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“The world is not as simple as we like to make it out to be. The outlines are often vague and it’s the details that count.

Nothing is really truly black or white and bad can be a disguise for good or beauty … and vice versa without one necessarily excluding the other.

Someone can both love and betray the object of its love … without diminishing the reality of the true feelings and value. 

Life is an uncertain adventure in a diffuse landscape whose borders are constantly shifting where all frontiers are artificial where at any moment everything can either end only to begin again … or finish suddenly forever … like an unexpected blow from an axe.  Where the only absolute, coherent, indisputable and definitive reality … is death. We have such little time when you look at Life … a tiny lightning flash between two eternal nights.

Everything has to do with everything else.

Life is a succession of events that link with each other whether we want them to or not.”

Arturo Perez Revarte

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Vague sucks.

And, yet, I would argue the majority of people only really have some vague outline of how the world works, or how effective or ineffective a leader is, or even only have a vague outline of any specific relationship between cause & effect.

This vaguery exists because it takes a lot of work to parse the details, and the appropriate details, and the ‘right’ details to make the outlines less vague and more tangible.

Is this work valuable ? Sure.

Is this work necessary to increase some certainty in Life? Sure.

Do most people do this work? No.

The majority of people have shit to do <other than this type of work>. Generally speaking, that is neither good nor bad; it just is what it is. A lot of pseudo intellectuals and smartish pundits bitch & moan and gnash their teeth over this, but they would lead a significantly less stressful life if they just accepted it.

What this means is that in this ‘vague outline’ people inevitably create a vague/semi solid outline belief. From there they look around on occasion and question that outline. The questions raised either support the vague outline or raise doubts and inevitably some more questions. All the while this is happening more information barrages the vague outline. In this barrage is a confusing mix of real, fake and quasi truths. All these confusing things do in the people’s minds is, contrary to belief, not confuse, but rather make the person more dismissive of the incoming confusion and steadier in whatever vague outline they may have constructed.

Once again.

Generally speaking, this is neither good nor bad; it just is what it is. A lot of pseudo intellectuals and smartish pundits bitch & moan and gnash their teeth over this, but they would lead a significantly less stressful life if they just accepted it.

That said.

I will say that at some point the ‘questions I have about my vague outline’ gain some gravitas. This can happen several ways, but let me point out two:

• 1. The questions themselves coalesce into some easy to understand ‘blob’ from which people who have a vague outline decide “my vague outline is wrong <or sucks>.” Let’s say that this is the point at which the doubts and questions begin to outweigh the beliefs that created the vague outline.

• 2. Someone weaves a narrative using the doubts & questions into a relatively succinct, believable and non-hyperbolic driven framing of an outline which people look at, scratch their heads, go “hmmmmmmmmm …” and decide this new vague outline will replace the one they had in place. Oh. To be clear. This narrative must not only use the doubts & questions to dissolve the current vague outline, but must also offer an alternative vague outline <outlines need to be replaced not simply destroyed>.

The first never happens fast enough to people who just cannot understand how and why some people have decided to live with some vague outline <that just seems ‘not really a smart outline’ to them>.

The second is not as easy as it appears. It isn’t as easy because problems are rarely as clear as we would like them to be and a narrative never lives without the context of all the barrage of real, fake and quasi truths impacting and denting and solidifying a vague outline that already exists. And, to reprise the end of point 2, someone weaves a great narrative to destroy, but forgets to offer an alternative.

Simplistically, this is the story that everything has to do with everything else.

I imagine I have two points today.

First.

We humans have come to accept a certain amount of uncertainty with regard to our lives and our decisions. This uncertainty is also built into the vague outlines we tend to construct for ourselves. What this means is that the construct of our beliefs and thoughts and ideas may be certain to us and, yet, its silhouette accommodates some uncertainty.

I began today by unequivocally stating that vague sucks. And I believe 99% of people would agree that it sucks. But in today’s world the majority of people have enough shit to do that they slot their thinking thoughts time. In one slot they place unequivocal certainty type thoughts. In another slot they place the “I will always be uncertain about this shit and thank God there is someone else at some higher pay grade than I who can be certain about it.” And, lastly, we slot all the shit in which we have formed some vague outline which accommodates a certain degree of uncertainty.

My point here is we tend to make this a binary discussion where the reality lies in a more complex mix of vagueness & clarity, certainty & uncertainty.

Second.

Certainty, in and of itself, has degrees; it is not a simple black or white binary.

People can have vague outlines AND have questions with regard to their outlines and, yet, not want to ditch the outline. “How can you still believe that?” may be one of the most misguided and unenlightened questions that has ever existed.  It completely misses the point in that it assumes ignorance, stupidity or some negative trait in order to hold on to some vague outline regardless of doubts.

A vague outline is a choice.

No more and no less.

We question choices all the time and, yet, remain with the original choice despite some fairly extensive doubts. I say this because, that said, it is silly to point out doubts and questions as a reason to ditch a vague outline. My easiest example is Trump. His followers have a vague outline of what they like and believe about him. We scrutinize them for doubts and questions and when they share them we immediately pounce and suggest “then how can you still believe in your vague outline!?!” <usually said with a slight overall disbelief & wonder>.

Within their lives of doing shit that is important to them they created a vague outline of who and what Trump is, or isn’t, and … well … uncertainty was built into their certainty. The moment they will begin to disbelieve their vague outline is when the uncertainty overpowers the certainty. Until then we should stop acting confused that someone believes what they believe.

Anyway.

I love the quote I opened with even though I hate vague. The truth is that we all live with some vague outlines albeit your vague outline may actually be one of my non-vague outlines, and vice versa. And when they are in conflict then, well, there is conflict.

All that said, while vague sucks there is a reason we do it and this reason is not stupid, nor unenlightened nor ignorant.

It is just damn practical to have some vague outlines.

Life is an uncertain adventure in a diffuse landscape whose borders are constantly shifting.

I am certainly not suggesting a citizenry with ill-informed vague outlines creates a healthy society. But informed versus ill-informed is a topic for another day. For today I am suggesting the majority of people navigate Life and the complexities of the world mostly using vague outlines.

Look. Life is restless. Our vague outlines are necessary to accommodate some of its restlessness. Not recognizing that is either naive or foolish. I would also point out that if you are frustrated by someone’s vague outlines, the onus is upon you to bold the outline on whatever issue you want them to see so that, well, they can clearly see the outline of what really “is.” Just remember. There is a massive difference between vague and vague outlines. Ponder.

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“Life, too, is like that. You live it forward, but understand it backward.”

Abraham Verghese

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“It’s the one thing we never quite get over: that we contain our own future.”

Barbara Kingsolver

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Thinking about what legacy you want to leave behind can make you start thinking a little bit about what you may want to stubbornly stand for and demand of Life and what you may decide to compromise with Life to insure you have something, i.e., some progress to show at the end. A significant part of this grand bargain we negotiate with Life is how we decide to compromise with those around us and those who affect the arc of our lives.

Ah.

That word “compromise.”

Therein lies maybe one of the most difficult topics of the current generation.

The topic is that the concept of compromise, meeting someone half way, giving something up and getting something back, is now a nebulous concept.

Why? Because I am not sure I know where the hell half way is.

And I tend to believe a shitload of people are standing with me, on one side or the other, not really sure where the hell half way is.

And if you cannot even see the middle ground how the hell can you figure out how to make a stand on it?

This gets compounded by a massive online communal world in which we all live side by side where even the marginalized people <real or perceived>, nutjobs & experts, now have a place to gather into likeminded groups and share as much a space as mainstream views. For good, or for bad, online any group of people can organize & mobilize & challenge the status quo … or pick & choose which status quo fits their view. The internet amplifies discourses critical of, well, any status quo you can think of.  And, as anyone could expect, all the critical discourse triggers a corresponding equal backlash from those who fear an uprooting of their beliefs <and the self identities that are inevitably attached to these beliefs>. Needless to say much of that backlash is a bit unhealthy and a lot unmoored to accepted reality.

It just becomes one huge mosh pit of criticism and cocooning of likeminded people.

Likeminded people – all who are angry.

Within all of this situation & anger civil discourse tends to be tossed in the trashheap. And maybe worse is the fact there is this ‘digging in’ aspect where we refuse to see any merit in other people’s opinions. Sadly, I can only conclude that we have lost the ability to converse, discuss, debate and have a dialogue with one another.

It seems obvious <at least to me>, but if we could figure out how to come together and compromise, that we could go a long way toward not only creating a better version of society in general, but it may give me, and all of us, at least a fighting chance with regard to where we make our own personal stand and where we compromise and how we attain the future that we contain.

As long as people cling to unbending attitudes & beliefs, the divides between us will not deepen, but will remain an unbridgeable divide.

I tend to believe most of us want better that that.

I tend to believe most of us would be willing to work to make this a better and more civil world to live in.

And if you do not embrace this thinking?

I would remind everyone that America is representative of a great compromise. The U.S. Constitution is possibly the greatest Compromise ever negotiated <it created a nation>.

But as a first step to bettering this entire situation we need to figure out how to better define Compromise.

Far too many loudmouthed people have ripped the meaning out of the word, twisted the value of the word making it seem valueless, and ultimately created an environment in which  we demonize the entire process of trying to reach compromise.

Compromise no longer means understanding your differences and working together toward a common goal, but now it seems to represent weakness, losing and not being strong enough to get what you want. This attitude and unwillingness to work together creates a dysfinctional society where the unwavering stance seems to be “don’t compromise, stick to your guns, don’t give in to the other side”.

Sigh.

Look.

I find it hard to believe that the majority of America is really that selfish and that stubborn. Sure. I know the people most passionate about any issue tend to be the ones less willing to compromise on them. And, yeah, I would guess most of us are fairly passionate about ourselves – what we decide to stand for … as well as what we will decide to sacrifice within compromise to attain some progress. But within this wacky world where no one seems to want to compromise anything on anything … well … shit … some of us are trying to think a little bit about what you may want to stubbornly stand for and demand of Life, and what you may decide to compromise with Life, to insure you have something – some progress to show at the end.

It seems like the situation we are in has arisen because we have permitted the stubborn voices of the radical marginalized <real and perceived> to drown out the pragmatic voices, the majority, of realistic positive compromise. If we want society to start working again we need to embrace compromise — and let it retain the positive definition which has served it well through time.

To end this I will go back to the beginning.

The “I” aspect.

I tend to believe all of us, with the intent of finding the best version of ourselves from which our ultimate legacy will be defined, will seek to find the balance of being stubborn and demand that Life bend to us and our principles and compromise where we make a grand bargain with Life in order to continue progressing.

Uhm.

If we believe this, then why wouldn’t we want this in Life and in business and in politics and in … well … everything.

There was a book that discussed this. In The Spirit of Compromise <Amy Gutsman and Dennis Thomson> they note that Americans support general compromise as an idea and like the idea of ‘other people’ working together to get stuff done <statistics support this in a variety of studies & polls>.

However. The authors then note that support for compromise breaks down when it addresses specific issues <Americans are much less likely to support a compromise on a specific issue>. What this means is that, as with most things in Life, we enthusiastically embrace the conceptual behavior and balk at the actual behavior.

I shared that to say compromise is complex and simple.

What I do know is that we contain our own future and building that future demands that we will have to make some compromises.  That is simple.

Making the specific choices is complex.

And while I am mostly interested in my own future and making my own compromise choices, I tend to believe we would all find the better version of ourself contained within if the society as a whole were more willing to refind the value in compromise. Yeah. I just suggested our best version is not an “I” thing but rather when we are part of the weave of societal fabric, i.e., “We” thing. Ponder.

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“We promise according to our hopes; we perform according to our fears.”

François de La Rochefoucauld

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In an era when we appear to be facing an increasingly uncertain and complex economic future, in this wacky business world in which technology seems to becoming the new ‘labor’ for business productivity <please note I am not suggesting technology is reducing ‘people jobs’ because it is not … simply shifting them>, the one certainty is that we have become the outcome business generation.

I say that to begin a business rant about how I believe our future resides in having every young person finding the skills to be successful <and generate results>, but also to develop their own character <and resilience to manage their generation’s version of business> AND have them reshape the current business world.

I say that because we are an increasingly outcome oriented world and focus.

In fact it may be the sole ‘go to’ focus and criteria for success. At least that is the current business environment and current business leadership focus.

How did we get to this place?

How did we create this misguided direction young people focus on <and business>?

How did we come so far down this path seemingly on misperceptions?

Let me suggest 3 things on how we got to this outcome generation business model:

–          Fear <performance according to>

–          Boomers <older people> – beliefs & attitudes

–          Boomers <older people>- perceptions

First. Fear.

Businesses are promising hope and a full business future to everyone and anyone interviewing and showing interest in walking thru their doors. But. Once in? It becomes performance based on fear. What I mean by that is business institutions , as soon as they put you in a position with some responsibilities will immediately tie you to some accountability for outcomes, therefore, creating a fear of not generating outcome & results. At least that is the inevitable leadership message.

Someone can put a positive spin on ‘we believe in business success’ or ‘results are the ultimate measure of effective skills’ or even ‘your ability to meet the outcome objectives despite such obstacles shows real character’, but, in the end it comes down to fear management.

Second. This beliefs and attitudes thing.

We current older folk grew up in a business environment in which the typical overly successful ambitious individual was always one who always seemed to desire what was just out of reach and go to almost any length to get what they thought they deserved often believing they were not only above everyone else, but also above the common rules <and in some cases … above law itself or some bent version of law>.

That was an attitude and a belief. A broad playing field of ‘do whatever it takes’ mentality.

That was a belief in results & outcome as proof of success. And it has bled into how we older folk think about how to live our lives in general. Shit. Even “the Secret” has embraced outcome <therefore we have gobs of people in the midst of life convinced the Secret to Life can be found in focusing on outcomes>.

Anyway.

Because we know this ‘secret’, i.e., this attitude/belief inevitably created a misperception among older folk that the current generation feels they deserve the same ‘outcome success’ but without the work <when the reality is they don’t want what we have>.

Well.

Not exactly.

Of course when in business you want business success. And the young are certainly willing to work for it, but they would just prefer getting it differently.

Regardless.

My generation’s <older> management style has beget its own uncomfortable outcome. A younger generation basically unhappy <or constantly chafing more so than usual in past generations> which, in my opinion, has fed into some fairly dismal employee engagement numbers.

I also believe that it’s possible to become so focused on the process of reaching our old folk business goals, our desired <or demanded> outcomes, that we not only lose sight of some of the other important things, in other words, ‘objective blindness.’

We forget that ‘outcomes’ are not the end all be all.

We forget ‘winning’ in business can come in different sizes and shapes.

Of course, making some sacrifices to achieve results is expected. There is always a price to pay to get where you want to go.

But let’s be clear. Young people are NOT taking for granted all the ‘good things’ we have going for us now, but rather they are challenging the journey we took to get the ‘good things’ and outcomes. They not only second guess our ability to balance ‘whatever it takes’, but they second guess our moral compass. And they are certainly second guessing ‘do what it takes to win’ mentality.

They also certainly second guess our obsession with time.

Why?

Maybe they have watched us older folk for so long endlessly obsessing and endlessly cycling through some constantly changing to-do list or watching us spending gobs of time simply arranging and rearranging a schedule <not doing … just planning on doing> or watching us wishing throughout the day <out loud most of the time> that ‘if there were only more time’ only to find out that at the end of the day … well … you were at the end of the day.

Frankly.

Old people are stubbornly holding on to the past attitudes and it is negatively affecting our future. Not only are we creating an outcome skewed generation, but also one driven by fear <of not generating outcomes or else> and ultimately they are becoming increasingly disengaged <they just don’t want to play our game>.

By the way, this outcome mentality the older generation has, and is implementing even now, is impacting kids even before they get to the workplace <which will inevitably bleed into work>.  Here is an example:

Five students were shadowed during a year of high school. The students attended a high school where 95% of its graduates attend college. The students in this book were forced to cheat, act different, etc. in the pursuit of high grades. The author of the study mainly addresses the “force” as coming from the inadequately structured school system, family, and in the end, America itself.

In looking for some insight from students regarding how school can be better a few of the students had some respectable suggestions such as fostering student engagement by allowing students to pursue topics that actually interested them and connected to other courses as well.

Ok. On the more positive side … we can also impact our children in good ways:

In a classic experiment, the psychologist J. Philippe Rushton gave 140 elementary- and middle-school-age children tokens for winning a game, which they could keep entirely or donate some to a child in poverty. They first watched a teacher figure play the game either selfishly or generously, and then preach to them the value of taking, giving or neither. The adult’s influence was significant: Actions spoke louder than words. When the adult behaved selfishly, children followed suit. The words didn’t make much difference — children gave fewer tokens after observing the adult’s selfish actions, regardless of whether the adult verbally advocated selfishness or generosity. When the adult acted generously, students gave the same amount whether generosity was preached or not — they donated 85 percent more than the norm in both cases. When the adult preached selfishness, even after the adult acted generously, the students still gave 49 percent more than the norm. Children learn generosity not by listening to what their role models say, but by observing what they do.

Suffice it it say this outcome mentality focus is affecting our youth’s education. Our school systems are increasingly not really places that foster learning <which has a disturbing ironic side to it> mainly because it is being built as a reflection of America’s own stressed out, materialistic, and results <test scores> culture. Schools are so worried about their outcomes, mostly because it is tied to funding, they have begin gaming student outcomes <or gaming the students so they achieve desired outcomes> and the real valuable student outcomes, like good citizens well trained for a variety of possible careers, is being ignored.

Third. This overarching perception about younger people by us older business folk.

Let’s call this attitudes towards work and work ethic. The perceived decline in work ethic is perhaps one of the major contributors of generational conflicts

In the workplace older employees complain that younger workers are uncommitted to their jobs and work only the required hours and little more.

Conversely, Boomers may be workaholics and reportedly started the trend <the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Office of Diversity, 2006> coming in on the heels of those before who have been characterized as the most hardworking generation <Jenkins, 2007>. Regardless … the prevailing stereotype is that younger workers do not work as hard as older workers do:

<note: while this specific research is slightly dated I am using it because it is the best written reflection of more recent research I have reviewed>

Whether the younger generations do not work as hard as previous ones is debatable.

A cross sectional comparison of 27 to 40 year olds versus 41 to 65 year olds in 1974 and 1999 indicated that both age groups felt that it was less important that a worker feel a sense of pride in one’s work in 1999 than in 1974. In both age groups, work values among managers declined between 1974 and 1999 (Smola & Sutton, 2002). Both age groups were also less likely in 1999 to indicate that they believed that how a person did his or her job was indicative of this individual’s worth. In 1999, both age groups were also less likely to believe that work should be an important part of life or working hard made one a better person (Smola & Sutton, 2002). Furthermore, older employees had a less idealized view of work than younger workers did.

Indeed, it was postulated that after witnessing the lack of employer loyalty toward employees, the latter consequently developed a less idealized view of work. Other sources of evidence do not support the claim that there is a decline in work ethics among younger generations.

For instance, Tang and Tzeng (1992) found that as age increased, reported work ethic decreased, indicating that younger workers reported higher work ethics than older workers.

——————-

Once again, I tend to believe most issues in today’s workplace have nothing to do with young people or any skills they may or may not have, it is more about the older folk and their attitudes and behavior and perceptions. And because of that, circling back to the beginning of this piece, we promise one thing and manage to another.

Look.

We’ve all been the givers and receivers of broken promises. In life and in business no one can say that they haven’t let someone down. But this ‘promise one thing manage to another’ is important. And I don’t even believe most older managers even recognize they are breaking promises.

And it not only bleeds into the work place attitudes & culture, but it bleeds the organization of its lifeblood.

Work ethic is a tricky thing to discuss.

Research has shown that work ethic varies with education level, whether a person works full-time or part-time, income level and marital status.  The lower the level of education of an employee, the higher their work ethic has been found to be. People with full-time jobs were found to be less likely to endorse a protestant work ethic than people with part-time jobs; and people with low incomes and those who were married tended to report stronger protestant work ethic (Tang and Tzeng, 1992).

The perception of how hard one works may also be associated with how individuals themselves approach tasks as well.  For instance, boomers have often been characterized as being process-oriented, while younger generations, as being results-focused, irrespective of where and when the task is done.

While younger workers focus on high productivity, they may be happier with the flexibility of completing a task at their own pace and managing their own time, as long as they get the job done right and by the deadline.

—————————–

So … while we wring our hands and bitch & moan about ‘these young people today’ with other older business folk, if we could keep our pie holes shut for a minute or two and listen … REALLY listen, we could hear the dismay and despairs of the fall of their dreams.

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“From where you are you can hear their dreams. The dismays and despairs and flight and fall and big seas of their dreams.”

Dylan Thomas

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We older folk <managers & leaders & parents> are so focused on outcome that we are losing sight of our future generation aspirations, hopes & dreams. Even on a practical sense of those words.

If you look at the typical path of life for most people, maybe about 90% of the journey is spent working toward achieving various goals and only maybe10% in the actual results <and I am most likely skewing the results number high>.

Yet.

In the business world we invest 90% of our energy focused on result analysis <and rewards & such> and only 10% on the journey. And … please … please don’t tell me this doesn’t affect how the young perceive how things should be done <or that it is ‘good lessons for them to learn’>.

Because we are teaching them not only the wrong lessons but also ones they do not believe in. and the risks are high <for our future> By the way … our outcome focus also further widens the gap between the haves and the have nots … for different reasons:

–           outcome orientation for middle/upper class means ‘do whatever it takes’ to achieve outcome type attitudes … that includes bending the rules, cheating & plagiarism <at its worst> or simple manipulation of the system to my benefit at its best …

–          outcome orientation for lower middle/lower class means ‘give up’ <lose hope> because (a) they do not have the resources to compete with middle/upper and (b) they have an inherently lower probability of attaining the success middle/upper does so why put the energy in <and put the energy elsewhere instead>.

But that is a separate rant.

Anyway.

Research is loud and clear. If you don’t model values <or something other than outcome>, verbalizing, even enthusiastically or passionately, may not help in the short run. And in the long run verbalizing is less effective than doing while saying nothing at all.

People often believe that character causes action … well … when it comes to producing a young moral business generation we need to remember that action also shapes character. Our behavior, this relentless pursuit of outcome & results, builds or unbuilds the next business generation.

In the end.

This ends up being a large complex issue of changing attitudes & behaviors … of older business people not younger business people. Or maybe even on a larger scale … older people and not younger people.

This also ends up meaning some troubling self reflection.

Maybe all of us older folk need to take a step back and as the psychologist Karl Weick says:

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“How can I know who I am until I see what I do? How can I know what I value until I see where I go?”

====================

Maybe the better question is:

“how often do I make promises on hope … and manage behavior by fear?”

We created this outcome generation and some of us cannot wait to ‘unmake it’ so that young people don’t live in constant fear of “am I generating outcomes” and instead build businesses of substance & value beyond simple transactions & outcomes. Ponder.

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“One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.”

Plato

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“A person who can think differently and truly on his feet will always find it difficult to sit and fit as an employee in a workplace, for his attitude & approach towards the work will often hit the ego of most co-workers.”

Anuj Somany

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“If u want to work in Corporate, then u should know how to play Chess.”

honeya

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Ok. I was asked recently about a past job I had where I had struggled to be successful. After hemming and hawing a little <I have never really been sure what hemming or hawing was> I answered “the position required a dedicated navigator with navigator skills and I am a sledgehammer with some navigator vision.”

<note: I didn’t understand that until actually into the role & assumed responsibility>

Yeah.

I am a sledge hammer. Always have been and I assume I always will be.

I respect navigators, but they are too slow for my tastes, far too often worried about political correctness and always too skewed toward what is important politically versus ‘what is the right thing to do.’

Ok.

Let me explain navigators and sledge hammers.

In business, there are just some people who see office politics <which all organizations have whether you like it or not> and they have the skills and vision to navigate them to get shit done <they also tend to benefit personally with this skill>.

In business, there are just some people who want to get the right shit done and believe if it is right then … well … it is better to just say ‘damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead’ rather than screw around with navigating people’s feelings and politics.

Now.

That doesn’t mean that sometimes a navigator isn’t more effective and that a navigator, which is tightly associated with someone who can play office politics, is always a corporate whore.

That also doesn’t mean that there aren’t navigators with good moral compasses because there are a shitload of ‘navigator managers’ who are skilled organizational politicians who do not showcase questionable behavior or even distasteful ‘sucking-up’ behavior.

I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that pretty much any leader worth a shit takes a realistic approach to managing around workplace politics. This does not mean they are ‘political’, per se, or want to play the political game it’s just they understand that you have to navigate competing interests, whatever resources may be available, the nuances of what is viewed as authority <and who has the authority which is most typically “enough to hang yourself’>, the bendable organizational rules and whatever information is available.

And, to be clear, the best of the navigators have a sledge hammer in their tool box <and use it on occasion>.

And, to be clear, the best of the sledge hammers have either some navigational skills or, at minimum, navigational vision <i.e., they can ‘see’ the politics and organizational rubble affecting your path>.

Me?

I am a sledgehammer. I like to get shit done.

Always have and always will.

Okay. I like getting smart shit done. And I really like getting smart ‘right’ shit done.

The nuance between that stuff is clear because if all I did was get shit done, smart & right being set aside, politics and navigating would become almost irrelevant. Because then you are simply a doer <not a thinker or a thinker/doer>. But even as a sledge hammer you recognize that whether you hate it, admire it, practice it or avoid it, office politics is a fact of life in any organization. And, like it or not, it’s something that you need to understand to insure not only your professional success, but the success of the good shit you want to do.

Yeah. Sure.

“Politics” certainly has a negative connotation. It most often refers to strategies people use to seek advantage at the expense of others or the greater good. In this context, it often adversely affects the working environment and relationships within it.

<and sledge hammers abhor this type of politics bullshit>

I hesitate to suggest there could ever be something called “good office politics”, but some organizational expert asshats believe that is the kind of crap you do which helps you fairly promote yourself and your ideas <they call it networking and stakeholder management – I call it the ‘necessary bullshit you just have to suck up and do in order to get good shit done’>.

As a sledge hammer I realized that there were some things that a navigator was good at and I should learn if I wanted to be a more effective sledgehammer.

About the only thing I truly value in a navigator is “social astuteness.” This is the ability to read and anticipate situations – allows you to prepare, adapt and tailor your behavior based on the people and conditions around you.

In my words this is being aware of the people and what they believe in combination with understanding the context and the situation and, ultimately, bending all existing resources to the situation at hand.

Let’s just call this “360degree context” <at least that is how a sledgehammer views it>.

Now.

Being aware is different than acting upon it. Being aware meant that it prepared me, and my groups, to manage the carnage or consequences of slamming your way straight thru a maze.

As a sledge hammer it pays to understand the real map, or maze, of the organization. I believe we all know that internal politics, more often than not, has little to do with the real organizational chart they give you when you sign on. Informal networks are usually the engine, the real power, that makes any organization work.

Someone outlined this important crap to be aware of really well:

    Who are the real influencers?

    Who has authority but doesn’t exercise it?

    Who is respected?

    Who champions or mentors others?

    Who is “the brains behind the organization”?

As a sledge hammer I realized there were absolutely some things that were in my control as I bashed my way through the middle of the maze getting to where I believed an idea, or the business at large, should go.

But, as a sledge hammer, I also recognized I needed to manage my own behavior <this lesson took some time … and learned thru some painful trial & error>. Through watching others and some painful trial & error you learn what works in your organization’s culture.

But you learn really fast … as in REALLY fast … that as a sledge hammer you invest exactly 0% of your time and 0 energy on:

• Gossip & spreading rumors: you learn to shut up and even when you hear something you wait and assess the credibility
• Interpersonal conflicts – you avoid “like/dislike people” discussions and certainly do not get sucked into arguments
• Integrity above all: this is a sledge hammer mantra … be professional, do not cut corners, do things right and always remember the organization’s interests
• No complaining: a sledgehammer accepts it will not be easy and you don’t whine about the tough path you have chosen <because it is the path you have chosen>
• Confidence: a sledgehammer is assertive not arrogant, proactive maybe edging on aggressive without ever sneaking into aggressiveness
• Never personal: a sledge hammer has only one thing in focus … the good of the organization and business outcomes <it is NEVER personal>
• Transparency:  assume everything is gonna be seen anyway so you may as well share it all

Look.

Here is what I know.

When you are a sledgehammer and everything goes right it is not only the best in the world for you but organizationally everyone kind of goes “whoa, that was something.”

<which is kind of cool and makes it all worthwhile>

I will admit.

Being a sledgehammer is a lonelier way to conduct business than being a navigator. It isn’t that you are not liked nor does it mean you aren’t viewed as a team member at the table, but navigators, I tend to believe, are just more social human beings & employees.

But sledge hammers have one thing in common — we are all homesick for an organization where we can not think about anything but getting good smart shit done.

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“I am homesick for a place I am not sure even exists.

One where my heart is full. My body loved. And my soul understood.”

(via lipstick-bullet)

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“No enterprise can exist for itself alone.

It ministers to some great need, it performs some great service, not for itself, but for others…or failing therein, it ceases to be profitable and ceases to exist.”

Calvin Coolidge

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“Let’s be honest. There’s not a business anywhere that is without problems. Business is complicated and imperfect. Every business everywhere is staffed with imperfect human beings and exists by providing a product or service to other imperfect human beings.”

Bob Parsons

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Originally posted in 2017

Let me take a minute and discuss “fraternite” in business.

Just a reminder but “fraternite” is one of the  French values of Liberté, Fraternité and Egalité (“liberty, equality, fraternity/brotherhood” the national motto of France).

Anyway. Business. Inevitably a great organization exhibits both efficient AND effective progress. What typically creates that combination is part discipline, part structure (systems), part leadership, all glued together by “fraternité”. That ‘glue’ is most often discussed in the American business world as ‘a vision’ or maybe ‘a purpose’ or even ‘culture.’ We do so because we Americans hate any kind of lack of specificity. But the truth is that the most common bond of a great organization is a more nebulous concept, i.e., one of “fraternité”.

Or.

“Any man aspires to liberty, to equality, but he cannot achieve it without the assistance of other men, without fraternity.”

Napoleon

Oddly enough, while this sounds like relatively common sense, I kind of feel like business itself needs a revolution to overturn the current thinking to accommodate what should be common sense.

What do I mean? Current business is kind of in a wacky spot. It talks a lot about vision and purpose and culture as if they are “things” — like maybe a lighthouse anyone can see as they bob around the chaotic sea of business life to find a way home. By the way, I would argue that is a very individualistic thought — “I can find my way home” type thought – and not really a team thought <but that could quite easily be debated>.

Regardless. Fraternity is more like “everyone not only knowing what they need to do to keep the ship afloat but actually pitching in whether needed or not because they love the ship itself.” That may sound like some wacky nuance, but I have to warn people that revolutions can kind of gain some momentum off of some fairly wacky things on occasion. By the way, this thought is a more nebulous “I feel this way” aspect of organizational culture and, as noted many times, if it cannot be measured or indexed or scored.

** note: most older leaders into today’s business just don’t like that kind of shit – things they cannot measure or score.

Anyway. Not to beat this metaphor to death, but I do believe we need a semi-revolution in the way business organizations are created and run and managed. I think we may need that revolution because “fraternité” as a core principle just ain’t the way business is run today. And, yes, it should be viewed as a “core” principle because … uhm … when discipline falls apart, when structure falls apart, when leadership falls apart what keeps you on the battlefield and fighting is … yeah … “fraternité.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of people talk about a “community” or “company team” or some other nice sounding platitude which sounds a lot like “fraternité”, but its mostly lip service. Its lip service because fraternité is a ‘collective’ thought and most businesses reward and incentivize individuals.

Anyway. On a bigger organizational level I worry about how an idea like this is getting suffocated by generational issues <younger people desire something and older people think they know the best> and maybe an outcome-is-the-only-thing-that-matters worldview versus a belief business should incorporate altruistic aspects. Both of those conflicts are HUGE issues. I have written about in 1200+ word thought pieces on both of these but, on the former, the best piece I can share is from Corporate Rebels “Cut The Crap: The Made-Up Nonsense About Generations At Work” which states all people want meaning at work (regardless of age or generational label).

I actually believe we need some revolutionary thinking on the latter. To me we have a bunch of people who look at business and turn away to non-profit because … well … I fear that they only believe they can change the world through more altruistic pursuits and not traditional business. And, yes, they are important and good pursuits but, from a larger perspective, business drives the world. Business makes shit that makes lives easier and healthier and impacts the home and life in ways that it is difficult to imagine let alone outline in a few words <and the business office/working groups creates behavioral cues which ripple out into culture>.

Somehow … someway … we need to insert the ‘believers of principles and principled behavior’ into the business world with all of their ambition and hope and remind them, empower them and enable them that they can change the world.

That they can make the world a better place. They can make society and people and lives better. And they can do it in and through business, not just altruistic career opportunities. If we do that, and do that well, I tend to believe we will build more organizations driven at its core by a sense of “fraternité” rather than a bunch of documents setting out some guiding or shared values, vision and purpose which everyone says “okay … let’s do that.”

What I do know is that … well … read the following quote:

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“I have found no greater satisfaction than achieving success through honest dealing and strict adherence to the view that, for you to gain, those you deal with should gain as well.”

Alan Greenspan

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I do believe we need to be drawing some lines in business. And I don’t mean company handbook type lines or even some well-crafted ‘lines’ in “how we conduct our business” or “who we are” but maybe they are more lines with regard to some unwritten principles.

I say that because when you can gather a group of people together who share a strong set of principles they will walk straight into a hail of bullets to not only survive, but to get good shit done.

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“Morality, like art, means drawing a line someplace.

Oscar Wilde

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Now. Business absolutely makes dealing with your principles a constant struggle. It can kind of suffocate your principles in between the pragmatic aspects of getting shit done <discipline & structure> and how that shit is designed to meet specific objectives/results and the faux burden of some vision or grander purpose which “you know is important to us therefore it should be important to you”, i.e., extrinsic importance not intrinsic importance. Frankly, when suffocated by these bookends you don’t have a lot of elbow room for any type of true, intangible, unsolicited camaraderie.

The fraternité is more forced than natural. Obviously, when it is not natural it is not as strong.

In the end.

Fraternité in business. I believe we have forgotten this. And while I do believe many of us have forgotten how to draw lines with regard to our principles I tend to believe business, in general, has simply decided to just draw lines <in a box in fact> and say “there you go”, i.e., there are your principles and rules for camaraderie.

That is kind of whack.

Look. I can honestly tell you that being a senior leader in a business and organization you like <you do not have to love> may be one of the greatest experiences anyone can ever have. What makes that experience truly great is when you are fortunate enough to foster something intangible, something that really cannot be measured, and something which doesn’t earn you some performance bonus at the end of the year … it is when you stumble upon the sense of fraternité.

I am sure some organizational guru will send me a link to “steps to build a fraternité organization” and … well … good for them. I tend to believe this is one of those intangible things that is created less by some “how to” guide or some formula and more by simple good intentions combined with some good discipline, construct and leadership. To steal another word from the motto, by creating a fraternité organization you inevitably create liberté for the organization to be the best version of what it can be.

This is what I thought about today and “liberty, equality, fraternity <brotherhood>”. With that I imagine I should end with where I began … no enterprise can exist for itself alone. That is the foundation for a fraternité organization. Ponder.

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“I see a lot of people in unstimulating relationships. If people were a little less scared of ending things they’d get more out of life.  You meet the right person at the right time and they fulfill a certain something in your life. You fulfill something in theirs.

But there’s a time limit to that. “

Laura Marling

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“When inspiration does not come to me, I go halfway to meet it.”

Sigmund Freud

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So. Unstimulating relationships. This is actually about business and about ‘time limits.’

As a business manager you end up grasping a couple of truths about your employees and their relationship with what they do, their work, their careers and the company.

The first truth is that many of the employees are just doing their job. They are in a relatively unstimulating relationship with their job & career and they are kind of okay with that.

As a manager you genuinely try and make the relationship a little more simulating for them and, if you are truly genuine, while the these employees may never get as passionate or interested as you would like they appreciate you caring enough to try and, on occasion, will try harder for you and the company. This doesn’t mean they don’t care about their work and, in fact, if you highlight the contribution and impact their efforts make, they will care, just not find work particularly stimulating. I mention this as a first truth to acknowledge, which some organizational development people do not, that to some people a job is a job – no more and no less.

The second truth is that there are some employees who are actively seeking stimulated relationship with their jobs, careers and the company. If they are in an unstimulating relationship, suffice it to say, they will make you miserable out of their own miserableness.

As a manager you genuinely try and keep these employees stimulated. If you do it well, these people kill it. They are absolute monster achieving workers/thinkers/doers in the work place. Get it wrong with these employees and … well … most leave to find some stimulating relationship.

Understanding these two truths is surprisingly like getting a pail of cold water thrown in your face.

Well. At least it was for me.

I am not sure it was the same for others, but this may have been one of the most difficult things for me to understand, and deal with, when I moved from managing a group <where you get to hire everyone and try to have them match your attitude> to managing a company, multiple groups, departments and a bunch of people you do not hire yourself.

I, personally, struggled to understand how anyone could come into work each day, be relatively unstimulated and not only do good work, but actually want to come in and do good work every day.

But a lot of people do just that.

It took me awhile.

But I got it. At the same time I also understood that you never really let the unstimulated group of employees remain completely unstimulated.

You kind of never really let them completely start doing their work by rote or like robots. Mostly you just try to give them some positive stimulation on occasion like, as I noted earlier, encourage them to see how they contribute and their impact <this is different than incentivizing or trying to ‘game’ their behavior>.

Anyway.

The reality is that being an employee is a dance. You have a dance partner and sometimes there is a song you hate and do not dance, sometimes there is a song you hate and you are asked <or told> to dance and sometimes there is a good song and you will dance no matter what.

That is a fairly metaphoric example of a stimulating workplace.

But I will point out something I purposefully did. I suggested the bad song is playing in two of the three scenarios.

Yeah.

And that is still a stimulating relationship.

Go figure.

For some reason we seem to think people need to love their jobs all the time <or the significant majority of the time> or inject passion into what we do.

That is, frankly, a little nuts.

Mostly we should be seeking to have employees be proud of what they do <even if they don’t actually love what they do> and, as a manager, be wise enough to know what to overlook.

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“The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.”

William James

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Work is called work, and not ‘play, for a reason.

It’s work.

And sometimes work takes some … well … work.

I could actually argue that the ‘working at work’ can be stimulating if you view it correctly.

But that really doesn’t sound logical enough to invest energy in.

And maybe that is the key to understanding this whole ‘unstimulating relationship” thing – logic.

I can truthfully say that behind closed doors senior managers talk far too much about “logical” ways to stimulate employees and tap into some mysterious passion muscle we absurdly believe every employee has within <to be focused on our business and their work within our business>.

Once again … that is kind of nuts.

To be clear. I do believe everyone has a passion muscle within, but to think it can randomly be directed toward ‘work’ <which, I will remind everyone, is called ‘work’ because it is work … and not play or relaxation or ‘fun’> is the nuts part.

Logically we should just accept the fact that many employees have mentally come to grips with a job in which they are not in an overly stimulated relationship with.

That doesn’t mean they don’t want to do a good job nor does it mean they will not care it just means that their job is more a paycheck and not a career.

All that said, let me close with where I started … “time limits.”

All employees have limits in an unstimulating relationship – all: the ones who live with being unstimulated and the ones who actively seek stimulation. I am fairly sure most employees don’t create tangible definable limits they more often probably fall into the “I will know when it is time.” 

All business managers should recognize that all employees have ‘time limits’ when it comes to anything unstimulating. What that means is you cannot get away with being an uninvolved, uninterested, un-energy creating manager for too long. I don’t mean to imply many managers do that, but I will note that creating stimulation and seeking to energize a stimulating relationship between your employees and your business is hard work.

It isn’t about some motto or slogan.

It isn’t about donuts in the mornings and fun team meetings on Fridays.

It is about finding ways to show employees that their work is respected, their contributions are valued and that there are opportunities to grow as a person <intellectually, skills or responsibilities>. Yeah. I just offered that up as a solution to stimulate relationships and nowhere in that was any activity or initiative. All I outlined was possible destinations – mind, body or leadership.

Nothing stimulates an employee business relationship more than being a business that suggest they will enable an individual to ‘be more than they are today’ if they have the time and interest. In my mind businesses with an unstimulated relationship with their employees may be doing ‘things’ but they are just going through the motions , maybe using too much logic, to create some false stimulation.

Here is the truth. Show people where they can go and tell them you believe in them and a shitload will be stimulated, all on their own, to engage in the relationship with their job and work. Ponder.

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“Her sentences were icebergs, with just the tip of her thought coming out of her mouth, and the rest kept up in her head.”

Gregory Galloway

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“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Ok. I can honestly say that I have few friends who I know the full thinking, i.e., everything they truly think, about a thought.

Very few.

This includes even my best friends.

Uhm.

I don’t think this is unusual.

More often we only see the tip of the iceberg.

Some words to open a thought.

A sentence or two which offer a preface to a bigger story.

The rest is kept up in their heads.

The ones we know the best may give us some cues, assuming we are paying attention enough, as to where to go next.

The ones we know the least may give us only the tip of the iceberg thinking we may not deserve the rest or maybe the rest is none of our business.

Not to mix metaphors <but I will> but people are like books we peruse at a bookstore. We scan the covers, maybe read the back and sometimes even open it up and read the inside sleeve to get a sense of what is inside. 90% of the time that is what we end up knowing about the book.

<kind of the same as an iceberg … just inside instead>

Now.

In business this is a little different.

In business, assuming you ever want to get some decisions and get something done, far more often you are exposed to a full iceberg, with regard to a thought, because business demands it. About the only way you can ever get an idea from insight to real action is to figure out a way to lift the bottom of the iceberg up & out from the ocean of ignorance and into the conference room light. And even then the business world does everything it can to encourage you to only show “what is important” … as in … “just show me the tops of the icebergs … that is all I have time for”. The misguided assumption being (1) that is all that really matters & (2) if you are good enough you will show the tip of the iceberg well enough we will get a sense of what is under the water>.

That last thought is kind of bullshit and why this iceberg metaphor is so appropriate. The majority of any idea and thought is found below water, not above, and 99% of the time what is above water gives very little indication of what is truly below the water.

Compounding this issue is, well, more often than not if you bring an iceberg into a meeting you will have to discuss the fact there are a bunch of other icebergs, also with tips people can see and bottoms one can only imagine, floating around the iceberg you are discussing.

The shallowest of people in the room will scan the tips floating around and assess that way.

The more thoughtful want to know at least something about the parts they cannot obviously see.

The most thoughtful are interested in everything they cannot see even if it takes a lot of time and it is less than simple.

All that said.

I could argue that in Life or in business what is important is the part most often not seen or heard.

I could argue that in Life or in business what we actually do is spend a shitload of time focused solely on the tips of icebergs.

I could argue that the latter point is the foolish consistency of the hobgoblin of foolish little minds.

To be clear, you cannot chase all icebergs. Attitudinally you would benefit by always being curious with regard to what you can’t see, but behaviorally there is just not enough time to chase down everything beneath the surface if you ever want to get anything done. All this to say chasing icebergs is not easy.

Look.

I could conclude my thought today pounding away on the importance of using curiosity to avoid bad business decisions, but I will not.

Instead I will use a personal thought to make a business point.

If you think about the moments you took a moment and stopped after hearing a sentence from a friend, the tip of an iceberg as it were, and followed up with some curiosity with regard the rest of the thought that you assume was kept in the mind and how much you were rewarded in terms of enlightenment by doing so, well, I kind of think that makes my point. It is typically a rewarding effort in terms of your friendship and connection.

We can spend our lives skating along the icy surface of irrelevance focused on the tips of icebergs or we can decide to dive down and see the larger portions of thoughts, ideas and minds hidden from sight.

That is your choice. Choose wisely.

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“For our own success to be real, it must contribute to the success of others.”

–

Eleanor Roosevelt

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“The way to achieve your own success is to be willing to help somebody else get it first.”

Iyanla Vanzant

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Business, as businesses should, think about how to improve their business. The good ones balance effectiveness and efficiency, the poor ones triple down on efficiency. But. 95% (I made that # up) of businesses focus on customers, service, process, systems and “best practices” — in their pursuit of efficiency (with head nods to effectiveness). This means 95% typically think of people as interchangeable pieces who can deliver all the service, process and outputs. All the systems are designed to ‘output’ and people simply make the systems ‘go.’

I would argue this is at the root of why organizations begrudgingly train employees. I would argue this is not only a bad ‘grudge’ if you really want to improve your business, but it is also stupid.

I always made a promise to anyone who ever worked for me – “if you ever leave this job I promise you will be well prepared to do well at your next job.” I’m not sure I was particularly good at preparing people for life, but I always said if you had a title/job responsibility with me you would be able to do that title/job responsibility wherever you went.

3 reasons:

• I knew people outgrew jobs & organizations and often organizations sucked at meeting peoples ‘grow’ needs. In other words, there is an incredibly high likelihood a current employee would become an ex-employee. I felt a responsibility to prepare them for their next job believing I/we would benefit for as long as they stayed where they were.
• Word of mouth is the most powerful recruiter. If you give, you get. The more people I sent out to build successful careers of their own, the more people recommended new employees to me or past co-workers sent people to me.
• I didn’t care about training per se, I cared about preparation to do jobs well. That may sound like semantics, but I think its important semantics. I believe businesses get hung up on “training people and receiving benefit.” And they may be right because, if you view training as simply training, you will most likely will not reap any meaningful benefits. On the other hand. If you look at maximizing an individual and enabling someone to do their job well, you will not only build individual strengths & potential, but also receive the direct benefit of them doing the job well. Choose wisely.

Regardless of your own view on this topic, the bottom line is a decision to invest in a person. Not some nebulous, often vapid, “invest in your people”, but rather ‘a person.’

I, honestly, can’t figure out why this is so difficult for businesses to grasp.

Is it lack of trust in people?

Is it a leadership ego thing?

Is it simply a misunderstanding of culture as a ‘we’ thing .. that you can enable & empower individuals and still be a ‘we’ culture?

I don’t know, but I do know any lasting change or effect in a business is not organizational or on systems or even on some broader cultural narrative. People leave, therefore, if your modus operandi is to enforce or impose (this includes ‘best practices’) systems, I can guarantee you that enforcing or imposing is not motivating nor long term effective (nor even optimizing short term effectiveness).

Truly lasting change & organization effect is within people themselves. Effectiveness is emergent. And because it is emergent it is something they not only embody when within the business, but also take with them outside the business (in life, family, community and other jobs). Therefore. To effectively lead people you actually need to view people beyond the limits of the organizational boundaries. This may sound odd, even inefficient. Its not. It doesn’t ignore the job that existing responsibilities demand, but it also enables individual potential to cross and bridge normal divides & barriers. Or, as Peter Drucker said, ‘business is of the community and the community is of the business.” And that is where true benefits reside. We far too often discuss ‘getting out of your comfort zone’ when instead we should suggest there is no zone or even if there is you should just push out on the limits and boundaries and give people the freedom to grow (and the business will grow). When a person is engaged as part of who & what they are they have the ability to engage to their fullest potential.

“Why do you, or they, or anyone get to determine my limits?”

Veronica Roth

Simplistically this is investing in people, not an organization. This leads me to the eternal question in business: “why train employees (people) if all they are going to do is leave? (and someone else will benefit by my investment).”

This is a valid, and important, topic.

At its core is, well, business’s decision to make business better. It’s like believing if you plant healthy seeds they will bloom here, there and everywhere and the entire forest grows.

Believing this demands we view a business in a non traditional way – you don’t ‘push down’ beliefs, behavior, responsibilities, etc. because, honestly, any time anything is ‘pushed down’ the world shudders to a halt as the people who are actually doing the work take the round peg senior leadership has created and try to figure out how to put it in the square hole of reality. In order to do so, most times, instead of convincing leadership they actually need a square peg, the teams design a mish mash version of a round peg that will fit into the square hole.

“In our consumer culture, we are encouraged to assume roles that aren’t truly authentic to who we are. In a way, this culture is its own kind of simulation, one that requires us to make more and more purchases to maintain the integrity of the illusion.”

Stowe Boyd

To be clear. I am not suggesting a ‘bossless’ organization. And while I do believe business has become more complex than in the past, I have always believed maximizing an individual maximizes the business. What was true then is exponentially true as business becomes more complex.

Stowe Boyd said “We’re in a time of rapidly expanding insights about human motivation and connection, but meanwhile our companies continue to be run with a perspective on human psychology and sociology circa 1970.” I slightly disagree. While, as a generalization, it may be true, I would suggest some people have always known this is the best way to maximize an organization — its just that leadership doesn’t trust it to be done that way.

Of course I believe discussing new organizational models is important and, in some cases, a business should have a new business model. But at the core of any organizational discussion it really isn’t about models but rather “how do you think about individuals?”

Because until you answer that question autonomy, empowerment, self management, is all irrelevant. If you do not believe in people, than you do believe in control. Period. Full stop.

If you do believe in people, than you will stop talking about leaders, and what makes great leaders, but instead talk about resource management – how can we get the proper resources into the proper hands at the proper times to maximize each individual and group of individuals.

This expands the business by expanding the individual. Therefore leadership isn’t about direction or control, but rather managing/optimizing expansion. Ponder.

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obfuscate

This is the word to use when evasion is achieved by clouding the issue.

Creating a smoke-screen.

prevaricate, evade, dodge

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“When shrouded meanings and grim intentions are nicely polished up and pokerfaced personae are generously palming off their fantasy constructs, caution is the watchword, since rimpling water on the well of truth swiftly obscures our vision and perception.

(“Trompe le pied/wrong foot.”)”

Erik Pevernagie

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So. There is possibly nothing more aggravating in business than someone not answering “the” question. To be clear on what I am speaking about. The person answers a question just not the one you asked.

I am not going to argue that some questions are not easy to answer. I won’t even argue that we get asked questions we don’t know the answers to, but the situation dictates we make something up <yes … that happens in business>. But abandoning the question completely is complete bullshit.

But you know what?

I think the main reason it is so aggravating is because it is truly a reflection of intentions. There is even a book called The Anthropology of Intentions by a professor, Alessandro Duranti, who kind of tackles this whole discussion of intentions and words. He offers us the thought of ‘intentional discourse’ wherein an individual filters words through their beliefs & desires and their plans & goals to guide the discourse <regardless of whether the rest of the people want it guided that way>. In other words, using another phrase he offers us, by engaging in an intentional continuum people ponder their use of words through self-interest motivations <some good & some bad>.

By the way I am fairly sure I mangled his academic masterpiece, but you get the point.

Ah. “You get the point.” I share that again because while we sit there aggravated at someone who completely avoided answering the question asked we almost always also sit there wanting to invest a little of our own energy trying to assess why they did it. Because, in our aggravated minds, in its most simplistic viewing, avoiding the question is solely about shifting attention – away from something and toward something else.

…………… question deflection …………

Sure. It could be something as simple as steering you away from their lack of knowledge and steering you toward something they may actually know. But, in most cases, a full abandonment of a specific question is complete & utter deflection.

In the intelligence community they call this effort to shift attention as deflection or misdirection. Magicians do something similar getting people to focus on one thing and away from the trick itself. Completely avoiding the question is the business version of a distract-the-audience approach. It is this weird moment in which someone pretends to answer the question by actually answering some other question that magically appeared to replace the question really asked. It’s almost like entering an alternative universe for a while.

Sadly, aggravated or not, the more practiced the deception <the more practiced the business magician is> the more likely you hesitate to step in <and the more you get aggravated as you hesitate> and correspondingly … the more many of these people actually believe deception works.

It is maddening.

Worse? If they are good at it, when someone responds to a question by not addressing the points of the question, thereby avoiding the issue itself, it doesn’t create unrelated discussion to the issue … it simply avoids the issue in totality.

Well. I am fairly sure we have all sat there in a meeting and watched something like this unfolding right before our eyes. The visceral response, the aggravation, we have to this ‘answer evasion’ situation is most likely found in the revelation it is occurring (watching it unfold before our eyes). Philosophically, we can see that through some internal conviction to retain something they feel like they should own <their reputation, their title, their perceived intelligence, their whatever> they justify evading the question.

Conviction. Yeah. I just used ‘internal conviction.’ This means their intentions reflect they are more important than not only the question itself … but you. You are not even dignified with an answer.

It is irksome <at its least worst>.

It is loathsome <at its most worst>.

Look. I give a partial pass to the asshats you can see who have some answer they want to give everyone, regardless of what question is asked, and blurt it out when given the opportunity. They haven’t deflected the question they just ignored it as unimportant to what they want to say and have been planning to say no matter what has been said up to that point. It’s the ones you know heard the question and just ignored it. Or avoided it. Or just didn’t answer it despite the fact they heard every word, every syllable and every intention from the question giver. In other words, they intentionally do not answer the question.

<envision a deep sigh here>

I want people to face questions head on. And what makes this even more aggravating is that you know these people are quite capable of taking things head on.

How do I know that? These are the same people who will attack, or ‘aggressively question’, the intentions of the question giver themselves. It is a common tactic for the answer avoiders. The natural instinct is to ‘defend’; to answer the attack. Fuck that. I want to say “just answer the fucking question asked.”

How else do I know these people are quite capable of taking questions head on? These are the same people who will attack, or ‘aggressively question’, the question itself. This is not a deflection tactic. This is a ‘turn the question back on itself’ tactic. And, once again, your natural instinct is to defend or, well, answer the question you are asked.  Aggravating. I want to say “just answer the fucking question asked, you shithead.”

And maybe what makes this ‘not answering the question asked’ so maddening is that we, most sane pragmatic business people, tend to sit back <after saying “WTF”> and try and unravel why it happened and what the hell just happened. Unless you are in an interview scenario <in which you always have an opportunity, one-to-one, to hunker down and hammer out a clear answer> you are most likely in a room with other people and the non-answer has sent at least some of the people careening down a completely different road.

That makes it even MORE aggravating.

One intentional non answer to a question can completely derail a meeting or a discussion. That is intentional discourse. Or how about the other phrase from that academic’s book: engaging in an intentional continuum.

Oh. One last way you know these asshats are intentionally not answering the question is when they cleverly decline to answer the question with the infamous head fake answer: “I don’t know the answer to that question. I’ll work on finding the information for you and then get back to you with an answer” <and they have no intention of ever getting back to you>.

Yeah. You know … sure as shit … they have no plans to work on it and will never ‘get back to you’ unless you call them on it. They are intentionally refusing to answer the question assuming the conversation will move on and, in a laundry list of other shit to do, that this one will either never make the list or be so low on the list they can stiff arm you on answering based on “working on things more important.”

Its bullshit. You know its bullshit. They know its bullshit.

Well.

Fuck you.

Fuck you and the non-answering horse you rode in on.

In my mind a good well-articulated question demands some accountability. The one given the question is now accountable for the answer. They may try and deflect and they may just answer a completely different question, but a question asked exists, it does not disappear. You cannot get away from it.

Let me share a graphic example of why accountability remains whether the question dodger likes it or not.

You open your front door in the morning and there is a nice pile of dog shit squarely in the middle of your front door opening. You either clean it up or you avoid it. The question dodger never acknowledges the pile and steps over it moving on to something else. The shit stays at the front door and over time the smell increases and the flies crowd around. A good question unanswered is just like that. And a question dodger cannot avoid the smell in the end.

All that said. My message to the asshats who completely do not answer the question asked:  You will be accountable to the question and to cleaning up the mess … now … or later <and quit aggravating me by not answering the question, you shithead>.

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Author note:

When I reread this, which took me less than a ½ hour to write, I was a little surprised by how … well … aggravated the tone was.

Some ‘fucks’ and ‘asshats’.

I left it as is because as a 50something business guy who has always attempted to take on what needs to be taken on regardless of how painful it may have been <and career wise possibly less than prudent> I get a little angry about how the business world has become incredibly unkind to the risk takers & truth tellers and seems to reward the less-than-competent and ‘political maneuverers’ more often than it should. That’s my excuse for why I let this one stand as it does.

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“Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well.”

—-

Robert Louis Stevenson

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Whew. This quote is often used and used with such a tone and inflection that does more damage than good. What I mean is that in discussing Life with someone, particularly in reference to their Life <business or personal>, if you are not careful how you use these words it can either:

<a> come across as condescending,

<b> come across as blatant ignorance as to someone’s situation, i.e., it is often used toward people in low income, low education geography as ‘inspirational words of wisdom, or even

<c> come across as flippant tripe.

Regardless.

I imagine it is a Life truth that pretty much anyone can play a good hand <or at minimum be less likely to screw it up>. Unfortunately, pretty much no one ever <or rarely> gets dealt a perfect hand. Almost everyone gets dealt some bad cards and some people just get dealt shitty hand after shitty hand. What I will say is that the institutional systems are clearly not equitable and simply working hard and playing an incredibly poor hand you are dealt well does not guarantee success, but, you gotta play the hand you are dealt.

That said. Suffice it to say playing a poor hand sucks.

But just because you are in a situation you don’t want to be in, well, in Life you really can’t fold. You need to work with what you have.  Sometimes you, if you are really good, you can take a poor hand and play it out much better than someone with a much better hand.  You are just more clever or smart or thoughtful & industrious.

Anyway.

Rather than discussing Life in general I want to use this quote to talk about business. Because, frankly, business is very rarely a matter of holding good cards, but rather of playing a poor hand well. If you are worth even half a shit in business you can play a good hand <and, in fact, you learn to not waste a good hand>, but if you are worth even half a shit in business you also know you very <very> rarely get a good hand.

Pretty much every hand you get dealt is flawed in some way and, in fact, often it is a poor hand.

Almost every successful person I know has been dealt some bad cards in their business lifetime. Sometimes some really bad cards. Cards you simply want to toss off to the side in disgust. But you don’t toss them. You keep them in your hand and think about what the fuck you can do with them. These people figure out how to take those cards and use them to put together a victory. They don’t give up when others thought their hand was unwinnable. They found ways to use those cards for the benefit and growth of the business.

They owned the hand and figured out how to win. By the way, that is business in a nutshell.

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“We are all dealt a hand and we have to decide how to play it.”

Voltaire

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We all go through things in our business life that we don’t always like.

Things that we have no control over.

Things that others have in place that we have to deal with <and can’t change>.

Things that put us in a place and position we can’t change.

All that said.

You can’t fold.

We have to play the hand that we were dealt. You have to choose progress over waiting for ‘the perfect hand’ <which – sorry to say – does not exist> or even waiting around for a better hand to be dealt.

I am writing this because while I have found many business people use great cards to increase the chance to win the hand I have also seen that it doesn’t really guarantee them a victory.

In fact <part 1>, more often than not, having a less than desirable hand doesn’t mean you automatically lose. There are other factors that go into winning <or finding some success>.

In fact <part 2>, I would suggest that more often than not, a less than desirable hand wins.

The best business people know you don’t get to trade cards with anyone else or pay extra to upgrade your hand so they work the hand they have as well as it can be played.

Look.

Each of us is dealt a hand when we come into work every day. I say that because it is important to remember most of the circumstances around you are out of your control, you don’t decide what circumstances you walk into every day and it does no good to complain about them or expect that they will determine your success.

That said.

<1> Many people think that a great hand, good circumstances, will guarantee their success <and increase the likelihood of happiness>.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

<2> Others will use their less than desirable circumstances as a crutch for why they don’t succeed. They take a look at the hand they were dealt and fold immediately.

They are foolish.

The hand you were dealt cannot be changed, but the way you play it can.

When you go through shit as we all do we all also have the choice how that ‘hand you were dealt’ is played … and inevitably you will do what you believe is best.

Or the best of the worst choices.

Or making the worst best.

Regardless.

You are simply doing what you think it right. And you know what?

In retrospect, if you line up all the choices you made, it will be difficult to see how some of the choices in the left hand column are right … if some of the ones in the right hand column are right. Why? Because you played the cards you had <which were imperfect in the first place>.

But you don’t get to do it over. Part of growing up in business is simply learning to live with regrets and choices made. In an odd way business is a little different than Life in this whole ‘play the cards you have been dealt’ thing.

You will actually find that business is made up of mostly bad choices. Or maybe better said … making the best of the less than best choices. All you really try and do is to keep your balance between them.

In addition … you will actually find that in business, versus Life, is every hand … even if it is bad … even really bad … still has the potential to be a winning hand. And because it is business … as we view the hands we are dealt … I imagine we seek some learning from the past. In other words … you will want to look at some past hands and examine how others have played them.

<note 1: often we do this to some absurd levels>

<note 2: this is sometimes called “procrastination” or “avoiding making the decision”>

Well.

Don’t waste your time.

Fundamental business human behavior doesn’t change over time. You can explore the functional and/or ethical choices <because people inevitably do get affected by how you play your hand> made by others in the past … and we often want to super-examine those made in the most extreme circumstances … but I cannot envision they were any more or less capable to deal with the situations than we are. You can go backwards and judge their decisions and you can be criticize … or applaud … their decisions.

But inevitably the questions lurking behind all that you examine is … what if it had been you? What would you have done in their shoes in that moment?

That’s it. Not their learning, but rather what you would do with those cards in that circumstance. And you know what? I do not need to go backwards in time to figure out what I would do now. Frankly, I will not be any more comfortable knowing that I am doing something that someone else did in the past or something different than someone else did in the past, I have to seek comfort in my decision and my choice.

In the end.

In business … in life … you play the cards you are dealt the best you can. No excuses.You just play ‘em.

And you know what? You will get deal another hand and you play that one the best you can. And maybe that is what this quote tries to tell us.

The last hand doesn’t affect the current cards you hold in hand. And it shouldn’t affect the way you play the next hand. And you certainly don’t get judged by how you played the last hand in the cards you are dealt. People may look at you differently but the cards make no judgment.

They simply get dealt. And you play ‘em.

In the end.

As stated earlier, in business you are more likely than not simply making the best of bad, or less than optimal, choices, therefore, business is pretty much all about playing poor hands well. Ponder that.

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p style=”text-align: center;”>Originally posted in 2012