REMINDER OF THE OBVIOUS

I think I may have a big blind spot.  I don't realize how awful most work
places can be and are.  I worked in a decent environment led by very decent CEO's.  Not perfect at all, but decent. 

Reading the review of HAND TO MOUTH—Living in Bootstrap America reminded me of how so many workplaces kill the spirit and intelligence of its employees.

I offer a smorgasbord of quotes to be used as a smack on the side of all of 
our heads:

—it wasn't the meager pay, the  mind-numbing assembly lines or the plastic dust in the air. Instead, most employees complained "that they didn't feel needed, necessary or wanted."

–It would be nice to imagine a class of stunned M.B.A. candidates preparing to employ people like the author. They would learn how denying dignity corrodes attitudes toward work and authority.

—As a result of being treated without dignity was, says the author, "I just give up caring about work. I lose the energy, the bounce, the willingness.  I'll perform as directed, but no more than that.  I've rarely  who showed me that he valued me more than my uniform—we were that interchangeable—so I don' go out of my way for my bosses either.

—There are poor working class people everywhere, guys. You can just have a conversation with one, like a real human being: Give it a try. You'll like it."

Like I said, "This is a reminder or the obvious" but comes from the direct voice of a self-proclaimed working poor employee.  I hope it is obvious. I hope you work against this numbing out and loss of potential by equal caring for everyone in your company. Seems basic.  

PEACE ON EARTH HAS TO BE POSSIBLE!

IF it HAS to be possible what would you do differently?
Immediately?
I don't have an answer yet, but will by next week.
Do you have any?

PEACE ON EARTH HAS TO BE POSSIBLE.

Read my very personal message at wwwtruthburps.blogspot.com for my
thoughts about Peace on Earth.  Back to the business desk next week.

PEOPLE ARE CURIOUS ABOUT THE CEO ROLE

It's been a social week.  I've been with lots of different people in lots of different situations--holiday shopping and gatherings.  In conversation about what kind of work I do with top executives, I got many different reactions.
Many continue to irritate and surprise me with their perception of how innately evil business leaders are.

Anyway, I would turn the tables before too many words were said and ask,
"What are you curious about when you think about CEO's  and their role?"

Here is some of what I got:

—Are all CEO's alike?  Can you make generalizations about the people in the role?

—Is the CEO role abused often?  What are the small abuses not just the large ones we hear about?

—What does a CEO have to watch out for?  What are booby traps?

—What are assumptions of CEO's in general that just aren't true, like people are lazy and need to be pushed to perform?

—Is money the primary reason someone wants to be CEO?

—What on earth does a CEO do that is special enough to justify the money they make?

—Why is it so rare for a company to have every employee be an owner, at least with shares of stock?

—Do you have to be arrogant or have a big ego to be a CEO

—Do CEO's have to give up their idealism to do their job?

There you have it.  Food for thought.  Underlying themes of the conversations
showed that the word "corporate" is a nasty one.  Another is that business is boring and only boring people like it. Or greedy jerks. Do we care about perceptions outside of "business"?  Is PR needed?  Does one big bad story of corruption spoil the whole basket of apples?  I don't know. I just got curious about other peoples' curiosity about CEO's. I got curious instead of angry. The operative word is "curious".  The blind spot to watch for is when your own curiosity dulls.  

TRADE-OFFS SHOULD BE EXCRUCIATING DECISIONS

Sometimes trade-off discussions can seem so gentle a kind of garage sale barter. I'll trade you a training program for some more marketing money.
I'll trade you 3 staff positions for an outside expert consultant.  You get used to it. It's just pragmatic priority setting.  

Not what I'm talking about.  I'm talking about the top strategic choices you, as a top leader, are in charge of making. You make tough decisions all the time.
You fire people, you cut budgets and thus people. Most times you are making the least bad decision.  (You know, the one that sucks less.)  

What I am talking about is choosing the possibility of the future for your company.  This is and should be courageous and scary and risky.  That's why your strategic choices need to be worth it.  Clear with sharp edges.  Every action needs to be a "yes" or a "no".  The things you say "no" to should be very difficult  or your "yes" isn't strong enough.  

AND the excruciating choice needs to be a giant YES.  "NO" decisions will not
grow your business or motivate your associates or enthuse your customers.
Don't be blind to your own juggling and compromising and teaching yourself to think small.  Make the big strategic choice, a "YES" choice, for your company and let the consequences begin.  Make the work worth it.

PARDON ME, YOUR EGO IS SHOWING.

First of all, ego is not bad. Ego helps you want to achieve, to be big in the world, and to be seen and heard. It protects you.  In fact it is all about you.
Unless you are familiar with your ego and know when it is being under utilized
or over utilized, your impact can be unintended.  A skill of a top leader is to 
have the self awareness to understand where she or he is on the continuum of ego. Healthy ego live in the middle, neither too small nor too big for the situation.

Symptoms of too small?
--you resent success of others
--you always (emphasis on "always") put others first
--you give up too soon on influencing others
--you think your voice is not heard
--you don't get noticed for good work

Symptoms of too big?
--you are known for taking credit for others' work
--you take up too much talk time at meetings
--you feel like the world is right when you are on stage performing
--you know that things would not go well without you
--you love external events and roles more than you do the business

Make your list of what healthy ego symptoms look like and send them to me.
I'll publish them anonymously next week.

Don't be blind to your particular ego-print!

WHO HAS THE MOST POWER????

If you are a striving person, you like competition, you like:
to win, you enjoy power you don't mind extreme accountability, you like status
you are driven by recognition for your work.
Then it is quite natural that you want the top job.

If, however, you want to cause large change, you want time to think to reach good decisions, you enjoy collaboration, you want positive impact, you want to be pro-active not reactive, you want to do the right thing for the business----then maybe you don't really want the top job.  

The CEO role or any other of ultimate accountability is incredibly constrained, unbelievably powerless, burdened by the weight of the enterprise and 
the chief decision maker of decisions that "suck less".  

Hard to believe?  Ask a CEO how able she or he is to make something happen,
to make the right thing happen, to think about what is the right thing to happen.  I remember one CEO I worked with who laughed and said, "I feel like I'm on a slow moving elephant heading toward a cliff guiding it with a feather switch".  

There can be much more power and flexibility and satisfaction in a number two role. You can speak more freely, act more creatively, rock the boat more
effectively and collaborate easily.  A number two person or team  has the right balance of freedom and power to truly function.

I'm saying, "THE CEO ROLE ISN'T ALL IT'S CRACKED UP TO BE".  Don't be blinded by the status, the perks, the office, the salary if you like quite a bit of intrinsic satisfaction.  I'm just saying---- think twice before you reject a number two position and don't be surprised if becoming CEO, you think to yourself, "What just happened to me?"