what drives our economy is nothing more than a fetish, an ordinary object that fills an empty place within any sort of structure - and perhaps relationships, businesses, and partnerships are nothing more than this either.
Maybe what we need to do (anyone sure how?) is re-establish what learning is - being the ability to become aware of the disturbing sides of something we knew existed all along - or perhaps even to acknowledge it if we are aware of it. That takes courage beyond what most have, and perhaps an ability beyond what our human minds can do out of self preservation. Maybe the ability to do this though would solve economic woes; calm nerves, and create stronger relationships.
If people always take the path of least energy, and markets always take the path of least energy, then the maximum level of achievement and perhaps even happiness can never be achieved - unless happiness is defined as homeostasis for its own sake. From stress often comes the greatest reward if you're willing to take it risk. Entrepreneurs all over America are trying to figure out what level of stress (and risk) they can handle. Automakers are trying to determine how to solve 3 month long stress to come back and revisit the humiliation again - but they are at a point of parallax gap - they will simply perform the same failed task until the need to do that task becomes their soul driven purpose - probably not so consciously either.
Right now an entire generation is learning about markets; that they don't just go up - they can go down, too... and they're not always "fixable" with more than time and government intervention. More likely in my view, they will go up because of the desire of those very few who wish for something beyond equilibrium - to take risk - and try again in a new type of marketplace. A market not afraid of money written in other languages or the people that speak them. This is what will rebuild our future economy over time... the risk takers, the people that don't want homeostasis, and those that aren't afraid of the neuroscience component that perhaps they're doing it for reasons beyond those that they can explain or will even attempt to.
Fear is bondage that keeps people from achieving great things and being incredibly happy because they're wired to do or be a certain thing for a group of people, an individual, or a business - often out of environmental impacts they cannot explain.
While they are perhaps unaware of the grip that the fear is having on their lives (I meet many of them - hedge fund managers, investors, traders and so on particularly in NYC) ... an entire generation is learning that over-leveraging can be a bad thing (present company included) albeit profitable in many instances.
I wrote in a previous blog called Feminism's Defeat... about my grandfather and how many times I've replaced my couch in the time he has reupholstered his. Our economy is being reupholstered; the fundamentals are there because the fundamentals aren't CPI or GDP or GNP or anything economists discuss in three minute segments on Fox News. The fundamentals are the people that encompass the desire to continue to push beyond what is comfortable for what is great and without boundary - courting all that is new to see what is possible. Once enough people do this, we will see recovery.
I've spent the weekend thinking about many things; among them, desire, human drive, intervention, interaction, economics, materialism, the human brain, "starters" versus maintainers and their gap; homeostasis or the psychological desire to maintain status quo to reduce tension, equilibrium points, internal stability, core responses, and the brain - particularly the fear many have of neuroscience ... that understanding it at its core might document what many suspect.. that humans have less free will than we think and are a product of our environment and our minds' perception of it rather than free thinking, useful, pragmatic organisms.
I am convinced these are all highly related to one another. It might take me years to figure out precisely how but we all have to start somewhere. ;) Perhaps this thought process started with the many friends, acquaintainces and business partners I have that seem to be terrific "starters"; they love creating something new. Yet several months into it, the desire to complete the project, book, company, relationship etc and drive to do the same seem to be disconnected. Some argue that it is because homeostasis (or in economics, equilibrium) is boring - so although any objects natural state is to try to expend the least amount of energy (and thereby stay at equilibrium), sometimes the desire and excitement of something new creates enough momentum and energy to move beyond this point into actual action. As something becomes the norm, it, too, is equilibrium and no longer requires the energy expense. This explains many things in life I believe.
Yet how do we explain then how objects that are in motion (baseballs included), including the human energy element, tend to slow over time.. beyond the physics involved. It would seem natural that the further along we as humans get into something and the more of a challenge it becomes (growing is hard), the more we'd continue to persevere until the mission is accomplished; yet the opposite seems to happen in real life. This is explained through physics and quick studies of the brain, but it seems illogical and a bit maladaptive to successful strategy of any sorts.
Many people put just as much energy into staying at equilibrium as they do getting out of equilibrium. I have many friends that do their best to maintain status quo and pour their heart and soul into it; and friends that seem to get themselves into situations just to create disequilibrium to get some sort of temporary satisfaction and high, only to go back to equilibrium when things become a bit too hectic or, to use a non scientific word, scary for them. Humans have too many motivations to begin to try to evaluate why this is the case; but it does lead to a great question - who should those who try to create disequilibrium but want to constantly maintain that status pair up with in business, in relationships, and in learning? It is rare to find someone that likes disequilibrium to the point that their version of homeostasis is constant change. I find them a lot in technology because change is the only constant; yet many fight it even in that field.
Constant change is where all the fun happens. There are few people I believe in this world that can make no change into fun constant change.
But this brings up so many other important points for our markets, our friendships, materialism and so on. Many people are great at beginning new things; not so great at maintaining them. Few possess the ability to do both and do them both with drive and passion. Zizek describes many theories and demystifies some; complicates others; debunks many more. He notes the Parallax View in a book titled the same as shifting perspectives between two points. In this particular case, because the individuals or the situation are on exact opposite sides of precisely the same phenomenon - they can never meet and therefore will never do more than be connected; they will never share space or find a point of mediation. But what I find more fascinating is the parallax nature of the "gap" between ones' drive, and ones' desire. If an individual is attempting to do something rather mundane but can never accomplish it, his attitude about that act often changes to the point where he finds excitement and even pleasure in repeating the same failed task! This is when we shift from drive to desire, to desire to drive.
Ultimately drive will then become its own strategy to profit from each failed attempt to reach that particular goal that is now merely desire. When looked at from a variety of perspectives, we can see this in failed businesses; in businesses that continue to operate without success; in personal relationships that are beyond homeostasis to flat out boring yet they are maintained - perhaps merely for the incremental profit (in this case it can be physical, mental, or literally, dollars) gained from repeating that same failed task. This is all fascinating stuff.
I believe that in good businesses, good relationships, in good friendships, in good partnerships, in good models and in good entrepreneurial activities there must be inherent tension. This can take all sorts of forms, but without it our natural tendency to maintain equilibrium is fulfilled; and life takes on a new meaning - going back to what the brain originally "knows" as intuition rather than intention, and not expanding to the point of drive + desire simultaneously. What a great anything this would be if we could combine the two and keep it there!
Greene and Cohen speculated once that neuroscience will toss out the window all intuitive sense of free will and we will be left realizing that very little of what we do is actually intentional; but more or less the product of outside influences - and that which is outside of our control. That has drastic implications; from the way we treat those that commit serious crimes to the way in which we run our businesses. They speculate that individuals are rarely consciously aware of what is driving their own behavior; and that we are not rational creatures. If the brain truly is the most complex living structure in the universe, then perhaps one day (well after I'm no longer living on this planet) we will understand the impact of this theory.
But I think more interestingly is the parallax gap which indicates (albeit using two entirely different areas of study) that the confrontation of two closely linked perspectives can never find neutral ground; if this is the case, we can apply it to markets and probably more importantly, to people (since ultimately they really make up markets). Perhaps then the effects of materialism and what drives our economy is nothing more than a fetish, an ordinary object that fills an empty place within any sort of structure - and perhaps relationships, businesses, and partnerships are nothing more than this either.
Maybe what we need to do (anyone sure how?) is re-establish what learning is - being the ability to become aware of the disturbing sides of something we knew existed all along - or perhaps even to acknowledge it if we are aware of it. That takes courage beyond what most have, and perhaps an ability beyond what our human minds can do out of self preservation. Maybe the ability to do this though would solve economic woes; calm nerves, and create stronger relationships.
If people always take the path of least energy, and markets always take the path of least energy, then the maximum level of achievement and perhaps even happiness can never be achieved - unless happiness is defined as homeostasis for its own sake. From stress often comes the greatest reward if you're willing to take it risk. Entrepreneurs all over America are trying to figure out what level of stress (and risk) they can handle. Automakers are trying to determine how to solve 3 month long stress to come back and revisit the humiliation again - but they are at a point of parallax gap - they will simply perform the same failed task until the need to do that task becomes their soul driven purpose - probably not so consciously either.
Right now an entire generation is learning about markets; that they don't just go up - they can go down, too... and they're not always "fixable" with more than time and government intervention. More likely in my view, they will go up because of the desire of those very few who wish for something beyond equilibrium - to take risk - and try again in a new type of marketplace. A market not afraid of money written in other languages or the people that speak them. This is what will rebuild our future economy over time... the risk takers, the people that don't want homeostasis, and those that aren't afraid of the neuroscience component that perhaps they're doing it for reasons beyond those that they can explain or will even attempt to.
Fear is bondage that keeps people from achieving great things and being incredibly happy because they're wired to do or be a certain thing for a group of people, an individual, or a business - often out of environmental impacts they cannot explain.
While they are perhaps unaware of the grip that the fear is having on their lives (I meet many of them - hedge fund managers, investors, traders and so on particularly in NYC) ... an entire generation is learning that over-leveraging can be a bad thing (present company included) albeit profitable in many instances.
I wrote in a previous blog called Feminism's Defeat... about my grandfather and how many times I've replaced my couch in the time he has reupholstered his. Our economy is being reupholstered; the fundamentals are there because the fundamentals aren't CPI or GDP or GNP or anything economists discuss in three minute segments on Fox News. The fundamentals are the people that encompass the desire to continue to push beyond what is comfortable for what is great and without boundary - courting all that is new to see what is possible. Once enough people do this, we will see recovery.
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