Princess of our Disorder

What a maroon as Bugs Bunny used to say. It is  a sign of the times when a person like this becomes a role model and leader to millions of people. But blame John McCain if you must find blame. He let this Pandora out of the box just as George Bush let evil out of the box when he made Dick Cheney his Vice President.

Some have greatness thrust upon them. Some seek greatness. Palin is neither. She seeks several things. Money and notoriety which also means more money.  I am not against her making as much money as she can. At least she is finally doing it ethically (even if I think her politics suck). She is running around the country going from conservative hots pot to conservative hot spot creating FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt). And people are paying good money to listen to her spout her hate and narrow views. But don’t mistake her for a leader because she doesn’t stay anywhere long enough to actually lead. That is her MO.

If she ever stands still long enough to win another public office, she will be the leader we deserve rather than the leader we need.

Have you ever seem her down in Gulf scooping oil or helping save wild life?  The Gulf is a hot bed of conservatives. She has the time, but God forbid she gets her Gucci’s  dirty or misses a $peech.

Goofs mar Palin’s Reagan college tribute, legal fund appeal

1 hr 33 mins ago

Following in others’ grand tradition of demonstrating gaps in knowledge while addressing a university, Sarah Palin told a crowd at a fundraiser at California State University in Stanislaus last weekend that Ronald Reagan, personal hero and inspiration, was a California college graduate. She told the cheering crowd: “This is Reagan country, and perhaps it was destiny that the man who went to California’s Eureka College would become so woven within and interlinked to the Golden State.”

There’s just one problem here: Reagan went to Eureka College in Illinois from 1928 to 1932, the Alaska Dispatch reports. He didn’t move to California until five years after his graduation. There’s no Eureka College in California (though there’s a town of Eureka that has a College of the Redwoods nearby).

Immediately after her speech, a live microphone caught voices in the press area trashing the former Alaska governor, Mediate reported. “The dumbness doesn’t just come from soundbites,” one complained. The Fox affiliate owned the microphone but says their reporters did not make the comments.

Meanwhile, the Associated Press reports on a more serious recent mistake of Palin’s political organization. Administrators for her legal defense fund accidentally sent out a rough draft of an email to thousands of supporters that falsely claimed she faced “millions of dollars” in legal fees because of “frivolous” ethics suits against her. The corrected version of the email said the fees numbered in the hundreds of thousands, not millions.

Critics say several more claims in the email were not true. The email said 26 of 27 ethics violations against Palin were dismissed outright, which is false: Three moved into the investigative phase. One inquiry resulted in a cash settlement; another found that ethics had been abridged but declined to recommend legal proceedings because the charge involved the dismissal of the head of the Alaska state trooper force, who was an at-will employee of the governor.

The email also alleged that the Democratic National Committee created a website whose goal is to keep Palin out of public office — a charge that the organization says is untrue.

Last week, the earlier incarnation of Palin’s defense fund was ruled illegal because it used the word “official.” The decision forced the fund’s administrators to pay back the $400,000 in donations they raised, and to launch the newer version of the fund.

— Liz Goodwin is a national affairs writer for Yahoo! News.

Read Full Post »

Leadership Lessons and Tony Hayward

It is silly to think that Tony Hayward won’t resign or be pushed out of BP. In the present model of corporate leadership, the corporation doesn’t care! With costs of Gulf Coast disaster heading toward 3 billion, someone has to take the fall for the very stupid decision not to stop the rig and repair the blowout preventer. He may not have made the decision but the part he didn’t get was that it happened on his watch. As they say in Silicon Valley, that’s why they pay us the big bucks.

Lessons

If they pay you the big bucks, you are responsible

If you have the title of CEO, you are responsible

If you company is in trouble, you are responsible.

Not every CEO is designed to handle a crisis. In fact it seems most are not. That person is usually the next guy. The one they hire after they fire the original CEO.

It might have been simple.

If Hayward had moved his offices to the gulf, showed great and continuing concern, lived  and fought alongside the residents who are having their lives turned upside down by his corporation’s mistake, he might have cleared this issue and been seen as something of a hero. He might still have had to resign but there would have been the image of him caring (and he might have cared had he lived and fought alongside of the Billy Nungessor’s and Bobby Jindal’s of the world).

Tony! Say these words.

I want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem. I am not leaving here until this thing is under control.

But he chose to go the other way. The yachting, I want my life, cover-up way. Now it is too late. he is a very rich, dead man walking (in the sense that he will be fired or forced to resign).

Read Full Post »

The monster under the bed!

I stumbled on these two quotes today. They belong to singer songwriter Tom Waits. The first one is for General McChrystal.

On talking to the press: “To me it’s a bit like talking to a cop.”

In this case the cop ended up being Obama. And no this isn’t like MacArthur and Truman. MacArthur didn’t resign. Truman fired him. Did Obama do the right thing? Well he’s the boss and he can do whatever the hell he pleases. To me he just moved deckchairs around on the Titanic.

This second one resonates.

On career and family: “It’s like having two dogs that hate each other and you have to take them for a walk every night.”

This has been my life for the past 30 years. Now I have only one dog and that dog sort of hates me but I still have to walk it every night.

Remember when you were a kid and you thought there was a monster under the bed and our parents would rush in and tell us that there was nothing there and it was all okay. Remember that?

Well, Guess what? There is a monster under the bed but thanks to alcohol, drugs and a dash of glorified self importance, we can handle it.

Read Full Post »

The world we thought we had and didn’t

Even though we may believe in free markets I believe the USA has seen a version of what happened to Rome in the 4th and 5th century AD. This is a paradigm so stick with me. Rome let various barbarian tribes settle peacefully within the boundaries of the empire. But non peaceful barbarians came too. The Huns and Vandals. Their goal was to rape and pillage. So while many of our fiscal institutions have been responsible organizations, there are some very big ones who were (and even today) are not. So you get the government you deserve and those institutions say we need more regulations and oversight.

We’ll have to earn our way back to the world we thought we had (and didn’t).

Canada’s economy is suddenly the envy of the world

No financial meltdowns here, Canada boasts, and world leaders want in on the secret

Rob Gillies, Associated Press Writer, On Sunday June 20, 2010, 4:51 pm EDT

TORONTO (AP) — Canada thinks it can teach the world a thing or two about dodging financial meltdowns.

The 20 world leaders at an economic summit in Toronto next weekend will find themselves in a country that has avoided a banking crisis where others have floundered, and whose economy grew at a 6.1 percent annual rate in the first three months of this year. The housing market is hot and three-quarters of the 400,000 jobs lost during the recession have been recovered.

World leaders have noticed: President Barack Obama says the U.S. should take note of Canada’s banking system, and Britain’s Treasury chief is looking to emulate the Ottawa way on cutting deficits.

The land of a thousand stereotypes — from Mounties and ice hockey to language wars and lousy weather — is feeling entitled to do a bit of crowing as it hosts the G-20 summit of wealthy and developing nations.

“We should be proud of the performance of our financial system during the crisis,” said Finance Minister Jim Flaherty in an interview with The Associated Press.

He recalled visiting China in 2007 and hearing suggestions “that the Canadian banks were perhaps boring and too risk-adverse. And when I was there two weeks ago some of my same counterparts were saying to me, ‘You have a very solid, stable banking system in Canada,’ and emphasizing that. There wasn’t anything about being sufficiently risk-oriented.”

The banks are stable because, in part, they’re more regulated. As the U.S. and Europe loosened regulations on their financial industries over the last 15 years, Canada refused to do so. The banks also aren’t as leveraged as their U.S. or European peers.

There was no mortgage meltdown or subprime crisis in Canada. Banks don’t package mortgages and sell them to the private market, so they need to be sure their borrowers can pay back the loans.

In Canada’s concentrated banking system, five major banks dominate the market and regulators know each of the top bank executives personally.

“Our banks were just better managed and we had better regulation,” says former Prime Minister Paul Martin, the man credited with killing off a massive government deficit in the 1990s when he was finance minister, leading to 12 straight years of budget surpluses.

“I was absolutely amazed at senior bankers in the United States and Europe who didn’t know the extent of the problem or they didn’t know that people in some far-flung division were doing these kinds of things. It’s just beyond belief,” he told the AP.

The Conservative Party government of Stephen Harper that took over from Martin’s Liberals in 2006 broadly stuck to his predecessor’s approach, though he cut taxes and, when recession struck, pumped stimulus money into the economy, with the result that Canada again has a large deficit.

But it is recovering from the recession faster than others, and although its deficit is currently at a record high, the International Monetary Fund expects Canada to be the only one of the seven major industrialized democracies to return to surplus by 2015.

This month Canada became the first among them to raise interest rates since the global financial crisis began.

George Osborne, Britain’s Treasury chief, has vowed to follow Canada’s example on deficit reduction.

“They brought together the best brains both inside and outside government to carry out a fundamental reassessment of the role of the state,” Osborne said in a speech.

It’s a remarkable turnaround from 1993, when the Liberals took office facing a $30 billion deficit. Moody’s downgraded Canada’s credit rating twice. About 36 percent of the government’s revenue went toward servicing debt.

“Our situation was dire. Canada was in a lot of trouble at that point,” Martin said. “If we were going to preserve our health care and our education system we had to do it.”

As finance minister, he slashed spending. A weak currency and a booming U.S. economy also helped Martin balance the books. In the 1998 budget the government estimated that about 55 percent of the deficit reduction came from economic growth and 35 percent from spending cuts.

“The rest of the world certainly thinks we’re the model to follow,” said Martin, who was prime minister from 2003 to 2006. “I’ve been asked by a lot of countries as to how to go about it.”

Don Drummond, Martin’s budget chief at the time, says the U.S. and Europe won’t have it that easy, because the economic climate was better in the late 1990s than it is now, with large trade gains and falling interest rates.

“There’s a lot to learn from Canada but their starting conditions are worse,” he said. “Even though we were on the precipice of a crisis we weren’t in as bad a shape as many of them are.”

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

Read Full Post »

Political Correctness and the giving of sperm

I was thinking about woman’s rights the other day. I have always been a supporter of equality regardless of sex (and not based on whether I was getting some which is very big of me).

But if I look at how much political correctness has strangled the workplace, because almost everything is now potentially politically incorrect, then I realize that if I were young (I was once) and first starting out on my so-called career path, I would not have had the succession of work related, fun affairs I was allowed to have back in the 1960′s and 70′s. And if I look at so many of my married friends, why do their “happy” relationships so resemble the above graphic. Some men need masters or mistresses and so they will find one wherever they reside. At home or work.

The problem is that being someone’s bear rug or good dog (which many of us equate to intimacy) breeds contempt and not the healthy independence and uniqueness that we all believe we possess.

I RESEMBLE THAT REMARK!

Women define themselves through men. Having men want them (sexually) and need them (sexually) and not needing them (sexually). But then that is Gay which means doesn’t need men (except to procreate).

Men want sex and so they will do almost anything to get it including giving up their freedom. Men don’t define themselves through women. They simply want sex. And the hope of it makes them do almost anything including lying on the floor and doing a great imitation of a bear rug.

And, oh yeah, we seem to have this need to procreate but for men that is sex (again) and for women that is the need to build their nest. Women need our sperm and we (men) want to give it to them but for very different reasons. For women sperm is a means to an end. For men, the giving of sperm is the end.

Read Full Post »

Tony gets removed..Sort of….

Even BP could see that this wasn’t going to end up in a good place.

Smart move getting him out of the line of fire.

Embattled BP CEO removed from spill oversight

By RAY HENRY, Associated Press Writers Ray Henry, Associated Press Writers 26 mins ago

NEW ORLEANS – BP removed Chief Executive Tony Hayward from day-to-day oversight of the Gulf oil spill crisis a day after he was pummeled by lawmakers in an appearance on Capitol Hill, the company’s chairman said Friday.

Carl-Henric Svanberg told Britain’s Sky News television that Hayward “is now handing over the operations, the daily operations to (BP Managing Director) Bob Dudley,” overshadowing news that after many setbacks BP was finally making real progress in siphoning and burning off oil from the underwater gusher.

Read Full Post »

Tony Hayward’s Bhopal Model

The CEO of BP continues to follow the Bhopal, Union Carbide model of passing off blame, not taking any responsibility for the disaster and now and then saying he is very sorry. If he survives long-term I will be surprised.  It will tell me a great deal about BP (more than I already care to know). It is a simple case of following the Johnson and Johnson Tylenol model of taking responsibility (even though they weren’t the ones putting poison in their product) and openly communicating versus the Union Carbide 1984 model of covering things up.

But today The U.S. Congress and Tony Hayward, the BP CEO both embarrassed themselves. I am not a big fan of Fox News but Neil Cavuto hit the mark today. Cavuto is a conservative but he is way more moderate and actually uses reason in comparison to the “hate” banshee’s that fly around in the head of Rush Limbaugh or Michael Savage.

The idiot of the week award has to go to Texas congressman Joe Barton. It was a close race between Barton, the rest of congress and Hayward but Barton won. He actually apologized to the BP CEO during the hearings.

I wonder what these guys (below) would say if they understood what we had just done to them in the name of profit. Especially when there was a warning afoot.

I love technology and innovation but not so much that I want to see a whole ecosystem destroyed in the name of profits.

Read Full Post »

Howard Roark, Oil Man

Someone asked me recently “What would Howard Roark have done had he been in charge of the Deepwater Horizon? Given that Howard Roark is a fictional character in the Fountainhead it is easier to think of the philosophy he represented. The philosophy is one of doing the best work that a man is capable of doing.  Roark, or the idea that he represents, would never design a flawed building. One that would have put the people that lived in it in danger.

So Howard Roark, oil man, would have shut down the drilling process as soon as he realized that the Blowout Preventer Seal was faulty. If BP, or Halliburton or Transocean had told him to continue drilling operations, Roark would have gone against their orders knowing the possibility of danger to the crew, the rig and the environment. He would have probably been fired but he would have done the right thing instead of doping things right. Yes doping, not doing.

Interesting website

Originally dated April 2nd 2010

The Fourth Step: Connecting the Blowout Preventer (BOP) and Marine Riser On Top of the Well Head

Formations in the ground are under tremendous pressure.  When you are drilling in areas where oil, water, or gas may be present, there is a possibility this pressure may escape out through the well you are drilling.  When this happens its called a “blow out”.

In some ways, the concept is very similar to popping a balloon.  Think of the air inside the balloon as a formation of oil.  When you poke through the surface of the “formation”, the air escapes out the hole and more often than not, the balloon violently explodes.

To control these formation pressures, a large underwater control valve called a Blowout Preventer (BOP) is placed on top of the wellhead.  This is why its very important to have run the first two sections of casing and properly cemented them in place.

The BOP sits directly on top of the wellhead on the ocean floor.  In the event a blowout or “kick” occurs, giant valves inside the BOP can seal off the well keeping any oil, gas, and any excessive pressure contained within the ground.

If not for the blow out preventer, oil and gas would escape directly to the sea causing tremendous damage to the environment.  Ensuring the BOPs are properly maintained and tested is one of the highest priorities of both the drilling contractor and the oil company involved in drilling the well.  BOP testing is also closely watched by the Minerals Management Service (MMS) mentioned at the beginning of this series.

My italics by the way….

Read Full Post »

Gulching

I have found a few things out in my many years in HR.

Forget committees. They are usually only as good as the weakest link. If the team is strong from top to bottom (rare) then you might accomplish something. I prefer never to do anything by committee.

Forget offsites. They are rarely effective. Little is actually decided. If your leader doesn’t think its important enough to be there “all the time” then that sends  a message (even if the benefit was that the group was more open). As you said they can be good for bonding and team building (I get that). But for little else.

Nothing will make up for weak leadership.

I tend to “gulch” which means as much as  possible I try to create my own little world and make that as effective an compelling as possible. Sometimes that little “gulched” world is only me. Sometimes I find others who are capable but they are rarely in HR.

If you feel like quitting, you are right. You inner self, your “real” self is telling you the truth. I recognize that we don’t always have that choice. I quit enough jobs over the years seeking “the better place”. I rarely found it. Sun HR in the 1990′s was one of those places.
By the time I got back to Sun in 2004 that place was already gone. Thank God I wasn’t in HR.

Bottom line: I became as self-sufficient as I could. Consulting was one way but it didn’t always work. Going back in as an individual contributor worked for a time until the strategic HR VP left and the book keepers took over.

Gulching for survival in HR or anywhere in business for that matter:

1. You have to adapt a lone wolf persona. You need to become self-sufficient emotionally. You have to stop expecting things from the people you work for or with. Now and then you will hunt in a pack. You can be with the pack but don’t become “of” the pack.

2. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you. You may not like them but you shouldn’t eat their cattle or sheep or attack them. You are after freedom. Don’t provoke them because they will come a lookin’ for you armed and dangerous.

3. Separate yourself from the things that allow them to have you by the short hairs.
Title, money, position, power.

4. Always be prepared to move to new territory if things aren’t working out.

5. Become the best lone wolf possible. Some of your bosses may actually value you for it.

None of the above will work for you if you need constant recognition and validation of your work. If you don’t know, no one else will either.

Read Full Post »

Carly on the hill (Capitol Hill that is)

It is scary to think of people like Carly Fiorina in California government. She was one of the most paranoid CEO’s around during her days (and nights) at HP. Tapping peoples phone and email to discover who her enemies were. I don’t fault her Compaq acquisition. It may have turned out to have been “the right” move. But personality wise, she will really end up as a basket case because in politics she will have enemies and they will be open about it. You have to have a very thick skin. Her fall from grace at HP was mostly due to in her inability to be an effective leader. She polarized rather than unified. She created a company of armed camps. In the end regardless of her best intentions, HP booted her out. I have had the pleasure of trying to put this sort of Humpty Dumpty back together again. The scorched earth, my way or the highway strategy rarely works these days. The people I knew who knew her, said that even when warned, she was not a good listener.

Oh No!

Now one never knows. Maybe she will take Prozac or Xanax and chill out a bit. It could only help.

Read Full Post »