08/25/20

Leadership Revisited — You Can Do This

This blog post is a revisit of something I wrote some time ago. It was one of the most heavily trafficked posts I have ever written though not at the time I wrote it. I have revised some things.

I have been a CEO for 33 years, before that an Army officer for five years, before that a cadet at VMI for 4 years, and most recently a CEO coach for 8 years. I grew up in a military family.

In business, I have founded private companies and grown them to some recognizable success; and, I have run a public company. My endeavors have been entrepreneurial and I have done a few turnarounds.

I have a lot of experience with both the theory of leadership and the practice of leadership. I have taught leadership. I have developed leaders both in the military and in business.

I have coached good and bad CEOs. I have helped bad CEOs become good CEOs. I have helped good CEOs become great CEOs and I have shepherded them to the pay window.

I have been in the leadership game a long time and at depth.

There is a huge difference between learning from an observer and learning from a practitioner. It is the difference between reading a book and lab work.

You can sit in an airplane in first class for 1,000,000 miles, but you still don’t know how it feels to take off and land a 737. [I have about 3,000 hours flying Bonanzas and find that flying analogies are very comparable to the startup business.]

Continue reading →

08/23/20

Understanding Logic

Yesterday, I was struck in the face by an intellectual 2×4. Luckily, it was an abstraction because a genuine 2×4 to the face can really hurt.

So, this group of influential Senators held a hearing to explore the mischief of our United States Postal Service Postmaster General — a man whose detractors widely described as a “Trump stooge.”

The usual suspects came loaded for bear, but I think the Postmaster General (only two months into his job, showing a bit of the learning curve) disappointed them as he was an unlikely target as he brought no real fight to the fight and seemed to have a good answer to all of their inquiries.

Some of his answers were comical in that he said, “Well, no that never happened and never will happen.”

Many of the inquiries arrived dripping in venom. This is not a unique phenomenon for these type of hearings.

In any event, many of the inquisitors left slightly mollified, but many did not.

In the House of Representatives — the hot coffee cup spilling over into the Senate’s cooling saucer by Constitutional design — they voted to give the US Postal Service $25,000,000,000.

Came back into town on a Saturday for an emergency session because it was apparently essential — an emergency — to give the Postmaster General $25,000,000,000

They did NOT take up any COVID Relief Package, but they gave the Postmaster General $25,000,000,000 for an unknown reason that is not even remotely related to COVID, the elephant in the room.

Thereafter the House returned home saying, “See, y’all, in a month. Sorry we didn’t get to that COVID Relief Package, but we did give the Postmaster General $25,000,000,000.”

He had not asked for any funds and had no real plans as to how to spend such a great sufficiency, a largess of gargantuan proportions.

[Note: By law the USPS is NOT funded by taxpayers, so this is a monumental deviation from the prior practice. The USPS relies upon their income — stamp sales, package delivery fees — to fund their operations.]

The logical dilemma looks like this:

 1. One group of influential politicians is certain the Postmaster General is a “Trump stooge” and believe he is trying to wreck the Postal Service in order to impact the election and nudge it in the direction of the odious Orange Man.

It would be fair to say they are apoplectic. They intend to exert discipline upon this dangerous Postmaster General. Jerk a knot in his ass, so to speak. Rein him in. Tell him how the cow will eat the cabbage.

 2. A similar group of like minded influential politicians (holding the same opinion of the Postmaster General) voted to give this Postmaster General — refreshing your memory, the “Trump stooge” Postmaster General — $25,000,000,000 with no real plan as to how he might spend it.

A big gob of money seems to ensure mischief and rather than jerking a knot in anybody’s ass, it conveys incredible flexibility and potential for questionable decision making.

Does this strike you as slightly illogical?

It did me, but then what the Hell do I really know anyway? I’m just a Big Red Car.

car

08/23/20

Jeff Bezos — The GOOD SON

You may have heard of this fellow, Jeffrey Preston Bezos — started a company called Amazon which has had a nice run.

His ownership in Amazon has made him the richest person in American and the world — some $200,000,000,000 from Amazon alone. This is after coughing up 25% of his shares to part company from his wife, MacKenzie.

MacKenzie Bezos replacement Lauren Sanchez looking adoringly at her new guy wearing sunglasses indoors. A very expensive relationship as it cost Jeff 25% of his Amazon shares. Uncouth persons might say it was the most expensive shot of leg in the history of mankind, but I am not that uncouth person, so we will leave that right there.

MacKenzie with her Amazon stock is the third richest person in America after one of the Walton Women.

Continue reading →

08/22/20

China Ignoring The Obvious

As I think of China, it seems it was a short time ago when we had prominent politicians telling us that China was not our enemy.

Today, that statement seems to have been one of the most clueless utterances ever made. We know a different China today.

We know a China that has its Red Chinese Communist jackboots on the neck of Hong Kong, who murders its ethnic minorities, that runs re-education camps for dissidents before they even dissent, who steals a dozen atolls in the South China Sea and militarizes them, who lies about pandemic viruses they have let loose on the world, and who has cataloged their entire population in a brutal system that awards simple life benefits only to those who are helpful to and cooperative with the Communist regime whilst brutally punishing those who are not.

Jonathan Bartlett illustration for Foreign Policy

At the same time, we are on a sounder trade footing charging the Chinese billions in tariffs, beginning to repatriate strategic industries, and taking a more sober look at China in regard to their military footprint including Taiwan.

Interestingly, the Chinese are ordering, paying for, and receiving the largest agricultural orders in US-China history.

Continue reading →

08/21/20

Performance Appraisal As Inspiration And Motivation

Performance appraisal in small to medium companies (including startups) is one of those things that CEOs equate to going to the dentist. Not only do they not like it, they are not good at it.

There are a lot of very odd ideas at play here in the performance appraisal business — 360 degree appraisals which also fold in the guy selling flowers on the street corner — which makes the process a moving target; moving targets are notoriously hard to hit.

The message I bring you today is that a suspiciously simple, well-designed and executed performance appraisal system can be the most powerful personal tool wielded by a keen CEO for inspiration and motivation of individual team members.

It can also be clean, streamlined, and painless.

Let’s take a quick look at where performance appraisal fits within the overall schema of a company’s organizational matrix. Click on the graphic to see it at a larger scale.

Business-planning-building-blocks-graphic

What I want you to see is that performance appraisal is at the foundation level of the company’s Vision, Mission, Strategy Tactics, Objectives, Values, and Culture.

Continue reading →

08/20/20

Accountability For Failure — Afghanistan

In the running of any enterprise, you will encounter some triumphs and some disasters.

If you remember your schoolboy Kipling, you will know that the right path is to “treat those two impostors just the same.”

That is well and good, but it is also critical to assess what went wrong, why, and how to avoid it in the future.

Which, dear reader, brings me to the subject of Afghanistan and America’s two decades unending war in a far away place called the Graveyard of Empires.

How did Afghanistan get so fucked up?

Continue reading →

08/18/20

College Basketball — Carolina Tar Heels v Duke Blue Devils — A Modest Proposal

If you are like me, you are still wondering when the 2019-2020 NCAA Tournament, March Madness, is going to start.

Alas, we are well and truly fucked, amigo. It is never going to happen. Which brings me to the quandary of what to do with college basketball come November.

So, I make bold to make a modest proposal. Read to the end before you judge me. Keep an open mind.

The Modest Proposal

I propose that in order to avoid any COVID infection risk, rivalry schools, like the Carolina Tar Heels and the Duke Blue Devils, enter into a series of games which will approximate their season whilst mining the enthusiasm of these critical rivalries and providing loyal fans with the necessary juju and mojo they need to stabilize their lives.

It goes without saying that it will be a welcome diversion from the COVID.

Somebody may make a buck along the way, but, hey, that’s capitalism, right?

 1. The Carolina v Duke rivalry in basketball is the gold standard by which all other rivalries are measured.

Carolina, a public school founded in 1789, and Duke, a private school founded in 1838, have played each other in the noble contest of basketball for a century this year. First game was 1920, UNC 38 – Duke 25.

Continue reading →

08/17/20

Confucius Say — “Keep An Eye On China, Amigo”

Comes now the tale of the Chinese government’s Confucius Institutes. The United States has designated the seventy-five US-based Confucius Institutes as “foreign missions.”

This designation requires the Confucius Institutes to register with the US government, to identify and register their staffs, and to follow the restrictions normally placed on a diplomatic embassy.

Haha, you stupid Americans.

The United States recently did the same thing with Chinese media outlets who the US contends are Chinese state organs advancing China’s global propaganda and exerting a malign influence on America. <<< Remember this phrase.

It is long overdue.

Continue reading →