The architect built a work of art, but the client wanted a house.
Note the difference between the original budget and the result.
Sunday, May 21, 2006
The Illegal Immigration Lobby
Businesses large and small, careerists with Latin nannies, and those who want wages low, the unions suppressed and their gardens well tended have made common cause with their political opposites. The latter, who have embraced multiculturalism and bilingualism, and who, though they may be little blast furnaces of ostentatious compassion, are in their disdain for America as ruthless as commissars, would be delighted to see it changed any which way as long as it becomes unrecognizable. If you worry about the potential for California and the Southwest to calve like melting glaciers and cleave to Mexico, or vice versa, the left will mock your distress as it once mocked and reviled anticommunism. And in the same vein the equanimity of the business right is similar to the self-satisfaction of those who would have sold Lenin the rope with which he planned to hang them. This is the lobby, strange as it may seem, for illegal immigration.
Mark Helprin on the immigration debate.
Mark Helprin on the immigration debate.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
Conductor, Lead Musician, or Farmer
This post at BusinessPundit examines the concept of Manager as Symphony Conductor.
[Oddly enough, Joseph Stalin also used that metaphor on one occasion.]
It has much to recommend it, although some people prefer to think of management as leading a jazz group in which the participation is much less structured.
My own favorite: Manager as Farmer, if only because that recognizes that certain tasks must be done at certain times and that organizations and people slowly develop.
[Oddly enough, Joseph Stalin also used that metaphor on one occasion.]
It has much to recommend it, although some people prefer to think of management as leading a jazz group in which the participation is much less structured.
My own favorite: Manager as Farmer, if only because that recognizes that certain tasks must be done at certain times and that organizations and people slowly develop.
Memoir or Revenge?
Carly Fiorina, fired CEO of HP, has a book coming out.
I hope it spends more time on her views of leadership and less on why she shouldn't have been sacked.
I hope it spends more time on her views of leadership and less on why she shouldn't have been sacked.
The Da Vinci Sequel?
Daniel Henninger, writing in The Wall Street Journal, has uncovered the real secret of writing a best seller.
The real accomplishment of "The Da Vinci Code" is that Dan Brown has proven that the theory of conspiracy theories is totally elastic, it has no limits. The genre's future is limitless, with the following obvious plots:
Bill Clinton is directly descended from Henry VIII; Hillary is his third cousin. Jack Ruby was Ronald Reagan's half-brother. Dick Cheney has been dead for five years; the vice president is a clone created by Halliburton in 1998. The Laffer Curve is the secret sign of the Carlyle Group. Michael Moore is the founder of the Carlyle Group, which started World War I. The New York Times is secretly run by the Rosicrucians (this is revealed on the first page of Chapter 47 of "The Da Vinci Code" if you look at the 23rd line through a kaleidoscope). Jacques Chirac is descended from Judas.
None of this strikes me as the least bit implausible, especially the latter. I'd better get started.
The real accomplishment of "The Da Vinci Code" is that Dan Brown has proven that the theory of conspiracy theories is totally elastic, it has no limits. The genre's future is limitless, with the following obvious plots:
Bill Clinton is directly descended from Henry VIII; Hillary is his third cousin. Jack Ruby was Ronald Reagan's half-brother. Dick Cheney has been dead for five years; the vice president is a clone created by Halliburton in 1998. The Laffer Curve is the secret sign of the Carlyle Group. Michael Moore is the founder of the Carlyle Group, which started World War I. The New York Times is secretly run by the Rosicrucians (this is revealed on the first page of Chapter 47 of "The Da Vinci Code" if you look at the 23rd line through a kaleidoscope). Jacques Chirac is descended from Judas.
None of this strikes me as the least bit implausible, especially the latter. I'd better get started.
A Poet and Didn't Know It
Emily Lloyd has discovered the Rejected Marketing Slogans for National Poetry Month.
A Model VP
Workplace Prof Blog reviews a case in which a bank vice president was fired because she posed in a swimming suit in a local newspaper.
I wonder if the bank's attorneys tried to talk top management out of the termination decision.
Another thought: Was this the real reason or just a convenient excuse for termination? If the VP had been popular and valued, would she have been fired?
I wonder if the bank's attorneys tried to talk top management out of the termination decision.
Another thought: Was this the real reason or just a convenient excuse for termination? If the VP had been popular and valued, would she have been fired?
Managing Victory
Imagine you have been asked to transport more than 198,000 men and women in uniform and another 29,500 civilians to a new location some 7,500 miles from home. They will need shelters, meals, and materiel to get their jobs done. You will have to prepare and motivate them to meet the competitive challenge of their lives -- one that could cost them their lives. They will have to square off against al-Qaeda cells, Taliban remnants and Iraqi terrorists.
Read the rest of this article from The Wharton School on “the tip of the spear.”
Read the rest of this article from The Wharton School on “the tip of the spear.”
Great Moments in City Government
The mayor of a small Arkansas town devised a scheme to continue water service to some residents who could not afford to pay.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)