Something to Do

You'll always have something to do rather than the thing you are currently doing and that vague and constant something can divert attention and enjoyment from the current thing which, once upon a time, was also a something to do.

That's why a certain amount of indifference is essential to happiness.

Friend or Foe?

Although there are neutrals, the "friend or foe?" question can be applied to:

• Time
• Meetings
• Food
• Drink
• Distance
• Technology
• Social circles
• Reading material
• The Internet
• Analysis
• Charisma
• Entertainment
• Projects
• Deadlines
• Comforts
• Praise
• Strengths

Quote of the Day

Most people think they know what they're good at. They are usually wrong. 

- Peter F. Drucker

First Paragraph

If people today know anything about the Roman Empire, it is that it fell. This is without a doubt the best-known 'fact' about Ancient Rome, just as Julius Caesar is the most famous Roman. Rome's fall is memorable because its empire lasted for so long - more than five hundred years after Caesar's death in Italy and the western provinces, and three times as long in the east, where emperors would rule from Constantinople until the fifteenth century. The Roman Empire was also exceptionally large - no other power has ever controlled all the lands around the Mediterranean - and left traces behind in many countries. Even today its monuments are spectacular - the Colosseum and Pantheon in Rome itself, as well as theatres, aqueducts, villas and roads dotted throughout the provinces. No other state would construct such a massive network of all-weather roads until the nineteenth century, and in many countries such systems would not be built until the twentieth century. The Roman Empire is often seen as very modern and highly sophisticated - glass in windows, central heating, bath houses and the like - especially by visitors to museums and monuments. This makes Rome's fall all the more remarkable, especially since the world that emerged from its ruin appears so primitive by contrast. The Dark Ages remain fixed in the popular mind, even if the term has long since been abandoned by scholars. 

- From How Rome Fell: Death of a Superpower by Adrian Goldsworthy

Packing the Briefcase

There are notes, pencils, and some markers for the flip chart. Those, along with a couple of cans of Starbucks espresso, are the physical supplies. All go into the briefcase and the case itself goes into a cart for the training materials.

The intangibles are more important. Reviewing the material. Anticipating questions. Considering how to translate complicated concepts into plain language. Remembering to pitch the points at a level that won't bore those who've some acquaintance with the topic while not baffling those for whom it is new. Encouraging questions and inviting interruptions.

There can be a fine line between an excellent presentation and one that is simply okay.

I hate "okay."

The Importance of Looking Closely

At Unhappy Hipsters: I thought it was a scarf.

What Happened?

Gwyn Topham at The Guardian with some possible explanations for the disappearance of the Malaysia Airlines flight. 

A Brief History of Firefighting

Did you know dalmatians became firefighters' best friends in the late 19th century, when they were used to protect fire-carriage horses?

See the Popular Mechanics slide show here.

Monday Morning Advice for Leaders

• If you are not going to be pleasant then you'd better be ultra-competent.
• If you think you have all of the answers that is a sign that you do not have all of the answers.
• Before you hammer a change through the organization, use the hammer on your ego and listen to more people.
• Beware of simple explanations for human behavior. Beware of the complicated ones too.
• At least once a week, have coffee or lunch with someone who is not in your usual circle.
• Contacts are nice, but relationships are better.
• Be forgiving but also be alert.
• People need to be studied in order to be understood and the knowledge which is obtained may have a short expiration date.
• Evaluate your work for its effectiveness today and for how you are likely to regard it ten years from now.
• You can focus on some subjects only by not focusing on them.
• Organizations don't make decisions. People do.
• A major decision that may be slept on, should be slept on.
• Keep track of your organization's history. It is not a "nice to know' but a "need to know."

What Is Not Done

In management programs and classes, there is a natural tendency to focus on what to do. More attention needs to be paid to what should not be done.

The manager who does a lot of great things will be less effective - and perhaps even doomed - if those are accompanied by basic blunders. [I say "some" because one error can outweigh a bundle of positives.] 

This is not an argument for caution. We all know that the person who is terrified of making mistakes will accomplish little. It does, however, recognize the importance of basic boundaries. The minus side of the ledger is rarely composed of mistakes which are exotic but is littered with ones which are elementary.

How can a less-than-brilliant manager be successful? By reducing the minuses.

Quote of the Day

When you are not practicing, remember, someone somewhere is practicing, and when you meet him he will win. 

- Ed Macauley

Double Meaning

Andrew Munro's Blog has a line which should be examined in marketing classes. 

It reminds me of the old reference dodge: "No candidate would be better for the job."

Strange Tribal Practices Update

No messing with clocks here. 

To its credit, Arizona does not follow daylight savings time but Anderson Layman's Blog has some items for those poor souls who do.

Find Something Beautiful Today

7 Keys to the Internet?

James Ball at The Guardian has written a description of the Internet's "phone books" which sounds like a Philip K. Dick novel. An excerpt:

What these men and women control is the system at the heart of the web: the domain name system, or DNS. This is the internet's version of a telephone directory – a series of registers linking web addresses to a series of numbers, called IP addresses. Without these addresses, you would need to know a long sequence of numbers for every site you wanted to visit.

Super Troupers

Not even Abba themselves had seriously thought they were in with a chance. Afterwards Björn, now 68, who’d had to stand in the coach all the way to the Dome for fear of splitting his flares, signed up to run the Stockholm marathon. “When I saw pictures of myself I realised I was a bit fat. To be a pop idol required a certain kind of body – particularly if I was going to wear jump suits,” he says in an interview to mark the 40th anniversary of their Eurovision victory and the publication of Abba: The Treasures, a book of unseen memorabilia and personal anecdotes put together by his friend Ingmarie Halling.

Read the rest of The Telegraph article.

"I'm living in a world of goldfish."

There are few things that can surpass a productive day which includes the recent season of "Sherlock."

Your Worst Enemy

Your worst enemy knows your hopes and dreams as well as your fears and weaknesses. The enemy's spies are aware of your strategies, often before you know them yourself. The enemy's fifth column encourages you to hesitate when you should act and act when you should wait and critics with dubious motives pack your meetings and haunt your audiences. 

Your worst enemy knows how much you want certain goals and exactly what must be done to keep you from achieving them. This enemy is tireless, cunning, and charming. 

You have known this person your entire life and see him or her every day.

The Australian Solution

News you can use: What to do if bitten by the second most venomous snake in the world.

Dangerous Loons in History

I recently finished HHhH, Laurent Binet's unusual novel about Reinhard Heydrich and subsequently found a Nazi video of his funeral. 

The "HHhH" is a German abbreviation for "Himmler's brain is called Heydrich." 

Heydrich, of course, was a coldly efficient manager of the Holocaust and there was speculation that one day he might succeed Hitler. 

The story of his assassination is also told in "Seven Men at Daybreak." The funeral video is rather chilling.

Skin Flicks

Cultural Offering links to some photoshopped pictures of celebrities with tattoos. Not a single one is improved by the "artwork."

And It Looks Great

Political Calculations looks at a Huffington Post article on Ben and Jerry's Core ice cream and reminds us of an earlier product.

I have not had that in years; an oversight which will be remedied.

Art Break: A Touch of the Duce

Art Contrarian looks at the modernists whose art meshed with Fascist Italy.

Miss Scarlett with a Lead Pipe

At SquawPoint, James Lawther plays a detective game and thinks about how we acquire knowledge. [In the United States, the game is called "Clue."]

The Victims Aren't Laughing

Professor Althouse - who says this is real - has an ad for a criminal defense attorney that could be filed under Reasons Why The Country Is Declining.

Where the Wrongs Hide

1. Information
2. Analysis
3. Mission
4. Leader
5. Team
6. Plan
7. Resources
8. Timing
9. Execution
10. Conclusion
11. Aftermath
12. Lessons

Quote of the Day

Work is hard. Distractions are plentiful. And time is short.

- Adam Hochschild

Vanishing Vipers

Popular Mechanics: Why Chrysler is destroying some of the original Dodge Vipers.

Wheeze and Sneeze

Not a surprise: No region of the United States is allergy-free.

[HT: Instapundit]

The Bureaucracy Battle

What amazes me is how many good civil servants stick it out, and deliver needed services despite work conditions that constantly trip them up. They deserve medals. But they’re not proof of a working system, but of the extraordinary strength of human character. Imagine what good they could do if they were free to roll up their sleeves and take responsibility.

Philip K. Howard on attracting good people to work for government.

Perhaps That's Another Program

"Something needs to be done about these ungrateful wretches."

- From the comments on a posting on Obamacare at Althouse.

Listening to the Characters

You know who they are. They're the employees who become known for their eccentric specialties or attitudes and who receive the label of "character." 

Some of the characters are truly bizarre but in my experience - and at various points in my career I'm sure that more than one person would have assigned me to their ranks - the characters have a lot to offer. They became characters because they took the job seriously. They cared enough to be cranky about how well something was done; an attitude which their more sophisticated and less committed colleagues would avoid. They were ridiculed for a virtue that was taken to an extreme while people who didn't give a damn were deemed acceptable because they knew when to keep their mouths shut.

In general, characters dwell on the fringes and are brought into the common areas only when their expertise is sorely needed. Once their knowledge is tapped, they are thanked and sent back to the area beyond the camp fire. 

They deserve far more respect and recognition than we give them if only because of their willingness to care deeply about the mission and the organization.

Association

Sharp razor. Thick foam.
Warm shower. More time.
Rainy day. Mexican food.
Sharp pencils. Blank paper.
Full tank. Open road.
Binoculars. Hawk.
Research project. Library.
Early morning. Walk.
Late night. Book.
Achievement. Pleasure.

Quote of the Day

It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window. 

- Raymond Chandler

Serious Country

Cultural Offering has the Essential Mixes list for Jerry Jeff Walker. 

[As I mentioned a few years ago, I once gave the commencement address for a private school. For some reason, the graduation ceremony was held at a hotel and, unfortunately for the sake of decorum, just as they started to hand out diplomas, a band in the next room started up with "Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother." That was far more memorable than anything I said.]

Click

You surround the subject, seeing it from all sides, with appropriate skepticism for the experts (because you know there are no experts) and eventually a picture emerges.

That is a fine thing.

Study in Leadership: Can Matteo Renzi Succeed?

Italy has now suffered through more than two consecutive years of recession. Sovereign debt stands at 133 percent of annual GDP -- among EU member states, only Greece has more. Rome is even €70 billion in debt to companies in Italy. Furthermore, business owners are complaining about the crushing tax burden and the country's unemployment rate has doubled since 2007.

Read the rest of the Spiegel Online article on Italy's new prime minister.

Taxi

Wally Bock has a very interesting post in which he and others discuss taxi cabs and the cab system. 

My worst cab ride does not match Wally's. It was on a shuttle van in Chicago where the driver was so reckless that all of the passengers were shouting at him to slow down.

A more memorable ride was in New York City where the driver drove on sidewalks and collided with a messenger on a bicycle. He stopped, gave the cyclist some money, and then both of them resumed their trips.

Lessons from Film Scenes

Some film scenes have broader lessons. [The titles will be posted later.]

1. Problems can arrive as silently as birds on a playground.
2. The associate who proposes a meeting with your enemies may not be on your side. 
3. If an old seaman warns you not to sign on with an employer, pay attention.
4. Bank robbing in Bolivia is a very poor career move.
5. When the person closest to the action says you need a bigger boat, he's right.
6. The most famous wizard may not be that smart.
7. "Fragile" on the shipping box does not mean the contents are from Italy.
8. Writing a novel in a closed hotel during the winter has its downsides.
9. An angry, armed and one-eyed fat man should not be mocked.
10. The intern might not be able to loan you five dollars for a cab ride.
11. Let the junior partner visit the client in Transylvania.
12. In this world you can be oh so smart or oh so pleasant.
13. When a man's partner is killed, he's supposed to do something about it.
14. Avoid any dentist who asks, "Is it safe?"
15. In France, they have a different name for the Big Mac.

Others?

[Update: 1. The Birds; 2. The Godfather; 3. Moby Dick; 4. Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid; 5. Jaws; 6. The Wizard of Oz; 7. A Christmas Story; 8. The Shining; 9. True Grit; 10. The Pursuit of Happyness; 11. Dracula; 12. Harvey; 13. The Maltese Falcon; 14. Marathon Man; 15. Pulp Fiction.]

Quote of the Day

I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. 

- Winston Churchill

Art Break: DeCamp

Art Contrarian looks at the work of Joseph DeCamp.

Building Your Client Base

Entrepreneur slideshow: How five companies did it.

It Was Brilliant

I was stunned. It was so keen an insight that clearly I'd remember it forever so there was no need to write it down.

As soon as it comes back to me I'll pass it along.

The Many Audiences Problem

Leaders of large organizations have a multitude of audiences and all of them may be watching at the same time.

Those groups range from the highly supportive all the way over to the strongly opposed. Statements and conduct regarded as amusing or boldly philosophical by the first group may be seen as weak or weak-minded by the second. 

That is why an internal filter is needed; a sense of discretion that catches the witty but cruel, the cool but wimpish, the open but meandering, and blocks them from being uttered. It is also why not every action or comment deserves a response. 

Silence can be both eloquent and wise.

Management's Routes

Whether it is by freeway, toll road, country lane, highway, bridge, ferry or cow path, the manager is expected to know how to get from Point A to Point B and when to blaze a new trail.

The leader is expected to know whether it's worth the trip.

But it is important for both to know the lay of the land. Experience is important, of course, and its by-product - instinct - is invaluable. A great deal of what a leader/manager does involves sizing up the situation. The brilliant ones can do it quickly. It is said that you have to be born with coup d'oeil. I think it can be acquired.

Sometimes.

Language to Remember and Use

"You wouldn't suspect it now but the old man in the corner was an ace during World War II."

Quote of the Day

What is your aim in philosophy? - To show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle.

- Ludwig Wittgenstein