Leadership forgotten

There are many ways to inspire and ignite a spark beneath those who are working to rise up through the ranks in their respective professions. Several years and companies ago when I was a much younger lad, one of the development pieces we were to perform consisted of reading through a few books on leadership and development. At the time, I thought that wasn't too bad of an idea.

I won't bore you with the titles or author names as there were several and frankly, they are irrelevant, at least to me. It wasn't that there weren't lessons to be learned. I think one can learn something from nearly anything they read as long as the presentation is coherent. The lessons taken from these sort of books can be either good or bad. That doesn't always mean they are right or their lessons reflect how the business world actually works.

I remember one such 'lesson' was on how companies should go about passing on the helm to a successor. The case study was a very large and well known corporation. The man who built and guided this company was considered one to put the welfare of the company first. The true way to continue growth and success was to chose someone who had the same values. That is an excellent lesson, if it were true in practice.

Over the years in my career I've come to realize that lesson is for a bygone time, an era that no longer exists. I've gone through too many changes in the business models of my career to believe many of these leaders understand the basic ideas of how the business runs. Sure, there are changes in every industry. One must adapt to ever-changing environments, but too often now the attempt at growth undercuts the foundations of the company. Wall Street and stock prices now drive the business instead of a solid base. The investors come first. Unfortunately that is what is getting so many businesses in trouble. Growth that can't be sustained ultimately leads to failure of the company and where is the investors now? They're left with loss or nothing at all.

And what happens to those who run these companies when things begin to go bad? They wind up with golden parachutes worth more than the combined payroll of all the rest of the associates in the company. Hardly the lesson put forth in the book and certainly not something commonly in practice in this day and age in the business world.

Coldest day

Today is supposed to be the coldest day in a year here in flyover country. Actually, the high temperature is projected to be twenty-two degrees. In my opinion that's not really all that cold as we haven't had a hard winter in the last few years. Heck, this winter we haven't even had double digits in snow and it's half way through February.

You know what us old guys say...back in my day...

The one thing that gets me every winter whether it's a real winter or just a false winter like these last couple have been is the number of people I run into that are always complaining they are cold. Well yeah, it's winter. You're going to be cold.

Hey, here's an idea; dress for the winter season with winter clothing. But Robert, we just want to be comfortable (or fashionable). Well let this old guy tell you, being cold isn't comfortable. Even in the dead of winter I see too many people walking around in the same clothes they wore during the warmer months of the year and simply toss on a coat.

That's not how it works folks. If you want to be warm in the winter you need to dress in winter appropriate clothes. That means heavier jeans, not stretchy fabrics that have no insulation to them, heavier tops, thicker socks (as I constantly see others without socks on) and, God forbid, long underwear.

I personally know no woman (that I am aware of) who wears thermal underwear beneath their clothing. I know a few men who do but even that is a rarity. For me, once it gets cold I wear thermals all winter long, indoors and out. Guess what? I'm comfortable...inside and out. On really really cold days, like back in the olden days of my youth, I may perhaps put on a sweater if I'm sitting still in a chair writing on the computer...or something like that.

So, if you're generally someone who complains they're cold and you are dressing like it is June and you have flip flops on, I don't want to hear it. At that point you simply chose to be cold.

Oh, and Happy Valentine's Day...we still have four and a half weeks left of winter. Damned groundhog.

Unintended consequences

Sometimes things happen, unexpected things. Sometimes these are small, inconsequential steps that simply add up when you're not expecting it.

Several months ago, My Beloved and I along with Ragin' Cage and his dad went to the nearby (sort of) Pumpkin Festival. Actually, this festival is during the fall months here in fly-over country. So, you see it's been several months since then. Yeah, so?

Well, during the festival filled with rides and fair food there was this game...land a ping pong ball in the bowl of water and win a goldfish. Those games are very hard to win, not that I'm saying they're rigged against you, but well, you know. The problem is, his ping pong ball landed in one of the bowls and he was the happy winner and now owner of a fabulous goldfish.

So again, what's the problem?

Well, we took the goldfish home, now named Mr. Waffles and put him in a large glass bowl. And there he sat, and sat, and sat. We kept changing the water every few days but Mr. Waffles lived on. We figured what the heck, goldfish don't live too long. But he kept on going, and going, and going until finally, we had to do something.

And so it began. We finally had to break down and spend money on a small tank for him to live in. I got tired of seeing a bowl of water on the kitchen counter. So, twenty-five dollars later for a small filtered tank and Mr. Waffles had a new home. But Mr. Waffles looked lonely. He swam around and hid behind the plastic plants for a couple weeks before we broke down and bought a companion fish, Oreo, another goldfish.

So they have been swimming around now for another month living happily together. Today however the tank had to be cleaned. We realized Mr. Waffles was getting black spots and likely an ammonia buildup was the cause, so, another ten dollars for a siphon to clean the bottom of the tank.

This little fifty-cent gold fish has now cost us about $44 in equipment and supplies, not to mention a companion. I guess that's the price you pay for raising a little boy. Oh, we also have a tree frog, but that's another story altogether.