Is Good Behavior Boring?

August 25th, 2010
"school"

School is In

You can feel school in the air. This is the week to prepare for teachers and we just waved goodbye to a group of amazing students who will be manning and womaning one of the main dorms at the University of Pennsylvania.

These dorm leaders were at the Country Place Retreat for the week end to get to know each other and talk about what is expected of them. They spent much time in the great room discussing campus issues. They played volleyball, had a campfire, and ate really great food.

Nothing out of control happened. No scenes from a reality show showed up. They talked, walked, played, and learned. Not much to write about. So, why am I writing about something that was peaceful and positive.

Different from a group we had here eighteen months ago who were about the same age as these college students. The other group thought the great room was a hockey field, that food fights were acceptable, and cleaning up after them was a sign of weakness. That other group cost us a fortune in repairs and new carpet.

Both groups traveled the hour and a half from Philadelphia. Yet, they were words apart. Both groups also had teachers with them to facilitate the program. So, what was the difference?

I’m going to take an educated guess. Now, group two will remain anonymous; just know they were mentors to students in the city. Maybe the Penn group is more future-oriented, more academic. Is that what could make the difference? That may be one part.

 Here is another thought to ponder. Pendulums swing from one side to the other. We have just come out of a time of “mean girls/boys” to the max. We are just finishing with the Lindsay Lohan drama and now that she is in rehab it is really quiet. I think that in these past eighteen months the tide has begun to change.

At some point all the cursing, bad behavior, and silliness of reality television starts to get old. We become hungry to hear about those who are making a positive difference. We become hungry to make a positive difference.

Like this saying:  “When wallowing in a vat of hot fudge one cries out for a piece of celery”; maybe, just maybe we are moving into a time where the Snookie’s of the world can drink their tequila and no one will care. Let’s hear it for those who are helping to make this planet a better place and don’t need to be applauded for every move.

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Leadership Dilemmas: When to Remain Silent

August 23rd, 2010
"communication"

Silence

Are you aware of the Target troubles? I mean at this excellent company where no one wanted to talk about a contribution made to the Republican candidate who is anti-gay? It had become a brooding, just under the boil point for many of the employees who felt this was not the right thing to do, Yet the silence, as they say, was deafening.

UNTIL…..someone from human resources spoke up. She asked for private time to say a variation of “What were you thinking?”

I say “good and right action!”

All too often there is this in-between land that we are unsure and uncomfortable traversing. Is it our business? Should we speak up? Will it cost me my job? What are the proper boundaries?

I say “those who remain silent are guilty too.”

Last night there was an interview about BP and the spill. It was not a witch hunt looking for scapegoats; it was a thoughtful discussion on CBS’s “60 Minutes”. Please go to their site for the full story. For me it was the sadness that if everyone had been willing to speak out, to say the Emperor has no clothes there may be a different story to tell that does not cause harm to human and animal life.

I say “when in doubt speak out”.

One of our clients recently had an ugly situation where an employee quit and claimed the place of her employ to be a “hostile work environment”. When the situation was researched, it turned out that she had crossed ethical boundaries. Different from the HR person at Target, she was a destructive force who told people she had the “inside track” and would warn them they might be fired (not true) or the company could not make payroll (not true).

It is now all in the open. However, several valued employees were hurt from the lies and sought work elsewhere.  It took time to dig for the truth and over and over the comments were “I did not feel I had the right to go to corporate, after all she was covering our backs”.

I say, “the truth shall set you free”! Never, never let someone keep you from  searching for the truth and speaking out, not easy to do, yet, it does make a major difference.

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Leadership Connections

August 18th, 2010

It’s always fun to find interesting people via the web. I just returned from San Francisco to check my morning emails and this delightful message was waiting for me. TED talks are a way for all of us to learn from each other. The founder of TED, Richard Saul Wurman graciously endorsed my book “Don’t Bring It to Work” and it is amazing to see how his idea for a think tank of creative people has spread word wide.

Thank you Alan for sending this to me and now I am pleased to send it to my readers. Enjoy.  

I recently discovered your blog, and I have become a frequent reader. My name is Alan with Bestcollegesonline.com and we recently published an article “12 Essential TED Talks for Writers” that dovetails well with your audience. Perhaps you would be interested in sharing with them? Here’s the link to the article if you would like to take a quick look for yourself: (http://www.bestcollegesonline.com/blog/2010/08/17/12-essential-ted-talks-for-writers/).

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My Boss, My Brother, My Goodness

August 17th, 2010

One of my coaching clients recently got a much wanted promotion. He was so beyond excited he felt like he was walking on air, for, oh for about a week.

"business communication"Then he called and said “What did I do?” Actually he used much more colorful language than that. He had gotten onto the most kick-ass team in the company, the place where new ideas magically become products in the blink of an eye, or so he thought.

Yet, at the same time he was promoted, so was another man who was now his boss. When he called to tell me his balloon was deflated and he was now dragging around on the ground, he was feeling bewildered. In only one week he saw his boss make blunder after blunder.

Everyone still seemed so upbeat and raring to go. Yet, he watched this guy make stupid decisions that would cause long range malfunctions if not corrected. He was in dismay. He felt like the kid who called out that the emperor had no clothes.

He talked to a few of his new colleagues. They did not get the same vibes; in fact they began to steer clear of him, not wanting to start issues with the new boss. My coaching client was in the midst of a real, bonafide dilemma: stay and shut up or get out fast.

Except that’s not so easy in a new job. There is a need to give it a chance. And yet, and yet, he was so sure this guy would continue to mess up he did not think he could participate in the fall of the department.

STOP. Could there be other forces at work? That is the direction I took this client and it paid off with a big bonus. Here is what you can learn from a situation when you are over the top in emotions. First, see if what you are experiencing is coming from the past or from the present situation.

In my client’s case he was both right and wrong about his new boss. Right that the guy was making some bad decisions, one’s fortunately that could be rectified and would not cause the downfall of the team. It was his inexperience and his own need to prove that was getting in the way.

My client had other areas to explore and learn from, those from the far away past of a childhood with an older brother who seemed to have that proverbial dark cloud over his head at all times.

Once he began to see that his deeper dismay was that he would have to clean up mess after mess, the way he did for his brother from the time he was a small kid, the panic and disappointment began to dissipate.

Fast forward three months. Projects were going smoothly and these two men literally bumped into each other in the cafeteria, sat down for coffee and for some unknown reason began to talk about the early weeks on the new job.

The boss talked about how nervous he had been, not sure he was really ready for the plum promotion yet not wanting to turn it down. He admitted he made some really dumb moves. That opened the conversation for my client to share how he had been ambivalent about the route to the future until he realized he had been battling windmills from old relationships. No need to go into details, just stating that the past had impacted his perspective was enough.

Now, here is the best part. This work relationship and my client’s revelations about how he still resented and mistrusted his brother led him to have a long overdue conversation with the brother, a physics professor at a prestigious university. It took several visits for them to “clear the past to free the present.”

Brothers finally became friends. And that, as he told me,  was worth all the angst at work.

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Leadership, Creativity and Getting Unstuck

August 9th, 2010

Did you ever see something unique and wish you had been that clever? Like rollers on suitcases or Q-tips to clean ears?

"stuck"How come others are so smart with novel ways to use common everyday products and you just see them for what they are and nothing else? Remember as a kid a wastebasket was for trash and also a drum, a step stool, even a hat?

When there is so much workplace stress and workplace conflict we tend to put up our shields and see the world through very narrow filters. We forget to take the time to have fun with creating. We are too busy producing.

So, take a few minutes today and just create. I promise it will help you see every situation today from more than just one perspective. That is a good thing. Pick an object, any object will do and just take five minutes to play.

Ready? You know what a table looks like. They come in all sizes and have many uses. Okay, get a piece of paper and as fast as you can write down at least fifteen uses for a table, any table. Did you say it could be used for a bed? How about as a sled? Could it be painted and used as a sign? You could write on it and it becomes a big book? Keep going. Get outrageous. Hey, I’m only talking about a five minute brain break to give you a new perspective when you get back to your work at hand.

Let’s face it. We need to train our brains to think differently or we become super stuck in old patterns. Know that when stress hits the hot button we all revert to old patterns of behavior, old ways of thinking that limit creativity.

In “Don’t Bring it to Work” I talk about behavior patterns that were there for survival and security. There is so much more to life than just being safe. There is adventure and risk. There is the adrenalin rush of learning something and seeing the world with new eyes.

All leadership development programs need to have a module on pattern breaking. In “Total Leadership Connections“, session four is dedicated to collaboration and brain training. After all the hard work to observe and understand where ingrained patterns developed it is time to transform them into fabulous and rewarding “aha” moments.

Here is one technique that will help you clear your mind and move from old patterns to new thinking. Grab a piece of paper and write down everything that is bothering you right now, that is distracting you from pure open concentration.

What is getting in the way of solving your present problems or coming up with new ways to solve old annoyances? Write and write fast. Make the fastest list you can. What is worrying you or making you angry? Who is disappointing you? Who do you think you are disappointing? Don’t solve just observe.

Now take the paper, roll it into a ball or tear it into pieces. Throw it away. Get up, get a drink of water. Sit down again and be surprised at how quickly you can make old patterns that are filled with knots (like cannot, will not, not capable, not good enough) begin to loosen and eventually disappear.

Great, you are on your way to being in charge of changing your mind. Once the knots, (the nots) are untied your ideas will flow. Have a fun day and let me know what new ideas you are bringing into play.

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Components of Leadership

August 4th, 2010

"leadership"Dissecting the various components of leadership keeps many an academic and blogger busy for years and years. It is such a fascinating subject. Do we really know what the right blend is for extraordinary leadership? We keep writing, reading and analyzing. The following article gives a great perspective to discuss. Think about those you have worked with who you see as exemplary leaders. What are the attributes that make you believe in them? For me, it is the willingness to be a truth seeker and a truth teller. It is one who is willing to look and re-look and be accountable when situations backfire. The rest of leadership, charisma, intellectual brilliance, great wit, are all window dressing. Give me someone who is willing to “own” his or her part of a situation, that is someone I will trust and be willing to follow.

On Leadership: BP, Dell, Wall Street –where have the corporate heros gone??

Amy M. Wilkinson is a senior fellow at Harvard University’s Center for Business and Government and a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

Somehow America has forgotten that our vibrant economy, the mass majority of our jobs, and the products we use every day are a result of strong business leadership.

When was the last time you went to the grocery store to find fresh fruit, sliced turkey, toilet paper or deodorant? The CEOs of Safeway, Giant, Whole Foods and many other retailers enable our lives.

Yes, there are leaders who have violated our trust and profoundly mismanaged their organizations. Yet, the vast majority of CEOs create jobs for more than 80 percent of America’s workers. In recent years, Google has created 22,000 jobs and put information at our fingertips. Apple has revolutionized music players and cellphones and irrevocably changed the way we interact with technology. Intel has built a computer chip that is 1,000 times as powerful, 100,000 times smaller and 1 million times cheaper than that of MIT’s mainframe in 1965.

We don’t think to thank the CEO of Waste Management when trash disappears from our curbs, but 20 million households across North America rely on the company.

So where are corporate heroes? They are working quietly among us.

John Baldoni is a leadership consultant, coach and regular contributor to the Harvard Business Review online.

In December 1995, Fortune conducted an interview with two titans of American business who defined those heady times: high growth, high return and high rewards; Jack Welch of General Electric and Roberto Goizueta of Coca-Cola.

Both became CEOs in 1981 when their companies were underperforming. Welch transformed GE into a sleek juggernaut that dominated market segments from jet engines and locomotives to finance. Goizueta shook up the culture to focus more on the customer and in the process increased Coke’s market capitalization more than 30-fold.

Neither had it easy. In their Fortune interview, Welch said he was always “scared” that GE would not be nimble enough. Goizueta confided he slept like a baby: “I wake up every two hours and cry.”

This gets to the heart of leadership. Leadership, like character, is what you do when the choices are hard. When things are booming, it can be fun to grow the business, introducing new products and services, hiring new employees and reaping strong profit. Tough times mean facilities closings, layoffs and bearish earnings.

Savvy leaders prepare for tough times always. They delegate leadership to the front lines. This not only makes for greater engagement because people feel more in control of their jobs, it is great preparation for tough times like ours. So when I am asked where all the leaders have gone, I say nowhere. What has changed is the depiction of them as heroes.

Erika James is the Bank of America associate research professor of business administration at the University of Virginia’s Darden School.

The outrageous acts of indiscretion and impropriety that we witnessed throughout much of this decade are inexcusable. But just as it is inappropriate to say that those CEOs were merely heroes who fell from grace, it is equally inappropriate to suggest that the men and women who are admirably leading corporations are heroes. They are not. Rather, they are humans who have a big job, and who, in order to do that job well, need and deserve the support of their leadership team, their board, their family, and a host of other stakeholders. They do not need to be put on a pedestal.

Todd Henshaw, a professor at Columbia University, is academic director of Wharton Executive Education.

I’m sitting on Omaha Beach conducting a “recon” of the sites my colleague and I will use as a classroom for the next few days with a group from Wharton MBA for Executives.

As I walked around, I thought to myself how impossible this mission must have seemed before the assault, and how many times the campaign must have been in doubt when the outcome was in question. I marveled at how wide the beach is at low tide. I walked the cliff’s edge at Pointe du Hoc and thought about the men scaling the 100 feet under machine gun fire. I saw the remains of the artificial port envisioned and built at Arromanches, an innovation that enabled the entire invasion.

“Corporate heroes?” It’s difficult for me to put those two words together. In Normandy, I saw the names of heroes inscribed in stone on monuments, but in most cases these men who changed the world are nameless, anonymous benefactors who gave Europe another shot at freedom. These are heroes.

How did these men prepare themselves for the almost impossible mission? How did they overcome the fear of death? How did their leaders help them understand what was being asked and required of them? How did they have the confidence to overcome the wide beaches, high cliffs, enemy fire, the inevitable doubt that emerges when men are thrown into chaos?

I have no idea why we would ever use the term “hero” to refer to a corporate executive.

Sir Andrew Likierman is dean of London Business School. He is also non-executive chairman of the National Audit Office and a non-executive director of Barclays Bank.

When asked about the quality he wanted most in his generals, Napoleon replied, “Luck.” On this score Tony Hayward would not have got a job with Napoleon. Of course it could be argued that he failed to rise to the PR challenge, but the roots of the blowout problem were sown long ago when safety standards were set. Michael Dell, on the other hand, has been much more the master of his own destiny. And if you name a company after yourself, you’re creating quite some expectations about your own personal performance and behavior.

The common thread that binds Hayward and Dell together is that both their companies have long been the subject of admiration and emulation. That makes their fall from grace even more galling to the rest of us. If we can’t even trust the people we are emulating, what does that say about our own judgment?

But the mistake is ours, aided and abetted by the press. Individuals are put on pedestals, giving rise to unreasonable expectations, only to be cast down when things go wrong. We need to be careful about what we expect, and learn from the mistakes of leaders as well as from their heroics.

So where have all the heroes gone? The same way as the heroes before them. Those who have the spotlight of publicity and fame come and go. We should look and learn, while reminding ourselves that uncritical admiration is probably best avoided after the age of 5.

Warren Bennis is professor of business at the University of Southern California.

Just about every decade I write a heated screed mimicking the ’60s flower song wondering where all the “leaders have gone.”

My latest attempt was in 2002 when Enron and Ken Lay were making headlines. I started with a long-forgotten Kipling poem:

But I’d shut my eyes in the sentry-box.

So I didn’t see nothin’ wrong.

The gist of my ‘02 piece can be stated simply, and its thesis is, if not identical, then remarkably similar to the BP disaster. Ken Lay’s failing was not simply his myopia or cupidity or incompetence. It was his inability to create a company culture open to reality, one that discourages workers from delivering bad news — just like Tony Hayward, who didn’t want to hear the concerns of the oil drillers marooned on that catastrophic rig, Deepwater Horizon.

How can an organization be honest with the public if it is not honest with itself? I asked. I do not believe that the CEOs of today are any worse or better than they were, let’s say, a hundred years ago. It’s just that the stakes are higher and more of us are affected by the dominance of a free-market economy.

The question remains: Will our corporate heroes or villains of the future learn from the sentries who didn’t see nothin’ wrong?

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7 Leadership Traits

August 3rd, 2010

"Leadership Traits"This is an excellent article that really does discuss what goes on when leaders lead. There is too much travel and it is not super much fun anymore, unless you have the private company jet, and that is really no longer viable in this green world. Then the food, seductive and loaded with carbs and sugar, yikes! Then we get to where the rubber meets the road, in relationships.

Leadership development programs need to spend more time getting future C-Suiters ready to handle the office politics that comes with the territory. I have spent my career researching and studying the importance of how to sniff out the behavior patterns that limit successful teams and companies and you can take the pattern aware quiz at www.sylvialafair.com to get ahead of the “gotcha game” and have your career soar. Enjoy this well written article.

BNET: 7 Leadership Traits that the Gurus Don’t Tell You

By: Jo Owen

Most leadership gurus tell you half the truth, at best, about what it takes to be a leader.

They will tell you about the need for vision, handling people, dealing with crises and all the other good stuff that makes up the corporate speaking circuit. Here are seven vital qualities you are less likely to hear them talk about:

  1. Sleeping on planes and dealing with jet lag. In any large organisation, a leader will spend a large amount of time on planes: I did 250,000 miles a year. The routine was simple: one glass of champagne and one melatonin pill forty minutes before take off, and I would be able to sleep all the way. Business class is not for fancy meals and watching movies: it is for work or sleep.
  2. Working in vehicles. If you can not work in taxis and cars, you will waste more time than you can afford. Staring out of the window mindlessly is not good.
  3. Dieting. Leaders are surrounded by biscuits, cookies and other corporate death food; and then there are the inevitable lunches, dinners and hotel breakfasts. Either learn to love the fruit, or start jogging. Or die early as an obese alcoholic. But to this day, some firms demand that you put your liver on the line: if you do not drink and entertain, you fail. Pick your diet to fit your firm.
  4. Ruthless time management: queues were invented to let leaders catch up with emails and phone calls; ditch or delegate everything you can; fix appointments around your diary, not around other people’s.
  5. Work the politics. Find the right assignments, right support and right mentors. Set expectations well. Negotiate budgets hard. Wake up to the reality of corporate life.
  6. Be  ambitious, for your organisation and yourself. Stretch yourself and your team to achieve more than ever; keep on learning and growing. Don’t accept excuses, don’t be a victim: take responsibility.
  7. Learn to speak well. To small groups, to individuals and to large groups. As one tribal elder told me: “Words are like gods: words create whole new world’s in someone’s head. So use words well.” For many people, having a tooth extracted is less daunting than speaking in public. But it is a skill anyone can develop, with practice, over the years. And leaders must have this skill.

These seven qualities add up to a person who is pretty driven: they are often not comfortable people to be with. Not surprisingly, many people prefer to keep their humanity and their life than make the sacrifices to get to the top.
 
When I first started out, my boss told me: “one of the benefits of this job is that you will never suffer the rush hour. You will arrive before it and leave after it.” And if you keep that lifestyle going for ten to twenty years, you can reach the top. It was not a good choice, but at least it was a clear choice.
 
Choose well.

 

My Comment:

All so true! Eating my way around the world was a fun yet pound addictive adventure. Air travel, well it was also fun before 9-11, now more of a burden even in the front of a plane. The most critical trait on the list for success is #5; learning to really work the politics. I believe this separates the long term winners from the short term high flyers. Politics at work is really understanding how relationship systems operate and how to help everyone, direct reports, colleagues, the boss or the board, find a way to dialogue past the invisible barriers we all have to telling deeper truths and establishing safe, trusting relationships. This is vital leadership work that rests in the realms of psychology, sociology and neuro-science. Then #7 comes into play and using language for the betterment of the whole makes one a beloved and respected leader.

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Leadership Dilemmas: Do We Really Have to Meet?

August 2nd, 2010

"Conference Room"It is time we put meetings in their proper place. Instead of dreading them we can use them as one of the best growth opportunities at work. Why? Because they are replications of what we lived with as kids and the patterns of behavior we still need to harness show up front and center at meetings.

Here are some examples: super achiever kids will always talk and talk proving how great they are; martyrs will spend their air time discussing how hard they work and how they have to take on everyone else’s burdens; pleasers will shout out “Yes I can” even though they really mean “no, that’s impossible“; and avoiders will keep looking at their watches for that special moment when they inform the team they have another meeting they almost forgot about and “see you later.”

Enjoy the article and my response.

How to Run a Meeting: Don’t Show Up

          by: Margaret Heffernan

Ask CEOs what they spend most time doing and the answer is always the same: attending meetings. Then ask how much time they devote to improving their meeting skills and you’ll get blank looks. We spend most of our time on an activity we were never trained for.

What happens in most meetings? The most senior person — who usually called the meeting — sits at the head of a table. Others drift in. If you’re lucky, you start only 5 or 10 minutes late. The issue, problem or question is identified, and then the ritual begins. Just like some people at school always sat in the front row, some in meetings always speak first — and there will always be the laggards who wait to see how the wind is blowing. And then there are what psychologists call the ‘social loafers’ — the individuals who always turn up and contribute nothing. For half an hour or more, a vast amount of second-guessing occurs, as everyone gropes for the answer that will receive the leader’s blessing.

What’s wrong with this picture? Well, first of all, meetings are expensive. If 6 people are 10 minutes late, the firm’s lost an hour of productive labor. Then, there’s rarely much conflict (a topic for a later post). The range of options proposed tends to be pretty narrow (brainstorming is bedeviled by conformity) and everyone leaves less energetic than they arrived. But the biggest problem of all is the boss, the person who called the meeting. Because his or her presence alone encourages everyone to compete for attention and approval. Whether we like it or not, leaders set an invisible agenda which implicitly curtails thought and exploration.

I’ve seen two relatively successful attempts at combating this. Donna Shirley, who ran NASA’s only successful mission to Mars, always made a point of not sitting at the head of the table. She wanted to be part of the team, not its focal point. Her highly collaborative style was controversial within NASA — but it worked.

If anyone’s more impressive than Shirley, it may be Mona Eliassen, CEO of the Eliassen Group. Eliassen doesn’t chair her own meetings; she gets a facilitator or someone else in the business to do it. Monthly and quarterly management meetings are run by someone from outside the company who has no power to make the final decision; that’s left up to the team. But more often, because she suffers from chronic fatigue syndrome, she doesn’t turn up at all. She has devoted years to developing her leadership team, and she expects them to be able to find solutions that secure everyone’s support.

One of the mistakes I see leaders make most often (and that I know I’ve been guilty of) is to underestimate the power of one’s own presence. This has nothing to do with charisma. If you’re the most senior person in the room, people will defer to you, and that usually means they’ll think less. So if you have a very hard problem to solve, call a meeting — and don’t turn up. You may be dazzled by the results.

 

My Response:

Meetings, the black hole of the business world can be turned into highly productive time if…..everyone is taught how to think in terms of systems. Once we become familiar with the fact that we all play powerful and important roles in meetings they take on the hue of living theater; we are the actors, directors, porducers. In “Don’t Bring It to Work” the dynamics of systems thinking is explored and the behavior patterns we learned in our original organization, the family are discussed. Once we realize that what went on at the dinner table when we were kids is not that different than what goes on at the business meeting table we can begin to observe, understand, and transform our patterns and meetings can be shorter, less contentious, and filled with creative energy.

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MSNBC: BP CEO, Tony Hayward

July 30th, 2010
Villian Pattern

Hayward

When the going gets tough the tough do not go yachting! This article recapping (interesting use of the word!) what Tony Hayward said in the Wall Street Journal article shows a perfect example of a victim pattern of behavior. While the situation is dreadful, Hayward was unable to give us any faith that he was truly at the helm. Leadership development programs really need to put in modules that prepare a future CEO for looking at internal resources for creative and powerful leading through dark times.

BP CEO: I became a villain…

Tony Hayward, who resigned as chief executive of BP in the wake of the Gulf oil spill, has said that he was turned into “a villain for doing the right thing.”

In his first interview since deciding to step down, Hayward told the Wall Street Journal that he did everything possibleafter the Deepwater Horizon exploded, by taking responsibility for the spill and spending billions on the clean-up operation and efforts to stop the leak.

The newspaper said he was unrepentant about BP’s response to the spill and that he resented criticism from the Obama administration, although he also admitted that he “understood their frustration.”

“I became a villain for doing the right thing,” Hayward said in the interview. “But I understand that people find it easier to vilify an individual more than a company.

“I didn’t want to leave BP, because I love the company,” he added. “Because I love the company, I must leave BP.

“In America, the road back will be long but I believe achievable when the whole truth of the accident finally emerges and the Gulf Coast is restored. BP can rebuild faster in America without Tony Hayward as its CEO,” he continued.

Hayward, 53, also told the paper that some comments he had made — which earned him a reputation for being gaffe-prone — were “wrong,” particularly his infamous “I’d like my life back.”

However, some critics remained unimpressed.

“Mr. Hayward should be less concerned about his vindication, and more concerned about what BP will do to end the victimization of families and businesses in the Gulf,” Rep. Edward Markey told the Journal. “It will take years of continued commitment to the restoration of the Gulf before BP has the legitimacy to engage in historical revisionism.”

Richard Charter, senior policy adviser for maritime programs at conservation group Defenders of Wildlife, added: “No one in his right mind would characterize BP’s effort as successful.”

 

My Response to Article:

The true test of a leader comes when everything down and dirty hits the fan. In this respect Tony Hayward gets a failing grade. In the Wall Street Journal interview he sadly sounds like a victim, claiming he was turned into “a villain for doing the right thing“.

He misses the point totally. It was his “wimpy” manner of response that disappointed all of us watching oil fill up our beautiful ocean. The pattern of “victim” runs deep and victim responses are always laden with hand wringing and poor-me statements. In “Don’t Bring It to Work” the victim who grows and shows stamina transforms into the explorer; one who goes beyond the obvious to find innovative solutions, or at least sets the stage for these solutions to show up.

It is too soon to know all the details about how this messy accident was really handled. In the meantime we have seen yet again a well paid CEO crumble when the going is tough ; when the requirement is for personal strength and superb accountability.

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Washington Post: Stupidity is the Name of the Game

July 29th, 2010

It really is time for all of us to come together and say “it will stop with me” . In this Op-Ed E.J. Dionne Jr. points in the right direction stating that “stupid politics, irrational ideas on fiscal policy and an antiquated political structure undermine our power”. Then there are tons of comments that show how stuck we are. There is so much blame and polarization it is no wonder we can’t come together. Think about where you dig in your heels to prove your position in life is the right one without really listening to other perspectives. Think about the patterns you need to transform, and then get to work!  

 

In American Politics, Stupidity is the Name of the Game

By: E.J. Dionne, Jr.

Can a nation remain a superpower if its internal politics are incorrigibly stupid?

Start with taxes. In every other serious democracy, conservative political parties feel at least some obligation to match their tax policies with their spending plans. David Cameron, the new Conservative prime minister in Britain, is a leading example.

He recently offered a rather brutal budget that includes severe cutbacks. I have doubts about some of them, but at least Cameron cared enough about reducing his country’s deficit that alongside the cuts he also proposed an increase in the value-added tax, from 17.5 percent to 20 percent. Imagine: a fiscal conservative who really is a fiscal conservative.

That could never happen here because the fairy tale of supply-side economics insists that taxes are always too high, especially on the rich.

This is why Democrats will be fools if they don’t try to turn the Republicans’ refusal to raise taxes on families earning more than $250,000 a year into an election issue. If Democrats go into a headlong retreat on this, they will have no standing to govern.

The simple truth is that the wealthy in the United States — the people who have made almost all the income gains in recent years — are undertaxed compared with everyone else.

Consider two reports from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. One, issued last month, highlighted findings from the Congressional Budget Office showing that “the gaps in after-tax income between the richest 1 percent of Americans and the middle and poorest fifths of the country more than tripled between 1979 and 2007.”

The other, from February, used Internal Revenue Service data to show that the effective federal income tax rate for the 400 taxpayers with the very highest incomes declined by nearly half in just over a decade, even as their pre-tax incomes have grown five times larger.

The study found that the top 400 households “paid 16.6 percent of their income in federal individual income taxes in 2007, down from 30 percent in 1995.” We are talking here about truly rich people. Using 2007 dollars, it took an adjusted gross income of at least $35 million to make the top 400 in 1992, and $139 million in 2007.

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The notion that when we are fighting two wars, we’re not supposed to consider raising taxes on such Americans is one sign of a country that’s no longer serious. Why do so few foreign policy hawks acknowledge that if they lack the gumption to ask taxpayers to finance the projection of American military power, we won’t be able to project it in the long run?

And if we are unwilling to have a full-scale debate over whether nation-building abroad is getting in the way of nation-building at home, we will accomplish neither.

Our discussion of the economic stimulus is another symptom of political irrationality. It’s entirely true that the $787 billion recovery package passed last year was not big enough to keep unemployment from rising above 9 percent.

But this is not actually an argument against the stimulus. On the contrary, studies showing that the stimulus created or saved as many as 3 million jobs are very hard to refute. It’s much easier to pretend that all this money was wasted, although the evidence is overwhelming that we should have stimulated more.

Then there’s the structure of our government. Does any other democracy have a powerful legislative branch as undemocratic as the U.S. Senate?

When our republic was created, the population ratio between the largest and smallest state was 13 to 1. Now, it’s 68 to 1. Because of the abuse of the filibuster, 41 senators representing less than 11 percent of the nation’s population can, in principle, block action supported by 59 senators representing more than 89 percent of our population. And you wonder why it’s so hard to get anything done in Washington?

I’m a chronic optimist about America. But we are letting stupid politics, irrational ideas on fiscal policy and an antiquated political structure undermine our power.

We need a new conservatism in our country that is worthy of the name. We need liberals willing to speak out on the threat our daft politics poses to our influence in the world. We need moderates who do more than stick their fingers in the wind to calculate the halfway point between two political poles.

And, yes, we need to reform a Senate that has become an embarrassment to our democratic claims.

ejdionne@washpost.com

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