A side note on age: 60+ 1 (July 12, 2010)

Today I turned 60 plus one day.  Honestly I have been looking forward to this day for ten years.  Now, that I have made it I am looking forward to 70+ 1.  Why?  I don’t dread living and feel it is great time to look at what I have yet to learn about:  myself, the world, life, etc., you know that small stuff many try to avoid looking at throughout their lives.  So here I go into the next decade of living.   Stay tune for it promises to be quite interesting from here out.  Mike

The 3 lessons

“Lesson one, The world owes you nothing!”

“Lesson two, The country owes you nothing!”

“Lesson three, What do you owe yourself?  A Great Life!”

The little girl looked up at her grandparents.  Into their eyes she searched for more, but their eyes kept repeating the same messages, over and over.

The Life and Times of a Chief Humility Officer: On to Better Things

Handwritten note to Bill, December 24, 2010

Bill it was great working with you and we truly appreciated all the fantastic work you did for the organization.

Best of luck in your new endeavors that you are pursuing.  Thanks, CEO and Chair

Company wide newsletter

January 2, 2011

Back page, bottom of column three

We wish to inform everyone that Bill_____ has decided to pursue new adventures with another

organization.  Given our recent reorganizations after Christmas, the Executive Team has decided to discontinue

the position titled Chief Humility Officer and spread its responsibilities among the following departments:

Legal, Marketing, HR and Risk Management.  If you have any questions, please contact the CEO’s secretary, Jonathan

________.

The theme of our next newsletter will be:  Hiring Etiquette Practices

The Life and Times of a Chief Humility Officer: Challenge Four

December, 2010

I feel awful.  No one wants to meet with me and no one is returning my phone calls.  Perhaps Nancy’s message had been shared with others and talking with me may place them in harms way?  Just thinking too myself; it is an old and invaluable habit.  Boy I could use some Key Lime Pie right about now.

A lot of questions are running through my head about next steps.  There are too many to think about as my head is pounding and my stomach is feeling like it wants to cramp up, like the kinds of cramps you get with a colonoscopy.  I think I better see a doctor.

At the doctor’s office the diagnosis: Nothing!  But I am obviously feeling a little “stressed out” about something.  “Yep!” was my response.  I went home.  I called in sick for four straight days. I was depressed beyond anything I had ever felt before.  My wife was truly concerned but I couldn’t tell her what was going on, even when I didn’t fully know what was going on.  Christmas was coming soon and I had to do some shopping, finish some reports at work and buy a tree for the living room.  Getting back to normal was my first and last objective for the week.

The Life and Times of a Chief Humility Officer: Challenge Three

November, 2010

I closed the door behind me as I left the CEO’s office.  I felt great as I was told that my work was exceptional and it was important that the publicity office write an article about me for the newsletter and the local newspaper.  No other companies in town had a CHO and it was important for the company to herald its guy at the head of his class.

Hiring Etiquette: Another Perspective–The In-house Professionals

Caller:  Sir, I sent in my resume and app two weeks ago and then had  a phone interview last Thursday.  But, even though I was told someone would call me on Monday, I thought it was best, since today is Friday, to call back and find out what was your decision?

HR:  Uh, well I haven’t heard back from the hiring manager, so I don’t know what to say.  Please, we will call you next week to let you know. Thanks for calling.

Two weeks later.

Caller:  Sir, I talked with you two Friday’s ago and you mentioned you thought a decision would be made the following week, but I haven’t heard from anyone.

HR:  Well, we are still thinking through what we want to do.  Thanks for calling.

Three weeks later, the Caller notices an announcement about the job he interviewed for.  It was found on the website:  www……

It notifies job searchers that the job posted three months earlier for so and so type company, had been pulled.  It doesn’t say if it were filled, nothing.

Two days later, the same job is reposted, inviting interested parties to submit resumes and applications.

The Caller (Dumb-founded and frustrated): Sir, Why didn’t someone have the professional decency to call me and let me know what was happening.  Click on the other end of the line.  Such is life in the hiring lane these days.

Is it fear of engagement or is it just not wanting to have to explain why someone was not hired.  Time or lack of it could be a culprit, too.  Should organizations call people or email them to let them know they were not under further consideration after interviewing them, especially if they were softly lead to believe they were still in the running for a position or possible further interviews?

What are your thoughts on this kind of situation for job seekers?  Do organizations have any kind of responsibility to inform potential employees of hiring decisions or is that a legal taboo?  What does this do to the hiring process in the future and who is going to believe HR people or their surrogate 3rd party vendors?  Are there any hidden costs for organizations who run soft deceptions during the hiring process?

The Life and Times of a Chief Humility Officer: Challenge Two

Bill is writing an email on the Monday following a national holiday weekend.  It is a memo to his “peers” on the alley.

September, 2010

To:  The Executive Team

From :  Bill, CHO

Subject:  A few observations and a cautionary tale

I was working late last Friday night , as my family took a trip without me.  So I started working through some of the terabytes of  emails burdening the speed of my hard drives.  It was a surprise for me to come upon a note from a field manager, who was questioning the etiquette of our hiring practices.  Etiquette was his term not mine.  It became clear after reading his statement that we have a problem in the company with how we treat people applying for jobs.  I only suggest this for it was not the first time I had heard about a hiring practice, which seems embedded deep within the organization.  It is a sad tale I tell you now and one full of risks for the company.  It deals with the special people who seem to know how to override our 3rd party vendor, who is responsible for vetting potential candidates for supervisory and lower level managerial positions.

The Life and Times of a Chief Humility Officer: Challenge One

A letter between a business executive (Bill) and an old friend of his from high school days (Jerry.)  Bill is opening a chapter of his life, unfamiliar to his friend Jerry.

August, 2010

Jerry,  It has been too long since we last connected and had a chance to share a few personal thoughts about life.  Before I forget, many thanks to you and your wife for the kind note you sent after we lost our son Tad.  It was hard to say good bye to a little guy who was less than a day old, but we still have the other three children to comfort us.  It was very painful, yet Jennie is doing well and has recovered from the shock.

I also want to thank you for the congrats! message, after I was promoted to CHO at our company headquarters.  Wow!  Now I am on C level alley in the back of the building, where all the important stuff takes place.  I must admit I miss the gang I hung out with for years, but you know the game, now I have to hang out with those who breathe air in the stratosphere.  You know you actually have to wear oxygen masks up there as it gets a little thin.  Something pushes the oxygen out of the rooms for some reason.  Yet, you do feel you are on top of the world, like being on the top of Everest.

I am also writing this note  to vent a little frustration I am having with my title and the work I have to perform on daily basis.  It seems that as the CHO I am expected to make sure people do the up and up things correctly; then I am signaled to ignore a few less than up and up decisions made daily.  And I do mean daily!

Have you ever felt like you were a token creature in a zoo?  Here I sit with the nice office, where I can glance out at a very nice view of the country side and it smells like crap all around me. I think you know what I am talking about because we both grew up downwind of that old feedlot on the edge of town.  Smell or no smell, my job is to serve as the humility pro.

When I started I wasn’t quite clear on what they wanted me to do.  But, looking online, I discovered that all I had to do was make the company appear to be honest, straight-forward and  open to its “vulnerableness.” Ok, I have achieved all of that, yet I find myself competing with the publicity and marketing people as well.  Even the risk management and legal people get into the act.  So, here is my problem.  I want to do this job right and do the right job.  But, there is a strange feeling sitting in the back of my head, which will not stop!

Am I fooling myself into thinking that I am really a CHO, or is this an act I must offer to the public every day I walk into the office and attend those glad hand events?  I struggle with this, I truly do.  Often I tell my wife how I wish I had followed your path in life.  You are your own boss, granted it isn’t easy thinking about where your next check is going to come from, but you have taken great care of your family and it shows.  Your kids are doing well, you can go home at anytime.   OK, so you work out of your home.  That is still important as I don’t go home until 7 or 8 most nights.  That is just the way it is around here these days.  But, I do envy your life and lifestyle. The money is fantastic and they want to give me more for doing less.  (Off the record, that is a coded way of saying I am now part of the club.)  I am tired and need to go home.  More on this later on.  If you decided to respond please send the message to my home email address or do as I did here, send it USPS, they need the business and I don’t trust our IT admin guys.

I guess you have proven once again that you were and will always be the smarter between the two of us.     Again, I lose another bet from the past.

All right, that is enough belly aching. I just had to share those thoughts with someone outside of my corporate circle and who knows me better than anyone else on the planet.

Thanks for listening, Please send all my best to your family.  Take care, from your buddy on the fast track, Bill

The American Work Ethic for the 21st Century

Our American work ethic has normally been confined to thoughts about the Protestant work ethic.  Specifically, it suggests that hard work is the key to success.  Yes, work is a key to some forms of success, especially working hard to get what you are after.  It is particularly true when you are in control of what you want to go after.  Historically, people had a great idea of what they were after, it was a strong pastoral lifestyle of open air and open opportunities formed from living on the land.    In today’s post-industrial climate, the setting for work is quite different and at least equal in challenge to the times of the pre-World War Two American farming society.

Many Americans, obviously not all, graduate from college and move into the ranks of normal working stiffs. Everyday, they jump into their cars, scramble aboard buses and trains, even a few ride bikes to work.  Once at predetermined workplaces life moves into the scripts of routines.  Work is now about doing things which may have consequences for the world, but more than likely the effort goes unnoticed.  Farmers grow things, raise animals and hopefully serve as stewards of the land.  When you are sitting in an office what are you are you doing that which resembles serving as a steward?  Perhaps you are a steward of paper or information!

When I was teaching graduate level business students some years ago, I often asked them who was responsible for their success at work?  A few said they were responsible, while others felt it was their supervisors’ responsibility to assure their success.  The latter was a very curious response, as it placed the individual’s success in the hands of their supervisors.  In so doing the respondents were also setting their own responsibilities for success outside of themselves.  Consequently, from their viewpoints, success or failure at work where not their collective responsibility.

I have thought about this paradox for sometime.  Unfortunately, I never asked my classes in who was responsible for the successes or failures in the rest of their lives?  I now wonder if they would blame their parents, their significant others or even their children?  It seems that both domains are now socially acceptable as status markers, they need origination from outside ourselves. Oddly, we seem to place our fates in the hands of those who shadow our lives.  Is this simply a practice of each younger generation?  Absolutely not!  Old and young today harbor senses of dependency on others.  Perhaps in a society where you clock in everyday, you sign a tacit agreement where you believe you relinquish your identity to others.  Yes, that is what I believe happens when you deed away your success and failures to others.  It is an odd work ethic worth exploring carefully and fully.

Let me suggest that if you know someone who is still in his or her twenties, that you sit down and have a heart to heart talk on who controls their lives at work and at home?

Our Transition Recession: Part Two

When you are over fifty you begin speculating about what life could have been when you were young.  When you are young you speculate about what life will be like when you turn 35 and become old.  Neither are spared their delusions as they journey onward.  This is the second part of “Our Transition Recession.”

We begin with a comment on an interesting article by Reihan Salam (Time Magazine, March 22, 2010, pg.46, 47).  Its title foretells the life stories for many in future generations:  “The Dropout Economy, The future of work looks a lot like unemployment.”  Whether or not present spectators of our times believe we are witnessing a tectonic shift in how the economic, social and political landscape is being reconfigured, we are definitely feeling the ground move beneath our feet.  Incidentally, that big wall of water is not a mirage, it is a tsunami racing towards us to wash-away the doubters about change.  Salam’s view of the future is not grim, nor sci-fi in its conclusions.  He simply writes a picture board of images depicting what many of America’s tomorrow’s will look like.  If those tomorrow’s are for the better or for the worse, they will depend upon how we prepare ourselves for unknowns, countless challenges and in how we energize ourselves to live–with reduced governmental and institutional support.

Fading From Retiring to Retired America: Tired Blood, Spent Imaginations and New Frontiers

I am focusing on an imagined image, where the iconic American artist, the late Norman Rockwell is standing before a blank canvass pondering painting a scene, a collage of sorts of America.  Known for his realistic depictions of American life, Rockwell is constructing a self-portrait of his country, “from sea to shining sea.”  But, for a few minutes he stands quietly, reflecting on what needs to be placed in the images he captures on his stretched material.  I can see him thinking about what he must include, but more importantly, it must be honest, true and not fitting the emotional needs of those who want to see something other than truth. Fortunately for us his era preceded ours. Where today stark truth is eclipsed by empty opinions, as they are validated by commercial appeal and high entertainment values.  It is an era where opinions weigh more than facts.

Micromanaging and Its Future

Life In A Non-Common Sense World

Life In A Non-Common Sense World

What’s in it for me?  This is a worrisome question we either hear or observe everyday in businesses, shops, schools, on street corners and so on.  When women, men, and children are asked to do something in their lives, the immediate response is a question in return.  For instance, what will they receive for their allegiance, for their money, for their time, or simply for their attention?  It seems nothing is free these days.  Consequently, even change in a person’s status comes with a price.  I wish to offer a currency used in America for purchasing how people should see things, and how they should think in common.  It is tagged as Common Sense.  A side note:  it did not originate with Thomas Paine, let alone with Glenn Beck.

Linchpin by Seth Godin, A book review

Our mythical Common Sense has a habit of telling us that everyone would or at least should agree on certain ideas, practices, etc.  As often as proclaimed, the notion is wrong.

For instance, it is suggested that we are all indispensable in our work lives.  Otherwise, we can naïvely ask, why were we hired in the first place?  Of course, in our eyes who can live without us?  But we are not indispensable.  It seems people are incurably and exceptionally skilled at making themselves dispensable.  (For full disclosure: I have been very adept in my life at making myself dispensable, in more ways than I would dare share with you today.) With that admission, I am now ready to declare that Seth Godin’s book, Linchpin, captured me for a sleepless night reading experience.

What does our Transition Recession Look Like, Part One?

The American Transition Recession began at the beginning of the 21st Century.  Two very important questions must be asked:  Are our next generation of leaders prepared to not only confront the economic and social traumas evolving as they grow up?  And, are they studying to know how to think wisely, critically, and unselfishly?  As a former adjunct professor of management in MBA programs, and as a professional management sensei, I am truly concerned by what I see are systemic human deficits in organizations.  I would add that this includes my observations of young and mid-age professionals in small to large corporations.