We Like To Pretend

We like to pretend that:

• Rules are suggestions
• Plans harm creativity
• Underdogs are always deserving
• Institutions are loyal
• Experience is a minor part of competence
• Intuition is irrational
• We can frequently beat the odds
• Appearance doesn't matter
• Being true to our inner self means we'll be better
• Other people have fewer problems

Quote of the Day

It's hard to teach anything that can't be broken down into repeatable and unchanging elements. Driving a car, flying an airplane - you can reduce those things to a series of maneuvers that are always executed in the same way. But with something like leadership, just as with art, you reinvent the wheel every single time you apply the principle.

- Sydney Pollack

Murray: Fishtown versus Belmont

Writing in City Journal, Kay S. Hymowitz reviews the new book by Charles Murray. An excerpt:

Most disastrous for Fishtown residents has been the collapse of the family, which Murray believes is now “approaching a point of no return.” For a while after the 1960s, the working class hung on to its traditional ways. That changed dramatically by the 1990s. Today, under 50 percent of Fishtown 30- to 49-year-olds are married; in Belmont, the number is 84 percent. About a third of Fishtowners of that age are divorced, compared with 10 percent of Belmonters. Murray estimates that 45 percent of Fishtown babies are born to unmarried mothers, versus 6 to 8 percent of those in Belmont.

Back to Nature

The trailer for "The Grey."

Candles for Mozart

At The Hammock Papers, a celebration of Mozart's birthday. Check it out.

Pleasant Surprises

A great fear of managers and executives is that some day they will get a very unpleasant surprise. That's one reason why keeping your boss well-briefed is important and why delaying the reporting of bad news can be fatal.

But let's consider the other side of the spectrum and think of ways in which something extra can create a lasting positive impression. For example, a top executive who is going to meet with a community group may be given some rough idea of the group's concerns and then be expected to wing it. On the other hand, an associate may provide information such as:

1. A brief history of the group
2. The names of the group's leaders, both formal and informal
3. Whether any one person can really speak for the group
4. Whether the executive has ever met any of those leaders
5. How the group perceives the executive's organization
6. What the group says it wants
7. What the group really wants
8. Whether the group has any hot buttons
9. What the group definitely does not want
10. What it expects from the meeting
11. Any time-sensitive matters
12. Some reasonable strategies for dealing with the group
13. What the executive's side can gain from the meeting
14. How the meeting is likely to proceed, and
15. What the next step may be.

Absolutely necessary? Probably not. Very helpful? You bet. And it would most likely be a pleasant surprise.

Pleasant surprises frequently stem from things that didn't need to be done, but were, and from potential problems that were identified, then removed or reduced.

Look around. We are circled by potential pleasant surprises. Let's surprise someone.

Quote of the Day

I always want to say to people who want to be rich and famous: 'try being rich first'. See if that doesn't cover most of it. There's not much downside to being rich, other than paying taxes and having your relatives ask you for money. But when you become famous, you end up with a 24-hour job.

- Bill Murray

Entertainment Break

The trailer for "Me and Orson Welles."

Great Public Speaking: Three Simple Words

Michael P. Maslanka examines a speech by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.:

He says, "Three simple words explain the social revolution taking place in Albany and the South today." Doesn’t that make the listener want to hear what those words are? King does not just come out and say what he’s going to say, because the force of his message would be lost on the audience. He primes the audience to start thinking about what the words are, and he then frames what is coming by telling them what the words are not: "They aren't big words. One does not need to have a philosophical bent to understand them."

Legionnaire French

A time-tested language immersion program for multiple nationalities:

Part One; Part Two; Part Three; Part Four; Part Five; Part Six; Part Seven; Part Eight; Part Nine; and Part Ten.

First Paragraph

Louis the Sixth of France, Louis the Fat, lay sick in his hunting lodge at Bethizy, whither his bearers had brought him from the unprecedented heat and the fetid odors of the summer in Paris. He was not old - verging on sixty - but he was failing perceptively. The chalky pallor, the bleared vision, the occasional palsy that had long marked him, were attributed to an abortive attempt of his stepmother, Queen Bertrade, to dispose of him by poison in his early years. Latterly he had grown so ponderous that he could no longer mount a horse or stoop to lace a shoe. About him in the sultry room were gathered some of his prelates and barons palatine, chief among them his lifelong friend and counselor, Abbe Suger. A confessor stood by prepared to administer the sacrament in extremis.

- From Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Four Kings by Amy Kelly

Scribble. Scribble. Think. Think.

I'm giving a fresh look at a product that we've offered via an unchanged format for years.

Perhaps I'll stick with that approach after analyzing the alternatives, but something tells me we are missing an opportunity. A modification might be an improvement and yet this cannot be a mere tinkering around the edges. I want a change that is close enough to the original to be reassuring and yet different enough to attract the eye and justify the effort.

"Different" by itself won't be adequate. It will have to be seriously better.

One test: Will people look at it and ask themselves, "Why didn't we think of that?"

The Easy One

He assured me that the item would fly through the committee meeting without any opposition and that it would barely take any time from the other work.

Alarm bells rang in the back of my mind.

The more he argued that the issue was minor, the louder the bells became. I seemed to recall an observation by Parkinson that boards will speedily approve a multi-million dollar project and then bog down on a discussion of parking spaces.

No one will be opposed to this, he said. That's optimistic, I replied, and you've been around long enough to know that. He chuckled and agreed to delay the matter.

I guess he thought it was worth a try.

Quote of the Day

The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.

- Marcus Aurelius

Another Art Blog to Appreciate

Check out Muddy Colors: an illustration group blog.

[HT: Art Contrarian]

[Pictured above: "Men Reading" by J.C. Leyendecker]

Mr. Clean

Some housecleaning tips at Instapundit. No leaf-blower?

Once a Month for 30 Minutes

Idea: Once a month at a staff meeting, the group will discuss the meaning of a virtue. The discussion will be strictly limited to 30 minutes, encouraging the attendees to be brief and to the point. If the group wishes, a topic may be extended to future meetings but the 30 minute rule will be honored at each one. People will be given advance notice so they can assemble their thoughts.

Potential Topics: Courage, Trust, Honesty, Loyalty, Fairness, Caring, Excellence, Civic Duty, Integrity, Respect, Kindness, and Ambition.

I've worked on some teams where the results would have been fascinating.

Oratory's Slide

Elizabeth Scalia on the decline of great oratory. An excerpt:

The passing of his federal holiday gave me an opportunity to ponder what my friend Lisa Mladinich calls the "holy courage" of Martin Luther King, Jr, who found strength in knowing that his cause was a just one, despite threats, despite difficulties. Watching the old videos, I found myself moved as ever by his stunning oratory. King was capable of using imagery; he understood the power of cadence; how to energize an idea with the forward thrust of repetition. He knew how to prompt the memory retention of a listener with alliteration: "...they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."

Quote of the Day

The longest journey is the journey inward.

- Dag Hammarskjold

First Paragraph

The woman on the ledge was wearing a nightgown. It was only 3:30 in the afternoon, but she was dressed for sleep, and the brisk spring breezes flattened the sheer nylon fabric against her body so that she looked like a legendary Greek figure sculptured in stone, immobile, on the ledge twelve stories above the city street.

- From Like Love by Ed McBain

The Power of Phrasing

At Sensory Dispensary:

Suzanne Vega singing "Tom's Diner."

Some Days

This post by Wally Bock should be copied by bosses and taped inside their desk drawers for frequent reference.

Art Break: The Fini Image

Art Contrarian looks at the work and portraits of Leonor Fini.

Oscar

The Academy Awards nominations are out.

My prediction on the Best Picture winner: The Artist.

Vora on Team Autonomy

Tanmay Vora has written a thought-provoking post on how to foster autonomy in a team. An excerpt:

Monitor progress, not people: Monitoring people is easier, but it does not help. As a team lead, your primary role is to monitor progress, not people. Small wins on a daily basis can be a great motivator for people. When people know that progress is important, they will do what is needed to ensure progress.

The Wyeth Tradition

Anderson Layman's Blog features several of the great paintings of Jamie Wyeth.

Marvelous stuff. Makes me want to move to an island and just watch life.

In The Stacks

This post by Cultural Offering brought back many happy memories of hours spent in the library at the University of Arizona:

He walked between the stacks and took it in. His eyes stayed open but he could just have easily smelled his way through. Alphabetical. He could move quickly to his favorites or the latest interest. They waited for him. No one else around here touched them. He even checked a few just to be sure. "Idiots," he thought. They have no idea what they are missing.

Warning Signs

The lawyer doesn't want to touch it. Upper management is nervous. They want you to handle the matter but with very close supervision. There is a tight deadline. Litigation is likely. The in-house experts are inexperienced. There are conflicting standards or rules. Information is withheld. They forget to tell you things. The atmosphere is toxic. There is a huge lack of trust. Neither side is admirable. You appear to be a convenient scapegoat. Mission creep is creeping. There are factions within factions. You'll barely have time to think.

You smell a rat.

Quote of the Day

We're all born under the same sky, but we don't all have the same horizon.

- Konrad Adenauer

First Paragraph

Business meetings are more or less the same all over the world, and have been since the beginning of time. There is the man in charge; the man supposedly in charge; the man wanting to be in charge; their minions, their enemies and those waverers who float gently downstream, hoping things won't get too choppy. And there is always a dispute, which serves the purpose of making half-felt antagonisms real. Sometimes these are of importance and justify the energy expended on them. But not often.

- From Death and Restoration by Iain Pears

The Flag Test

At Cultural Offering: How those rating decisions are made.

Silent Thoughts

All of his allies would retire within three years and the young lions were counting the days.

Whenever she saw other department heads making important decisions she thought, "How could I have ever doubted my qualifications for this job?"

In the past decade, he'd been told by several people that he had been a major influence on their ability to achieve highly desirable positions. Each time, he silently wondered, "When do I get to meet me?"

She noticed a glance between Harold and Marie at the board meeting and knew that Elaine had better watch her back.

She was able to go through adversity that would have crushed most people, but he knew her secret weapon: She had absolutely no feelings.

No one said it but everyone was aware of why Preston spent so much time at the office. He was married to a dragon.

She regarded him as an early warning device. He maintained no position because of principle and would drop it as soon as unpopularity loomed.

He knew the rest of the oral board would never admit it, but they had given a low score to an excellent candidate because she was overweight.

The team members knew Kelly was doing 98 percent of the work but told themselves that she really preferred that arrangement.

Quote of the Day

Two things seemed pretty apparent to me. One was, that in order to be a [Mississippi River] pilot a man had got to learn more than any one man ought to be allowed to know; and the other was, that he must learn it all over again in a different way every 24 hours.

- Mark Twain

All is Balance

Some thoughts I've mentioned before but have seen vividly displayed in some recent projects:

Exhibit too much of any virtue and you'll plunge into a problem. You can indeed be too kind, too analytical, too bold, too tolerant, and too open. I've seen organizations and departments that suffer from excessive virtues - conditions that have turned poisonous - and they fail to see how they have overdosed on a good thing.

That lack of balance is a common problem. My guess is that most of us are afflicted. Once we label something a strength, it is hard to see its dangers.