You know who you are.
Starting as a child you sat for those standardized tests and you took them well. Very well, indeed. In high school and college you excelled, impressing the intellects and powerbrokers with your brash grasp of facts and your sharp tongue. You used all the right words at all the right times. And you rose fast out of school and into a newly ordered world, honed as you were by the algorithmic tutoring of the video games and programmed electronics on which you were suckled very nearly from the day you were born.
Then one day - let’s call it a day not too long ago - you arrived in a place where you were in charge of men and women, some nearly twice your age, all of them eagerly anticipating your reputation and your brilliance. And they looked at you and they waited. And after not too long they knew one thing that you did not. They knew that as smart as you were you had no idea what you were doing and they wondered how, in God’s name, you got to be where you are today.
Put simply, you had not yet learned that the truest measure of intelligence is humility. You just cannot understand how anything you think is right can ever be wrong. Nor can you ever believe that any idea you have ever had might ever have been had by anyone one else but you. And all that would be okay in a well-ordered world where, in those arrogant moments of youth, we are handed enough rope to hang ourselves with the surprising tensile strength of our over-wound egos.
The problem is that somehow you have made it to a place where you have been given enough rope not only to hang yourself but to loop it twice around the neck of everyone else who works with you. You, yes you, you brash young thing. You are enthusiastically throwing the rope attached to our necks over the lights in the conference room, about to kick out the chairs from under all of us. Only now, because the world values your vanity and youth over any wisdom or common sense, when you strangle us all there is no one in the room who has the power to stop you before you turn out the lights.
Yes, I am afraid. But I’m also laughing my head off. The conversations you have with us and the language you use to advance your career are a study in American comedy. Only in America, with our low self esteem subconsciously buried under our self importance, would you be able to use words and ideas that sound real, but mean less than nothing at all.
. . . Going forward, if we can find the bandwidth and acquire the resources we’ll be able to drill down to a set of deliverables that sweat our assets and create enough synergy for an internal paradigm shift. Let’s not forget that we need to carpet bomb the competition and wow our customers while ramping investment and motivating stakeholders. The bottom line here is to give the team a heads up that we’re about to open the kimono and create some visibility in order to think outside the box and put ourselves in the right mindset to push the envelope and get in the ballpark so we can hit a home run. My goal is to empower each of you to fill the strategic gaps and facilitate an enterprise wide strategic fit . . .
We nod our heads as if we understand. Then we go outside and laugh until our eyes fill with tears of pity. Even if we have no idea what you’re talking about we still know what you need. You need us to save you.
Now I ‘m not saying I’m better than you. Nor will you ever hear me say that I’m wiser than you because I’m older. The truth is that because we’re all human and imperfect there’s really not all that much difference between us. Except for this. Before I open my mouth, I open my heart.
It may surprise you to learn that the people sitting around you in that conference room aren’t motivated by how smart you are; they’re motivated by how much you care. Charles over there may spend a little too much time slapping up sticky notes to remind himself of things he should be able to remember, but he’s the most honest man alive and if you start to think about him as a person, he might just put up a sticky note to remind him to do something that will make you look like a genius. Stephanie who just sat down with her second bagel of the morning can be a bitch sometimes, but just throw a compliment her way once in a while and she’ll stay at her desk all weekend living on food left behind in the office refrigerator just so she can get you a promotion. And, Michele and Kevin over in the corner, well let’s just say that no matter how much Red Bull they drink they run on human kindness, and when you stop talking long enough to listen to their point of view you might find out that they have an idea or two that could save your job. Yes, caring about us before you tell us what you think might make you feel a little dumb at first, but it could be the smartest thing you ever did.
The truth is we know how smart you are. But we also know that you’re just a scared little child, afraid of making a mistake. Afraid that if you stop trying to prove how smart you are the world will leave you behind. Well guess what, my friend – in the end that makes you just like the rest of us. Sooner or later the world is going to leave all of us behind.
So while you’re here and in charge there’s something we need you to do. We need you to remember that while you think we’re following you, you are really following us. Left behind to do it right or do it wrong after we’re gone. And as much as we don’t like it at this moment, in this conference room, the future is in your hands.
So please, don’t screw it up.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Your Father and Mine
It started small. Coming deep from a place of innocent courage which only a young man can feel and then only for a whisker of time. With a baby to feed and a home to protect, a wife to serve and vows to keep, one night he brings home a small fiberglass case within which rests the false hope of an amended constitution. Barely a quarter of an inch at the mouth of the bore, it is encased in custom cut foam with six shafts carved in for the bullets. There is oil to grease the spark and a cute little brush to keep it clean. This piece fits in his hand like the jaw bone of a small animal and he believes he will he never need more than this talisman to keep other animals from his door.
Starting small in this way, who would deny this man his sanity or his right to be safe and free? To know him is to love him. And if you understand the seeds of his reason then you understand his actions and what he might do next.
He is only your father and mine, a man who loves us so much that he would kill another man to save us.
But then his family begins to get larger and his work hours get longer and the pay checks don’t stretch as far and the taxes the government are taking are killing him. There are people of color moving into the neighborhood and men of terror kicking in the doors of the airplanes on which his friends and family fly. The government uses his money to protect the civil rights of criminals and third world thugs while his youngest son waits patiently for his older brother to outgrow his next pair of shoes. He remembers a time when as a young boy he collected stamps and coins, baseball cards and toy soldiers. And he thinks, why not. His hoarding served him well in the past, vesting him with control and a sense of power. He knows how obsession can bring focus and readiness and so it only makes sense to begin to collect again.
He is already well into middle age when he walks into a local gun mart to begin his collection in earnest. He wants to build wisely. But it doesn’t take long for him to see that if you can crave one gun you should crave them all. Sir, if you don’t care about accuracy and sheer stopping power is your aim, you can do no better than the 12 gauge pump action over and under. Then again if distance and precision are your goal - owing, let’s say, to a small group of armed men you need to stop at the crest the hill 100 yards from your home – well then you’ll want the hunter’s Westchester with a self-sighting scope and a modified clip. On the other hand for personal protection on those family outings, the 9 millimeter, with ten in the bank and one in the chamber, goes a long way toward showing the bad guys who’s boss and letting your wife and kids know that you’re the man (put it on our wife’s night stand and you might even get laid tonight). If however - and I can’t sell it to you here - but if, god forbid, you should find yourself in one of those end-of-the-world situations where you need to set up perimeter fire (where you need to be both first and last), then I would recommend you check into the American Eagle assault; air cooled and rated at 20 rounds per second I’ve seen this little monster cut a pine tree in half in just under a minute. You can call this guy I know but don’t tell him you know me. Breathlessly, he hands over his driver’s license and speedily his background is checked after which a cart is stacked with boxes of weapons and holsters and straps. Two shopping bags full of ammunition are then piled on top, and a stock boy is dispatched to help him haul it all to his car. In the quiet of his front seat he sighs and grins and picks up his cell phone to buy the American Eagle. He wants that too and only hopes that he can also buy enough bullets at one time to last him for the rest of his life.
He is only your father and mine, and he loves his home so much that he could kill a crowd of people to save it.
For two years thereafter at night when his family is asleep, he goes to a room he’s etched out at the back of his garage and he counts and polishes, cleans, stacks and dreams, watching his collection grow bullet by bullet, piece by piece, month by month, his face glowing in the light of a halogen desk lamp. He seldom fires his guns, preferring to conserve his ammunition, but when he does, out in the woods in a place where no one ever goes, he sees himself as the last good man on earth, his wife and sons trailing behind him in his righteous footsteps. He loves the feeling of quiet freedom that comes over him as he fires – single fire, rapid fire, cascades of fire – parading explosions of liberty crashing against his brain pan, helping him think more clearly and more evenly then he ever can at home or at work, giving him the strength to endure what he now sees as the insane laws of an increasingly insane land. Then one day, just back from the woods, he turns on his TV and he too begins to go just a little insane.
There at home, within his flat screen, he finds politicians smugly rattling the swords of law, one of them loudly calling for a limit to the amount of ammunition one man can hold in the pockets of his person or the privacy of his private property. At a time when unbalanced ex-college students and disgruntled factory workers are being sucked in by a climate of political hate only to be extruded into America wrapped in belts of ammunition and pondering which congresswomen or senator they should murder, this politician is simply suggesting that it might make sense not to give these men or women enough bullets to kill an entire mall full of people. But these are our father’s bullets they’re talking about and by now his stocks of munitions have become that which makes him who he is today. Take them away en mass and you would rip out his wisdom and his soul. His very right to be.
Slowly he feels his self separating in two. He is a madman standing side-by-side with the loving husband and father wondering which one of them is real. Forcing his hands to work for both these selves he gets to a computer and finds the phone number of his senator. He dials the phone and when it is answered by a young and eager intern, our father is both pleased and terrified by the man who starts to scream into the phone. He startles the intern so much that there is momentary silence. Then suddenly he begins once more, this time more slowly.
Son, I am a father and I could be your father and the day our government tells me how many bullets I can and cannot buy is the day I can no longer be your father. Do you understand? Do you know how many guns I own? Do you believe in god? Why would the senator let this happen? Why would he limit my right to be free? I am an American. I will not be punished – my family and loved ones will not be punished - for the acts of criminals and crazy people. Let me tell you, son, right now I can understand why someone would want to kill a president or a member of congress or a judge. I can truly and goddamn well understand it. Yes sir son, I can really see how some people might start to feel that you and the rest of our government are the real enemy …
And then he stops. The selves have separated again but this time the loving father has been watching the madman. And he is frightened of himself.
He is only your father and mine, and he loves his country so much that he is afraid he might bring down our government to save it.
And Lee Harvey Oswald and Sirhan Sirhan each say they loved their countries. And so did John Wilkes Booth and he was a father too. And John Hinkley and Jared Loughner each loved someone or something so much that they would kill to have it. And all of them had fathers who loved them. And through each of them runs a line to each of us. And through each of these assassins holding a gun or two or more, runs a line to all those fathers who have loved us so much that they would kill to save us.
But that does not make them right. And that does not make us free.
Starting small in this way, who would deny this man his sanity or his right to be safe and free? To know him is to love him. And if you understand the seeds of his reason then you understand his actions and what he might do next.
He is only your father and mine, a man who loves us so much that he would kill another man to save us.
But then his family begins to get larger and his work hours get longer and the pay checks don’t stretch as far and the taxes the government are taking are killing him. There are people of color moving into the neighborhood and men of terror kicking in the doors of the airplanes on which his friends and family fly. The government uses his money to protect the civil rights of criminals and third world thugs while his youngest son waits patiently for his older brother to outgrow his next pair of shoes. He remembers a time when as a young boy he collected stamps and coins, baseball cards and toy soldiers. And he thinks, why not. His hoarding served him well in the past, vesting him with control and a sense of power. He knows how obsession can bring focus and readiness and so it only makes sense to begin to collect again.
He is already well into middle age when he walks into a local gun mart to begin his collection in earnest. He wants to build wisely. But it doesn’t take long for him to see that if you can crave one gun you should crave them all. Sir, if you don’t care about accuracy and sheer stopping power is your aim, you can do no better than the 12 gauge pump action over and under. Then again if distance and precision are your goal - owing, let’s say, to a small group of armed men you need to stop at the crest the hill 100 yards from your home – well then you’ll want the hunter’s Westchester with a self-sighting scope and a modified clip. On the other hand for personal protection on those family outings, the 9 millimeter, with ten in the bank and one in the chamber, goes a long way toward showing the bad guys who’s boss and letting your wife and kids know that you’re the man (put it on our wife’s night stand and you might even get laid tonight). If however - and I can’t sell it to you here - but if, god forbid, you should find yourself in one of those end-of-the-world situations where you need to set up perimeter fire (where you need to be both first and last), then I would recommend you check into the American Eagle assault; air cooled and rated at 20 rounds per second I’ve seen this little monster cut a pine tree in half in just under a minute. You can call this guy I know but don’t tell him you know me. Breathlessly, he hands over his driver’s license and speedily his background is checked after which a cart is stacked with boxes of weapons and holsters and straps. Two shopping bags full of ammunition are then piled on top, and a stock boy is dispatched to help him haul it all to his car. In the quiet of his front seat he sighs and grins and picks up his cell phone to buy the American Eagle. He wants that too and only hopes that he can also buy enough bullets at one time to last him for the rest of his life.
He is only your father and mine, and he loves his home so much that he could kill a crowd of people to save it.
For two years thereafter at night when his family is asleep, he goes to a room he’s etched out at the back of his garage and he counts and polishes, cleans, stacks and dreams, watching his collection grow bullet by bullet, piece by piece, month by month, his face glowing in the light of a halogen desk lamp. He seldom fires his guns, preferring to conserve his ammunition, but when he does, out in the woods in a place where no one ever goes, he sees himself as the last good man on earth, his wife and sons trailing behind him in his righteous footsteps. He loves the feeling of quiet freedom that comes over him as he fires – single fire, rapid fire, cascades of fire – parading explosions of liberty crashing against his brain pan, helping him think more clearly and more evenly then he ever can at home or at work, giving him the strength to endure what he now sees as the insane laws of an increasingly insane land. Then one day, just back from the woods, he turns on his TV and he too begins to go just a little insane.
There at home, within his flat screen, he finds politicians smugly rattling the swords of law, one of them loudly calling for a limit to the amount of ammunition one man can hold in the pockets of his person or the privacy of his private property. At a time when unbalanced ex-college students and disgruntled factory workers are being sucked in by a climate of political hate only to be extruded into America wrapped in belts of ammunition and pondering which congresswomen or senator they should murder, this politician is simply suggesting that it might make sense not to give these men or women enough bullets to kill an entire mall full of people. But these are our father’s bullets they’re talking about and by now his stocks of munitions have become that which makes him who he is today. Take them away en mass and you would rip out his wisdom and his soul. His very right to be.
Slowly he feels his self separating in two. He is a madman standing side-by-side with the loving husband and father wondering which one of them is real. Forcing his hands to work for both these selves he gets to a computer and finds the phone number of his senator. He dials the phone and when it is answered by a young and eager intern, our father is both pleased and terrified by the man who starts to scream into the phone. He startles the intern so much that there is momentary silence. Then suddenly he begins once more, this time more slowly.
Son, I am a father and I could be your father and the day our government tells me how many bullets I can and cannot buy is the day I can no longer be your father. Do you understand? Do you know how many guns I own? Do you believe in god? Why would the senator let this happen? Why would he limit my right to be free? I am an American. I will not be punished – my family and loved ones will not be punished - for the acts of criminals and crazy people. Let me tell you, son, right now I can understand why someone would want to kill a president or a member of congress or a judge. I can truly and goddamn well understand it. Yes sir son, I can really see how some people might start to feel that you and the rest of our government are the real enemy …
And then he stops. The selves have separated again but this time the loving father has been watching the madman. And he is frightened of himself.
He is only your father and mine, and he loves his country so much that he is afraid he might bring down our government to save it.
And Lee Harvey Oswald and Sirhan Sirhan each say they loved their countries. And so did John Wilkes Booth and he was a father too. And John Hinkley and Jared Loughner each loved someone or something so much that they would kill to have it. And all of them had fathers who loved them. And through each of them runs a line to each of us. And through each of these assassins holding a gun or two or more, runs a line to all those fathers who have loved us so much that they would kill to save us.
But that does not make them right. And that does not make us free.
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