Alan Weiss's The Uncomfortable Truth®: Recent Episodes
Alan Weiss
Alan Weiss's The Uncomfortable Truth® is a weekly broadcast from “The Rock Star of Consulting,” Alan Weiss, who holds forth with his best (and often most contrarian) ideas about society, culture, business, and personal growth. His 60+ books in 12 languages, and his travels to, and work in, 50 countries contribute to a fascinating and often belief-challenging 20 minutes that might just change your next 20 years.
no weekend retreat. It's as simple as this:•Identify what you love doing and are great at•Determine how best to market and monetize it•Rejoice in the courage of your talentYou don't need the Wizard to give you courage, as he did for the lion in The Wizard of Oz. Because what the Wizard actually did was to show the lion the courage and talent already resident in his heart and soul.Find yours.Alan Weiss is a global, award-winning consultant, coach, speaker, and author—with 57 books, and 16 additional editions in 15 languages. He's the only non-journalist in history to have received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Press Institute, a Fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants, and an inductee in the National Speakers Association Hall of Fame®. His newest book is The Courage of Your Talent (Taylor and Francis, 2026). Advance purchases: amazon.com/Courage-You-Talent-Self-Esteem-Constantly/ebook-dp/B0GXRNT7DY
SHOW NOTES:The Bishop of Fall River, MA, told me an interesting story recently in Nantucket. It seems he was present during a memorial service held in a huge airplane hangar for families who lost loved ones in a terrible airplane crash off the coast.People were grieving and forming small groups to offer each other consolation. There was even some laughter among the tears as they exchanged stories about loved ones. Clergy from varying faiths, along with psychologists were there to provide clinical help.One woman among the hundreds was notable because she was weeping uncontrollably, not staying with any groups, but going from one to another.Finally, a priest took her aside and asked if he could help. Listen to the podcast to hear what she said and think about her reply.
so that they want you around. If your brand is strong, they want to brag about being a part of it. Just ask Bentley.
SHOW NOTES:Do we have toxic workplaces or toxic employees who make workplaces harmful and unhealthy?Are we terminally entitled?I found that there was no safety net for me, being born and raised in a poor family. I mean damaged furniture, stained rugs, bill collectors on the phone.When I was being beaten up by the neighborhood tough guy, my father, leaning out the window, told me to fight my way out of it. Many years later a therapist told me that was my father's bad, not mine. Whatever.So I learned to be smart to stay out of fights, to get along with teachers right through grad school. They looked kindly on me as not being a troublemaker and gave me the benefit of the doubt when I was. I was never looking for a safety net below, I was looking for another handhold above. I free-climbed the El Capitan of life. When I was fired, I got angry, not distraught, and determined to be my own boss and to own, not be employed. I realized that my life was my responsibility. I was happy later to support both my kids (no college debt) and our parents (no rent, medical bills taken care of, assisted living provided). I was the safety net, and happy to be one.Let's stop bitching and moaning and demanding that everyone else change because our every little requirement is not being met. Life IS unfair, so deal with it. We're entitled to an equal starting line and level playing field, but not to an equal finish. That's determined by talent and discipline and accountability.Even if you successfully blame someone else, you haven't improved your condition. And you're probably not going to receive the help you need. If I've found one thing to be true in 40 years of consulting and coaching, it's that you can't help anyone who doesn't want to be truly helped, as opposed to just receiving a handout.If you're not willing to help yourself, why should anyone else try to help you?
You'll always receive one of these after every Uber trip, along with the tip suggestion.I'm told that Uber drivers rate their customers, as well, and those customers who have given low ratings aren't responded to as rapidly as those who've given high ratings. I don't know if that's true, but I would suspect it is.Please don't rate this podcast. But then again, no one is asking you to do so.
just adds talk, not insight. Gender reveals are nonsense and now the trend of mass wedding party dancing as an opening to the ceremony is as boring as running into the same caterer at every fundraising event.You can be married underwater with a jellyfish band for all I care, it doesn't make your love for each other any different in my mind, though it doesn't affect my impression of you self-absorption. Try for quality, not quantity, and certainly not volume.
the past attempts as a metric of current success, the more you're prone to fall short.No one has ever sung the Star Spangled Banner better than Whitney Houston, so stop trying to create a canonical version, and just sing the song. Tom Brady wasn't trying to be better than Joe Montana or Johnny Unitas, just the best quarterback he could be.Picasso was just trying to be Picasso.They're wondering why attendance is down when a train ticket was $15 is now $150 to get to the Meadowlands in New Jersey from Penn Station in Manhattan, and it can cost as much as $175 to park at Gillette Stadium on Foxboro, MA for the World Cup (where it's $50 for Patriot game).The road to excess had a lot of potholes.
tuning and the rapid development of the Italian concerto style. Together, these innovations allowed him to achieve his legendary harmonic complexity and contrapuntal mastery. But the talent was already there.Houdini created incredible illusions and escapes using hidden keys, sleight of hand, mirrors, and secret hatched. But the design and the implementation were due to his talent.Focus on your talent, not technology. A microphone can enhance volume but won't help you to naturally sing on key. Superb skis and advance waxes can help your skiing speed and control, but are no replacement for quick reflexes and physical stamina.Technology, whether AI or a remote control, can enhance your abilities and success, but they can't replace your judgment and native talent, unless you try to allow them to, which will only atrophy your unique abilities.
He pulled a couple of sheets from his jacket and condemned fascism, racism, misogyny, colonialism, stolen lands, and it seemed also mosquitos and loud noises. It never ended. Fortunately, it was the exception on a stage where the mixed media affect used to predominate.Moreover, no one seems to care anymore. The group on The View, a notoriously liberal and polarizing television cast, embraced Kamala Harris physically and intellectually when she visited them while running for president. And look what happened to her.So ignore the otherwise notable figures who are stepping out of their field of expertise and/or talent. They're just richer, they ain't smarter.
SHOW NOTES:We’ve lost trust in major institutions: universities, medicine, journalism, the law, politicians, religion. (The recent rise in Catholic converts and church attendance is not due to any great marketing by the church, but rather due to a desperate need for a source of faith by many.)We tend to see AI as a magic bullet that will help us out of our uncertainly, lack of success, confusion, and sense of loneliness.Yet AI is the product of humans and has the notorious imperfections that one would expect. My GPS, spell check, computer, and other technology has glitches and errors. They are far from perfect.What we truly need is self-belief, confidence in our own judgment. We need to stop seeking the judgment of others, of others’ metrics, of others approval, and of validation for our tentative decisions.This combination of a loss of trust in ourselves and an overhyped AI by an industry seeking to make trillions is a perfect storm.Resist it. Develop faith in yourself. It doesn’t matter what happens to you in most cases, what matters is what you do about it.
SHOW NOTES:At a restaurant, I’m asked if I have food allergies when I make the reservation, then by the hostess when I arrive, then by the server who has my table. While I appreciate all the precautions, I think they’re afraid of being sued. Isn’t it the responsibility of someone with a serious food allergy who’s make the decision to dine in a restaurant to inform people themselves? The Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills, a wonderful place, actually has a sign informing its guests that the china, which has artful designs and craftsman ship, has potential cancer-causing agents in the art work. Since these are decorative “chargers” and not used for food, a guest would have to chew on the gold leaf to ingest anything remotely dangerous.People complain that prospects are constantly “ghosting” them and it’s an epidemic of rude behavior. Well, the commonality is the person ghosted, so perhaps they aren’t offering sufficient interest of value to justify a return call and that prospect doesn’t want to waste still more time by having to tell them that. When you think others are uniformly acting improperly, it’s usually you.Do you really need to tell us “do not try this at home” when a commercial shows a driver spinning in circles at high speed or a daredevil leaping from a low-flying plane into a convertible? What about when we see an elephant stand on a pool cover to show its strength? Should I cancel the elephant rental?When you’re a medical or dental assistant and inform people they may not wear fragrances in the office because you have a fragrance allergy, perhaps you should consider not working in crowded spaces. How to do you survive in a plane, train, taxi, or elevator? If you feel your rights have been violated because you hear employees talking politics with which you do not agree while you’re waiting in an office, you’re correct. You have the right to leave, which you’re not exercising.
SHOW NOTES:Wherein Alan shares his views of exotic car density, cab maneuvers, High Tea, American advantages in admiring the Royals, and the lies and deception around priority luggage.
SHOW NOTES:“No worries” doesn’t mean “you’re welcome” it means “You didn’t bother me all that much.”“Perfect” doesn’t mean “thank you” it means “You got that right and didn’t waste still more of my time.”“You guys” is terribly inappropriate if the people addressed are not entirely “guys,” and is most misused by women, especially women in the media.“February” and “library” each have two “r’s” in them, or the first is not a month and the second is some kind of fibbing fruit on a vine.These usages are all square pegs attempting to fill round holes, and they’re battered by people who just can’t pass the test.“No worries,” you guys weren’t “perfect.”
SHOW NOTES:The fallacy is that you should be prepared to “spring” in a sales call to “pitch” the sale, like a cheetah on the Serengeti chasing an eland. Well, cheetahs can only maintain high speed for a limited duration, and they’re only successful getting a meal one time in ten (as are all predators).One time in ten is not sufficient for a successful career.We need to empty our heads, and not allow our minds to be crammed with facts, figures, “closing” language, and one-upmanship comments. To “stay in the moment,” which we’re constantly told, we need to listen and watch, not talk and pontificate. The sales “pitch” was already ineffective in the 1950s, but even today you hear about the elevator pitch or the airplane pitch from people who don’t have a clue and cannot sell a thing (which means they’re on Linkedin).Follow my lead. Empty your mind to stay in the moment. And it may just become your moment of glory. The eland is caught, your family is fed, nine times out of ten.
SHOW NOTES:The following guest column by Randy Gage is an excerpt from his new book, Wealth Without Apology, which is being released this week, and which will be the subject of my conversation with him on my podcast this Thursday: Alan Weiss's The uncomfortable TruthMagnitude of Scale: Why Thinking Bigger Pays Better I’m currently conducting a comprehensive, groundbreaking, rigorous, cross-sectional, peer-reviewed, gold-standard, double-blind, placebo-controlled, first-of-its-kind, breakthrough, scientific research study. The purpose of the study is to test the following hypothesis:In today’s environment, it is easier to become a billionaire than a millionaire. This premise may not be as cheeky as it sounds. As I told you earlier, it’s surprisingly easier to earn a large amount of money quickly than it is to earn a small amount of money over a longer period. This is due in large part to a dynamic I call the “Magnitude of Scale Effect.” Put simply…The more bold, audacious, and breathtaking an endeavor is—the greater the likelihood it will attract the people and resources necessary to bring it into existence. Think about this: Airbnb went from two guys renting air mattresses to a $100 billion IPO faster than millions of entrepreneurs ever manage to reach six figures.Why is it easier to sell a Lamborghini Veneno than a Ford Escape? The person who buys a Ford likely must plan far ahead, budget tightly, weigh sacrifices, and hopefully get approved for credit to drive home their new wheels. The person who buys a Lambo understands the concept of value-for-value exchange, has no creditworthiness issues, and brings in enough discretionary income to make the purchase an easy decision. Even an impulse one.If you want to join me on my crusade to make the world more prosperous, it begins by increasing the level of your own prosperity. And the most important part of that process is expanding the window through which you see the world. I use shoes as the analogy for how this process worked with me. Initially my dream was to be able to afford a pair of luxurious Bally loafers, which cost around $200 back then. Younger readers may be shocked to discover we didn’t always live in a world where sneaker drops were a thing! My siblings and I had two pairs of shoes: dress shoes (cheap leather or, more often, plastic) which we wore to school, to church, on holidays, etc., and tennis shoes for gym and after school.By the time I grew up and had entered the business world, having three or four pairs of shoes meant you were extremely rich. In fact, I knew a few guys who had black shoes for dark suits and brown shoes they could wear with a green or tan suit. I even saw Elvis on television once wearing blue suede shoes!Next thing you know, I’m a twenty-something hard-charger who wants to be a business tycoon like Bobby Ewing on Dallas and Blake Carrington on Dynasty,and I heard about the aforementioned Bally loafers. (Which were voted by the readers of Robb Report magazine as the most comfortable shoes in the world.) Since $200 was what I paid to buy my used car from the post office government auction, you can imagine what a daunting, almost impossible goal this was for me.But manifest those suckers I did.Had my mother learned at that time that I spent $200 on a pair of shoes, she would have slapped me into next week. But the spell was broken…I learned there was another world reality out there, and that it was possible for a kid from Allied Drive in Madison, Wisconsin, to own nice things. Once I started rocking those Ballys—the window I saw the world through started expanding.© 2026 Randy Gage You can reach him at RandyGage.com....Read more on the blog here: https://alanweiss.com/randy-gage-2/
SHOW NOTES:The airlines’ major frequent flyer programs began with American Airlines back in 1981 (thought Texas International Airlines had one in 1979). Everyone quickly followed. Travelers fell in love because they were earning free trips without paying anything extra for the ticket. You may feel the travelers were and are silly. Well, the average major airline today has a liability of about $7-10 billion if these points were all cashed in. Although there are attempts to squelch this with blackout periods and restricted seats available, this is none the less a very real monster under the bed. However, many people never cash them in or they the points may expire. Airlines and hotels figure the points won’t all be used. This is called “breakage,” believe it or not, and it’s the monster-slayer.Another example of this is the US Postal Service, which prints about $14 billion in postage stamps each year. But it’s estimated that over half of this amount is never used for postage because it goes into collections so there’s no attendant labor involved. I provide “unlimited access” to me for my top clients, both corporate and individual. That seems like it can’t be fulfilled, and many people ask how I can do it. It’s simple, virtually no one abuses the privilege. In fact, many people apologize for “bothering me” or ask if they can have an appointment. One year I had 36 corporate clients, and these days I have hundreds of these top echelon clients globally. They call when there’s a need and, since they’re so successful, the needs are relatively few and reasonable. This is my monster multiplier. Even successful solo consultants don’t generally offer this, and I’m probably the most approachable and reachable person at my level in the world.Use your airline points. Collect stamps if you like. But provide unlimited access. Then go sit on the beach.
You don't have to agree with someone else politically, but to simply ignore them and disappear is the nadir of intellectualism.Comics are supposed to be very bright. I guess there are clear exceptions.Joy Behar makes about $7 million a year to walk off the set whenever she likes. If you need to walk out because you can't deal with people intellectually, then STAY OUT.
SHOW NOTES:• Two great American novels: Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged.• She championed “objectivism” and individual accomplishment.• It’s not subtle, and it’s not modest. It’s a full-throated defense of reason, individualism, and self-interest—often misunderstood because people hear “selfishness” and stop listening.• Today we have “soak the rich” and “tax the rich” and “occupy Wall Street” and people defending Luigi Mangione who killed an insurance executive on the streets in New York.• I don’t think a company needs a Jim Anderson of Coherent making $100 million as CEO. I do think that any founder of a company deserves whatever money he or she can make. • We’ve moved from a society that prized innovation and initiative and the wealth that ensues to one where entitlement is a prevailing belief. • Yet we idolize red carpet movie stars, athletes, and simply rich celebrities without discernable talents, like the Kardashians.• We find excuses not to succeed, such as “toxic workplaces” which, if they do exist, are probably caused by toxic employees who are not pulling their weight yet demanding more and more.• We blame the “boomers” as having taken everything and not replaced it, which is total hogwash. The boomers created jobs and entire industries.• I’ve always believed in “healthy selfishness,” meaning you can’t help others (with money, time, ideas, coaching, emotional support, and so forth) unless you possess the resources that allow you to do so.• A great many people who take ultra-progressive stances, from Bernie Sanders to the women on “The View,” themselves are so wealthy that no amount of their espouse government taxation will seriously cause them discomfort.• Unless we reward creativity and jobs creation (along with star athletes and performers and “celebrities”) we won’t have the opportunity creation for everyone else.• Australia’s “tall poppy” vs. my Rolls Royce.• We need to take care of our homeless, and ill, and incapacitated, but not people who are able but unwilling to work. • States creating “millionaire taxes” are losing taxable citizens at an alarming rate. Massachusetts and along with them $4.2 billion in adjusted gross income.• You don’t eliminate poverty by creating more of it. I’m for a version of Ayn Rand’s healthy selfishness.
SHOW NOTES:• If you’re in love with golf, and especially hitting a ball into a bed sheet, I suggest you don’t listen to this.• Is watching multi-millionaires hit balls into a screen and then in a confined stadium with undulating greens really interesting? Is it really a sport? Are they really “athletes”?• Maybe the Americans should focus on trying to win a Ryder Cup out in the real world before trying to excel in a virtual world.• Are we ruining tennis, baseball, football with endless algorithms and technological toys while purging them of judgment?• Do you need a veteran sports manager to read computer output?• We’d never develop today a Ted Williams, Willie Mays, or Sandy Koufax.• I understand the weekend duffer who spends four hours with buddies and then goes for drinks and cigars. I don’t understand what’s so fascinating about watching millionaires, who have caddies and perfect courses, competing to make more millions when there’s such a strong factor of luck involved.
SHOW NOTES:Learn how to learn from ducks, geese, otters, herons, egrets, turtles, osprey, and fish.They're bolder than many of you. Of course, they have to eat to live, but so do you...
SHOW NOTES:Higher education is going extinct.Tuitions are sky high forcing parents to take out second mortgages or kids to mortgage their future by owing $300,000 to teach history in high school for $60,000.Brick and mortar is giving way to remote learning.Government is increasingly intervening in college admissions, curricula, and hiring.The Epstein and other sexual scandals are undermining (and ending the careers) of faculty and university officials. The president of Ohio State just resigned because it was revealed that he had a sexual liaison with a woman bidding to do business with the school. The next president will be the fourth in five years.Ideology rules the classroom among tenured professors who can't be fired short of committing arson.Today and tomorrow, competence is trumping credential. Harvard had to create A+ to differentiate among all the A's everyone automatically receives. Is that really a valid degree?Think twice before you go into hock to send your kid to college. Look around. This decision does not require a college degree.
SHOW NOTES:INMJ (It’s not my job.)Some people define their job as the absolute minimal effort to be expended and not be penalized. It’s about laziness, lousy attitudes, and low esteem.Some people define it as pleasing and delighting the customer. It’s about pride, resourcefulness, and helping the organization. I’ve just returned from an eye doctor who is magnificent and has a great personality. But her technical assistant is a drip, with no personality who never utters a word like “please” or “thank you.” I tolerate her only because the doctor is so good. There are no consequences for her dull personality.This is all a matter of choice and it can determine repeat business, referral business, or no business. I don’t like virtual assistants and other third-parties because there are rarely consequences to perform well and not to perform poorly. If you own a boutique firm, I suggest you test with your clients how they believe they’re treated when dealing with your employees, who may be pleasing around you but can be like dark clouds with everyone else.It’s your money.
jobs•The less on Downton Abbey•The doers vs. the administrators•Neither rain nor snow nor gloom of night•Blue is trumping white•AI isn't plowing your driveway•Maybe your daughter should marry a cowboy
SHOW NOTES:Alysa Liu won the woman's gold medal for figure skating a couple of days ago, our first in 24 years! Watching her and listening to her prior, during, and after her final performance (she was in third place at the time), she exhibited a carefree and total joy in her skating. It wasn't about competition or medals, it was about sheer delight. Scottie Shuffler is about sheer delight on the golf course (Tiger Woods was strictly about competition), Sinatra singing on stage, Helen Mirren acting, Zig Ziegler teaching sales skills, Phil Donahue hosting a talk show, Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner creating comedy.It's not about 10,000 hours, though some people may choose to invest those five years. It's about being unafraid of failing, using your own metrics for success, and refusing to bow to the external pressures of the moment.I have shelves of awards in the house. I didn't pursue any of them. I've pursued my passion, which is helping others succeed and prosper. Most rewards occur not when you're thinking about them, but when you're not thinking about them.
(illegally touching a stone after its initial release) in separate matches. Sweden's Oskar Eriksson initiated the allegation against Kennedy on Feb. 13, while officials flagged Homan on Feb. 14. Curling is basically the same as shuffleboard, which older people play in retirement villages, or bocce which specifically older Italian people play on dirt. Then there’s the cousin, English Lawn Bowls, which I’ve never been able to finish watching without falling asleep.Johnny Weir, the former Olympic figure skater and NBC commentator, is renowned for his highly, flamboyant, and gender-neutral fashion choices while broadcasting, often featuring makeup, jewelry, and avant-garde, designer clothing. He and Sarah Lapinsky are worth the time spent watching people jump around on ice. Yes, it is true that the Olympic Village at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games ran out of free condoms within the first three days, according to reports in La Stampa and The Guardian. Approximately 10,000 contraceptives for about 2,900 athletes were depleted quickly, prompting emergency restocking due to higher-than-expected demand. Now THAT’S the competitive spirit!
thing all wrong, where you can never fulfill your expectations. Here's a distinctly contrarian view.
SHOW NOTES:• Suddenly we have “toxic workplaces” (and need “psychological safety” and have “unhoused” people and “food insecure people).• We try to wallpaper over real problems with euphemisms and ideologically-biased language.• Can you have a “toxic workplace” without toxic employees? Chicken and egg?• On social media we see complete nonsense such as “52% of all workplaces are toxic,” which is preposterous and without any valid study.• Can we have so many successful businesses with such malicious management?• I’ve witnessed the opposite: Leadership doing its best to deal with underperforming and entitled employees.• The story of Burlington Industries and Bill Klopman.• If people want to do the job but don’t know how, they need skills training.• If people don’t want to do the job even if they do know how, they need coaching (attitude adjustment). If they still refuse to do it, they need firing.• It’s an entitled age, and people demand certain treatments and conditions that please them, but may not please others, and don’t help the business or its customers.• My work at the post office. • “Toxic” often means “I’m asked to do too much, to meet deadlines, to fulfill commitments.”• There are, of course, bad bosses, and hungry people and homeless people. Let’s not conflate the truly bad with those who are merely discontents.• I have to conclude here, I feel “food insecure” so I’m going out for lunch, which would make me, for the moment, “unhoused.”
SHOW NOTES:• Parents and kids were united in what was watched, experiences, and enjoyed in the early 50s. Gunsmoke, Soupy Sales, MASH, Bonanza, Sink the Bismark.• Then came Dick Clark and American Bandstand.• The 60s saw the Beatles, Sex/Drugs/Rock and Roll.• Viet Nam and campus occupations.• A man on the moon.• Assassinations of John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King.• Woodstock.• The Cuban Missile Crisis.• The Schism has evolved into polarization.• We don't trust each other anymore.• We feel entitled. (You can't give an activist enough, ever.)• What can unite? Comedy, trust, tolerance, art, forgiveness?• Unlike climate change, which is highly existential, this is immediate and grave. This is a threat that we need to handle now.• The alternative is chaos.
SHOW NOTES:• The point is to live with imperfection.• Free of mistakes, we’re free of critique and ridicule is false• Perfectionism leads to huge stress• It’s a fictitious expectation (dining, travel, relationships, etc.)• We think it protects us, but it ruins us• It’s based on the fear of being imperfect—and human!!• Engage in vulnerable conversations and actitivies• Accept results of a task that are “OK”• My wife’s formula for long-term marriages• Perfectionism assumes control you don’t have• Why I don’t guarantee my results• Strong esteem nullifies perfectionism• Self-compassion, the same sensitivity you’d offer others• My “therapy” of trains and models• Small “chunks” of change, not mammoth ones• At extremes we have OCD• Experience rather than orchestrate• Ironically, caused by not feeling worthy or good about yourself• The critical distinction between efficacy and self-worth
SHOW NOTES:• Defined as moral and mental qualities; strengths and reputation.• It’s a matter of self-worth, or esteem, of personal dignity.• Also a matter of our willingness to help others, to have an abundance and not a scarcity mentality.• It’s a quiet confidence, not braggadocio. • It’s legitimate and earned, not bogus or borrowed.• The lessons of the Ritz-Carlton.• It’s also with whom we choose to spend our time.• It’s refusing to cheat at golf but trying to cheat in football.• There is the issue of cause and not blame.• There is innate respect for others and not envy or acrimony.• You give back the mistaken, excess change.• Entire cultures can lack character.• The ongoing struggle of politicians to remain in power undermines character.• Yet this is an age of obfuscation, of mistrust, of deep fakes and phony news.• Thinking peoples with opposing views are somehow morally inferior is reflective of poor character.• Intolerance is an absence of character.• “Character” is also about occupying a role, being performative.• Are you real, or just playing a character in your own illusion of reality?
or GenX because they took advantage, they led great lives, and left nothing for us! Nothing but a healthier, safer world and the last decade of constantly improved living standards.I'm not valued! Maybe because you don't create much value and you don't make it visible.Take some accountability, and stop immersing yourself in the internet for that good old confirmation bias from other people who don't take initiative.If you're unhappy in your job, change it or leave it. There's plenty of work out there that pays well, isn't threatened by AI, but does require responsibility and ownership.But just stop whining, stop yelling for your Mama.It ain't your mother's fault.
SHOW NOTES:New Year celebrations date back 4,000 years to ancient Babylon, where the festival of Akitu marked the new year around the spring equinox with religious rituals, debt-paying promises (early resolutions), and kingly renewals. Early civilizations linked it to agricultural cycles, like Egyptians with the Nile's flood. The Roman calendar, shifted to January 1st by Julius Caesar, became the basis for our Gregorian calendar, solidifying the date, though many cultures still celebrate at different times (Chinese New Year, Rosh Hashanah). The Babylonians made promises to their gods during a 12-day Akitu festival (their new year in March) to repay debts and return borrowed items for good fortune, a practice later adopted and adapted by the Romans and evolving into today's personal goal-setting tradition for self-improvement and a fresh start.New Year's Eve celebrations became huge in Times Square starting in 1904, when The New York Times hosted a massive fireworks party for its new building, drawing 200,000 people; the iconic ball drop tradition began three years later in 1907, replacing fireworks and cementing the event as a beloved annual spectacle, as reported by The New York Times Company and Times Square. Make a single resolution, not scores which will not be realized and lead to disappointment and self-doubt. Start it now, today, not some future date. Don’t regret the past or dread the future. Live for today, every day. You can’t change the past and the future will here before you know it.And remember most, perhaps, that all of us deal with trauma and pain of varying types. Pain is inevitable in life, but suffering is voluntary. So mourn your loss, endure the pain, but stop suffering and enjoy the wonderful life of existence. It beats the hell out of the alternative.Happy New Year! (blow a horn)
SHOW NOTES:Two of the most popular Christmas Songs (aside from Mariah Carey’s cloying All I Want for Christmas Is You) are I’ll Be Home for Christmas (Kim Gannon, Walter Kent, Buck Ram) from 1943, introduced by Bing Crosby; and Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas (Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane) introduced by Judy Garland in 1943, also. Frank Sinatra later recorded the canonical version of each of them.The year 1943 was in the middle of World War II. These songs, unrealized by many who hear them today and unaware of the origins, are not sincere expressions of happiness of holidays spent together. They are lamentations, expressing a wish to return home to the safety and comforts and love of family. They were meant to represent the soldiers in the Pacific and in Europe who lived in horrible conditions, faced the possibility of death daily, were often ill, too cold, too hot, and too lonely.The lyrics such as “Christmas Eve will find me, where the love light gleams, I’ll be home for Christmas if only in my dreams,” and “We’ll all be together again if the fates allow, but until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow” (later “lightened” to “Hang the Brightest Star Upon the Highest Bough”) convey the intense nostalgia for better times.Think about that background as you consider Christmas this year. We still have soldiers away from home, in harm’s way, separated from their loved ones. We’re fortunate to have them, and we’re fortunate for our freedoms and liberty.Merry Christmas!
SHOW NOTES:We had left Vigil Mass on Saturday night where I helped serve Communion as a Eucharistic Minister. (I’ll be the lector next week.) We drove ten minutes to the restaurant for dinner and immediately heard of the shooting at Brown University. (And as I write this, a similar horror at Bondi Beach in Australia which was aimed at Jews celebrating the start of Hanukkah.) The streets, the classrooms, public gatherings—none is immune to the violence of the mentally ill, the racist, the anti-Semitic, the terrorists, the disaffected who merely seek to kill. Luigi Mangione, who killed United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson on a New York street, captured on camera, has pleaded not guilty, and some people have raised a fund for his defense. Do we kill the school principle if our child has failed a test? Do we murder the coach if our home team is terrible? (Gamblers are currently threatening athletes to underperform which will reward their betting.) Do we kill the event planner if the wedding is not to our liking, or the chef for a bad meal?In the US, our government representatives are cowardly in not taking action on a bipartisan level to remove the mentally ill from the streets and to enforce stricter gun control laws. (I easily remember all the Representatives and Senators immediately after 9/11 standing on the Capitol steps singing God Bless America together. I drove home cross-country from LA with a client, and we saw cities, bridges, and countrysides adorned with American flags.)I am not ever again providing funds or voting for anyone of any party who does not make these points a campaign pledge with a plan to implement. I know there are some of you who resent even a political taint to what I write here, but this is non-partisan, this is a call for freedom—the freedom from violence. We have a right to conduct productive lives and to live and raise our children in safety. When I was a child, poor and in an inner city, I could walk the streets alone, even at night, without fear and without my parents fearing for me. Early this morning, 15 minutes from Brown where I live, I considered taking my gun to walk the dogs in the dark patches of our own lighted backyard. (I didn’t. But I thought about it.)Some people object to “thoughts and prayers” as if they are of no value. I disagree. And I offer them to the families, to our communities, to all of us.Right now, at this moment, that’s all I have.
? We all need others. We need companionship, love, solace in defeat, and celebration in victory. Many of us have visited foreign lands, scuba dived, engaged in competitions, faced health issues, suffered trauma. Doing so alone makes defeat into cataclysm and victory into evanescence. It's healthy to be able to be effective and happy alone. But I doubt it's healthy to want to achieve that as some aspirational life goal. It takes accountability and sacrifice to be in any kind of relationship. Perhaps being alone isn't so much a goal and as escape.
in terms of performance, especially under pressure, people are becoming more afraid, more uncertain, as the turmoil and disruptive nature of our times continue and will not abate.
which are not sufficiently taught in schools nor recognized in workplaces.Hence, my highly successful career, and this podcast.
SHOW NOTES:I don’t want to give this away, suffice it to say it’s about panic vs. calm, and successful marriages vs. rocky ones.
SHOW NOTES:•Why do such a staggeringly large percentage fail?•They don't respond to inquiries when busy.•They tend to create prices based on wealth of buyer.•They don't show up, don't return calls, don't finish on time.•They don't bill in a timely manner, so cash flow is an issue.•They don't consider repairs and warranties for the buyer.•They tend to seek perfection rather than success.•They use shortcuts and blame others when they don't work.•They aren't proactive, only reactive.•They act as if their educated, wealthy customers are stupid.•They don't actively seek referrals.•They act as if the customer's ideas are absurd.Other than that, they're run wonderfully and their rate of failure is due to climate change.....
Despite the decline, athletes, celebrities, news anchors, and politicians receive obscene salaries, endorsements, and benefits. We seem to have lost our taste, misplaced our judgment. We're receiving pap and being told it's wagyu beef.You might find it easier to be getting around these days. But that might have nothing to do with quality or smarts, but rather just the direction in which society is heading.
which involve large, infrequent, and long-lasting transaction. Alan emphasized the importance of meeting senior clients, preparing thoroughly, and facing fears to succeed in high-stakes sales. Lisa highlighted how whale deals can create a defensible moat and increase business value. They agreed to collaborate further, producing articles, videos, and other content to help others implement a whale sales strategy.
SHOW NOTES:My tribute to one of the greatest historians in our history. This is the speech he made in 1995 when receiving the hugely prestigious National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He was also awarded two Pulitzer Prizes among dozens of other awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
SHOW NOTES:There was a song from the movie of the same name called The High and the Mighty, by Dimitri Tiomkin, nominated for an Oscar. It was about a trans-Pacific flight with critical engine problems and crew and passengers facing confrontations with death. It was probably the first of the major disaster films: 1954.We have the high and mighty today and they occupy.....Washington, DC: 2025, 70 years later.The Senators and Congressmen still get their salaries during a government shutdown. They go on "junkets," often with family, overseas. They don't stop at TSA.Many have served through generations of their constituents and they are shameless. They "gerrymander" openly, seeking unfair and wildly distorted districts to ensure local victories.They are hypocrites, with very weak people, such as Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, who screams for term limits on the Supreme Court but not the Senate. He gives more speeches on climate change than anyone else, but his wife is a marine biologist consultant, and the subject of an ethics complaint last year because of his lobbying for climate investments and her potential to benefit from them. Neither party has a statesman, as they've both had in the past, who can create civility and collaboration. They each want the sandbox solely for themselves and threaten to destroy it—shut it down—rather than compromise on where the toy cars should be place.Jasmine Crockett is one of the most foul-mouthed, profane people in any profession I've ever heard, and she's a Representative. She's an embarrassment whenever in the media.They think they're the High and Mighty, but they make that emperor without the clothes seem fully dressed.
SHOW NOTES:•The lessons of the newspaper woman.•The causes of toxic workplaces, more often than not.•The 90-minute wrench.•It's not your mother's fault.•Distress and eustress.•The key to peak performance.•It's about how you awaken, and I don't mean "woke."•Putting it to bed.
SHOW NOTES:•Never talk to people who can say "no" but can't say "yes."•Treat the buyer as a peer, not a superior.• Have a conversation, don't make a presentation.•Language controls discussion, which controls relationships, which controls business.•No one is shooting at you, get rid of your fears and weak ego.•Gain conceptual agreement.•Money and time are priorities, not resources.•There are three elements to every sale.•Play into the buyer's "story."•Four objection areas, only one is legitimate.•Don't give off "deal vibes."•Have a "min/max."•Always conclude with TDA.•Think of TDTC.•Never settle for "best practices."•Don't be intimidated, change the frame (we never hire consultants).•Provide options.•Learn from every interaction.
SHOW NOTES:If you're in favor of this stuff, listen carefully to the audio. You're driving on the wrong side of the road.•servant leadership•holacracy•one-minute management•management by wandering around •management by objectives• total quality management•360° feedback•self-directed teams•open office (hoteling)•open book management•reengineering•JIT (just-in-time)•lean•matrix management•theory Z •flat organizations•matrix management•six sigma•open book management
SHOW NOTES:•This is an almost subliminal technique to create normative pressure psychologically.•It's pointing out what others are doing, or not doing, or what events, prove your point.•It's the use of profound analogies.•Listen to my examples about Amtrack's infrastructure, or the fallacies around Kodak.•If pictures are worth a thousand words, social proof is worth a thousand pictures.•Learn who was more important, Brady or Belechick.• Understand how breaking the rules can save lives.•Understand why coach does not arrive at the same time that first class does.•Use these techniques for assurances and probabilities.•Use them to accelerate your conversations toward your goals.•But social proof demands that you be well-informed.To learn how to develop and use Social Proof, go to my website or read below:THE PROOF BEHIND SOCIAL PROOFHas anyone ever asked you, "Give me an example of your point?" and you suddenly forgot how to speak? Or have you said, "Let me give you an example...," and then immediately gone into brain freeze without any ice cream?"Social Proof" comprises pragmatic examples that others can readily relate to which reinforce your point instantly.When you "open the hood" on social proof, beneath is actually a psychological dynamic which creates normative pressure assuring that the actions of others are appropriate and should be imitated. A desire to "fit in" is created.While testimonials and endorsements are a type of social proof, they are not as powerful as citing a headline, a major incident, or a famous example. (One problem with quotations, for example, is that for each one there is an opposite, equally true: "Haste makes waste" but "He who hesitates is lost.")Many people use "false social proof." Kodak was not hiring chemists while digital photography was taking over. Their executives simply thought they could wring a couple of more years of already-projected profits and underestimated the speed of the digital takeover.Join me for 90 minutes and fill your conversations, narrative, and collateral with social proof that will build your brand and fill your bank account.People ask what research I invest in for my success. I don't. Then they ask what my investigative habits are. I don't have any. "So what DO you do?" They ask.I look around.LEARN HOW TO LOOK AROUND TO DOMINATE CONVERSATIONS AND CLOSE BUSINESS:October 14, 202510:30 to noon, US eastern timeVideo and Zoom notes includedFee: $350 until and including Sept. 30, $500 thereafter.REGISTER HERE: https://alanweiss.com/growth-experiences/the-proof-behind-social-proof/
SHOW NOTES:•We think the higher the value, the more we can charge.•However, at a given point, people believe they get what they pay for and those lines cross.•The point at which they cross means your brand is strong.•No one needs a Bentley for transportation, a Brioni for attire, a Bulgari to tell the time. But they assign great emotional value in their association and display.•The wrench story.•Many people made money during the pandemic and rough economic times by raising fees. It's easier, of course, to lower them, and to go out of business!•Mercedes made a mistake going "downscale," then failed to go "upscale" with the Maybach.•At the outset, raise value to raise fees. When your brand is powerful, change the order.
SHOW NOTES:•Do you know people who are loquacious, verbose, prolix?•Ask a "yes or no" question and they respond with opinions, history, and self-therapy.•Have you been to the Jersey Shore?Well, I did go once, as a child, but my parents really couldn't afford the vacation, and then when they could, they preferred Cape Cod. I haven't taken my children because my spouse thinks that "Jaws" was a documentary.•Why so much talk?-Articulating cognitive processes-Buying time-Believing it adds credibility and esteem-Just a bigmouth who loves to hear him/herself talk•Tell people what they need to know, not everything that you know.•Assume intelligent people will ask you questions if needed.•Don't be afraid to stop people from rambling:-What's your point?-What's your question?•Verbosity attempts to hide the point: politicians do it and it probably helped cost Kamala Harris the election.•It dilutes your real power, like planting the Mona Lisa in the midst of a much larger painting.•People forget the major points because they are drowned in minor points. She talked at length about needing ice cream, but I don't remember what flavors she said to avoid at all costs.•Lincoln's Gettysburg Address took about 2.5 minutes to deliver. Can you recall who else spoke that day for hours?•The US Constitution is a couple of pages. The rules of golf are over 600. Is it really easier to run the most successful and powerful democracy in history than to hit a ball with a stick?
SHOW NOTES:People want problems solved, even if you caused them!Learn how Katz's Deli and Mercedes Benz have turned problems into profits.Don't look for blame, look for opportunity.No one is as excited about an expected excellent experience as they are about a disappointing experience turned into an excellent experience.Customers tend to tell a huge number of people about their experiences, at their levels—peer-to-peer evangelism.This is why companies that make it their work to make themselves unreachable (welcome to government agencies) are so foolish.Perhaps, instead of saying, "The problem with you is...." you should be saying, "Let me help you do that even better."
SHOW NOTES:There are myriad claims on social media that are justified by the author observing (or being a self-proclaimed expert in) "body language." I have always thought this was ridiculous, sort of a faux psychological claim of expertise. Of course, the French have long studied graphology (handwriting) to determine behavioral traits (hard in a world forsaking cursive), and scapulimancy, the study of old, burned animal shoulder bones, has been used by various cultures to contact the gods."Body language" is a similar myth. You don't believe me, here's what Psychology Today has to say about it:"Every day, we get queries from around the world about non-verbals and invariably about detecting deception through body language. The biggest takeaway from the hundreds of messages is that despite the undeniable importance of nonverbal communication, many myths and false beliefs undermine its importance, relevance, or utility. So, we decided to pool our resources and comment on ten myths about body language that are currently trending, and you may notice some have been trending for a long time."https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/spycatcher/202207/debunking-body-language-mythsBut why trust me or science? After all, who knows what my body language looks like right now?
SHOW NOTES:•Let's stop the hypocrisy around this affair.•This goes on all over, government, business, education.•I've seen it, many people know the "secret."•The foolishness is the arrogance that you think it's a secret.•But the attempts at shadenfreude are ludicrous.•Who's pointing the finger? People who have cheated on exams, broken traffic laws, evaded taxes, blamed others for their corrupt behavior, lied on applications, snuck into events, bragged about things that never happened, and covered up things that did.•People reveling in the pain of two people who now have broken marriages and broken homes.•A man died a week ago with whose politics a woman on Facebook disagreed and said his death "made the word a better place."•What kind of sick behavior is that? It's low self-esteem.•We've all done things we're not proud of, and some of us are remorseful. That's what the confessional is for, or Yom Kippur, or your therapist, or a serious, soul-searching hike up a mountain.•If others learning of a transgression were able to learn from it, okay. But to use it sanctimoniously, to mount the high horse and seek the higher moral ground? That's just juvenile.•It was their fault (my disrespect is for the guy who is now suing Cold Play as if they did something wrong. They warned about the cameras and no one has the right to expect privacy at a public event).•My advice is to heed Jesus about those without sin casting the first stone. But of course we're supposed to value secularism today, not religion, not the admonishment to treat others as you'd like them to treat you.•Better pack a first aid kit, though, because that high horse can give you quite a nose bleed.
SHOW NOTES:•Why is Scottie Sheffler likely to become the greatest golfer ever?•Why is mental attitude the key to winning?•How some sports prompt more honesty than others.•Handling defeat and victory properly.•Not allowing a mistake to become a haunting obstacle.•Why Tiger Woods was overrated.•Even if you don't play the game you can learn from it.•Playing prudently to win.•Never "coming back to the pack."•Sheffler and Koufax and Sinatra.
SHOW NOTES:We strongly suggest you view the video of this conversation using this link: https://alanweiss.com/mercedes-and-anastasia/ Mercedes and Anastasia Korngut are two teen sisters, and co-founders of the company, Small Bits of Happiness. Their mission is to help individuals of all ages find more happiness in daily life. They have reached over four million teens and adults. As two teens, Mercedes and Anastasia understand firsthand the difficulties of teenage-hood, including not only the hormonal changes that tweens and teens undergo, but the added stressors of war, post-pandemic life, and beyond. The two have been featured on national news and media, spoken at schools and conventions across North America, host the podcast Hack Your Happiness, as well have designed a series of happiness-wellness products for tweens, teens, adults, and schools.
SHOW NOTES:One of the most corrupted words in the language recently is "unicorn," which is a mythical creature. "Mythical" means "not real."Yet all kinds of people have decided they are unicorns and, therefore, are unique, better than others, more valuable.Yet if so many people are appropriating the title, then are they really "unique"?Outstanding performers may be rare—in sports, business, entertainment, whatever—but they are not mythical, and they don't see themselves as mysterious creatures. In fact, highly successful people can tell you why they're successful. It's the unsuccessful people who insist they're somehow "unicorns."You know, narwhals also have single tusks sticking out of their heads. Or, mythically, you could call yourself a Sasquatch, or Yeti, or Loch Ness Monster. Or the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy.But enough with "unicorn." They are now a herd and none are differentiated.
SHOW NOTES:•We should avoid generations stereotyping.•We're really better off than we're led to believe.•Try living in Denmark or Iceland.•Magic bullets won't help.•Can a culture survive on gambling?•There is extreme unhappiness in the land.•It is exacerbated by the internet.•People would rather blame themselves, the boss, or the system rather than accept accountability.•Conspiracies and claims of catastrophes abound.•Self-absorption has become a pastime.•Selfishness has grown to not even wanting to have kids.•What I learned growing up having to challenges without safe havens and trigger warnings.•What I told my son.
SHOW NOTES:Here's just a part of the obituary of my friend and former subordinate, Francis X. McGuire from 2010:"...a unique man whose professional life began as a late night disc-jockey in New York City, led him to serve in the Kennedy White House, work for the ABC network (hiring Ted Koppel), to be on the ground floor side-by-side with Fred Smith during the Fed Ex start-up, and there with Colonel Sanders when he sold."In the mid- to late 70s he wound up working for me at a firm in Princeton, and even I didn't know what he was doing there, and our owner kept trying to fire him in cost-cutting fits, emerging from his office shouting, "Fire McGuire!" I forestalled that with quick thinking and fake assignments.I'm thinking of him now, because Fred Smith, with whom Frank was quite close, just passed away, which is notable because Smith is one of the greatest business leaders of my entire lifetime, in my assessment.So here's to Frank, whom I'm hoping Fred Smith is meeting again, because only God can tell what Frank is supposed to be doing.
SHOW NOTES:Fight, Flight, Fright, or Fall Down QuakingWe feel powerless in an age of volatility and disruption, of lack of trust in our institutions, and of polarization among those supposed to represent our best interests and not merely their own.Fight or flight has added fright to the equation, but it seems to me there's also the new option of hiding under the bed (fall down quaking). Whining has become a national past time, and we hear of "toxic bosses, poisonous workplaces, unfair demands, too little pay for too much work. And the anodyne solutions is "soak the rich, tax the wealthy, take back....well, whatever."Those experiments in Seattle and Portland, which were actually anarchic takeovers and the end of law and order didn't work out so well, did they? The Great City of San Francisco, where we lived for a glorious while in the 70s is not filthy and dangerous in many areas. The homeless often physically confront pedestrians.At least we don't hear "defund the police" so much anymore, since it's such a stupid concept. The homeless, the mentally ill, deserve and require empathy beyond a police response. But when the bad guys are trying to break the law, trying to steal, trying to create chaos, we need more police not fewer.In the long run this is about perceived powerlessness. We've lost faith and thereby feel alienated, which causes us to "drop out" (not vote) and the results are the greater influence of those with whom we don't agree, creating a greater sense of powerlessness and a "doom loop" exsistence.There are a lot of positive things going on in the country, and other things that well-meaning people would like to change. Fair enough, but that takes will power and relative fearlessness, not some kind of hibernation.At least we've stopped taking the names of the Founding Fathers, Lincoln and others off of public buildings. We're more concerned about gender and bathrooms today than we are with public welfare, quality education, and decency.Fortunately, the system is brilliant and survived, made to endure even when run by idiots from either party.
SHOW NOTES:° State of the art robots for pools.° Found two years ago in a high-end magazine.° Took a chance.° Outstanding results.° Second season, this year, one robot fails.° Company says to send it back, they'll send a replacement first.° True to their word, everything is good.° Chinese company, locally in Texas.° Two people ask to visit. ° Thought it was a scam.° Two Chinese people, one from China currently, visiting customers.° Bring me a gift.° We walk through my usage, they take photos (of course).° They question my use, show me an app and ask my reaction.° Expanding into more robotics, they ask for suggestions.° I point out pool levelers.° Would I be interested for my cars and house?° Encourage me to continue to ask questions by phone, offer ideas.The Uncomfortable Truth:1. I've never seen any other firm in any field go to this trouble, even my investment advisors (who did just take me to lunch).2. I cannot find any software or devices they left surreptitiously to undermine our way of life.
SHOW NOTES: Covid was a surprise, but not completely unexpected. Financial people were prepared for some "big event."The scientific, medical, and political responses were mixed, politicized, and hurtful.In retrospect, was it necessary to suspend schools and deny kids of years of learning and socialization; to prevent families from assembling for important occasions; to shut down businesses and drive some into bankruptcy; to endanger the arts, and see cultural activities stopped, sometimes permanently; to create increased sense of fear, isolation, and helplessness.Closings, suspensions, masks, distancing were clearly huge overreactions, and perhaps completely unnecessary. What IS clear is that the failure to create bipartisan approaches which found and promoted only the best and most reasonable reactions were not present, and not even sought. It was equivalent of social media and conspiracies and absurd opinions.And it encouraged fraud in claims made for financial assistance, circumvention of rules, disrespect for medical opinion. Billions were wasted, and cheats and crooks are still being arrested. This has contributed to a sense of powerlessness, of low self-worth, and of mistrust in the system. This is an age of low trust in government, journalism, entertainment, education, and religion.We need to create more trust in ourselves. We need to demand more, and we need to stop being content voting for the "least worst candidate."
SHOW NOTES:Why are politicians asking for support without revealing the party they represent? Because they're embarrassed or duplicitous, or both?Why don't they admit to errors their party has made, or they have made? "We shouldn't have supported this" or "I'm sorry I supported that."Why campaign as if fighting an enemy (the other party) instead of supporting their constituency?Why become a lacky to your party's demands rather than speak out against those with which and with whom you disagree?Why do you insult our intelligence by not providing a positive platform focused on what you can do, rather than merely against what the other side is doing?And how can you claim that you didn't know what you obviously did, and did know what you obviously didn't (or hid)?Why are politicians from states I don't care about with positions that don't affect me, strangers to me, expecting my money, and why are politicians selling each other lists within the party to gain access to potential contributors?It's because their affiliations to party are more important than obligations to us.
SHOW NOTES:There are jobs that many of us would prefer not to have and businesses we'd prefer not to own, but they provide valuable services. Someone has to run funeral parlors, cemeteries, cesspool cleaning, mold removal, and junkyards. Personally, I wouldn't like to pick up garbage, but we need the service or the rats would overwhelm us.Then there are jobs that I can't comprehend doing because of their impact on others. I knew a woman who incessantly pointed out that her husband was a doctor. I asked him once for a referral for a client who lived in the area, and he couldn't provide me one. I found out when we had dinner once, and I questioned him, that he sat at a desk all day approving and rejecting medical claims.Even with my excellent health insurance, I'm occasionally informed by a distant "claim administrator" that my claim wasn't covered or only partially covered. There's no coherent explanation, only the small print that some attorney, also sitting at a desk and who's never been inside a courtroom, has conjured up to protect the company which pays his or her salary.We do need some claims adjustors, for property insurance—houses and cars—for example, to protect against fraud and to serve the consumer, as well. But there are too many stories about medicines and procedures, to alleviate chronic suffering and even to save lives, that are denied on very arbitrary grounds, other than saving the insurer money.Remember when Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson sang about not letting your babies grow up to cowboys? Well, who on earth says to their kid, what guidance counselor suggests, what story of success supports, "My child, I can see with your skills and personally, you should go into health insurance claims adjusting! You'd be brilliant at it and I'm sure it would provide huge gratification!"Don't let your babies grow up to be insurance claims adjustors. If they display any such inclination, adjust them away from it.
SHOW NOTES:When I was teaching a graduate course as a "side hustle" for MBA and PhD candidates at the University of Rhode Island, I inherited a student who claimed he had ADHD and the "documentation was coming from health services." He also answered every question in class with a single word, "reengineering."I found out that he had pulled this con with the full-time faculty, and was in his final courses getting to his MBA. He told me he couldn't take "timed" tests. No worries, I told him, the midterm and the final were take-home essays and everyone had whatever time needed so long as they met the deadline. I gave them the questions 60 days ahead of the deadline. He never contributed anything else in class except that word, and I watched him easily banter with classmates, otherwise. He never turned in the midterm or final. I flunked him, unheard of in the graduate school where everyone received A's or B's or a rare C. He went ballistic and filed a complaint. My grade was upheld. The school's director told me, "You're like a utility player who came into the game and did things the starters never do."Post-script: After teaching two courses over five semesters in the evenings, I was not invited back, because (I was told confidentially) the student evaluations put me above the full-time faculty in quality of teaching and the faculty lobbied to have me removed.Another student who contributed brilliantly in class despite English being a second or third language (he was Indian) turned in a paper I required on an aspect of consulting. I found that he had copied, word-for-word, out of one of the assigned books for the course (not one of mine, but one I was obviously familiar with). I told him privately that I could have him expelled, but if he completed the assignment honestly and then did extra work I assigned him in the next two weeks, we'd get on with our lives.I felt he deserved the chance and I didn't want to end his current pursuit of the degree. He admitted what he had done and did an excelled job on the remainder of the assignment and class. I gave him a C.An obvious learning point for me was that doing something as an independent and for the joy of doing it enabled me to do things that those lobbying for careers, tenure, promotion, and popularity could never do, although my departure did help the rest of them lower the bar.
SHOW NOTES:The odds were better for the biggest longshot in the Kentucky Derby. An American has become Pope. It was said that no American could become Pope because the church wouldn't vest its power in someone with a Super Power. I would think, however, that there is no greater Super Power than God, so we shouldn't worry.Many people are pointing out that he spend twenty years in Peru so he's actually Peruvian. No, he's American, born here, but with a dual citizenship. Others, especially non-Catholics, panic when he's called a "missionary," thinking of the Colonialist/Imperialist times when the clergy were sent as missionaries to convert any non-Christian in sight. Today, missionary work is about caring for the poor, providing for the less fortunate, helping after natural disasters.The clergy as a whole are highly educated and learned men. There is no theological justification for a celibate, male clergy. Jesus never spoke of it, God never mentioned it. This was created by the church in the 12th Century because of the wealth of local churches passing on the priest's death to his wife. With celibacy, the wealth remained for the priest's successors and for the Vatican.For the record, about 4% of priests have been found guilty of sexual misconduct over the last 60 years of a total of about 3,500. Of 3,200,000 teachers over that period, between 11 and 14% were found guilty of sexual misconduct over the period (depending on the source you consult).Today, one of five humans is Catholic with varying degrees of commitment, and about 33% of humans are Christian. It's often occurred to me that the loudest atheists, such as the late Christopher Hitchens and the current Richard Dawkins, are "religious" in their attacks on religion!If you think about it, sooner or later everyone says a prayer when they are overcome with grief, or hope, or uncertainty.Let's give this new guy a chance. God knows, apparently, we need someone to bring us together in an angry world.
SHOW NOTES:•There was once a Readers Digest staple by this name, still available in summaries.•Here's mine. Keep in mind, when you critique someone who happens to be black, it's 'de rigueur' to announce, "I'm not a racist." Well, I'm announcing to you that I'm not a Trump supporter (and I'm also not a racist).•Years ago we thought about selling our home. Every realtor who showed me "comparable's" I turned away, because there was no comparable's to this home. It's a lifestyle, not a house. You judge it on that basis, not the neighbors.•People outside the US, especially in Europe, think that the US is simply like a European country, but much larger. (A client of mine in the EU, to whom I mentioned that Lichtenstein was the only European country I haven't visited, said, "Lichtenstein is in Europe?")•Trump is targeting some areas that need improvement, but where he should be using a scalpel he's using a flamethrower.•We cannot allow unregulated, illegal immigrants into the US. (Does an "undocumented immigrant" make a rioter an "undocumented shopper?") We cannot accommodate Latin America on our welfare system.•Dismantling the hundreds of millions of dollars, hundreds of thousands of organizations, and tens of thousands of people from the divisive DEI is productive.•Punishing—providing consequences—for universities which tolerate and even foster anti-Semitism and harm to Jewish students is an important consequence. "Hitler should have finished the job" is repugnant in moronic.•Taking the graft and waste out of social security and Medicare isn't ending it, it's saving money. (Do you know that billions were lost through corruption and criminality during Covid PPP payouts?)•It's interesting that when the US pulls out of an international aid group, the group usually has to close down, because no one else is supporting it sufficiently or intends to take over for us. •It's pretty clear a great many people seem to hate us in the US, and want us to fail, and enjoy using profanity hiding behind the internet to question our intelligence and wish us all the worst.•That's because they're envious of our freedoms, economy, and opportunities. It is self-hate directed outward. No country that declared neutrality in WWII should have any citizens voicing any critique of any country that fought they tyranny and oppression that threatened and killed so many. •There are no "comparable's" to the US, anywhere. If you want us to fail, give it your best shot, but you're on the wrong side of history and the future.•And some day, sooner or later, you're going to come around looking for our help again. You always do.
Show Notes:I knew kids in high school and college who cheated. They stole exams or looked at other people's answers or had someone else take tests for them. (Ironically, grammar school was far more honest!) My daughter had a friend whom she abandoned because of her chronic cheating and requests to help her out. She even cheated at sports unless the officials caught her.When you're successful, of course, you don't stop, and she tried cheating in college and got herself tossed out. I'd bet she's in a blue collar job today and stealing from her employer.People asked me to help them cheat and even offered money to me to write a paper or sit in such a way where they could see my answers. I never acquiesced, and there were two quite simple reasons. First, it makes it harder for all the honest kids to stand out, and second, I really don't want someone doing my taxes, or selling my house, or operating on an abscess who cheated to get to those positions.I remember a guy called in by auto shops who would "prove" that the car you wanted to trade in had been in an accident and repaired, hence lowering it's value. I assume he was one of the cheaters who was now making it his life's work. A doctor and bank board member cheated when he sold his house to us in Summit, New Jersey, by removing the lighting that would have shown a rusting furnace, then paying off the inspection guy to overlook it. So I turned down his bank for my loan.Chronic cheating is a disease, a personality disorder. Like smoking or certain drugs, which can addict you, cheating can dominate your life because, unfortunately, the more you get away with it, the more you think you're great at it, and the more you do it—until ultimately caught, sooner or later. You know all those college deans and politicians who, inexplicably, had lies on their current resumes and were cashiered? They had gotten away with it for so long that they began to believe it was the truth. "Yes, I went to Oxford, and yes, I was awarded a Silver Star."You know this Senator, Bob Menendez, convicted of fraud and political corruption (along with his wife). He pleaded for leniency in front of the judge and then walked a few yards over to the press and complained how unfair the judge was. I knew him when he was elected as a "reform" mayor at 20 in Union City, New Jersey.He exhibited then and since the same behaviors that have thrown him into jail now. The more powerful the person, the larger the lies.
Show Notes:•Quality diminishes as numbers increase.•As everyone joins in, fewer and fewer real authorities.•A guy doesn't publish directly, but is "presented" by others so you can't block his inanities. If you click on his site, there is a ridiculous training program hawked with absurd promises. He's a hustler. I block the people "presenting" him.•All those people with 17 "rules" for great leadership and charts for making decisions have never been a great leader or decision maker. If they were, why would they post this nonsense publicly. Can you see a leader with a chart or list in his pocket consulting it in the boardroom?•The there are the 'ad hominem' attacks, very popular on Facebook, where a person with an IQ 80 points lower than yours say simply, "That's a dumb question" or "You're clueless."•About 90% of the stuff that shows up on my X feed, which I don't want and never requested, is anti-Trump, often with ridiculous claim, false statistics, and posted by third parties but representing some random Democratic office holder. Have you ever considered that it's you and a terrible strategy and candidate, and not "them"?•Unscientific survey: Rabid Democrats are far more profane and obscene than Rabid Republicans. (I think profanity is the resort of the non-intellectual.)•There ARE some intellectual discussions on LinkedIn about politics, the environment, education, and so on. But they are usually interrupted and often ended by some wise ass who barges in with inanity.•One of my model train groups had to be ended because of political hostility (a train car had Trump written on the side).•There are also "cultists," for example with battleships of all things.•And then on Facebook, all the soft porn with usually Asian women in five-inch Laboutins and perfect legs. (Or so I'm told.)
SHOW NOTES:The threshold of rational behavior and values overcome by opposing normative pressures. The rioter's justification.The battlefield.The social media and "influencers."People who have low self-esteem and seek bias confirmation and approval.Fear begets fear, panic begets panic.The "drug" of the "magic bullet."Handholds when you're confused—they may be even more dangerous.Example: Are you trading or investing?Example: Have you looked at best case/worse case?Example: Have you considered probability and seriousness?The case of the quite successful "big lady."What's the empirical evidence and observed behavior?A friend is a friend, not an expert. The three kinds of empathy.
You can't deal with Hardly Relevant or Losing and Dying.You must be paid at least a deposit in advance.You must have "non-cancellable" under terms and conditions.You have to deal with a legitimate buyer. (I'm a buyer, I just don't have the budget.)The difference between budget and money.Don't argue over small matters and fall into the legal trap.Meet whomever is a stakeholder, especially in small businesses.Conceptual agreement ends with pouring concrete.Don't sacrifice and compromise personal issues.Don't give off "deal vibes".Always give options with value based fees.Always set DTA.Discuss outcomes not "deliverables".Create value with the buyer (that's how to increase fees).Never do a "pilot".Never do pro-bono for a for-profit.Never give a lower fee to sample your work.Do your homework.Act like a peer of the buyer.
While it's true that nonprofits often fail for lack of funding, there are reasons that they don't achieve funding or that they use it incorrectly and/or inappropriately. Here's my experience from eight boards, including chairing two of them:The boards are weak. They are made up of "names" who would seem to be significant, but who provide very little in terms of governance skills, strategic viewpoint, or even attendance.The executive director/CEO remains too long. The "shelf life" of these leaders is about seven years. After that, they stop serving the institution and the institution starts serving them. They create a tyrannical "fiefdom."No skin in the game. There must be a "give or get" minimum financial contribution from the board. They can't just play with "other people's money," and many granting foundations insist on such investment as a must for grants.They are not run as businesses. There is a budget to meet, strategic goals to achieve, the mission to be accomplished. They often approve budgets with illusory revenue sources, for example. They aren't professionally run. Just because you're a "volunteer" doesn't mean you have an excuse to be unprofessional. You need to meet accountabilities, show up, and do your job.Donors are not sufficiently romanced. Donors need to be "triaged" so that the highest donors receive the most recognition. One theater, in a fit of "woke" madness, actually put donors in alphabetical order in their playbill, so that no one knew who gave $5 or $50,000. That's just dumb marketing.They exhaust funds and credit lines with no idea of how to repay. Debit kills the arts in particular. There's no room to take risks or to contract for expensive rights. Politics overwhelm the value. It was just pointed out that every member of the board of National Public Radio, accused of being far too liberal and unfair in its reporting, is a Democrat. That wasn't an accident, and they're using public tax money.They default to tactics on the board, not strategy. Instead of talking about what to create to attract more patrons or donors, they discuss what meal to serve at the next fundraiser.Every organization is a business. You need customers/clients/members/audience/contributors. You need leadership and board members who know how to run a business and meet goals and financial requirements. Oh yeah: And you need term limits to remain contemporary and effective.
Uncertainty leads to poor choices. People seek certainty at the cost of their well-being. We have been "certain" about such horrors as eugenics and such trivialities as not swimming for an hour after eating.We've had brutal endings to cults, in Waco, in Jonestown, because conmen had convinced followers that they had certainty. We have polarization today because opposing politics or values cause adherent to be "certain" about their position and hold those who disagree as inferior. There are people taking invalid behavioral tests to dismiss others as having weak or defective profiles, and they are certain that they are superior to them. I remember when so many people had their feet burned trodding over hot coals that more EMTs had to be called. I guess their motivation wasn't sufficient—they were uncertain.BOTH science and religion try to create certainty around the mysteries of the universe, as if we could understand the unfathomable. (What do we mean there was "nothing" and then there was "something" which then "exploded"...??)In this age we need to live with and thrive on uncertainty. Solid companies such as GE suddenly crumble. Upsets in sports abound. We have gone from "global warming" to "climate change" to try to correct prior uncertainties.Can you be "certain" that your kids aren't using drugs or that your elected officials aren't stealing? I'm not calling for continual cynicism, but I am suggesting we have to live with uncertainty and be resilient and agile enough to deal with the failure of the "certain."These two astronauts who went to the space station for a week and nearly stayed for a lifetime are good examples of dealing with uncertainty. Of course, they have "the right stuff."
I'm a capitalist. Socialism and the rest simply favor the few at the top, from Lenin to Hitler to Castro. Yet we do have too high a level of poverty.In the face of this we are paying athletes tens of millions a year and hundreds of millions in contracts. Connor McGregor makes $180 million annually, Lionel Messi $130 million. Juan Soto, a good hitting but poor fielding right fielder has signed a $765 million contract with the New York Mets, which is about $60 million a year, more than a million dollars a week, and that's not counting endorsements, commercials, and other extra-curricular activities.Entertainers make a fortune: Dwayne Johnson (the Rock) $88 million, Ryan Reynolds $100 million, Kevin Hart $100 million, Tom Cruise often $100 per picture. I don't doubt their talent, but I do question the proportions.I've never believed that if you build one less aircraft carrier you could improve every school. Government doesn't use "pockets" of money. But I do suspect that most athletes and entertainers, proportionally, do not contribute to charities or their communities in greater percentages than average.The same, of course, applies to business executives. Elon Musk (Tesla): His compensation reached $1.403 billion in 2023. Alexander Karp (Palantir Technologies): He earned $1.099 billion in 2023. Hock E. Tan (Broadcom): He received $767 million in 2023. Brian Armstrong (Coinbase Global): He earned $680 million in 2023.I understand that these people bring fans into the athletic venues, into theaters and streaming services, and produce products and services that are needed. But unless you've founded a company, as did Fred Smith with FedEx, Steve Jobs with Apple, or Bill Gates with Microsoft, do you deserve $500 million when someone could lead it well for $50 million (or even $5 million)?And then again, Harvard, of the huge tuition of about $60,000 per semester, also has an endowment of $53 billion. That is not an error or misprint.Perhaps it's unfair to "blame" these people in any way, and the system has created a vibrant middle class over the years. As many of you do, I pay a large amount in taxes and I am highly philanthropic. But what of money to create an equal and high quality educational system? Or to create equal and high quality medical care for all citizens?There is something wrong here. I believe that none of us has the right to consume wealth or happiness without producing wealth and happiness for others. That's not socialism, not capitalism, that's humanity.
SHOW NOTESLet's stop using inaccurate terms, such as VITO (Very Important Top Officer) or "C-suite," which doesn't actually exist. Let's focus on real buyers. And that also calls for accuracy. A small business owner is a small business owner, not a CEO. That buyer has differing frames of reference and motivation from an executive in a large organization. Trust and credibility are reliant on understanding those distinctions.Titles are midleading. I've found a lot of vice presidents who can't buy, and a mid-level director who spent $250,000 with me every year for ten years.Budgets and money are two different things. A true buyer can move money from one budget to another, or create a new budget (especially important since a new client hasn't budgeted for you, someone the buyer didn't know prior, in advance).You need to convince the true buyer that moving money from an existing budget to you represents a far better ROI. If you can't do that, no one else is going to do it for you.No one is a buyer who doesn't control money with discretionary purchasing power. "I'm the buyer, but my boss has to approve," is absurd. Move on.The first sale is to yourself, the second to your client, the third for referrals, and the fourth to building that collection of income into an evergreen relationship.Always think of the fourth sale first.
Usually found on AM radio, sometimes TV infomercials, sometimes online ads. They involve an "authority" you've never heard of and an interlocutor you've never heard of who's as eager as a puppy, e.g., "Media personality Joe Shmo."The issue is weight loss, erectile disfunction, leg pain, backaches, congestion, hearing impairment, of any other popular problem. There are "studies" and the suggested approach has been "clinically proved." There are eager customers who evangelize. On TV it says in small print either "hired actor" or "actual patient who is compensated for the appearance."The sidekick asks all the "deep" questions (How long have you been investigating this?)" and provides all the deep responses (wow, hooooo, impressive!).Then there are the strange warnings and advisories required by the laws: may cause permanent hearing loss, narcolepsy, kneecap fracture, suicidal tendencies, and urge to commit arson. Do not take if you are allergic to the dug (how would you know?), if you're on drugs in the form of an oval white pill, if you live above 2,000 meters, or have lost your driving privileges in Nebraska, consult your physician first. On TV there are paragraphs of small print on the screen for 3 seconds.These are present, surpassed only by the obnoxious and slimy personal injury lawyers' ads, which cause you to want to shower immediately after, at huge cost, usually in the hundreds of thousands, sometimes in the millions. That means there's a huge buying potential. People want the magic bullet over the hard work. I had a client who continually asked me how she could make millions and not leave her home. Yet as silly as that is, it's also what a thousand people on social media promise every day.What is the diabetes drugs which also promise everything from weight loss to hair growth, from virility enhancement to clearer skin, had a longer-term adverse consequence?- I know what you're thinking: They're tested, there are laws, others are using them, the media approves, even some medical authorities and intermittently supportive or at least passive about them.-That's what you may be thinking. You know what I'm thinking: The treatment for morning sickness and insomnia, two serious medical issues. The answer was approved and utilized for a decade. It was called Thalidomide.And today, we actually have an issue with measles because some parents won't vaccinate their kids against it.One thing medicine in any form can't do is fix "stupid."
Radon is a radioactive gas that has no smell, colour or taste. Radon is produced from the natural radioactive decay of uranium, which is found in all rocks and soils. Radon can also be found in water. Radon escapes from the ground into the air, where it decays and produces further radioactive particles.Radon from soil gas is the main cause of radon problems. Sometimes radon enters the home through well water. In a small number of hones, the building materials can give off radon, too. However, building materials rarely cause radon problems by themselves.You can either hire a radon tester or purchase a radon test kit from a hardware store and do it yourself. However, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recommends hiring a qualified tester if you are buying or selling your home. A short-term radon testing kit measures radon for 2-90 days for quick results.Radon is a naturally occurring, colorless, odorless, radioactive gas. It can seep into homes and other buildings. You're at higher risk for developing lung cancer if you breathe in high levels of radon gas over time (over 4pCi/L or 148 Bq/m3). Tests can measure radon in your home. Mitigation effectively lowers radon to acceptable levels.For most people, the most likely place you're at risk of being exposed to radon is in your home. The U.S. Environment Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that 1 of every 15 American homes has radon levels above the recommended safety level.People who work in mines or caverns may also be at higher risk, depending on how many hours a day you're exposed to elevated radon levels. If you smoke and are also exposed to radon, it increases your risk even more.Radon levels are usually in higher in places that are:•Closer to the ground, such as basements or underground mines•Near soil that contains more radioactive metal•Poorly ventilated•Processing or storing certain products, such as phosphate fertilizers or uranium•Very tightly sealed•Very well-insulatedYou can also talk to your child's school about radon levels in school buildings and whether they've had testing. And the U.S. federal government has regulations about radon levels in workplaces. If you're concerned about radon levels where you work, talk to the company's safety officer, or contact the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
"I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore"This is a line from the 1976 movie Network. The line is spoken by Howard Beale, a character who is angry about the state of America.The executive vice president at a huge bank asked where I was from. "So you left that cesspool to move up here," he said. I said, "Why are so many of you so jealous of New York, is it an inferiority complex?" (This guy was later cashiered because of massive sexual harassment charges.)Then you have the passive-aggressive types: "I assume your daughter's school as her backup school"? "No, but you wouldn't know how good it is because your kids could never get in and you could never pay for it."My first Ferrari: "Look, you can't afford the insurance and she could never learn to drive it." Three Ferraris later, he put me into the first Bentley sports car for $150,000 to try to buy my good will. I've now had seven Bentley's.Stop taking crap from people. When the woman in the coffee shop was rude twice in a row, I told the owner, whom I've known since he opened up 20 years ago. "I'll take care of it," he said. She's all peaches and cream now.Prudence is required. I don't respond to poor driving. I don't want to encourage road rage. But I have taken movies of truck doing 40 on the main street, and a state bus tailgating at six feet behind cars. I received very thankful notes from the trucking company and the Rhode Island transit people. How will they know if no one tells them?I stop donating to causes that are poorly run, don't conduct quality events, and constantly berate me as if I'm an ATM. I hang up on every phone solicitation. The gym knows that when I'm there, if they can, they don't play rap music featuring the "N-word," or "mother F," or any other Fbomb, or calling women "bitches." That's not a matter of taste. It's revolting. Should they show porn videos on the wall, as well?I don't try to please other people's accounting departments and their affectations. They don't need a W2 from me, I'm a corporation. I don't send invoices for minor amounts. And I'm on them like the wrath of God if they owe me money past the due date.And speaking of God: Jesus said to turn the other cheek, but he never said to let them keep hitting you.
Show Notes:Consider two axes, one or importance (of a job, career, project,relationship) and the other of courtesy. Thus, we run from unimportant toimportant, and rude to polite on the two continua.If something is important and it is performed with courtesy andconsideration, it is effectively done. Consider the flight attendant ensuringthat seat belts are fastened or the server apologizing for a poorly preparedmeal and quicky replacing it.If something is relatively unimportant but politely done, it’s a graciousencounter. This might be the coffee shop worker delivering your order andthanking you for your business, or someone ahead of you holding a doorand smiling.When something is important but people are impolite you have a nastyindividual. I’ve met immigration officers who are simply surly anddisrespectful, and bank tellers who ask for identification from people theyalready know quite well.And when something is unimportant and people are rude, you havemalice—someone looking for trouble. These are people who shove youaside on the sidewalk or who are passive aggressive and try to undermineyou in a chat with others.It costs nothing to be polite, but it seem that a lot of people see it as too bigof an investment.
Lisa Miller is an expert and thought leader in efficiencies and effectiveness in health care, including how to sell in changing environments to health care executives (and avoid procurement, for example).In this rapid-fire conversation, we discuss the pros and cons of AI, the multitude of options, the projected shortage of physicians, the ability to obtain fast, comprehensive results, and much more.Can you see yourself in a "mini-Mayo Clinic" where machines evaluate, diagnose, and prescribe in one brief visit? Are you using the "portals" now available to quickly access test results and to confer rapidly with your physician without delayed visits and messages relayed through assistants?AI is proving to be fast and accurate with diagnoses, but it's incapable of hearing a random patient comment that might be more important for the patient's medical condition than the patient thinks, and that a doctor might well pick up immediately if present.When doctors are departing or changing their practices to escape confiscatory insurance premiums, will this "high tech" alleviate shortages or make them worse?If you're selling products and service to the health care market, you can't afford to miss this interview. (And for that matter, any market we discuss here the art of "warm introduction".)Lisa T. Miller, MHAWith over 33 years of unparalleled success in the healthcare sector, Lisa’s expertise in selling to the C-Suite and deep understanding of the market and her clients’ needs have driven over $200 million in sales.In August 2022, Lisa Miller’s company, VIE Healthcare Consulting, was acquired by Morgan Stanley Capital Partners, marking a significant milestone in her career and underscoring the immense value and impact of her work in cost optimization for the healthcare industry where she has helped hospitals and healthcare systems eliminate over $1 Billion in unnecessary costs.As founder and CEO of VIE Healthcare Consulting, Lisa perfected a sales framework that enabled her to sell successfully to the C-Suite. Using that framework, she closed multi-million dollar deals by helping her clients eliminate unnecessary costs, operate more efficiently, and provide exceptional patient care.Today, Lisa utilizes her sales strategy, C-Suite Selling, combined with deep industry knowledge, education- based selling, and innovative solutions to identify and articulate value propositions that resonate with healthcare executives. This approach builds credibility, addresses complex needs more effectively, and ultimately leads to higher-value contracts.Lisa’s career began with record-breaking performances as a top sales representative for CytoDiagnostics and Stryker Surgical, where she developed a profound understanding of sales as the engine behind business growth. These early accomplishments provided the foundation for her entrepreneurial success, instilling in her the strategic thinking and sales acumen that have become her trademarks.What sets Lisa apart in the competitive world of healthcare consulting is her ability to compete with industry giants and win. She has repeatedly outmaneuvered larger firms by leveraging her sales expertise, delivering superior results for her clients. This David-versus-Goliath success story is a testament to Lisa’s courage, sales tenacity, strategic thinking, and unparalleled understanding of healthcare organizations’ needs.Lisa’s success story is a powerful testament to the critical role of sales skills in business leadership. It demonstrates how a sales-driven approach, combined with industry expertise and innovative thinking, can enable smaller, more agile firms to outperform industry giants. Her career serves as an inspiration for sales professionals and entrepreneurs alike, highlighting the potential for sales excellence to drive transformative success in any industry.
A "battleground state" in a US election is a state where either candidate might win depending on the appeal to voters and for whom the majority votes. This is the essence of democracy. Shouldn't every state be a "battleground state"?The same should apply to Congressional and Senate Seats. We have Senators serving longer than many European monarchs. Will people with that kind of sinecure ever vote term limits for themselves. Let me go out on a limb and say, "Never!"The European monarchies were cast aside by democracies. We seem to be going in the opposite direction, with democracy subordinated to Senate monarchs. You think I'm kidding? The late Robert Byrd served in the Senate for 51.5 years. The currently serving Chuck Grassley has been sitting there for 50 years. Queen Elizabeth II reigned for 70 years, but the average tenure of a British monarch has been 25 years, and only 17 if you remove her unnaturally long reign. The French monarchs have averaged 20 years, but less if you remove the 72-year reign of Louis XIV.Since 2018 polling, over 80% of Americans favor term limits in Congress. Sheldon Whitehouse, one of our Democratic Senators from Rhode Island for 24 years hollered long and hard for term limits on the Supreme Court, which was too conservative for him. He has never uttered a word about term limits for the Senate. He has also fought to end the filibuster and increase the size of the Supreme Court, but he's mum on that now since his side lost the election! Were they good ideas, or was he just seeking more power?I don't think the founders left King George III to someday serve under King Sheldon I.
War’s End?We’ve honored the character and acts of Jimmy Carter upon his death, as we should.But most of the honor was due to his works after he left his one-term presidency, defeated by Ronald Regan. People voted for a starkly different candidate (as they did with Trump after both Obama and Biden).One of Carter’s great blunders was his handling of the Iranian hostage crisis, that lasted for over a year. While there was international pressure and economic compromises, the overwhelming pressure was probably from that election of Ronald Regan, who was seen as someone who would be far more forceful than Jimmy Carter.Regan fired the air traffic controllers who illegally went on strike.Now we apparently have a cease fire in the Israeli/Hamas war which seems to be due to the same factor: In this case, a threatening Donald Trump replacing a wavering and weak Joe Biden.It isn’t unreasonable to believe that Ukraine will settle its war with Russia in a similar fashion. There will be pressure for concessions, some land lost, but a way for both sides to save face and rebuild. Korean soldiers being used a cannon fodder are clearly not the answer for the Russians, not is tolerating the horrible attrition for the Ukraines.Strength, and the ability to project strength, are what enables national goals to be met and protected. What is China doing these days? Building a stronger and stronger navy.
We made four significant charitable contributions to the arts at year end. Two of the the group’s management called to thank us.Whenever I see a positive mention about me on social media, I write in to simply say thanks for the generosity. I thank bussers and gas station attendants. I thank my trainer each time. It doesn’t matter whether I’m paying them or not. People get unduly upset when people in other cars don’t express thanks for being able to turn, but I don’t let them turn in order to be thanked. And they may be preoccupied. But people always say “thanks” when you hold a door, I think because of the physical proximity.I thank my doctor and dentist and attorney. I thank people who pay me. It’s more than a common courtesy, it’s a symbol of respect and dignity. Removing used plates and leftover food is an important service in terms of a dining experience, as is standing out in the elements and pouring gas into my car.A great many people, believers and non-believers, reflexively say “Thank God” when something good occurs, from an illness recovery to a victory for the home team. But I don’t believe He is the one who’s concerned. Yet we see this desperate need to thank someone!Some of us offer thanks publicly, some privately, some often, some infrequently. But I think we all tend to exhibit gratitude when things go our way or weren’t as bad as we feared.Thank God for that.
Show Notes: Predictions• Both wars will run out of steam and end, officially or unofficially.• There will be insurrections in Iran.• Neither the Dodgers, nor the Celtics, nor the Chiefs will repeat.• Electric car requirements and limits on ICEs will be lifted or eased.• Retinal scanning and fingerprints will allow many to circumvent TSA.• Attempts to copyright and/or trademark AI composites of text and images will eventually reach the Supreme Court.• A betting scandal will rock professional sports.• As China’s economy weakens it will engage in more limited military actions against Taiwan.• Universities will face a perfect storm: AI will enable cheating and plagiarism, students and parents will revolt against huge tuitions, government forgiveness of tuition debt will end, there will be attempts to fire tenured professors who teach radical and biased political views, and large cuts will have to be made. The biggest threat: Remote learning which will dramatically lower tuition and enable a greater choice of institutions.• As the population ages and the Millennials rise in business, the country becomes more conservative and centrist in its views and voting.• There will be more intensive recruiting and higher pay for police officers.• Two more members of Congress will be indicted for corruption.• The Taylor Swift phenomenon will begin to wane. • The largest contribution to population growth in the US will be from legal immigrants.• Hacking will accelerate, and will include all kinds of organizations. The government will grant immunity to convicted hackers to help them combat other hackers.• The smart Democrats will realize that it wasn’t that “their message didn’t get out,” but rather that most people didn’t like the message.• Not a prediction, but a wish: Term limits for all of Congress so we can finally end the incestuous power grabbing that has undermined progress for the people.• Happy New Year.
Forget resolutions that are broken in 90 minutes. Try to focus on the good things that you do and that happen to you.Try a personal journal. You don’t have to be compulsive, but keep it handy, electronically or physically, to easily record things. These may be good acts done for you by others or good acts you perform, especially spontaneously and “in the moment.” Record experiences that were unplanned yet rewarding: a deer staring at you from the woods, a quick-reflex escape from someone else’s driving error, a baby smiling at you on a plane.We tend to default to the negative: what didn’t work, what disappointed us, what we did to disappoint others. Reverse that, and make note of the positives and the emotionally rewarding. Have you worked out without missing a session for 90 days; have you refrained from entering into a senseless argument with a family member; have you thanked someone seldom thanked who was appreciative of your recognition?Every so often, you can review your journal, not necessarily reread it all, but randomly choose some pages to remind yourself of the rewards in your life and the kindnesses you bring to others.We need to escape our “doom loop” mindsets and the normative pressures that attempt to make us feel guilty and unworthy. While it’s important to rely on others, it’s also important to rely on ourselves, and our recall isn’t always sufficiently complete or accurate. Did you throw your first snowball of the season, call a friend you haven’t spoken to in quite a while, or leave social media platforms that are simply irritating and unfulfilling?What did you do for your family, your business, your community, and yourself?Some people might call this a journal of gratitude, but I prefer a journal of reality and accomplishment. Life is not a slow crawl through enemy territory nor a random walk in the dark. It’s a thoughtful journey in what light we have.
These are times of astounding incivility, harassment, and dismissiveness. These acts are based on a posturing of moral superiority, as if mere disagreement denotes an inferior being.There is a line in Morris West's The Navigator that states: "And that's the terror of the high place and the high man. Is it God he hears or the echo of his own mad shouting?" Hillary Clinton most probably sealed her election defeat with the observation that those who would vote for her opponent were the "deplorables." This time, it was Joe Biden calling Trump supporters "garbage." The arrogance of such statements and such positions is appalling. I'm not taking a political position, but rather a social one: We understandably reject people who feel our opinion is not to be respected but immediately rejected because it originates in some lower intelligence.But we are mostly filled with hubris. We live in an indeterminate universe, acting as if we understand infinity, light years, and black holes. We know virtually nothing of its origins or nature. (A "big bang" before which there was nothing? "Nothing" has no meaning if there isn't "something" to which to compare it.) When praised for discovering universal laws of the cosmos, Einstein replied, "Yes, but the question is really who made the laws?" During a recent scientific journey in Peru's Alto Mayo region in the Amazon rain forest, researchers identified 27 new species of animals and indications of another 48, all previously unknown to science. And, of course, we have very little idea of what lives in the abysmal depths of the great oceans.We do know that we live on a hunk of rock speeding through a vacuum at 85,000 miles per hour, around an exploding star. Don't tell me you have no faith.I'm not proselytizing, not suggesting a belief in a deity is required, though I would remind everyone that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I am suggesting that the arrogant, polarizing behaviors extant in the land are basically caused by low esteem, the fear of trying to confront the unknowable, and the comfort of kidding ourselves that we truly understand the arcane solar systems and galaxies. A little humility might go a long way this holiday season, and it just may be developed and instantiated during this time of purported tolerance and forgiveness, of presents given and received, and of church bells ringing and choirs singing, "Joy to the World."From Maria and me, my friends, whatever your beliefs, in the true spirit underlying it: Merry Christmas!
Are you looking where it's easy or where you're more likely to succeed? We content ourselves with people who can say no and can't say yes.We seek affection and not respect. Remember "looking for love in all the wrong places"? You won't find love in a bar. A woman told me all the really appealing men in bars are married or gay!If you want to catch fish, go where no one else is fishing, not where all the fishermen (and bears) are. When you try to get into the fastest lane on a crowded highway, you usually wind up in worse shape.You won't find high-level buyers trolling the web. Cold calling is absurd. Email is surrounded by scammers, spammers, and noise. Most claims on the internet about building a business are bogus. Most certificates and initials after your name are worthless.This podcast is the right place because no one else is telling you this.Search for your keys where you dropped them.Use your iPhone to shine a light in your life.
We seem to have a sense of entitlement. We believe we’re being “ghosted” (a ridiculous term) when people don’t return our calls because we didn’t sufficiently impress them or excite them in our earlier interactions.We’re not entitled to:• Clients who never change a schedule• Not having an opinion on business practices• Using non-validated testing instruments• Always ignoring the dinner check• Deducting the family car as a business expense• Using a client’s logo without permission• Showing me your “smile sheets” to impress me• Expect a client refund on a non-refundable ticket• Use or refer to others’ work without attribution• Expecting well-known people to be on your podcast• Contact people through an assistant for a favor• Coach for months with no resultsWe seem to shift the blame for unpleasantness to the client, our family, the environment, technology, and the family dog.Dogs can bite. So, this attitude can bite you right back.Take some accountability. In fact, assume all of it as your accountability and you’ll truly be in charge of your fate. Otherwise, you may be running a solo business with the stereotypical toxic boss.
You steer into a skid; you don't try to get out of it because then you lose control. We have to exploit opportunities and deal with setbacks resiliently—"bouncing forward."Blaming and complaining are for children and immature adults. Never let up. The key is to be at your best when you're under the maximum pressure. We should be able to make minor and major adjustments in our lives and work and constantly innovate to grow. The key is to never be complacent and to ask why we didn't succeed when we expected to (even with clients).This is how the best players can consistently make free throws in basketball. Why the best of us can improvise and extemporize. We can create historical memory where we are reinforced as "winners."We should seek respect, not affection. And never be embarrassed by winning.
Relativism holds that knowledge, truth, and morality exist in relation to culture, society, and/or historical context and are not absolute. I’m not so sure (nor are a lot of other people).Let me speak of relativism today. There is an old Monty Python skit where a one-legged man auditions for a theatrical role as Tarzan. After some awkward movements, the people in the dark of the theater say, “Thanks, we’ll get back to you.”The man plaintively asks, “Do I have a chance at all of being considered?” “Well,” answers a producer, “I supposed we would come to you first before a man with no legs at all.”In Rhode Island, there are two public schools that stand out among all the others in terms of grade-point averages, performance on standardized tests, and admission to colleges. They are hailed as the avatars. Yet neither is in the top 100 of such schools nationally.A great many high school all-stars can’t make the team in college, and most college all-stars never make the pros. Some people snidely point out that a Chrysler or a Genesis looks just like a Bentley. Perhaps, until you place them next to a Bentley. A Campbell’s soup can painting or a banana taped to a canvas might go at an auction for seven figures, but they’re ludicrously considered against the Mona Lisa, The Nightwatch, The Scream, or Guernica.We tend to lose perspective if we don’t open our vistas, widen our interests, travel to new places, and gain new friends. You may well, rightfully, enjoy the view from a ski chalet, but the Grand Canyon is hard to describe adequately once you’ve been there in person.While I was trying to hide at a party, a college professor’s wife mentioned to me that her husband had published four books over 12 years. “That’s impressive,” I offered, looking for an escape route.“Impressive?!” she repeated in a stentorian voice, “It’s more than that! How many people do you know who have done that?”
The post-mortems from those who did not back the winner in this presidential election seem to be two-fold.On one hand, we have a group of insightful people asking, “What did we do wrong, and how can we improve?” On the other, we have people whose heads are exploding in vitriol and venom. The latter’s basic premises are that those who voted for the winner were fooled, are ignorant and poorly educated, and are “f…ing” morons. The amount of profanity seems to be in direct proportion to the lack of an intelligent argument. The overwhelming number of people who didn’t vote for the Democratic candidate are not misogynistic, racist, or any other epithet. They just did not prefer that candidate. Perhaps “woke is broke.” Perhaps the price of consumer goods, the lack of any cogent immigration policy, and persistent, independent polls indicating that Americans didn’t like the direction of the country shouldn’t have been ignored. There’s too much arrogance around, too much self-illusion that one’s opinion is more than an opinion; it is the “moral high ground.”Maybe. Or maybe it’s something we experienced when we were young and won a game fair and square, but the other side complained that we won the game by cheating.We called them “sore losers.”
We all need friends, but not the same ones! Friends need to evolve as we grow, mature, and change.Marshall Goldsmith and I wrote Lifestorming together, and we somewhat disagreed on this, but he wrote the terrific book What Got You Here Won’t Get You There, so I think this applies to friends, as well!Your spouse is your best friend? That’s a cop-out. You need people who will push back, tell you the truth, mourn with you, and celebrate with you. I’d prefer an honest critic to a lying friend. We don’t need our egos protected, we need to grow.Long-time friends can poison you with their poverty mentality, “guilting” you about your spending, habits, or lifestyle. They can insist on the same places and the same experiences “for old time’s sake.”“When it’s cold,” said Hemingway, “home is where you go, and they have to take you in.” Fair enough. But with friends, they don’t have to take you in, but they choose to do so.Have you been to school reunions? If so, you’ve found that people are basically the same as they were X years ago, with very few exceptions. It’s nice, perhaps, to see them again, but you’ve outgrown them.
This election reflects a totally flawed Democratic strategy:• Painting your opponent as toxic but not having positive policies.• A candidate who cannot speak without a teleprompter and memorized sound bites.• A morally superior attitude that conveys people voting for the opposition are less educated, dumber, and morally inferior.• Rallying celebrity support, media support, Hollywood support, and academic support—which actually was terribly off-putting.• Somehow maintaining the paradox that their candidate was superior in every way yet claiming the election would be close, thereby implying half the population was stupid.• Transgender and DEI focus pales next to prices, immigration, and a sense of security in a turbulent world.• Calling illegal aliens “undocumented” and the homeless “unhoused” is simply disingenuous, like calling rioters “undocumented shoppers.”The overwhelmingly liberal newsreaders on election night were actually grimacing and shaking their heads in disbelief at the results, having previously believed their opinions to be the fact.The real culprit here is Joe Biden, who claimed to be a “transitional president,” i.e., serving one term, and who broke that promise, fell ill with age, and the Democratic reaction to obviously try to hide it until exposed during the first debate. Then, to preserve $160 million pledged to the Biden/Harris ticket, they didn’t hold a true convention but maneuvered an ill-prepared and terribly unsuited Kamala Harris into the nomination.How many heads are exploding this morning at the New York Times and on the progressive talk show The View? Do we have an airport express lane for all those celebrities who will now be leaving the country?We don’t have to “make this country great again,” it IS a great country with free elections and people unafraid to make their sentiments known at the ballot box, sometimes waiting hours to do so.You can now support the country or waste your time castigating people who disagree with you but who may just have turned out to be far smarter, after all, than you are. God Bless America!
The turning point in the American Civil War—and probably world history—occurred in Gettysburg on a rise called Little Round Top. At that place, at that time, a Union general saw a vast threat, and a Union Colonel and his regiment averted the threat through the brilliance of a single command.We need more courage in our lives because, unlike Gettysburg, no one is shooting at us. We are too easily placed on the defensive by bullies, the economy, regulations, normative pressure, or simply fear. But we can easily regain control of our circumstances by playing offense instead of defense, by being assertive instead of timid, and by being bold instead of afraid. This is the true story of a relatively few people doing what they were expected to do, under great pressure, and with great courage. I remind you, once again, that no one is shooting at us.
We all get the kind of government we deserve. If you voted for the winner of the election, that’s good until such time as you feel promises aren’t being kept. If you voted for the loser of the election, that means not enough people in the right places agreed with you, and you have to submit to the system. However, you’re still free to protest, be surprised by some things that are advantageous to you, and wait for next time.If you didn’t vote at all, then you simply have to accept the government that other people voted for, and you have sacrificed your right to complain about it. If you didn’t vote, you obviously don’t feel strongly about anything enough to try to affect the election. (The US ranks 31st of 50 countries in voter turnout, albeit 22 of them mandate voting, so you could make a case we’re high on the list, but with 40 million not turning out, that number would easily sway an election one way or the other.)To be somewhat cynical, we have no good metrics for politicians because most of them put their own needs (to stay in power) before their constituents’ needs. I love the newsletter you get two weeks before election day, as though the candidate at any level really cares. If they did, why aren’t the newsletters weekly or monthly? And politicians are really like children, trying to take the ball and go home if they don’t get their way. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse up here in Rhode Island honks long and loud about Supreme Court term limits and/or expanding the court to include more justices who share his view. He wouldn’t feel this way if the court had already agreed with his biases. Whitehouse will be elected to his fifth Senate term this year, which is 30 years, and he’s never suggested any term limits on the Senate, which would be a far better system than people holding these offices for life. That’s how transparently hypocritical he is.But so are they all! It’s like the rigged trotting races that took place in the Meadowlands of New Jersey when I was young. Betters simply tried to choose the horse which was rigged to win.Today, we simply try to choose the politician who’s probably lying the least.
Bill Russell, in Second Wind, defines pressure and performance.For example: - Brady coming back from 25 points down in the second half of the Super Bowl.- Houston, we have a problem (Apollo 13).- Sully Sullenberger landing in the Hudson River. The need is to really stay calm.- Three Mile Island as opposed to Chornobyl.- Bluffing in poker (vs. the “tell”).- Is Mickey Mouse a dog or a cat?- Police overreaction.- The basketball player’s wink.Keep perspective, the world isn’t watching. Most pressure is self-generated.Think of Philippe Petit and the six feet.Use some humor. It’s usually not fatal if you fail.Puncture the pressure balloon.
Many people in Rhode Island have never been to Boston, let alone New York. I’ve coached a very successful entrepreneur who has never been to New York and doesn’t wish to go. Most people can’t locate Bolivia or Laos (or Nebraska) on a map.When Americans in a survey were asked the three most famous Japanese they could think of, it was Bruce Lee, Yoko Ono, and Godzilla. Or not?Through my travels abroad, I learned:- To eat “European style.” - People are far more multi-lingual than we are.- Computers in foreign airport restrooms tell you how many stalls are available, and you can rate the cleanliness. - Floating markets of Thailand (and the Cayman). - The immensity of the Great Wall (some of which can’t be fixed today). - The Acropolis uses the same machinery today to repair it as was used to build it.- The exquisite wines of Chile don’t travel well.- The modernized airport immigration systems.- There is better first class (Emirates, Air Singapore).- Some lamps are older than our country.- The timeless artistry (Leonardo, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Rodin, Mozart, Vivaldi).- Bikes, scooters, motorcycles, and trains are used for everyday commutes.- People in the US are stagnantly Americentric.We see the world through distorted lenses: US TV, US papers, US social media friends. If it’s truly a global economy, we ought to be a global people. Diversity goes beyond borders.
Esteem means respect and admiration. Hence, self-esteem would mean respect and admiration for yourself. Self-worth and self-esteem are the same thing to me, whereas self-confidence is your faith (or lack thereof) that you can do something: efficacy.Pride is feeling proud of your accomplishments, but vanity is insisting that others hear about them, as well.The pandemic, foreign wars, polarization, AI, demographic change, and climate change are all contributing to the diminishment of self-esteem. People feel as if they’ve lost control, need too much permission (TSA), and lack power. Pandemic approaches seemed to be more about politics than medicine. And the internet is rife with conspiracies and misinformation. How do we resolve this and reclaim our power and esteem?• Be healthy. Exercise, have a reasonable diet, and get medical checkups.• Love yourself. How can anyone else love you if you can’t love you?• Don’t jump to conclusions and make assumptions. Find the facts.• Don’t fret. Find ways to take action.• Talk positively about yourself, don’t speak about your “struggles” or “fears.”• Isolate negatives and generalize positives.• Create a sounding board, a support system, and enlist trusted others.• Recognize that if the cause is emotionally deep and traumatic, you probably need therapeutic help.• Journal your accomplishments and successes.• Practice a morning/evening ritual.Be honest about your successes, that’s not boasting. But if you don’t recognize the talents and abilities that led to your successes, you’ll always feel like an imposter.
The rate of failures of small businesses is astounding: 20% fail during the first two years, 45% during the first five years, and 65% during the first ten years. While there are myriad reasons, such as succeeding generations of ownership not being as motivated or competent, most of these fail under the original founders and owners. That’s because they tend to think of their business and tasks and not the customer’s happiness and results. In this episode, I discuss the 20 or so common mistakes and oversights that contribute to the problems. For example, most owners don’t sufficiently shop their own businesses, hire “bodies” instead of talented people, and view customers as an impediment to doing business the way they’d prefer!Instead of passing on every possible cost to the customer, client, or patient, small businesses should be passing on every possible value and benefit. They should make it easy for the buyer to buy.I’ve come to believe “Someone will be right with you” about as much as I believe “This call may be recorded for quality control purposes.”Just because you own a small business doesn’t mean you can get by with a small mind.
Some suggestions to build credibility with a buyer during the initial meeting. (This assumes you’re meeting with a true economic buyer who controls the budget.)1. Assume a peer mentality. Don’t allow yourself to be cast in a “dog and pony show.” (I suggest you never show up with visual aids for this very reason.) Adapt an attitude that the two of you are peers mutually exploring a working relationship. Either of you might accept or reject it.2. Be patient. Don’t barge into silence and state, “Let me tell you about myself.” You’re not there, believe it or not, to get a sale. You’re there to develop a relationship. That might require several meetings.3. Use provocative questions to get the buyer to talk about him- or herself, or at least the company. Show an interest in the buyer and the business.4. Do your homework. Learn the current stock price, the company history, the major competition, and the primary markets served. Become conversant in the client’s business environment before you meet the buyer.5. Push back. Choose your spots to disagree with the buyer. At least offer alternative viewpoints. Relationships are based on honesty and candor.6. Offer immediate value. Demonstrate some techniques or approaches that might be applicable. Don’t wallow in theory, and do not focus on your exceptional credentials. Instead, provide help.7. Embrace the buyer. Use “we” and “us.” Orient your conversation around how the two of you would partner, not what “you” would do to “them.” Encourage the buyer to think about the two of you working in concert.8. Focus on business outcomes. Spend as little time as possible on alternatives and input (e.g., training, surveys, retreats, audits), and emphasize results (e.g., market share, improved teamwork, higher profits).9. Ensure that your image is professional. Dress well, even in a business casual environment. (Expensive casual clothes are indicative of successful people.) Make sure your grooming is appropriate. Use the language perfectly.10. Take the initiative. Ask about and reaffirm the meeting time frame and the agenda. Suggest next steps. Summarize what you’ve heard. Act like someone accustomed to working with high-level people.You won’t close every deal or charm every buyer, but at least ensure that it’s not because you’re your own worst enemy.
There are 330 million people in the US that we know of. There are 12,500 school districts, 18,000 police departments, 17,000 libraries, 400 different languages spoken, 45,000 flights per day, 5 million privately and commercially owned vehicles, 200,000 dentists, and 641 amusement parks. There are nation-states (Japan, Korea), multi-state nations (Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Kuwait), and multi-nation states (US, UK). The US is probably the most pluralistic and diverse nation on the planet, especially in these numbers. Comparing us to Denmark, Thailand, or New Zealand is plain silly. I'm not disparaging those nations; I've been to them and another 60 besides, and like almost all of them (apparently, I'm alone in finding Iceland totally boring and Brazil scary).It's like saying if a hybrid Kia can get 60 miles to the gallon, why can't a Ford pickup? Well, because they're entirely different vehicles with different appeals and purposes.I pointed out to a client in Denmark while arguing these points that there are no lines of people at Denmark's borders seeking entry and citizenship. "Well, you're right about that," he said, "and if there were, we wouldn't let them in."There's a lot of room for improvement in the US, and, in all fairness, there's been a lot of improvement, and people are better off than they think they are because they haven't been to 60 other countries (and, in many cases, even one) and they're drowned in bad news by media that reports calamity where none exists and refrains from reporting good news as if that's the calamity.By the way, there are 2,700 commercial news channels in the US, and I'm not sure that's a good category to be leading (we're 4th, after Russia, China, and the EU).
This is a marketing lesson for the Catholic Church. I’m a lector and a Eucharistic Minister in the Church and converted 18 years ago. As some of you know, I’ve also spent a great deal of my coaching and consulting career in the field of strategy and have written two commercially published books on the topic.The average age in the church my wife and I attend is north of 60. Young people are not drawn to the church in the numbers of old, and as the population ages, it also diminishes. Churches are closing and being combined because there aren’t enough priests to go around. They, too, are aging as young men aren’t becoming seminarians in large numbers. Strategically, the Church needs to permit women and married men to become priests, as is the case in many other religions. This would provide not only more people, but more diversity: female points of view (Mary is important only second to Jesus in the Church and many people feel they’re equal), and priests experienced in marriage, raising children, and intimate matters. Tactically, the Church needs to equip existing and future priests with the ability to deliver pragmatic sermons which reflect how Christianity is to be lived daily, not just one day a week for an hour within certain edifices. (And even then, I often don’t get a break trying to get out of the parking lot.)I have heard, nationally and internationally, some brilliant sermons delivered by priests, bishops, and cardinals. But too often, the sermon is existential and philosophical, not something parishioners can take with them back home or to work. Too many priests read their sermons, which are horrible and not very heartfelt. And often, what they’re reading are their notes from when they first gave that sermon 40 years ago.The church needs to be audience-centered, not clergy-centered, and priests (as well as lectors) need to be instructed in professional speaking skills. (This is why the mega-churches always have highly skilled homilists, by the way). And there’s also humor to be found. St. Augustine said, “Lord, please make me a good man. But not too soon!”Church is community. The community deserves more than a shepherd; it deserves a diverse clergy whose messages can be applied to improve lives immediately, delivered in powerful and effective ways.So help me God.
The agenda of inequality and wealth focused only on the richest might not reconcile with reality.There have been increases in home ownership (even though buying always has its difficulties, from interest rates to inventory). There is a record of intergenerational wealth transfer from retirement savings and the Regan-era IRA legislation.In the West, family prosperity is higher than ever: assets, cash in banks, pension funds, etc. Daniel Waldenström's book Richer and More Equal makes a case that the West is richer and has less inequality than in the past. US wealth concentration is higher than in Europe but is lower than before WWII. Major improvements that lower wealth concentration have been pension/retirement funds and home ownership. Wealth improvement leads to successful business ventures, hiring, and investment, and the most net, new jobs.We are not there yet. Many inequities remain. Capitalism does a fine job generating wealth but not distributing it. It is an ethical and societal responsibility to help others who cannot generate wealth and/or who are denied the opportunity.One reason that we don't appreciate our well-being is that the media prefers to trumpet inequities and problems rather than progress and improvement. Another is that not every grievance expressed is legitimate because the loudest voices often are pursuing very private and personal interests.This podcast was stimulated by an article called The Great Wealth Wave by Daniel Waldenström, a professor of economics at the Research Institute of Industrial Economics in Stockholm. It was published in Aeon.
Just tell me what I want to know.People instead tell you everything that they know.College professors are reading their dissertation notes. Electricians are telling you about high and low voltage, amps, and watts. The tree guy tells you about diseases of poplars when you asked if he could prune some dead branches on an oak. The auto guy explains why a repair isn’t as easy as it looks because of the wiring, which is different from last year’s, which is subject to weather conditions….On the other hand, there are some benefits.Keeping someone talking at a bar and not having to talk back. Feigning interest in someone’s work by asking a question every five minutes. But it doesn’t work with politicians because they put no stakes in the ground.The phrase “How Are You?” isn’t actually a legitimate question because the asker is not seeking an answer but merely providing the secret handshake.Catholic Confession can be burdensome when you confess to impure thoughts, and the priest’s reply is, “Let’s begin with Adam and Eve.”Of course, some answers are too brief. “Can I plug this in here?” Answer “yes,” but it doesn’t include “if you turn the power off, first.”General Anthony McAuliffe’s response to being asked to surrender around Christmas 1944 by the overwhelming German force facing him was “Nuts!” His forces held out and were rescued.I often go ask a question with a phone to my ear, ask out loud, “Can you hold on a minute while I ask a question?” ask my question, and then go back to my call. Of course, that didn’t work out too well in the Confessional.
Even in truly tough times and horrible market segments, there are winners and strong companies. You have to play the hand you’re dealt, and you have to play it well. If anything is happening to you more than two times out of ten, it’s you, not them.With high interest rates, houses are still being sold. With food being expensive, people are still dining out. But you can’t expect yesterday’s ideas to thrill people about tomorrow. Nor can you tap dance on hot coals, in sweat tents, or with rah-rah speakers.You have to show people that you have ideas for tomorrow, anticipating change, not answers to past problems. Don’t create false narratives that drive your approaches, e.g., “I can help you cut expenses” or “We need to lower our expectations.”Don’t allow your prospects’ fear to scare you or infect your thinking.The Titanic was a bad idea: mistaken design, insufficient lifeboats, and a poor route. FedEx was a great idea: postal service weakness, hub, and spoke, “guarantees.” We are accountable. Not the fates or the winds or the tides or technology or society. Endure the brief pain of trying new approaches and innovating, or you’ll face the long-term pain of inevitable decline.
If you win a race by .001 seconds, have you really “won.”? And certainly, you’re not the “best in the world.” On that day, in that place, at that time, you finished barely ahead of the next person. What if you did it again an hour later?Of course, if you constantly and consistently win, you might be the best in the world or the best ever: Yankees, Celtics, Tom Brady, Rocky Marciano, Serena Williams, Jack Nicklaus. In subjective judging, it’s really a joke. Those that are the best also get the most benefit in the scoring. Brady threw touchdowns, or he didn’t. But the ice skaters, divers, gymnasts, surfers—those with the best records get the best treatment.Then again, there’s the doping and the cheating. The Chinese escaped disqualifications for doping by claiming they consumed “tainted meat.” I wonder who slipped them that? By the way, if the Olympics are about simply the fastest, strongest, etc., why keep medal counts and raise national flags to national anthems?What about the bad calls and missed calls from officials? Is break-dancing a sport? Isn’t there a practical requirement historically, such as in archery, fencing, judo, or running? Even the pommel horse was used originally to teach mounting and dismounting. If break-dancing is a sport, why isn’t ballroom dancing, which has its own competitions globally and requires superb coordination, training, balance, and teamwork? I was at a Four Seasons where, early in the morning, there was a bed-making and floor-vacuuming competition. Why isn’t that an Olympic event? It’s a highly coordinated skill done billions of times a day worldwide?Tennis players are athletes. I don’t think golfers are, nor are race car drivers. They are certainly skilled and adept, but so are woodworkers and chess players. I understand the ambiguity of X and Y chromosomes and uncertain genitalia. However, I also know that women’s athletics and Title 9 were not intended for average male athletes to be stars in another venue.When you “eclipse” someone’s record, does it really count if you’re using vastly improved equipment, medical support, and venues? Hasn’t fiberglass improved vaulting over wood and bamboo? With modern sports medicine, Sandy Koufax would have had another six unsurpassed years. Brady couldn’t have played into his 40s. We’re a country of 330 million people, and it seems to me that the Australians, with 30 million, eat our lunch in the pool. And they’re not as insufferable as we are with the constant chants of USA, USA. (I do chant myself against the Russians and the Chinese.) Finally, I don’t know about you, but the juxtaposition of athletes not supported by anything substantial and working with little money and not the greatest support at home, and the kibillionaire professional US basketball players, marching in the same parade and winning the same medals, well, come on….
The Olympics sparked several replays of an Australian swimmer, Cate Campbell, being interviewed on what I think was an Australian TV news show. In a prior competition, she had beaten out the Americans for the gold medal. The interviewer asked her what it was like. She ranted on about how glorious it was because she detested the Americans using a cowbell to motivate the team and hated the chant of the fans, “USA, USA, USA,” which she mimicked in a sarcastic tone.Let me repeat: her team won. She was a sore winner.If you’re a world-class athlete and you can’t take the pressure of people rooting against you in favor of their teams or motivational techniques used to un-nerve the opposition, maybe you have some serious esteem problems. If you don’t want to endure the pressure of the limelight, don’t walk into it.I’ve been to Australia 19 times, I have friends and clients there, and I find Australians to be “in touch,” personable, and have a great sense of humor. It’s when we take ourselves too seriously when we feel we shouldn’t have to be subjected to boisterous fans, that our fragile egos are exposed.The same day the interview was first aired, the Australian women won the 4X100 meter relay, and the American men won their 4X100 meter relay. The Australians and Americans at the pool congratulated each other in good sportsmanship.So here’s to you Cate: Bong, Bong, Bong, Bong…..
You’ve known wowsers. They’re always trying to be the “second smartest person in the room,” and they correct you even though you’re correct to begin with.They are official “killjoys.” They are critical of others’ pleasures and accomplishments. Lacking expertise doesn’t inhibit their critiques and corrections. They never converse; they lecture as perpetual professors. They’re distraught if they think someone else is having a better time than they are (and most people are).Wowsers are dismissive according to their own biased criteria. “You smoke cigars, so you don’t make good life choices, so your opinion on the climate is flawed.” For them, everything they do is the best, no matter what: The trip was the most thrilling, the play was the most sensational, the restaurant was seven stars, and the restroom was the cleanest.They announce awards and honorifics no matter how transparently unimportant they are. “I’ve been named as most likely to write my first book within four years in my zip code.”Knowing next to nothing, they are cynical and cite memes and fragments of others’ expertise: “Well, consider the ‘establishment clause,’” “They might invoke the 27th Amendment….” These are the people who scream, “Get in the hole!” after every golf shot and call into the tournament if they spot a violation on TV.They call people over to the bar to have drinks and then disappear before the bill arrives. You know who I’m talking about.
People may think of a "Grand Challenge" as an exceptionally worthy and difficult problem to solve, and they'd be right. But it's also representative of a more formalized and impressive approach to what appear to be intractable societal issues.Seth Kahan specializes in these, his most recent being to remove stigma in mental health issues. This involves a farrago of interested parties, from television writers who want to depict the issue realistically and correctly to pharmaceutical companies which seek to develop the proper medications and police departments which need proper responses.These challenges can be about education reform, immigration reform, climate safeguarding, reproductive rights, and other such vast issues. They tend to be nonpartisan. The correct approach to mental health issues, for example, benefits a wide range of society, from treatment to facilities, from crime deterrence to cures.Learn where the funding comes from, how varied organizations become involved, and the timing needed for these initiatives to make a difference while successful along the way—sometimes 20 years or more. And looking back, from women's rights to civil rights, such movements have existed, being formed out of necessity. We also discuss great leaders (Lincoln, the Roosevelts, Churchill) who were successful because they purposely created these Grand Challenges—not just to improve civilization, but to save it.
My wife wasn't feeling well, so I went out to eat at 5:30 and brought her something back. When I do that, I bring my iPad and read a book at the bar.I finished, the takeout arrived in a shopping bag, and I drove home. At 10 pm I thought I'd play some Angry Birds before going to bed but realized my iPad was gone. I used "Find My iPhone" to determine that it was still in the restaurant. Although after hours, they answered the phone. "We have it right here," said a manager, after a brief search, "come around to the door by the bar, it's open. We're cleaning up."They were cleaning up, and the same bartender from five hours earlier came out and handed me the iPad. We chatted, I thanked him, drove home (and played Angry Birds).That's the way it's supposed to work, right? Friendly people, honesty, using technology as a help to solve something.Yet we keep valuables locked in hotel safes, we're careful about where we keep our wallets or carry our purses, and some stores don't accept any cash larger than a twenty-dollar bill. Shoplifting is one of the major expenses for retail stores. We're advised to use a complex password on our smart phones because thieves are stealing them, cracking simple codes, and cleaning out bank accounts.It's a shame when once-common acts of honesty and courtesy stand out because they're exceptions to our expectations and no longer the rule.
I recorded and wrote this prior to the presidential debate. When I couldn’t publish it before the debates, I was going to abandon it. But in view of what occurred, I’m publishing the recording and show notes now.In the upcoming debates, no notes will be allowed, and the moderators can mute the microphones. Moderators have had undue influence on past debates, becoming the inappropriate centers of attention. Think Meghan Kelly. It will be even easier now.One of the candidates is 78, and the other is 81. One has no vice presidential nominee as yet, and the other appears to be continuing with Kamala Harris, who was chosen originally solely because of her identity and her ability to gather votes to beat Trump. She has failed at every major initiative given to her since then.Trump often digresses into blather. Biden often falls victim to confabulation, where things he’s invented to fill memory losses become real to him. He was not at the top of his law school class, despite his claims that he was, but was 74th of 85 students and failed one course, having been found guilty of plagiarism. Trump degenerates into crazed diversions, at one point talking about being electrocuted when his teleprompter failed.This is an age of threat from China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran. Are these two guys (and Kamala Harris) able to handle the simultaneous anti-US maneuvers of these leaders of this evil axis?Neither of these two guys would be acceptable as the CEO of a major organization, not to the search firms, not to the governing committees, not to the boards.Is this the best we can do in this great country? These two guys?Of course not.
The only way to “coast” is when you’re going downhill. Even on a plateau, you have to pedal to keep moving. However, there is a way to “coast uphill.”To succeed, businesses must keep growing. And to keep growing, they must innovate. No business can grow simply by solving problems and “fixing” things (or, worse, blaming people). Problem-solving keeps you afloat, but it doesn’t raise the water level or get you into a boat.There are three kinds of innovation, and we speak in this session about what they are, why they are important, and who exemplifies them. As social proof, we discuss avatars in these areas, from the Wright Brothers to Fred Smith and Jeff Bezos.Innovation is not the result of “skunk works,” outdoor experiences, or building sand castles. It is the result of a constant focus on improvement, finding promoting actions to enable it, and exploitative actions to capitalize on it.There was only running, no passing in football, until someone decided to try throwing the ball. The high jump was a standard competition with inches of difference until Dick Fosbury decided to jump over the bar head and back first, which everyone now does at much higher levels. How much more exciting is basketball with the advent of the three-point line?Schumpeter called innovation “creative destruction.” And I call it “applied creativity.” Learn why herein.
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?No, they don’t. The advent of the automobile around 1895 did not engender a huge equine genocide. We use horses today: for work, for recreation, for crowd control, for sport.Hence, the internal combustion engine is not disappearing in your lifetime, despite stupid political statements such as the recent “all cars must achieve 65 miles-per-gallon by 2031.” (Let’s also pass a resolution that there needs to be world peace by November. That should take care of that, right?)I listen to Vivaldi, Sinatra, Lady Gaga, Billy Joel. In my business, I accept credit cards, checks, and wire transfers. I choose not to use Venmo or PayPal because their service is dreadful. It’s hilarious to listen to the pseudo-snobs who prelatically inform me that they haven’t used checks in ages. And they only use Tik Tok via Instagram, and insist on a text before receiving a phone call. I imagine in their spare time, they’re shooting horses.I can drive an automatic transmission and a seven-speed manual (which is why I can leave my Corvette unlocked with the keys in it because no one is skilled enough today to steal it and drive it off). We need to live with many choices; newer ones don’t necessarily replace older ones completely, and the situation, the moment, and our behavioral predispositions often determine what’s best, not normative pressure.An electronic car future for everyone? Look out for my horse!!
Our 60th High School ReunionOn the way to the reunionWe’re on Amtrak on our way to our 60th high school reunion: Emerson High School, Union City, NJ. It was then and is now the most densely populated city in the country. Emerson is now a middle school, but back then it was one of two full-fledged high schools with all sports, and dances and typical teenage angst. We had about 200+ in the class. About 30 of the original class will be at the reunion, along with spouses and assorted hangers-on. Two of the teachers with whom we’re still in touch were able to be at the 55th, but not this one. They’re both in their 90s and one is quite active on Facebook. He’s told me he reads my books.I do have one lifelong friend, Robert Borghi, whom I’ve known since kindergarten. He used to put a nickel a week away to someday buy a helicopter and a ranch. He does, today, have a pilot’s license. At the last reunion, a woman walked up to talk to me as if we had been speaking continually. I could not place her. As I leaned to the right to see her name tag without appearing to stare at her breast, I was stunned to see she had been my steady girlfriend in the 6th and 7th grades.At past reunions, held every five years, some people unfortunately passed away in the weeks before the events. I’m just hoping no one passes away AT this event! In other words, we need the same numbers departing as arriving.After the reunionWe left with the same number that arrived. Unfortunately, Robert Borghi couldn’t make it because he’s having surgery in the next few days. Our table did win the school trivia contest, but I was shocked when one of the questions was, “Who coached the girls’ bowling team?” We had a girls’ bowling team??!!Some people were in remarkably good shape. Some were not. Some were seriously disabled. Out of a class of slightly over 200 we had 31 people (plus partners) all between 77 and 79. The average life expectancy in the US is 78 for men and 80 for women, but once you reach those ages you get another 7-9 years! One man whom I knew casually in school approached me to tell me he reads my books and newsletters and wanted to know what I was going to do next.We end by singing the alma mater. These things are always bittersweet.
Show NotesMario Abbondanza and Noah Chantharangsy have been bartenders for quite a while, Mario for about a quarter century. I see them so often from the customer side of the table that I thought it would be fun to “step around the bar” with my listeners and discover what that would be like.You’ll find out that the hours are often brutal, but the job—rewarding. There’s fulfillment in helping people. And the belief that people turn to bartenders to discuss even intimate details of their lives—often as first-timers and often as regulars—is quite true, not a myth. “More than I want to hear,” says Noah.Neither of my buddies could explain to me why people order espresso martinis—an after-dinner drink, a digestive—as a cocktail before dinner, an aperitif. I can’t imagine having a cup of coffee before or during dinner.You’ll find out what the craziest drink request Mario ever had was (surprised me) and how bartenders have to take care of people who have had too many drinks. One of the antidotes is actually quite attractive!We tend to take bartenders for granted, but their “mixology” and their conversation—and genuine interest in customers—make a dining and/or drinking experience all the better.And when I asked about their own preferences when they were on the other side of the bar, I found out that I’m actually a health addict!
We claim we don’t like elites, but we eagerly follow every ridiculous and pompous movement of the British Royals. (They’re now upset about a Nigerian trip that Harry and Megan took where they were treated too much like a state visit!) We belong to air clubs, hotel clubs. We have Amex green, gold, platinum, and black cards. Hertz has a platinum service. On our recent trip to LA, we arrived and departed though Amex suites.Once upon a time, elite offerings were only open to invited, important guests. Then a court case opened them to all, with the wonderful result that we can watch people clip their toenails in a Delta lounge. (No, I am not making that up. Nor am I making up the woman who changed a filthy diaper on a first class United seat.)So since lawyers of course sued to open private clubs intended for the top guests, people struggle for other elite experiences. This happens at beach resorts, in school, on the job, and when traveling. (There’s a rigid “culture” among people who commute by train every day, and apparently on the few times I’m on such a train I break every tribal law.)Why is this? It’s because we struggle for independence. As much as we collect ourselves for mutual protection, influence, and sustenance, we need vacations to get away, special treatment to separate us out, offers to elevate our status.As much as we hear “no man is an island” or “it takes a village” or “we’re really pack animals” I wonder. It seems at times, not infrequently, that others’ breath is poisonous to us.
I met Doug at Merck where he worked as a sales executive and I was an external consultant. Some years later, he called me from his current pharma company and asked my advice about an ethical issue he was seeing. About five years later, he was presented with a huge (listen to find out how much) “whistleblowers award” for turning the dangerous practices in for the government to investigate and eliminate.We talk here about the courage and risks of being a whistleblower (two such people formerly employed by Boeing have since died, one by suicide, one by unknown causes, and Doug faced physical threats) and why they are needed more than ever today. We discuss whether drug prices are reasonable in light of the investment in creating them and, if efficacious, obtaining FDA approval. The results might surprise you.We also discuss the high mortality diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, diabetes, and cancer, and whether too much is spent on “cure” and treatment at the expense of investment in prevention. The issue of extending life, but with quality, is raised, as is the need for certain types of surgery being abandoned.Also examined is the ironic serendipity of drug creation, aside from huge, targeted investment, which we’ve seen result in weight loss, hair growth, and the eradication of African River Blindness. Sometimes, even with drugs, it’s better to be lucky than good.And don’t miss our focus on opioids and the absence of whistleblowers among people who should have acted but didn’t throughout this crisis.
The old apothegm is that the first generation starts it, the second expands it, and the third ruins it. Probably not so true any more.It’s not about a mandatory spendthrift or wasteful generation. It’s more about hunger. I don’t know about you, but I grew up poor, and when I was fired as president of a consulting firm, we had relatively little money in the bank and two small kids with private schools and a wedding ahead of them. We also had elderly parents who needed our support.So I did whatever was necessary to make money. I would charge $25 for resume reviews for people looking for work. I charged $750 to speak, though I often did it for free to get in front of potential clients.That hunger subsided when I had “made it,” but it has never really left. I don’t work hard, but I work very smart. I pursued success and create tougher goals and higher standards for myself.I think the metaphorical third generation I mentioned may just be bored. They don’t want to expand the business further, the don’t want to start another, and they have no hunger. Their education and living standard have been taken care of.You can’t make your kids poor. The second generation might have experienced a period of your hunger, but not the grandchildren. They assume you were always well off. They think that’s what life provides. My son would respond, when I was making a case about “the old days,” that “I know, Dad, you were barefoot, wrote on a shovel with charcoal, and walked to school three miles in the snow.”“Yeah,” I said, “and it was uphill in both directions.”
The best leaders and most successful people I’ve met also exemplify generosity. This is not an accident.“Generosity” means “giving or sharing,” and being liberal in so doing. It isn’t primarily about money, but it is about credit, recognition, time, listening, coaching, supporting, and so forth. If it’s authentic, then it’s consistent, not situational. I’ve always thought the award winners who get on stage and thank 20 people are many times those whom the people being thanked have thought of as horrible, selfish people with whom to work.Generosity is often about hard work and sacrifice, not merely “giving.” Writing a check is easy, serving at a soup kitchen is harder, chairing a nonprofit board that’s in trouble is harder still.Caitlin Clark led basketball statistics in scoring, but she was also very highly rated in assists. Mentioning someone laudably in public (and on social media) is generous, as is not mentioning negatives. Refraining from complaining, especially over minor issues is generous. We often call it “giving the benefit of the doubt.”Developing people is generous. Maya Angelou has noted that “we train animals, but we should educate people.” We shouldn’t assume people are somehow “damaged” and require remedial work (which most self-help books do). We shouldn’t project our personal shortcomings to others, as if they must be universal to salve our egos (this is called “projecting”).Being vulnerable and honest is generous. To admit our mistakes and fears to others is a generous act, encouraging them to feel safe doing so, and enabling them to try to help us and that we will willingly listen. We should also overlook minor flaws that may discomfort us but are trivial in the large scheme of things.I had a coaching client who told me he was annoyed when one of his customers chewed on the ice from a drink. I asked if this were somehow dysfunctional. He said it was just irksome. I suggested he just live with it and forget it. But, ungenerously, he told the client that the habit was irritating. The customer then told him to “get lost.” Refraining from holding a grudge or harboring resentment is generous, as is never taking things personally. (I didn’t make a sale at this time in this place to this person. That doesn’t mean the person doesn’t like me or that I’m not worthy.)And remember Joseph Epstein’s famous observation: “The true measure of generosity is not how much one gives but how much, after giving, one has left over.” It’s a fundamental concept or philosophy about life.
I was required to engage in a “liberal arts” education at Rutgers. That meant that I had to have credits in languages over two or three years, science every year, history for two years, and English for two years. Although I majored in Political Science, because I thought I was going to law school (!), these other classes were required.The length and amount of education is far less important than the quality and depth of education. A lot of people attend school (sometimes for far more than four years) and simply get their “ticket stamped.” I sat next to a great many students who were no better off leaving school than they were entering it except that they had more job prospects.In these times, with competence more sought than credentials, that might no longer be true. Airlines are looking for qualified pilots whether or not they have a college education. We have a shortage of air traffic controllers. Do they need college educations? An electrician doesn’t.We tend to focus on business books and the “idea du jour.” I had a client who wanted to change her Fortune 100’s organization every time she went to a new seminar or read another book. It is okay to be the smartest person in the room—someone has to be. It’s not okay to try to be the second smartest. You’ll earn what that means when you listen to the podcast.You’ll also hear my two key criteria to determine intelligence. See if you pass my test.
Al McCree is a former fighter pilot who has flown 196 missions! He is an executive in the music business and has managed all kinds of talent. He’s also worked with top business executives.We talk about the differences and similarities of combat flying and the competition of the music business and the challenges of changing hearts and minds in a business setting. Ironically Al thinks music can be a distraction at work, even though we see so many people with ear buds in all kinds of workplaces. I challenge Al a bit on his belief that DNA and genetics are important for success. We both reflect on the wonderful, developmental feedback we obtained at the Johnson O’Connor Research Foundation (and why he can play a musical instrument and I can’t, authoritatively validated). We fondly recall Jeanne Robertson, a brilliant speaker and storyteller who, in a beauty contest, enthralled the judges with her “talent” of twirling an invisible baton, which she lit on fire and had it descend on the judges’ heads. The role of luck is analyzed in any pursuit, and Al feels it’s a stronger factor than might be realized. But what is luck, really? And before we end we discuss how to exemplify what will make your kids successful, especially if they’ve led a privileged life and may not have the parents’ “hunger.”
Primary and secondary1 End the “warehousing” of children• Chronology is silly and hundreds of years old• Socialization is important, but not at this cost• Move kids as they learn• Measure learning by outcomes: application, tests, etc.2. Stop defaulting to college educations• Prepare for a range of employment opportunities• I sat next to too many duds in college• Teach life skills: civics, account management, do-it-yourself repairs (remember shop and home economics)• Growing tendency to hire competence and not credentials3. End the teachers’ unions control of schools• Introduce carrots and sticks for teachers• The Rubber Room in New York City• Albert Shanker’s quote• Randi Weingarten’s $600,000• The customers are the parents and kids, not teachers• Make the job rewarding and also demanding• Recreate school “open houses”• End the mainstreaming of behavioral problems• End the inclusion on non-English speakers• My experience with Tourette’s Syndrome• Teachers have lowest grade point averages and attend the worst academic schools• Former president of URI: People with poor finances and/or grades go to inexpensive and mediocre schools• Get rid of failed progressive nonsense like “new math”• Allow for school choice of all kinds with vouchers4. Change school financing• The affluent/tax/attraction/more tax trap• Pool money within the state for equal distribution• Create true equal opportunity with equivalent resources, quality, teaching across the state5. Enforce discipline• Assistant principle might go to jail for stopping a female, black student from heading for a fight, she claimed he physically abused her in doing so. She had threatened the fight.• Mandate school officers. Anyone who says that children are fearful of uniforms and police should understand they’d be more fearful of being beaten up or shot at.6. Apply common sense and avoid political correctness and the woke• Teachers may not involve themselves with personal, sexual, gender, and similar issues without involving parents, including names kids use, how they dress, and how they want to be addressed.• Teachers’ personal politics, gender beliefs, and religious beliefs are not permitted in the classroom.
Not just about the government or the banks or big Pharma, but even sports when YOUR team loses! “The refs were crooked, it was rigged.”9/11 was an “inside” job, and we never landed on the moon.Key elements: belief in a pattern underlying the event; provocative and deliberate plans; coalitions or groups are involved, even disparate ones; there is a clear and present danger; secrecy that is hard to justify or believe by non-conspirators. Groups blamed are typical targets: wealthy, politicians, business leaders (especially bankers), historically stigmatized minorities, such as Jews or Roma.Conspiracists defy pragmatism and evidence, e.g., “Princess Diana actually killer herself or faked her death.” The threat of lack of control forces insecure people to find cause and effect outside of their control that explains their fate. (THEY are out to get me/us.) Paranoia is a key element, involving perceived victimization, social isolation, and the refusal to admit that others succeed by their talents and hard work. Paranoia generally starts individually but then lends itself to “groupthink.” Conspiracy thinking, or the tendency to believe in conspiracy theories, shares several characteristics with paranoia. Both involve ideas that harmful outcomes can be attributed to malevolent agents rather than to more benign or non-agentive causes. Other similarities in concept are notable, for example, both paranoia and conspiracy thinking represent suspicions that can be hard to falsify and may concern events or theories that later emerge to be true, for example claims about pandemic demands by the government that, scientifically, were incorrect and ineffective.In an increasingly volatile age, without confirmations of power and control, people default to these “settings.” This will become worse.Perhaps paranoid to begin with, see this as a conspiracy, though I doubt that Trump ever did.
The more pressure you feel, the more your talent is “masked” and the worse you perform. You control pressure.You can’t allow yourself to feel “judged” every time you speak, write, or perform. And when and if you do need feedback, never accept it from unsolicited sources, which is always for the sender’s benefit, not yours. Seek solicited feedback from trusted people you respect.It’s fine to feel anticipation and eagerness to proceed, which should heighten your performance, but not fear and dread which will diminish it. The greatest athletes are who they are not because of their everyday performance, but because of how well they perform in championship games, under maximum pressure from the other team, the media, and fans.Maintain perspective. No one is shooting at you. You should fear a tornado in Kansas in a storm, but not a question in a conference room during a meeting. We too often create pressure on ourselves by comparing our intended performance against great performances we’ve seen, and therefore fear being seen as inferior to them. In fact, we need simply to prepare well, do our best, and then go home. Our lives are greater than a single event or a single day. When you’re afraid to post on social media, or have to rewrite or re-record something six times, you’re simply creating your own tornado. And this isn’t Kansas anymore, Dorothy.
Do you need shoes that you can put on without touching them, without bending down, without even sitting down? Barring those whose illnesses or conditions prohibit bending, just how lazy are the rest of us becoming?Skechers sells some shoes which have a patented device near the top of the heel that allows you to slip into them without manipulating the shoe: no shoehorn, no wiggling, no close proximity at all. (Of course, you have to have the mental capacity to know your toes go in first.) I can understand this if you’re, say, 90. But they’re advertising this for everyone. How lazy are we becoming?Our luggage has wheels these days. People can gamble on their smart phone apps and talk into their wrists. We may think that garage door openers and TVs “must” be remote, but why fireplaces? You no longer build a satisfying fire any more, you program one. How lazy are we becoming?Vacuum cleaners now self-clean, and lawn mowers self-mow. Cars can self-park. Gym trainers assist their customers in lifting weights. Siri keeps interrupting intelligent thought to see if she can be of further annoyance. People try to cut turkeys with electric knives, which is like using a blowtorch to light up a cigar. How lazy are we becoming?One of my cars “hands” my seatbelt to me, and the car manuals are six hundred pages because of all the automatic features. Meanwhile, I haven’t used cruise control, which has been on every one of my cars, in 25 years. And now we have those Japanese toilets….
Some things we can control, some we can influence, and some we can neither control nor influence. It’s important to understand the differences, and it’s vital to never cede control nor underestimate our abilities to control.Facing a prospect for the first time, what do you think you can control, influence, or affect neither? (Listen to the podcast to hear the examples.) Do you tend to surrender control because the prospect is powerful or wealthy? Do you sacrifice personal time, change important personal appointments, and inconvenience your family over client issues that the client could easily change?You can control where your kids go to school, what kind of insurance you carry, where to go on vacation, and how to deal with colleagues. You can certainly influence the boss, clients or prospects, or suppliers, a lot more than you think (or currently are). If nothing else, consider this: language controls discussion, discussion controls relationships, and relationships control business.The larger and more diverse our vocabulary, the more we can use metaphors, analogies, metonymy, hyperbole, and so forth, the more we can influence. When someone objects to my fees I point out that my fees are less than they pay to plow the parking lots, mist the plants, and compensate for spillage and spoilage. Where is the best ROI?You best ROI, of course, is listening to and heeding this free podcast!
We’re going to need tens of millions of electric charging stations to satisfy goals for electric cars in six years set by the government. It looks like we might have 500,000. Electric cars might represent zero carbon footprint improvement. The mining of lithium is dirty and expensive and requires a lot of energy. Disposal of the batteries presents similar problems. Fires are a danger and are harder to extinguish. Hertz is returning or cancelling orders for a thousand electric vehicles because they are not in demand for rentals and are hard to maintain. Ford has pulled back investment in battery plants. Toyota has committed solely to hybrids. I’ve driven in them and driven them myself. Meh. Not a big deal, and still limited ranges. We’re going to have to overcome our own hubris and realize that climate change isn’t going to be reversed and maybe not even halted. We can’t build (and insure) housing on the water’s edge or in forests. We can’t expect to ban internal combustion engines, gas stoves, and gas leaf-blowers (which is ludicrous). What we DO need in the US is energy independence (which we once had and can easily have again with our huge reserves), control of the southern border to permit legal immigration for white and blue-collar jobs, and a vast improvement in educational equal opportunity.Otherwise it may be “lights out” for reasons other than insufficient electrical power.
I send out• Daily video• Monthly video• Weekly podcast• Monthly newsletter• Weekly newsletter• Blog 7 days publicly• Blog 7 days to community• Post on X 7 times per week• Post on LinkiedIn 3 times per week• Send out monthly promo pieceThat’s 1,651 potential contact points with clients and prospects annuallyThat’s why I receive unsolicited referrals and purchasesPeople can always unsubscribe, I’m never offendedHow long does this take me: Total is three hours a week or half a day.I don’t self-edit or cover up mistakesI use self-effacing humorI tackle some tough issuesI have a huge net, so I only pull out the fish I desireI have offerings at various levels for everyoneI market before I create contentI rely on external resources for technology, etc.I’m faster at both quality and quantity than ChatGPTDoes this really work?Well, you’re listening right now, right?
The pandemic is a milestone event. Even if the medical effects have been ameliorated (which is debatable), the social impact is huge and continuing. Some of the evidence:• Some people continuing to wear masks, which also serve as a “warning” to others, and is an extreme behavior if one isn’t otherwise medically compromised. Covid transmission interpersonally would require someone in very close proximity for an extended period of time. Also, masks prompt people to keep touching their faces, which can cause further disease spread.• “Live” business meetings have been hugely reduced, from conventions of thousands to conferences among a few people.• Business travel has been commensurately reduced with remote meetings preferred.• People are suffering from mental health issues being in isolation in their homes, even with family, because of the inability to have lunch or a drink with co-workers.• Work pressures have mounted as leaders try to figure out how to assign and measure productivity among people who are not physically present. This has ranged from many tech workers never coming into an office to Elon Musk demanding that his SpaceX workers show up physically for 40 hours a week.People are more isolated than ever, and more despairing than ever. Add to the increasing automation and AI integration and the trend worsens. Once upon a time a driver could chat with a gas station attendant about politics, sports, the weather and so forth. Now, most gas stations are self-serve, attached to a mini-mart. (The gas pump, however, does talk to you, since it’s programmed to play advertisements.)We’ve made some progress in dealing with business needs and travel needs since the pandemic, with supply chains and international trade, but not so much with emotional needs. Our ability to express ourselves to colleagues and acquaintances, to learn whether our positions are supported or resisted, to share a laugh or a celebration are severely reduced. It’s true that people continue to gather in large number for sports and entertainment events, whether locally or remotely, but these aren’t frequent and far from intimate. A million people might gather for New Year’s in Times Square, but they’re only sharing some moments in time and not personal sentiments. (Is there anything so superficial as an entertainer telling the audience that he or she “loves them all”?)We’ve actually made more emotional progress, however, socially than we have professionally and in business settings. Coffee shops are still jammed in the mornings, restaurants are overflowing, golf courses and pickleball courts are filled. Most people in these venues know each other and continue the relationship, and newcomers are usually welcomed.
Jeff is the publisher of Performance Magazine which has featured interviews of and articles from people as diverse as Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Shaquille O’Neal, Sir Richard Branson, Joan Rivers, and Larry King, among hundreds of others.In this conversation we talk about the effectiveness, and lack thereof, of the media; the major issues on the minds of executives post-pandemic; how to convince people to accept an interview even if they haven’t heard of you or the publication; and why Jeff, living in Vegas with plenty of Super Bowl invitations, will be on an airplane heading to a National Guard operation in New England to work with the leadership.Jeff is controversial (he will not pursue an interview with the current occupant of the White House) and outspoken. He feels that the pandemic, even now, has caused a seismic shift in global business and leadership, and that promotions are based on being seen frequently in order to be known. One of his clients says, “If I don’t know you, I can’t promote you, and if I don’t see you, I can’t know you.”We talk about whether or not there’s a generation gap, and what talent is really all about. And we hear the story of a cabinet member appearing in Jeff’s magazine because he saw a copy on another cabinet member’s coffee table with that person’s picture on the cover, and wanted to do so himself!
I’ve met Rudy Giuliani. We belonged to the same cigar club in New York (which has since lost its lease). Those were the days when he was still in the afterglow of “America’s Mayor” from the way he led after 9/11. And those were the days when crime in New York was way down. He and the police commissioner, Bill Bratton, instituted tough approaches to “minor” violations, believing they would lead to arrests and halting of major violations. So there were penalties for blocking intersections (today in Manhattan, city buses block intersections with impunity), for jumping turnstiles in subways, for the guys who tried to wash car windshields at red lights. And crime greatly diminished.Today, we have district attorneys and other highly progressive politicians who have either made “minor” crimes acceptable or have refused to prosecute them. Here’s the simple math for those of you who never majored in math (I certainly didn’t): When shoplifters steal from stores without any worry about being prosecuted, fined, or jailed, the store ownership decides to close those stores in such areas because they can’t afford to conduct business at a loss. So the pharmacies, local retail shops, clothiers, and so forth close up or relocate. Instead of walking for a few minutes to pick up drug prescriptions it then requires a 20-minute drive or public transportation for 40 minutes to a store that’s in a safer neighborhood.Activists demand that laws be passed preventing the chains from closing local stores, rather than laws preventing the “free” looting of local stores. Now ain’t that poor math?And who’s most hurt by those pharmacies that close? The elderly, the disabled, the people without personal transportation, single parents, and so forth. If you don’t want stores to close, stop the cause: crime. And to stop crime, stop ALL crime. Once you forgive the “small stuff” people move on to the larger stuff. Have I mentioned that auto theft in the US and Canada is on a severe upward trend?
How do you create a million dollar idea and begin earning on it in one weekend? Noah Kagan is one of my buddies and a guy I greatly admire. He’s founded and sold several multi-million dollar enterprises—and readily admits to his share of failures, as well—and he’s put together an approach, summarized in Million Dollar Weekend, which is a clear recipe for success. I know about how to make millions of dollars in consulting, for example. Noah has accelerated that process for most of you.He makes fascinating points about quantity winning over quality, in that quantity tends to find many more powerful solutions. He talks about how the Rule of 100 will get you started, and stresses something we all know but don’t practice nearly enough: You don’t get if you don’t ask.So join us here as he explains how he simply asked people to board their private jet, and wound up flying to Boston without any luggage or plans and then was terribly disappointed in flying home again commercially! Listen to what he says about making your first sale immediately, over that weekend. We talk about the internet as the “great equalizer” today (neither of us had its benefits as we built our businesses), and the traits that people need to genuinely accept his counsel and make rapid progress. (Resiliency is mandatory.)Listen to the only person ever to appear twice on The Uncomfortable Truth, and for good reason, and also find out how to access more of his smarts and this book.
Isn’t Starbucks just a tad affected when the have “baristas” and sizes like grande and venti and trenta and Huey, Dewey, and Louie? Is it possible not to want to body slam a “barista” who informs you they don’t like to put whole milk in a cappuccino because of “poor frothing”? I saw a couple enter a diner for breakfast carrying takeout Starbucks coffee. That level of self-absorption can cause implosion.When it’s ten degrees with a wind-chill of minus 15, why do women in skirts and dresses have bare legs? Is that really comfortable or just a concession to fashion that can cause serious illness? When I buy shoes, I can wear them right out of the store. Women, a year later, are still complaining about the pain (and apparently some hire other women to “break them in”). Talking to the movie screen or to performers on stage in a theater is not a cultural manifestation. It is simple unbounded rudeness.Trying to pay a dinner bill proportionately (“We didn’t have an appetizer and I only had one drink”) is the hallmark of a scarcity mentality. If you can’t afford to simply pay an equal share, don’t go to dinner. Eat the dog’s kibbles.I’m not impressed by a picture of an empty hall where you will be speaking. I’m impressed by a picture of a full hall while you are speaking.Revving your engine or playing your radio at jet-take-off levels is not a sign of masculinity, but rather a lack thereof.Learn of the former presidential candidate who drives me into the shower.
One of the major issues with a lack of success is that people don’t hold themselves accountable. They fail to meet deadlines, fail to fulfill obligations. They put more work into making excuses than they would have doing the actual work. The old “dog ate my homework” is now “there was traffic,” “we have child care issues,” “my internet was down.” There are no consequences for our failing our own accountabilities, and no rewards for meeting them. I’ll get around to it, unless I decide not to.Symptoms include lateness, unpreparedness, seeking last minute help or replacements, begging for more time. If you don’t think this is systemic as well as individual, think of Pearl Harbor (or 9/11, when flight schools had Muslim pupils who wanted to learn how to take off, navigate, and fly, but not land).We are unorganized and rarely penalized for it. We are able to blame others or the system of the deep web or some conspiracy, somewhere. Occupy Wall Street, Soak the Rich, down with Big Pharma.And, eventually, these people justify their lack of discipline by pointing out they can’t achieve anything because they’re not getting a fair shot. That’s what happens, of course, when you’re a dollar short and a day late.
If you want to see writing exhaustion, this is the series. After two pretty decent seasons, the show devolved through the ensuing six as if the writers had become deprived of oxygen.Every time someone knocks on a door, the response is, “What are you doing here?” It’s not, “Good to see you,” or “How can I help you?”, or “Are you lost?” People discussing matters in a private office are interrupted with a solution or dramatic new information by a colleague simply traipsing in from the halls.There are continuing confrontations and apologies, prefacing further confrontations and apologies, between and among the same people, often multiple times per show. People hard to reach are ambushed in the streets—outside their offices, at hot dog carts, in public garages—as if they were on a schedule and could easily be found. Similarly, people barge into private offices in other buildings without bothering to go through security or secretaries or assistants. And the person being accosted says, of course, “What are you doing here?”All the women, from the stars and supporting cast to the extras wear stilettos all day long. I’m assuming the producers have a fetish about this. (And the clothing is out of Vogue and hugely out of place as office attire.)I’m told they’re trying to conjure up a ninth season. If this appears on any of my streaming platforms I’m going to ask, “What are you doing here?”
• We’re seeing huge changes in healthcare.• About 25% of patients used telehealth last year, far exceeding the 5% who accessed care this way before the pandemic.• Pharmacies with physicians present (like pet stores with vets present)• Physicians in private practice greatly reduced.• The share of doctors who worked in practices wholly owned by physicians fell from 60.1% to 46.7% from 2012 to 2022.• More people seeing nurse practitioners • From 2016 to 2021, the number of primary care physicians billing Medicare declined each year, from 142,000 physicians in 2016 to 135,000 physicians in 2021. • Physicians tell me that the paperwork, reimbursement bureaucracy, and corporate demands are terrible. Example: 5-8 minutes allowed for patient questions during visits.• Some exceptions: dermatologists have modestly increased. There are no midnight emergencies for dermatologists.• Faith in the medical establishment has been undermined by the conflicting medical and political decisions during and after COVID. • Religious institutions, education, and medicine have all suffered damage to their integrity.• Patient costs are rising in terms of copays and over coverage denied by insurers.• The limited government data available suggests that, overall, insurers deny between 10% and 20% of the claims they receiver• When I consulted with RI Hospital it started every year in the red by $14 million because they were required to provide care to indigents.• Recent studies of medical errors have estimated errors may account for as many as 251,000 deaths annually in the United States, making medical errors the third leading cause of death.• Sepsis is a leading cause of death in hospitals.• Emergency room waits can be 12 hours and worse.• It wasn’t all that long ago that doctors were not washing their hands between seeing patients!
• Cut your expenses: virtual assistants, subscription software, subcontracting (even in the Philippines).• Move work to the client.• Focus on advisory work, not project work.• Increase number of sales.• Increase amount of sales.• Increase duration of client relationships.• Increase solicited referrals.• Create community evangelism.• Produce new products and services for existing clients.• Reduce marketing expenses.• Reduce time waste (internet).• Stop overdelivering/providing what wasn’t requested.• Track your time in a journal.• Get paid in advance.• Never tolerate delayed payments.• Focus on total days to cash.• List and evaluate all possible expenses (e.g., office rent at home, medical).
When you have a great talent on stage, do we really need dancers, other singers, flashing lights, and magic tricks? What does Starbucks gain giving us all those choices in its own strange language?Have you ever noticed how visitors from Europe are astonished at the size and number of our restaurant dinner courses? Have you ever tried to quickly find something in a car’s owner’s manual? Can you read all the menu options at Dunkin’ Donuts drive through window before the person in the car behind you becomes homicidal because they haven’t had their coffee?Do you love being “pitched” to buy credit cards on airplanes (which probably all lower your credit score)? Can you really decipher the bond issues you’re asked to vote upon with their triple negatives and boiler plate language? We tend to provide so many options to appear as if they raise the overall quality of our offerings. Or the lawyers insist we cover all the ground we can and leaver out nothing. Maybe the customers are at fault—do we need instructions that include “turn bike light on at night” or “do not eat or consume any of these pool chemicals”?We don’t recycle all that wasted food. People bring home prodigious amounts, which they don’t finish there, either. Maybe we need to look at quantity in a new way.To quote Miss Piggy, “Never eat anything you can’t lift.”
•The American Council on Education reports that 33% of universities and colleges have female presidents. • In the Ivy League it’s six of eight. Several for the first time ever.• The three women in front of the congressional committee were clearly over their heads, ill prepared, stunned, and soon reversed some of their testimony.• We’re focused on identity, not talent.• Boards used to seek academic excellence and a track record of outstanding leadership. • Now they want the first woman, or minority, or trans person, or whatever.• When Biden promised a black, female Supreme Court nominee, he found Ketanji Brown, by all accounts an excellent jurist.• But he had reduced her to the “best black female” available, instead of the “best candidate available.” That’s demeaning.• The Boston Association of Female Marketing Executives. Why me? Best role model.• Your freedom stops at my nose, I think John Jay. • When you advocate the mass murders of 9 million people, already attempted to begin with beheadings, rape, murder, and kidnapping, that’s well beyond my nose and yours.• And it won’t stop there. It didn’t with the Nazis, or the Russians, or the Chinese or the Khmer Rouge. It doesn’t stop with any corrupt “ism.”• A letter writer on a university faculty claimed that students know which professors will involve them in political indoctrination before they register for the course. This is the worst kind of sophistry.• Students pay absurd tuition to understand how to learn and evaluate differing points, not to hear absurdist, Marxist views from people protected from consequences by tenure, another ancient artifact.• The question is who’s running the asylum?• Oh, and by the way, after the University of Pennsylvania president was forced to resign after her failure in Congress, over 500 Harvard faculty members signed a petition supporting their president. What does that tell you?• It tell me she doesn’t have the spine to interfere with their provocation and indoctrination.• The “safe zones” on campus certainly aren’t intended for Jews these days, are they?
I find the use of profanity is the last resort for the inarticulate. It’s supposed to be “daring” and “shocking” but it’s actually just lazy. I sometimes surf through the comedy channels and hear standup comedians simply repeating m…..f….. over and over. There is no intellect there, and intellect and pain are actually the basis for almost all real comedy. Putting profanity on a book cover is boring, but it beats trying to come up with an appealing title.But most alarmingly, it’s simply entered the vernacular as adjectival alternatives. I hear parents in restaurants and at home over meals say s..t at in front of their kids. WTF is used by the more delicate, but it’s profanity nonetheless. Teachers and the “elite” often use it to show they’re “hip” and “down to earth,” which is the absolutely last thing they are. At my gym, where we have personal trainers, the music is very often rap with profound profanities, n….. for blacks, and “bitch” or far worse for women, yet there are black people there as well as women.This is simply the communication evidence of an uncivil age, a greedy and self-centered age, where people want shortcuts to success with no restrictions placed upon them and no concern for a contribution to the society and well-being around them. Everyone is entitled, and if their entitlement doesn’t work out, then they’re oppressed, and then they protest for more entitlements.This way lies madness.As an optimist I believe we’ll recover. But I’m the eldest of the Baby Boomers, my father fought in WW II. We can send carrier groups to the Middle East and apply economic sanctions globally. We can use drones, missiles, and remote weaponry.But we could never win the equivalent of WW II with our contemporary society because no one would want to make the sacrifices at home that were required.They would simply say, “Fuck that.”
Have you ever wondered about how other people might see this society? The proliferation of “tip jars” when virtually no service is performed; the intense scrutiny of head injuries in football, while players who make great plays deliberately bang their heads together; cars that can go almost four times the speed limit, manufactured and sold despite it.Why do we smuggle dogs into restaurants, refuse to merge in traffic, and think AI will become sentient and rule us when we still have to unplug and replug electronics as the primary repair principle? Laugh tracks, scripted reality shows, “influencers”: Why do we kid ourselves with this stuff?I wouldn't mind Wolfgang Puck giving me advice on menu selections, but I resent my life trickling away while a waiter tells me his or her favorite dishes. Why do tennis and golf professionals require total silence, but quarterbacks, basketball players, and boxers do not? Why do we talk too much and too loudly in public areas, but we’re mute in elevators?My guess is that people who borrow $300,000 to pay tuition to major in philosophy or history, which pay on average about $60,000 a year IF they can find a job, should really take more math courses. Why does an auto DUI not trigger a search for a boating or plane license? Can I lose my driving privileges at noon and take off in my Cessna for dinner?Does the advice “don’t take this medicine if you’re allergic to it” really help if you’ve never taken it? Do we have a right to complain about uncomfortable seats on an airplane taking us cross country in six hours for $100? What the hell is an “influencer”?And then there’s kale….
The opposite of evolution is devolution. Merely moving forward in time chronologically doesn’t guarantee higher standards, better performance, or improvement.Our speech has declined. People support this, claiming that speech must “evolve.” But does evolution include mindless, ubiquitous profanity, unintelligible statements, and confusing grammar? The arts haven’t made great strides, and on television and in the theater we see a procession of diluted revivals and low quality spinoffs. Athletes showboat over a tackle when their team is down three touchdowns.Service levels in most hotels are down, as they are on most airlines, and the latter fly smaller and smaller jets on longer and longer flights to make money despite passenger discomfort. Traffic is terrible in most large cities—incomprehensibly bad in LA— and if you replace every single internal combustion car with an electric car tomorrow, you’d still have the same number of cars on the roads with the same traffic jams! Civility is lower than ever, with polarization creating terrible name-calling and an overall casualness, where clerks call customers by their first names and people wear ripped jeans and hoodies to upscale restaurants. There is an entrenched belief that a privileged few in government and in the media somehow have the right to dictate to the rest of us how to live our lives.And we’re trapped in identity trumping talent, where merit and ability take a back seat to making sure gender, race, and ethnicity are “fairly” represented. (Yet this doesn’t occur in sports, where owners, players, and fans simply want the best talent available to win, no matter who that talent may be.)
Why do people immediately leaving a church service proceed to cut you off in the parking lot or, immediately before it, park in “no parking” fire zones?Don’t you think Bernie Madoff’s entire family figured out he was crooked and simply ignored what they knew? Politicians curry favor with popular positions but then feel free to change positions once elected and safe. The pandemic was, I believe, dishonestly manipulated by politicians and the medical community which led to more illness than necessary, harsher restriction than required, and more public acrimony than would otherwise have been the case.Learn here examples of why both John Denver and Nancy Pelosi have been inauthentic. False praise is far more harmful than honest, negative feedback. If you lie enough on your resume, you eventually begin to really believe the lie, which is why business executives, military leaders, and academicians often face humiliating ousters late in their glorious careers. President Biden has been caught in lies about awards he claims to have received and his class ranking in law schoolPeople blame third parties rather than being true to themselves. “It was the officiating.” “It was the weather.” “It was cheating.” Being true to yourself requires that you know who you are, and not pretending to be someone else, better, different. Are you attentive to others or self-centered, true to yourself or painting a false picture, creating fiction? Finally, learn about the institution that I think is the most hypocritical university in the country.
According to Google, the average college/university tuition in the US is $26,000 a year, but they range up to nearly $90,000 per year.We know this, these are statistics.Philosophy majors in the US make an average of $62,000 per year. The same for history majors. English majors average $56,000. All teachers in public schools average $65,000 (private schools $50,000). We know this, these are statistics.Apart from a very wealthy family supporting you, how much debt can you incur and pay off (while paying for housing, insurance, raising a family, etc.) in what amount of time given your loans and your intended occupation?If you can’t make those numbers work without defaulting on loans or begging the government for help that others didn’t receive, maybe you need to rethink college. Or, at least, private schools.And, of course, maybe the government needs to rethink a ridiculous system in the public sector, at least, before it implodes.
What are the major concerns of leadership in the near future?• Managing the transient worker• Metrics for true performance and not “presence”• The 40 hour week myth• The environment for intrinsic motivation• Voids of personal fulfillment• The loss of travel• Volunteerism • Abandoning guilt for not adhering to archaic work standards• Pushing accountability down and over to the individual• Triaging customers• Finding honest and authentic communications• Embracing true diversity not virtue signaling diversity• Coming to grips with the false promise of retirement• Physical, psychological, and emotional health• Embracing technology with proper proportion• The speed necessity• Thriving in ambiguity, disruption, volatility• Alleviation of excess stress• Being an effective avatar• Knowing how to create personal meaning
• Gratification is pleasure• Immediate means done at once• Why do we seek this:° To avoid delay in important matters personally/professionally. Evolutionary need for food, protection° A fear of opportunity lost° Impulsivity. Especially as we age. If not now, when?° Intellectual curiosity.° Poverty, desperation° Boredom. Here’s a new shiny object.° The alternative of long hard work (I can make money selling cars now, being an engineer would take six years.)• The trouble is that it is often temporary. (The dog toy breaks.) Other people have the same thing. The novelty wears off.• Often generates anti-social behavior—breaking into a line, theft.• In the longer term is unfulfilling, creating more disappointment.• Undermines all patience even when required: recovering from an illness, waiting for a delayed plane, even waiting at the deli counter.• Impulse purchase items are placed near the cashier in stores or at the end of aisles.• Can cause health problems (stress, ulcers) waiting for an acceptance to college, a job offer, a club membership.• Isn’t a realistic view of life, even when successful. Often depends on factors out of one’s control.• The key, perhaps: Fine on the minor stuff, a gamble on middle stuff, can be fatal on the major stuff.• Don’t forget, this is an age when kennels and shelters force potential animal adopters to qualify!
Here’s how I saved the entire $450,000 tuition bill for my kids by not having an office. I’ve never needed nor desired employees for my strong, seven-figure business. I want help that’s “in and out” very quickly, no long-term obligations. I use very good outside firms because I believe in investing money to save money. My worth isn’t based on “virtual assistants” whom I find virtually worthless.Observe the “total days to cash” dynamic, and improve your cash flow by collecting early, not late, on your terms, not the client’s terms. Remember, it’s not what you make, it’s what you keep.You can do this without sacrificing well-being: first class air, hotel suites, and limos. That’s because you charge clients basic and reasonable expense rates but can afford to upgrade yourself. But you have to eschew fanaticism. You don’t need version 4.1ab.7-a of anything. I learned the nonsense of ridiculous backups in pre-computer Prudential Insurance. Never “automatically upgrade.”Do I drive the last of the blazing fast, manual shift Corvettes, or do I drive a seven-year-old Chevy? It depends upon how you perceive it.Make your corporate bylaws as favorable as possible in order to use pre-tax and not post-tax money. Maximize every retirement plan available to you, and “catch-up” if you miss a year. Minimize meetings to increase your margins, and learn how I saved a month a year by simply refusing “small talk.” Oh, yeah: Web sites are not sales tools, so stop investing anything beyond basic credibility needs in them. Success, not perfection, my friends.
Bonanza: A situation or event that creates a sudden increase in wealth, good fortune, or profits.It was also a TV show in the heyday of westerns, and ran from 1959 to 1973, second only to Gunsmoke in longevity. It’s still shown in reruns on a variety of cable channels.By accident, I happened to see one the other day with a disclaimer on the screen, citing racial stereotyping on the show and to be aware of it. My first reaction was that this racial and gender stereotyping was all-too-common in the past. My second, however, is that wouldn’t a viewer know that and understand how far we’ve come and how far we still may need to go? (I don’t readily recall stereotyping on Bonanza, although maybe their Asian cook was the problem somehow.)I believe we’re all adults above a certain age, imbued with intelligence and judgment, which allows us to hold jobs, drive cars, and feed ourselves. (If a child were watching that rerun, somehow, would the kid understand the “trigger warning”?)Is this a legitimate warning or is it just more virtue signaling, like signs and flags on lawns? Those represent to me people trying to convince you of their virtue without necessarily behaving with virtue. (I’m all for stopping at a “stop” sign for everyone, but for me a “rolling stop” is okay.) After all, the station doesn’t have to run Bonanza at all. (CVS has taken tobacco out of its stores but not sugary candies and processed foods.)My feeling is that we learn from the past, both in our victories and our defeats, in our honorable behavior and in our sins. That’s the only way to improve the future, not by eradicating the past, or shouting opposing views down on campuses, or demanding we all take loyalty oaths to whatever cause. (Don’t laugh, they’re required in some universities for newly hired professors. You have to sign a diversity or inclusion oath, or the offer is rescinded. Remember when we were proud of having Communist professors speak their peace?)The media today are full of derivatives (a new “Frasier” with some new characters, appropriately diverse, which is not going to equal the original); new takes on “reality” shows (a 72-year-old “golden bachelor”); celebrity game shows (Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy) where the questions are either easier or the answers are hinted at. Let’s be honest about the past and optimistic about the future. Revising or eradicating the past doesn’t improve the present and pretty much undermines the future.
We are in the midst of the largest transgenerational shift in wealth in the history of the country. Part of this are the maturing retirement funds created under the Reagan administration, and part is the succession of small business owners from founders to the second (or third) generations.Barry Banther has worked with hundreds of family businesses, from $50 million to $500 million in revenues. He creates strategies for continuity and succession, from family ownership to outright sales with proceeds going to the family. He distinguishes between family-owned and run businesses and family owned but not run businesses (run by professional executives employed for that reason). He's worked with some of the most well-known families in the country whom we can’t name here but whom you would recognize instantly, as well. He talks of the three major factors involved in positioning successful family businesses, and of the sometimes incredible factors overlooked (trusts, wills, successions plans, etc.). He points out the dangers in having a family member serve as a trustee.Barry has run his own business independent of this one, and works with his clients typically for several years in order to position them for success. He’s currently finishing work after 17 years with a company that was at $60 million and will now be sold for a quarter billion.Small businesses are the largest creators of net new jobs in the country. The smart and longest-lived ones listen to Barry Banther. Perhaps you should, too.
Is an economically disadvantaged kid better off because of an insistence on how many black film editors, or baseball executives, or executive chefs receive awards?Is climate change really helped by expensive legislation that kills jobs and causes inefficiencies? (The prohibition of gas-powered anything.)Virtue signaling is the public expression of opinions or sentiments intended to demonstrate one’s good character or social conscience or the moral correctness of one’s position on a particular issue. It’s often expressed as being against something.Remember:Live and let livePeople who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stonesDo unto others as you would have them do unto youDo as I say not as I do (that didn’t work coming from my father)I don’t care whose picture is on a beer can. I don’t believe you’re a “better” person because you have a black lives matter sign on your lawn. I see too many people praying in church who won’t merge leaving the parking lot.Virtue signaling is the expression of a conspicuous, self-righteous moral viewpoint with the intent of communicating good character.Virtue signaling doesn’t actually require or prove that you’re doing or have done anything virtuous.In 2016, an NFL quarterback named Colin Kaepernick chose to sit rather than stand during the national anthem. This was his form of protesting against racial prejudice and inequality. Nike sales and stock shot up when they made him their spokesperson. But 7 years later Kaepernick still hasn’t been signed by any team and his age probably prohibits it at this point.In another example, when Apple stopped including chargers for its new iPhones they stated that it helped cut back on e-waste.However, as the authors point out, “Cynics argue that Apple is merely taking part in moral grandstanding and cutting costs while not passing the savings on to customers.”Some Sources:Virtue Signaling ExamplesBy Dave Cornell (PhD) and Peer Reviewed by Chris Drew (PhD) / August 5, 2023 from HelpfulProfessor.com
Jeff has been representing me for over 30 years, and was responsible for acquiring publishers (McGraw-Hill, Wiley, Macmillan, AMACOM, et. al.) for my four best-sellers, including the 30-year, 6-edition Million Dollar Consulting.He is responsible for thousands of published works and hundreds of authors’ happiness. For example, he represented the famous Why Bad Things Happen to Good People.We talk of the takeover of publishing by large venture capital firms. We discuss why hard copy books have never disappeared or even greatly diminished, despite the false prophets of electronic dominance. Learn how to create a query letter and formal proposal to “sell” an agent to represent you, and why publishers are expecting the authors to market and sell enough books to pay for the entire initial press run (sad, but true, and publishers know next-to-nothing about marketing these days, and wouldn’t invest in it even if they did). Publishers once paid for advances, but now they want the “advance” from you in terms of initial sales. You can, of course, pay between $50,000 and substantial six-figure amounts to firms which will “guarantee” a best-seller position in the New York Times or Wall Street Journal, but it’s for a nanosecond. I know people who have done it. They don’t even deserve the nanosecond.Jeff talks about the distinctions of the power of reviews vs. testimonials, and what it takes to convince an agent to represent you. This is a fast and furious tour through modern publishing. You might want to fasten your seat belt. Most of my business and referrals have originated with my books.
I received a letter from someone who had subscribed to one of my newsletters for $250 annually. He was late, but I accepted him, and he demanded—not requested—that I send him all the issues he has missed. I did that and he complained that they weren’t always in the same format, although I think that was a matter of his equipment, not mine. Now he’s complained that he didn’t get the final (August) issue and went on to lecture me about responsibilities, living up to promises, what constitutes professional businesses, yada yada, yada—sanctimony on parade. And, of course, I had sent it, who knows why he didn’t get it.Ordinarily, I simply provide what’s requested, but I told this guy to buzz off, except with my New Jersey vocabulary. The vast probability with these things is that the problem is on the receiving end.But, more than that, we’re looking at:• A return of Covid• Wildfires around the world, including absolute carnage in Maui• A seemingly endless war in Ukraine• Poor public services (this guy is in Italy, and they’re bad)• Social justice demands• Polarized politics Now, I know that neither you nor I go through this litany every time we have a difficulty to rationalize that we’re overreacting. But there is a limit to overreacting. This was a single issue of an electronic monthly newsletter which is probably in his spam file and which was promptly replaced.So, I told him off and told him I wouldn’t accept any further subscriptions from him. Maybe it was petty, but he’s an ass. And that’s the uncomfortable truth.
Elin Hilderbrand has a new book called Five Star Weekend. In my view, it’s awful, not at all up to her earlier work, predictable, with paper-thin characters and a dumb plot. You may disagree with me, most people do according to the reviews on Amazon. But I posted a very critical review. Amazon accepted it.However, after accepting it, someone clearly complained, because I received this obtuse communication today:I never mentioned “authenticity” (in a book??). I’m a veteran reviewer on Amazon. But I think someone from the publisher or author is muting negative reviews and Amazon is going along with it. This is the world we’re living in today, nonsensical responses from automated programs that distort and hide free speech. My critique was purely literary, noting the weaknesses in the book and the writing, nothing ad hominem. When they start to remove dissenting points of view, where does that leave us?
An “old fashioned” is a fabulous cocktail. The official origin of the drink is still heavily debated. While the Waldorf-Astoria in New York by way of the Pendennis Club, a private social club in Louisville, KY has been crested as the birthplace of the cocktail as we know it today, the publication of Modern American Drinks, by George Kappeler, in 1895 mentions the recipe for the Old Fashioned Whiskey Cocktail that Simonson describes as the evolutionary link between the whiskey cocktail and Old-Fashioned as we know it.
I will admit to being “old fashioned.” I believe in courtesy and a balance of personal preference with societal conformance.
Recently in Toppers, a world-class restaurant in Nantucket’s Wauwinet Inn, some people had on jackets (once a must) but most had on “resort casual,” shirts and slacks for men, summer dresses for women. One woman, dressed in that manner, came in with a man who had on shorts, a polo shirt, and flip-flops. You might say he was an individualist. Or you might say he was a slob. What did this nicely dressed woman think when he showed up that night?
I hold open doors for people when I’m slightly ahead of them. I open the car door for women. If I’m wearing a hat I take it off in a restaurant or in a meeting or in the theater.
I don’t “work my phone” at meals with others, nor do I tell stories loudly enough for people to hear me who are driving by.
I’m adept at yawning without making a noise like an oncoming tornado, and I say God Bless You when someone sneezes. No one has accused me of violating the separation of church and state as yet.
In 1973, D. Keith Mano wrote his only science fiction book, The Bridge.
It takes place in 2035, over 60 years since its original publication, but only 12 years from today.
It is about radical environmentalism run amok with a “green” socialist government.
The government decides to give earth back to nature, after already protecting all animal and plant life, but the fact that we destroy microbes every time we breathe is the final straw.
Cars have been eliminated, people return to the fields. The world is incapable of complex technology. Obesity is social standing.
There is resistance, but it is ineffective. Diseases must go untreated. Tumors are declared autonomous life forms, and protected.
Everyone must commit suicide, squads are deployed to kill those who don’t and then they will commit suicide, until the earth is free of all humans.
The hero, Priest, is determined not to die but to find his wife. He must cross the decayed and destroyed George Washington Bridge, hence, the book’s name.
When I read the book, 50 years ago, six years out of undergraduate school, I felt it was dystopian fiction, imaginative but implausible.
Just yesterday I read of a scientist in a scholarly journal who discussed the “full life of plants, including their communications and emotions.”
Barry Goldwater was urgently warned in his presidential bid in 1964 NOT to say that extremism is sometimes justified. Yet he said, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” He lost in a landslide to Lyndon B. Johnson.
Exercise, religion, philanthropy, volunteerism, education, travel: You name it, anything that takes you to extremes is likely to be terrible for you, even if moderate amounts are positive for you.
I’m predicting that the inhumane harvesting of animals will be a major and divisive cause in the near future, and it deserves to be remedied. But ending the consumption of animals by law is well on the way over the slope.
Do you think you can’t be arrested for harming a tree or a bush? A woman just petitioned the Rhode Island legislature to make it a felony to use your fingers to pretend to point a fictitious gun at someone.
When everyone’s every grievance is a demand that the entire world observes and honors, otherwise there is oppression and resultant entitlement, we may just be heading for The Bridge. Good luck trying to cross it.
When we see an empty ballroom, or stadium, or theater, we can see unlimited possibilities if we have any creative juices at all. We can stage performances, meetings, athletic events, entertainment, networking opportunities, and so forth.
But then we think of our fictitious “business life” and “personal life” duality, and we bifurcate that huge space with a wall right down the middle, a line of demarcation with separate pursuits on each side.
And then we create meetings, obligations, failure work, responsibilities, “bucket lists,” one-way streets, detours, “do not enter” zones, a great deal of noise, and misdirection. We become mice in a maze of our own creation, and that once huge, empty, high-potential space has become a tiny, oppressive place.
The fact is, we have one “life,” period. Personally, I have no problem whatsoever taking a few phone calls at the beach on vacation, just as I have no problem taking a weekday afternoon and spending it at my pool. I can engage in one of my hobbies on a Thursday morning and write part of my next book or create a proposal on Saturday morning.
I never feel “cheated” of time, nor that I’m “intruding” on some other portion of my life! If you have to go to Staples to pick up some office supplies, wouldn’t you also stop at the grocery to pick up some food for dinner? Or are those two separate trips, one for each “life”?!
We can’t keep closing in on our “breathing space,” enclosing ourselves and reducing our huge space and opportunity to small warrens and corners.
If we do, we’re going to run out of oxygen.
Let me harshly deal here with people who provide you with feedback you didn’t ask for, don’t require, and can’t use. That applies to feedback which is too positive as well as too negative.
We talk here about the trivialists, the hypocrites, the projectionists, and the general pains in the ass. Those who claim the only thing to do with feedback is to consider it are directing you toward the life of the ping pong balls or pickle balls being whacked back and forth.
You’ll hear some of my standard replies when offered unsolicited feedback and why even my mother fell into my feedback hell.
No one is erecting statues to critics in the park, even to replace those Columbus statues so ardently removed. We honor creators, not critics.
Thus: Defend yourself against the time wasters and underminers and passive-aggressives who would, with a patina of supposed good intention, try to derail you. Our job is not to please everyone, not to be liked, but rather to help improve people and be respected. We do that through the honest and forthright delivery of good ideas and practices, not through tearing others down.
Feedback can radically change others’ behavior, especially if they think you know more than they do. Be careful about intervening when you’re not asked. Telling someone they have lettuce in their incisors or toilet paper draped on their Pradas is, indeed, an act of good will. But telling them they shouldn’t be eating lettuce because they have an eating disorder or that their shoes are inappropriate is not helpful.
Don’t believe everything you hear. In fact, try not even to hear everything.
Seth Magaziner and I met when he ran for, and served as, Rhode Island State Treasurer for eight years. I asked that we make this conversation non-partisan, to which he agreed, and as always was gracious with his time and accessibility.
We talk about his view of the three biggest issues he sees facing America: climate change, income and opportunity inequality, and the rise of non-democratic movements inside and outside of the country.
He talks about the House of Representatives as the purest elected part of government, since Senators can be appointed by governors when the office falls vacant, and the President is actually placed in office by the Electoral College. (Originally and Constitutionally, Senators were appointed by state legislatures and there was no popular vote until the 17th Amendment in 1913.)
The discussion covered Ukraine, a war that originally was to see Russia in Kiev in two weeks, and is now in its 500th+ day with Russia on the defensive. I asked what we learned about our own military preparedness.
Seth is optimistic that polarization will be lessened, and wants to ensure that the debt ceiling is never again used as a bargaining chip by either party. He points out that there are many bipartisan discussions, agreements, and bills passed that don’t always make the media even now.
He told me that he was surprised by “how nice people are in the House”! I surprised him by recommending Washington’s Café Milano, the restaurant where the food is supposed to be mediocre but the neutrality is top priority and power brokers from both parties enjoy meals together.
I did tell him reservations are tough and he may have to call on Ms. Pelosi to get a table!
What do you mean? What do we mean? What is “meaning”?
We seem to be engaged existentially in some search for meaning. The Beatles were famous for a spiritual odyssey with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. We seek such spiritual guidance in many (often strange) forms: sweat tents, therapy, 12-step programs, trodding on hot coals.
The meaning in our lives needn’t be religious or spiritual, but one would think it’s above and beyond the trite and every day, sort of a North Star providing guidance. Yet it’s often normative, derived from others. We compulsively seem to emulate others’ styles, behaviors, and beliefs.
The definition of meaning is “an important and worthwhile quality or purpose.” We often consider it a magical breakthrough. We picture the guru on the mountaintop (somehow living without running water or electricity, but strangely content) to be consulted and answering in runic complexity.
Is this a practical pursuit? Does it matter? Does it make a difference in our daily lives, suiting us when it’s convenient but ignored when “meaning” gets in our way?
I think that meaning is like a rudder that provides the direction when we’re not consciously steering. It can provide and enhance resilience and decision making, and can reduce stress and conflict. It can guide our daily actions. Which begs the question: Is meaning an ever-moving goal or is it on our shoulder, sometimes unrecognized and unheard, but available for daily guidance and direction?
I’ll reveal what I think it truly is at the end of this podcast.
I could share theater stories with Tony all day long. As both an actor and director of great stature, his knowledge of the theater and its strengths and weaknesses is impressive.
We talk about the myth of the “dying” theater and the “aging” demographic. Tony points out that both the theater and the audiences have been “dying” since birth, to be replaced by new cohorts. His view is that people most appreciate the arts in their middle age and beyond. It’s not all that surprising that younger people often have far less interest.
I brought up the “drama within a drama” when an audience medical emergency stops a play, and those times when the “fourth wall” needs to be broken (or shouldn’t be). We’re both big Kevin Kline fans, and we have appropriate “fourth wall” stories (Tony’s is far better).
Money is a chronic problem for the arts, because debt kills the ability to experiment and the freedom to fail. It’s dangerous for the arts to become conservative and afraid.
We’ve both been colleagues of Oskar Eustis, who is now the artistic director of The Public in New York City, and who’s brought works such as Hamilton to the stage. We parse what Oskar has meant in his writing and speaking about “art being neither red nor blue, but for everyone.”
The “Netflix” phenomenon has created serious problems for movies, but there is no such comparison with live theater. Since Thespis began the art form, and two people began speaking to each other on stage, creating dramatic tension and a storyline, the culture of the theater has remained a central element of society. The recent actors’ strike since we recorded this session brings even more relevance to our discussion.
I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.
Remember “the benefit of the doubt”? That was meant to convey the belief that, when something was in doubt, give the other person a break. Don’t assume guilt, or fault, or ulterior motive. Maybe it was just a mistake, or an accident, or your misunderstanding.
So we tended to ask, “Is that what you meant to say?” or “Why exactly did you do that?” or “Perhaps I’m not understanding this correctly.” We also forgave people when it was their fault, they did make an error. Marriages generally have not ended because of a forgotten anniversary or the divorce rate would be even higher than it is.
Today, we almost always assume fault and flaw, and often we assume malice. We don't just believe someone inadvertently causes us pain, we default to the belief that they intentionally wanted to harm us. We don’t see accidents, we see conspiracies. And we don’t forgive or forget.
We get even.
We’ve moved light years away from “Do unto others….” to “undo others.” The other person isn’t wrong or even mistaken, they are ignorant and unethical. We see this clearly from a higher moral plain. If you’re not here to help me then you must be here to hurt me. There is no middle ground. You’re with me or against me. And if you’re against me, well you’re an inferior and subject to whatever I can dole out to demonstrate that.
I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that most of you will agree that we ought to give each other a break.
Randy told me once that you don’t end poverty by creating more of it. He’s an independent thinker on prosperity and success. He doesn’t connect prosperity solely to financial well-being, but rather to an intelligent combination of factors, happiness being one of them.
He very pessimistic about our news sources and you’ll be fascinated by his personal, daily routine. He actually times himself on Twitter and eschews the other social media platforms. He’s overall an optimistic guy, but admits his pessimism has slightly increased of late. (Here’s his blog post on social media killing prosperity: https://randygage.com/social-media-is-killing-your-prosperity/)
We both agree that young people have it harder today with extreme normative pressures, poor educations, and more limited opportunities. Once upon a time you were graduated from college with an assortment of useful business and life skills. Today, not so much. Consequently, we discuss the “fall of conventional universities” and their increasing irrelevance. The future will be about competencies and not initials after one’s name.
We’re “taught” to be self-effacing and “humble,” two conditions which neither boost our self-worth nor improve our standing in others’ eyes. Too many people feel powerless today, and believe they have little or no control over their lives and destinies.
Guido and I have known each other for a quarter century. He introduced my concept of value-based fees in Germany in building his multi-million euro boutique consultancy.
We talk here about the post-pandemic atmosphere in Germany and in Europe. These issues include: • labor shortages • remote vs. in-person work • post-Brexit realties • existential vs. pragmatic issues
We discuss what his clients are most concerned about today, and whether those concerns are valid. As is the case elsewhere, we examine the motivation, productivity, and work ethic of people in organizations, and what they’re seeking.
On the morning we chatted it was reported that Germany had “slipped into recession” and Guido pointed out the irony of the government complaining that consumers weren’t spending enough!
The difference between strategic business and tactical concerns, relative to the nature of the types of meetings was an important distinction in communication which we can all learn from. And we examine the current French environment where, with morbidity outpacing fertility and immigration problems, and the public rabidly against raising the retirement age, labor shortages will be a harsh economic reality.
Guido is a superb example of someone building a boutique firm that is successful with the top officers of major enterprises amidst turbulent times.
How much have times changed in the past 50 years? What is the difference in view point, expectation, and options for college graduates today versus those in 1968?
Of course, 1968 was no picnic. The Tet Offensive raged in the Viet Nam War, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy were assassinated, and the inner cities burned.
But in ’68, seniors in college became engaged and married soon after graduation, having children in the next few years. That was the sequence then, as religious institutions, schools, and the family dinner table imparted values. An “intact family” (two parents married for the first time and one or more children) constituted 85% of all family units. Today that number is 7%. That is not a misprint.
In ’68, young adults were looking at rental apartments leading to buying a home, independence, jobs, travel (no matter how modest), reliance on an extended family—the world was wide open for us. Today, there is the sinkhole of social media, dismal job prospects with ugly commutes or distracting work at home, politicians no one trusts, high stress, a feeling of powerlessness—according to Cigna International, 91% of 18-24 year-olds report they are stressed.
People who are optimistic and happy perform better, are healthier, and are more prosperous than those who are pessimistic. (Dan Gilbert, PhD, and his book, Stumbling on Happiness.)
In 2021, suicide rates increased after two years of decline, and it’s worst among 15-24 year-olds where it increased by 8% (CDC). The pandemic was terrible, but perhaps more so because today’s youth are not as resilient as their forebears.
In less than a generation—55 years—what have we done?
50s: Constancy, GI Bill, Levittown, Sputnik, Korean War, Univac, DNA discovered, Joe McCarthy, Hungarian uprising, Montgomery bus boycott
60s: Kennedys shot, King shot, Woodstock, the Beatles, Watts riot and cities burn, Cuban missile crisis, Viet Nam, Bay of Pigs, first televised presidential debate, USSR had hydrogen bomb
70s: Kent State shootings, Watergate, Nixon and Agnew resign, Mars landing, Viet Nam ends, gay liberation movement
80s: CNN begins, Iranian hostages released, Falklands war, Sandra Day O’Connor first female on Supreme Court, Sally Ride first woman astronaut, Challenger explodes, Macintosh computer, Cold War ends with Reagan/Gorbachev, Berlin Wall falls, intense materialism and consumerism, MTV emerges
90s: LA riots, Oklahoma City bombing, Columbine shootings, Persian Gulf War, TWA flight 800 is blown up, relative peace and prosperity, end of USSR, rise of the Internet, Dow Jones clears 2,900 for first time
00s: Al-Qaeda attacks world trade center and Pentagon 9/11, Department of Homeland Security established, invasion of Iraq, Nancy Pelosi first woman Speaker, Michael Jackson dies, economic collapse, Y2K a flop, Barack Obama first black president immediately receives Nobel Peace Prize, Great Recession, Tesla launched
10s: Black Lives Matter, Brexit, occupy Wall Street, launch of the iPhone 4, Trump elected, natural disasters, Boston Marathon bombing, LGBTQ, Ebola, Prince dies
We’ve come from a period of constancy to a period of continuing turmoil; from privacy to omnipresent publishing and exposure; from civility to rudeness and aggression; from support for the law to defund the police; and from respect for institutions to near-anarchy.
This is not merely the changing of generations or progress or evolution of thought. It is a decline and declivity into amazing self-absorption, disdain for differing opinions, and really a wallowing in ignorance. Our primary institutions of the conveyance of values have all decayed: the schools, organized religion, the intact household, statesmanship.
Is this a natural sign of the times, or more like the old trope that the first generation founds a business, the second modernizes and expands it, and the third, having no such hunger, runs it into the ground?
The US is about 240 years old, which is one-thousandth of one present of the tenure of the dinosaurs on earth. They were erased by space junk, or they’d still be here.
Will we be erased by junking our values?
Chris gave up his commission as a full Colonel in Afghanistan to assist three, four-star generals and two Secretaries of State to try to negotiate with the Taliban. He was the only combat officer ever asked to do so.
The lessons he learned he’s applied to both business and charity. Chris specializes in helping leaders, entrepreneurs, and our “wounded warriors.”
We talk about the readily-transferable leadership traits that lead to success in private business, including the great discipline and self-accountability that we encounter in most officers. But then there is the difficulty in moving from a world where feedback from below is rarely solicited—and Chris demonstrates how that can best be accomplished—to one where it’s essential to listen to subordinates and customers.
He explains his battlefield webinars where executives learn “on the ground” why battles were won or lost, and then examine what those principles mean in their own businesses and lives.
You’ll hear about Chris’s remarkable work with wounded warriors and his Saber Six charity, including a 1,700-mile bike ride to visit the gravesites of six men from his unit who died in battle.
We also chat about whether the military and private business have grown too “top heavy” with general officers and business executives, and what that means for effectiveness and efficiency.
You’ll be hearing this not too far removed from Memorial Day in the U.S., so the conversation provides an excellent opportunity to reflect on others’ service and our own.
Learn how I’ve been banned from Linkedin, though not why, because none of us knows why. Consider what might happen to you—with your business, a special event, your reputation—when these aloof, powerful social media platforms simply use stupid algorithms and poorly trained people.
Social media are really public utilities at this point and, as much as I’m not a fan of big government control, I do think they need to be controlled just as the gas, electric, and water companies are. Imagine if your accountant, or attorney, or architect refused to talk to you in person and required only automated interactions? How long would you stand for that?
What Zuckerberg et. al. created and, too ironically, Musk is now a part of, has morphed into cesspools of disinformation, misinformation, and confirmation bias. I’m told by several people who are social media savvy that only 15% of members post over 75% of content, and 100% of the 15% are either radicals on the right or left.
If you want to post photos of family vacations or impress someone with your new boat, go for it. But for most people in professional services, there is too much “noise” and amateurism on social media for them to serve as legitimate marketing routes.
Scores of people have written me since I exposed this banishment, telling me that they or friends have been banned for varying amounts of time without explanation. Yet I find myself dealing daily, on Facebook in particular, with profanity, threats of violence to various groups, and rudeness.
My model train group was closed by the administrators because the members had become intolerable in their fighting about modelling!
It’s social media (not “business media”) and if you haven’t noticed yet, society is getting pretty ugly.
Macroaggressions should be pretty obvious, but even they are often ignored because they are too common. I’ve been involved in shining a light on them for some clients. “Micro” means small and often “unimportant.” So what are “microaggressions”? Well, it certainly is rude to ask an Asian student you don’t know to help with your math homework, which is based on a stereotype. It’s equally rude to ask 6’6” black people if they’re at the university on a basketball scholarship. I know a priest who is that size and immediately says to new people that he never played sports. He’s rather dour at times, and I think it’s because he’s seen too much rudeness that other people simply think is humor. “Dour” isn’t good for a priest.Recently, the leading candidate for superintendent of Easthampton Public Schools claimed he lost his job offer for using the word “ladies” in an email to two women on the board. He said he was “shocked” because he “grew up in a time when ‘ladies’ and ‘gentlemen’ was a sign of respect.” Some of you will remember when Ritz Carlton Hotels (before Marriott bought them and damaged the brand) had a sign in the employee areas that said, “We are ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen.”So when do we properly point out and acknowledge inappropriate behavior and language, and when are we simply the “targets” of “diversity and inclusion experts” who see their job as taking shots at anyone who doesn’t meet their particular criteria? I once heard a diversity speaker say that she wasn’t “childless,” but “child-free.” Does that make me “child-burdened”?The House of Representatives has adopted a protocol whereby terms such as “mother, father, and step-sister” are no longer to be used, replaced by “parent and step-sibling.” “Father-in-law” becomes “parent-in-law” in this gender-neutral double-speak.There is no doubt that the rudeness and insensitivity and worse that needs to be changed must be changed, and is intolerable. But I doubt that extends to calling a woman a “lady.”
It’s seldom that you can receive uncomplicated answers about the economy and the impact of these turbulent times. Ask five “experts” and you’ll get seven opinions.So I was overjoyed that Lee Duckworth and Larry Dooley from Capital Wealth Management were able to join me and respond to questions about unemployment, bank failures, the Fed’s actions, the TINA principle, and the TARA principle. (I hadn’t heard of these, either, but they make a lot of sense and you’ll see how they’re changing when you listen to the interview.)We chat about the primacy of cash for individuals and organizations in turbulent times, and what some bare minimums are to consider. I’ve always advised people entering professional services that they should have a minimum of six months of regular expenses in the bank when they launch their practice. Find out if I’m right or wrong.We discuss the very low unemployment we’re experiencing and the fact that there are two jobs for every person seeking one. We review consumer spending, especially in hospitality and travel. There are very original insights on the bank failures in California of a few weeks ago, and the need to check on whether deposits are actually insured or not. I raise the issue about the large withdrawals from Schwab and State Street, two main custodians, and receive a rather surprising answer.I have four degrees, but took only three credits in economics over that entire stretch of schooling. You’ll learn a great deal here listening to two pros in financial planning and asset management.
We are largely in conflict with ourselves. This is assured to be destructive to everyone.One person complains that their sixth grader saw the great art work, The David, complete with genitalia, of course, and the teacher is fired. A solitary coach praying on a football field after a game, win or lose, is voluntarily joined by some players and a few parents feel that this is a tectonic issue of church and state, despite the fact that athletes performing well and entertainers receiving awards regularly thank God in gesture and words.Politicians with opportunities in front of them are struggling to deny that they have ever said “defund the police” even though their statements have been captured on tape. We use the “woke” and grammatical horror “they” to refer to individuals, so that the listener doesn’t know if the reference is to one person or a group or a nation.Some doctors are actually endorsing physically-altering therapy for pre-teens and teenagers who claim they identify with the opposite gender. Yet many of these kids reverse such sentiments over short time frames. But you can’t reverse the surgery.Airlines and theaters actually have to make announcements that patrons should respect those who wear masks and those who choose not to, as if a professional wrestling or soccer riot were to break out. We’re teaching kids about how to identify their gender while the Chinese are teaching their kids the STEM disciplines.We insist on fighting ourselves where no one “wins” and progress doesn’t occur. Is there a cure for this illness?
I’ve known Suzanne for about 20 years. She is the relatively rare example of the founder of a boutique firm who successfully built up its valuation, decided to sell, found the right time to sell, overcame the interruption of the pandemic, and closed with an international buyer.Her journey is a huge example of talent, success, and plain grit. Originating in the media business as a news anchor, she migrated to communications education and training, offering her coaching services and gradually built a company which obtained Fortune 500 clients. She describes, in this interview, the challenges encountered and overcome, often not so easily. (She started preparing to sell five years before the sale was actually consummated.)We talk about the impact today of remote learning, ChatGPT, and leadership in ambiguous times. While it may sound grandiose to say that AI will “change the world,” there are precedents, such as the Industrial Revolution, right down to the advent of the internet (which no one predicted). Should social media companies be treated as utilities and regulated (as is gas, electric, and water)? As you read this, I’ve recently been reinstated after being banished from Linkedin for reasons they won’t disclose!It's difficult to sell a business, no matter how successfully, and become someone’s “employee” once again. And it’s also difficult to decide who you are and what to do once that relationship also ends. Neither Suzanne nor I believe in “retirement.” And neither should you.
Why is it that I trust the doctor when he simply says, “You look healthy, don’t worry, you’re not sick”?The first 90 seconds of your speech will determine how closely people pay attention to you. Not if they pay attention, but to what degree. It’s the difference between them taking notes and asking questions on the one hand, and checking their email under the table on the other.That applies to what you write, your conversations, and what you record, as well. We tend to immediately make conscious or unconscious notes about peoples’ attire, table manners, language, sense of humor, attitude, attention and focus, and emotions. Books are often judged by their covers.Haven’t you found that the plane’s cleanliness or lack thereof can affect your trip, or that the auto dealer’s service area gives you a lot more confidence when it’s spotless and uncluttered? What about the hotel lobby, and the doorman or desk agent? And certainly, when visiting a home, you take into account the grounds, the interior, the layout, the lighting, and so forth. I’m impressed that my gardener’s tools and equipment are clean and neatly stored in his trailer. Nothing is rusted or rattling around loose.No matter how much we may deny it, first impressions are lasting impressions. They can be overcome, of course. Or, they can overcome whatever follows.That choice is ours.
Steven and I have known each other for over a decade. He’s an expert on a widely-studied field—teams—and a field not studied enough—honesty.In this conversation he explains about fear being the cause of a lack of honesty. He explains the novel notion that “It’s not what we say, but what we don't say.” Steven does believe that honesty is making a comeback, contrary to what many people may think. We talk about the government actually rewarding “whistleblowers” to come forward by offering seven- and even eight-figure payments, and the problems that creates when people make false accusations to try to get some of that money.We discuss the modern “guilty until proven innocent” reversal that seems to have taken hold of society and the media, as embodied by TSA: Prove to us that you’re not a terrorist.Steven doesn’t feel the pandemic dramatically changed teamwork but he does see a trend to get people back into the office because socialization is a huge part of effective teamwork, and you can’t do that remotely. He feels that “high achieving” teams is the right phrase, more so than “high performing” teams. And he doesn't see a difference in honesty or teamwork between the public and private sectors. Of course, we talk about politicians.He makes the case that you need to calculate time investment before taking on some lies that really aren’t harmful, or where people are so resistant to other views that they won’t listen anyway. I asked him if he were self-conscious about his own truthfulness and he said, “Of course, and sometimes I do lie!”And, lastly, we do agree on the appropriate time to lie.
In dealing with a global community of thousands—and hundreds of thousands who have read my books—I’m able to keep my finger on the pulse of the profession and its clients. I’m sharing in this podcast some of the repetitive discussions and challenges that are extant internationally.For example, “remote” now rules. It’s often the default interaction, and often represents more value, not less. (A huge amount of time and money are saved.)However, leaders are not sure how to deal with combinations of remote, onsite, and hybrid employees. They are frustrated that they’re not getting their “40 hours” of productivity from them, when, in fact, even employees in the office physically are not providing 40 hours of productivity! This goes back to “Scientific Management” and Frederick Winslow Taylor in the early 20th Century, the first time-and-motion consultant. The problem is that he fudged his numbers and never factored in fatigue and boredom.Supply chains are changing, but they’re changing from global (do we really want to rely on China for chips or Russia for gas) to regional supply chains. Hence, the US, as an example, is building chip plants. And we see new alliances forming that once were almost unthinkable—Finland joining NATO, Japan and South Korea cooperating and the former settling WW II claims from the latter.The old retirement rules are artifacts. The French are crazily protesting an increase in the retirement age to 64 or 65 in the face of morbidity outpacing fertility and restrictions about immigration. The entire First World, including China, is facing severe labor shortages. (The US desperately needs pilots, yet the government mandates 65 as the retirement age. Government stupidity at its worst.)I’m 77, it’s a good thing they don’t have the power (yet) to mandate that I retire!
Connie is a former anchor on two major networks. She has moved from broadcasting to coaching, consulting, and speaking with remarkable ease. She’s created her own psychometric testing instrument, and has clients on six continents.I’ve had the pleasure of working with her for many years, and her innovation about, and intelligence in, leadership and executive presence is creating state-of-the art interventions.We talk about the relationship of charisma, presence, and leadership. She tells us about how she became engaged in places such as Kuwait and Dubai, dealing with inclusion and equity. Connie raises the issue of those who think they’re influential but really are not. (My term is “legends in their own zip code”). We focus on the differences among manipulation and actual, long-term, mutually supportive influence. I ask her about the effectiveness of leaders in remote and hybrid environments and about the changes necessary intergenerationally. When I asked about a leader who exemplifies her beliefs about superb presence and leadership, her choice is at once both surprising and unarguable.She cites a very suspect source for some of her success, but she does provide great advice for those who are, or aspire to be, leaders in any realm. I know you’ll greatly enjoy this informal, insightful conversation with a master of her craft and a leading light in her profession.
Well, is this a further step in the dehumanization of civilization, or a Jonestown Kool Aid romp, or another Y2K flop?When you put a variety of documents or fictional passages through the system, I find they are seldom improved and often seriously injured. In some cases, such as in instructions or directions, I think there is huge potential. But I examine in this podcast the downsides of people jumping on this latest “bandwagon” amid the pet rocks and hula hoops.Are we eager to “homogenize” writing? Or eager to duplicate with grammar what we’ve done with math, which only a few people seem to be able to do in their heads anymore. (I fall down laughing at people who can’t figure out a tip in a restaurant, so that the restaurants overcome this by suggesting percentages to tip and the amounts represented therein.)What does this mean for dissertations or term papers? What does it mean for book proposals or reviews?Are we going to live in a world of automated writing, automated math, autonomous cars, and synthetic food? Is that the kind of quality life to which we aspire? Hell, I won’t drive a sports car without a stick shift (or it ain’t a sports car).Believe it or not, the following is ChatGPT’s “improvement” on the final four lines above:As automation technology advances, it's becoming increasingly likely that we will see more and more examples of automated writing, automated math, autonomous cars, and synthetic food in our daily lives. While this may bring convenience and efficiency in some cases, it raises the question of whether this is the kind of quality of life we truly desire.There are certainly benefits to be had from the automation of certain tasks, but we must also consider the potential drawbacks. For example, while autonomous cars may make our commutes more pleasant and reduce the number of accidents caused by human error, they also raise concerns about job loss for drivers and the possibility of accidents caused by software glitches.Similarly, while synthetic food may offer a solution to food scarcity and reduce our environmental impact, it may also pose health risks and raise ethical concerns about the nature of what we're consuming.It's important to consider these issues carefully as we move towards a more automated world. While some people may prefer the convenience of automated technology, others may feel that the loss of human control and connection is a step in the wrong direction. Ultimately, it's up to us to decide what kind of world we want to live in, and whether the benefits of automation outweigh its costs.As for driving a sports car without a stick shift, personal preferences will always vary, but it's clear that the rise of automated technology is changing the way we interact with our cars, and it remains to be seen how this will impact our overall driving experience.Need I say more?
I’ve been staying at the Lotte Palace Hotel in New York City since it was solely “The Palace” and run by the legendary Leona Helmsley. It’s ideally situated on Madison Avenue between 50th and 51st, right across from St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and in easy walking distance to all Broadway plays and only about 300 good restaurants.Becky Hubbard has been the general manager for a dozen years amidst her 20 in the hospitality industry. We speak here about staffing and sustaining a highly supportive and polite work force; of the rebound since Covid; of international tourism rebounding; and of a day that had her walking home around eight at night, while her daughter tracks her location on her cell phone.She presides over a 900+ room, elite hotel which she calls her “inn” and has just overseen a $140 million renovation. We talk here about her preference for dealing directly with guests and the importance of the “first see, last see” front door staff. We discuss the dramatic rise in hotel charges to guests (in Florida right now they are up as much as 64%) and how to overcome rising costs to the hotel. And we talk about the continuing need for innovation and adaption of technological solutions. (Even low-end hotels are offering keyless entry using smart phones and check in remotely.)
We explore the need to help those who need help, as opposed to those who simply make irresponsible decisions.
An examination of the best and the worst customer service, and the fallacy of the problem being the Great Resignation.
The difference between excellent and indifferent service is often a matter of who owns what.
I'll define what leadership is and isn't, and you can decide whether you see it or not.
Where we study the recent "whoops" from Whoopi Goldberg and the sources of "shut up and sing."
Wherein we examine why loan forgiveness for student debt is applicable today, but not before, and doesn't apply to those who paid out of their own pockets.
Wherein we examine the extent to which celebrity trumps common sense and social obligation. Oh, yea: and ethics.
The people who steal your oxygen and your energy. Move away. Have yourself a merry little Christmas.
Why rules are important for the dynamic of conformity and creativity. It's not what you think.
A mob is a mob, but perhaps we can better learn the need to understand each other without storming a building.
Mental illness comes in varied forms and perhaps it's the real problem we need to face.
Legacy is about creating your own meaning, not searching for someone else's meaning. And you'd better begin now.
Is anyone capable of turning down the offer, of refusing the advantage, of cutting the line?
Why agendas are simply selfish "to do" lists and can never satisfy those who don't wish to be satisfied.
How the "newspaper of record" has become a broken record in trying to create loathing for American and guilt for Americans.
Pretending that not wearing a mask represents control is like claiming that not vaccinating your children isn't really stupid.
Can we and should we really try to scrub away past sins and shameful history, or try to learn from them?
How and why 25% of all business practices will change and what to do about it if you're smart.
Play a dirge, the sales profession is being replaced by the leveraged consumer and customer. It's time to get out of Jurassic Park.
For this special edition of The Uncomfortable Truth, I sit down with marketing strategist, Lisa Larter.
Wherein everyone demands everyone else's attention for every minor inconvenience, ending civilization as we know it.
Why the Super Bowl has become an almost mindless ritual despite the quality of play on the field.
Why are we afraid of an illness that won't harm most of us but not of an illness that will kill 70,000 of us in the US alone annually?
How a legislature full of multi-term attorneys is killing us and why we should send them out to harvest crops.
Why we back up instead of move forward and what it means to have the courage of your talent.
How the news media and reporters distort fact for drama, trying to make the mundane magnificent.
Why lies and fabrications stick to our histories like glue, and why we provide the glue.
Our prisons would reflect a depraved society to anyone coming from another world and wondering how we can treat people this way.
Why they're important some of the time only, and the worst, most dangerous critic of all.
How banks disregard the customer and why they should be run like hospitality organizations.
Why government intervention in how much a team is allowed to win by may mean The End of Days.
Why capitalism is about the survival of the smartest as exemplified by taxis that no longer stink.
Why we're strangers within the crowd and how we need to avoid the fate of Valentine Michael Smith.
Wherein Alan shares some truths about himself which, he hopes, won't make you too uncomfortable.
Despite modern technology and increasingly rapid communications, we've become more and more isolated.
How we are told of the exceptions as if they are normal and not told of the normal as if they are exceptions.
Wherein we examine the uncomfortable truth about people and politicians seeking the benefits of free stuff.
We have the dumbest priorities possible, focusing on the vague and esoteric and not the issues in front of our faces.
Why talent always "outs" except when the conditions don't allow it or there's not enough talent.
The Michelangelo Factor and why careers can be works of art if we cull away everything that doesn't fit our passions and skills.
Arthur Miller today might write about The Death of All Salesmen, because traditional selling is going out of business.
Why mastering a spelling bee isn't at all important and why understanding reasons and relationships is.
Why progress in personal transportation is questionable, and how personal injury lawyers probably invented it.
Why Ponzi is alive and well and calling it "multilevel marketing" is just lipstick on a pig
Would you let your kids play football today, knowing what you know? Gronk is getting out just hoping it's not too late.
Justice is overrated. It's not what happens to you, it's what you do about it. Seize control. Carpe diem.
Why is it revolutionary and shocking to suggest that NOT everyone deserves a turn at everything and we should focus on the best?
Why we're not sure about which cliff we're going to drive off because we've taken a wrong turn in society.
Uncovering where we fail to get the proper return on our energy and how it undermines us.
Not all art is good. It's not unethical to point that out, and it's silly to praise the unwatchable.
Why it's better to march to your own music rather than a distant drummer who's probably not a very good musician anyway.
We are who we decide to be. If you choose to be disadvantaged, then you will be. But we all have choices.
Why do you see enemies all around us, and why do we think we're on some exalted height?
Political messaging is about what the candidate is against, or how the opponent is a criminal, or what they think about world issues. But what are they actually for?
What if they make you worse instead of better. With whom do you really want to hang out?
How being guilty until proven innocent is undermining our freedoms and creating fear and loathing.
We mock hoarders, but most of us are caught in a "never enough" mentality quite similar to them.
Wherein we try to discover what greatness is and who's responsible for it, with results that are very frightening.
There is a singular answer to everything you wish to accomplish but you won't find it with motivational speakers or "The Secret."
There are consequences to everything we do, and we ought to consider them before jumping into action.
The ridiculous machinations employed to avoid talking to customers, what number do I press to end it all?
We're absolutely certain, and quite often wrong, because we refuse to listen while we're so certain.
When the student isn't seen as the customer the student isn't served well, and neither are we.
Was Columbus a good guy or not? Should we play Wagner's music, even though he was an anti-Semite? Can you be an outstanding talent and also a lousy person?
Wherein we examine who can curtail the power of those who exert unfair and inappropriate power by dint of their positions.
The endemic cynicism and pessimism of so many people remind me of alligators who habitually eat their own offspring.
This podcast discusses my indirect association with Napoleon Hill through my old boss, and why thinking alone won't make you rich.
Humility is NOT a desirable trait for professionals because no customer, client, or consumer screams out for a humble surgeon.
Awards are a dime a dozen, but acknowledgment can mean all the difference in the world.
Time is a priority, not a resource. You can no more negotiate with it than you can with a hurricane.
Why spending time examining who you really are and what your calling is can ruin your life.
Wherein government might be improved if those making the laws were subject to the consequences of those laws.
How suffering has become the proof of existence and why we all need to reflect back on Descartes.
How do we deal with cardinal sins and venial sins? Do we take all accusations seriously?
Why there is no direct correlation between success and happiness, at least in the Pacific.
Why we shouldn't be applying contemporary beliefs to historical events and we'd be a lot lighter if we put the stones down.
How we are dulling our senses and ruining our meaning. WARNING: Profanity is used throughout for examples.
How we're not preparing our kids for the basic learning that many of us were prepared for in simpler times.
Fear of failure is fear of living, so let's come to grips with why we've failed and whether it matters or not.
United may have been obvious, but you are being dragged up the aisle daily by a variety of public and private organizations.
Don't tell me you don't have any faith when you drive on the highway with people all around you steering deadly weapons.
Learn why too many people focus on the task and not the result, hear about some scary examples, and understand how you can avoid it yourself.
Wherein Alan discusses that we all believe in something, and we're not random biological mechanisms.
How to help others to improve, and how to easily measure performance without surveys, evaluations, and voodoo.
Why all of us require unconditional support at times and why it's so difficult to obtain it.
Some lessons in why your telling yourself you can might wind up in finding out why you can't.
We "settle" instead of deliberately choosing what's best for us, and we need to stop that.
Why we are far too timid in our lives and work and how to stop playing a "prevent defense."
Why whatever you perceive your condition to be does not warrant a vote in Congress or a newscast.
A memorial service to the many friends you lost when they went swimming 55 minutes after having lunch.
Roosevelt was right, and we ought to stop being frightened by everything that goes bump in the night.
How the Second Law of Thermodynamics can erode your business and your life if you donąt renew yourself.