Monthly Archives: May 2019

05/18/19

A Letter — The Greatest Gift

So, the other day, the Big Red Car is talking to one of his brilliant CEO clients and they get talking about Mother’s Day and how everybody waits until the last second to get an appropriate Mother’s Day Gift.

“My Mom is the greatest Mom in history. I need to hustle out and get her a gift,” says the CEO, a very busy CEO dealing with high level CEO stuff and crushing it. He was talking about the classic struggle of picking a gift that befits Mom’s unique greatness, one of the greatest struggles known to mankind.

“Ahh, do you want to know a great secret?” asked the Big Red Car.

“Of course.”

“Write her a letter.”

The clouds part. The seraphim competes with the cherubim for the best tunes–and a bit of hip hop because even the Heavens are woke these days.

Related image

Continue reading →

05/17/19

China — Reading the Tea Leaves

In case you had any doubts, the Chinese are not to be trusted.

I cite not the obvious such as the militarization of islands in the South China Sea to expand Chinese influence and to put deadly weapons upon 40% of the shipping lanes in the world, or their operation of re-education concentration camps, or their perfidy in dealing with North Korea (a vassal state which exists only because China supports it), or their reneging on things in the USA-Chinese trade negotiations.

Couple of pals hamming it up after a nice confab.

“You ready to do some de-nuking, my man?” asked President-for-Life Xi.

“Nah,” sayeth Kim, “just jerking The Donald around. Need some swag before we do that. Serious, serious swag.”

“Don’t you let him bully you, Homie,” Xi said. “I got your back. Plus, I need to jerk him around a bit my own self. Son-of-a-bitch is getting all restive about our stealing some technology. What is up with that.”

“Do it, President-for-Life. Of course, you have been stealing a lot of tech and manipulating that currency of yours. Well played. Let’s go eat, shall we?”

“What you have in mind?” Xi asked.

“Some American baloney?”

“You’re bad.”

Image result for images xi kim

Continue reading →

05/17/19

Fountain of Youth v Fountain of Wisdom/Experience — For CEOs Only

Grayish, cool day in the ATX which gets me thinking about the journey a startup CEO makes from ignorance to wisdom — OK, you do know that’s the journey, right?

As a young leader, I knew next to nothing about everything — so I thought, but I did have an advantage as I’d been in the Army for five years and had run largish outfits. My last command was 600 men in a unit that should have been 186 (The Army was contracting form Vietnam War levels and discharging a lot of draftees. I housed, fed, trained, disciplined them until their magic date arrived — a wild bunch. What a nightmare.).

Truly, everything I ever needed to know to be a CEO I learned in that assignment, but I just didn’t know it. I was 25.

I was young and dumb. I was drinking from the Fountain of Youth and Inexperience. There was a long line to get a cup of that stuff.

Some thirty-three years later, I was filled to overflowing with wisdom and experience, so much so that today I advise startup CEOs and assist venture capitalists prying their fully funded oxen out of ditches.

I can’t quite put my finger on when I stopped bathing in the Fountain of Youth and took up station in the Fountain of Wisdom and Experience. I just know I did.

OK, it was probably five years until I even knew there was such a thing.

Read your Malcolm Gladwall Outliers to learn why it takes five years.

Outliers: The Story of Success by [Gladwell, Malcolm]

Continue reading →

05/15/19

Tariffs — Some Straight Talk

If you read the current drivel on the imposition of tariffs on the Chinese — notorious thieves of intellectual property, currency manipulators, erectors of hurdles to access to their market, a despotic Communist regime — you would think the entire economy is about to explode. Let me give you some facts.

Here’s President Trump putting the squeeze on President-for-Life Xi. Ouch!

Image result for images trump xi

Tariffs are taxes, right, Big Red Car?

Yes, dear reader, a tariff is a tax. The USA depended primarily on tariffs from its formation until the first income tax.

The first income tax imposed in the US was enacted in 1861 — 3% on all incomes over $800. It was rescinded in 1872.

In 1874, the US Congress enacted a flat rate Federal income tax that was promptly found to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

The Sixteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, passed in July 1909, papered over this defect, but it wasn’t ratified until February 1913.

A Federal income tax was enacted immediately after ratification and has been enshrined in the funding of the Federal government since then.

Big takeaway — we didn’t really have an income tax until 1913.

So, we lived on tariffs.

Continue reading →

05/14/19

Cut the Toxic Behavior II

So, a psychologist sends me an email in response to our blog post on toxic behavior of yesterday, says, “Good start, Big Red Car, but you left out a few key ideas.”

“Oh, I did?” says I.

“Yes, don’t be such a snowflake. Take criticism as it’s intended — for your own good.”

Continue reading →

05/13/19

Cut the Toxic Behavior

So, under the influence of a pal who I accused of being a bit toxic in his behavior and the power of craft beer, here are some rules with which to lessen the toxicity.

He asked, “Why don’t people like me?” Here is what I told him, with the profanity edited. [Actually people do like him, but he needed a good kick in the ass.]

 1. Stop comparing yourself to others who are better positioned from any perspective. Cut the envy, but do study how they became better positioned and, if you want that outcome, do what they did. Earn it.

Have you done the best you can with what you have? If you take that attitude, you own your own life.

 2. Stop being such a snowflake and taking everything so damn personal. If somebody disagrees with you — trust me, this will happen — it is not because they hate you. It is because they have a different view of things that may be based on different facts or a better analysis.

Stop taking everything so damn personal.

Continue reading →

05/13/19

UBER Surge Pricing

Hail, Uber! Uber went public last week with great fanfare befitting the third largest Initial Public Offering in US history. Hoorah, Uber! All hail Uber!

Then, they ran into reality and reality drowned them with surge pricing.

Uber came public at the low end of the proposed range (already a huge disappointment when compared to the investment bank courtship days) and promptly fell, making it the largest first day IPO loser in US history. Hello, America.

In fairness to Uber, the markets have been reeling with the US-China trade treaty negotiation news and the imposition of tariffs and retaliatory tariffs. [Trump’s fault?]

Lyft — a competitor — was also tanking adding to the cloud over the market and the IPO world.

Nonetheless, Uber has some problems.

Uber shares.

Continue reading →