Anti-Gay, Anti-First Nations, Anti-Feminism... Anti, Anti Anti.

I had a difficult decision to make as I set up my account several years ago when creating this blog. Do I write anonymously or use my real name (and photo)?. It was a challenging decision as expressing ones business, personal and political views can be risky when you associate your name with it. Of course, blogging is not my sole income, and I have a professional persona that I must protect.

I decided, in order to have any credibility to the articles I write, I should be prepared to stand behind them.. Thus my decision to associate my writings openly.

I write so often motivated by our public radio station (CBC), and although I now have a well developed "filter" on how they deliver interviews, news stories and human interest stories, I tongue in cheek think of the old drinking game we had as teenagers was to watch the children's cartoon series "The Smurfs".. which required every time the word "Smurf" was spoken, all participants were to take a drink. Of course the program offered up the word "Smurf" so frequently that the game rarely lasted the duration of the 1/2 hour programme, due to over consumption of alcohol.

How does the "Smurf drinking game" tie to this topic??  "Smurfs" was chosen as the television show, as  the word was used in almost every sentence. Likewise, my regular listening to CBC offers an equally disproportionate reference to LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender), as well as First Nations, and coming up a close third - Feminism. So, the Adult "CBC Drinking game" could be equally destructive to ones liver, as the Smurf game, if, one were to take a drink every time a reference to LGBT, First Nations or Feminism was made - I think one could take any hour of CBC radio, and easily need assistance in finding ones bed.

If you think I am off base - try it.. any hour, any day.. but be prepared for a nasty hangover.

So, the reaction to your reading this is clearly I don't understand the issues of these minority groups and I am a callous, bigotted, homophobic social outcast.

Well, NOTHING could be further from the truth. I have a great deal of respect for the above mentioned groups, and strive to understand all of the issues surrounding each of these groups.

But, to the point of this article, speaking publicly about any negative aspects of ANY minority is taboo.. or done at the risk of being called a bigot or prejudiced (now there is an antique word). Without exception, these minority groups demand (and deserve) equality and fair representation in the public  realm. Protests, parades, lobby groups public demonstrations are almost solely presented for a demand of equality.

Part of equality within our social system, of course deserves equal treatment of rights, and community acceptance - and again, I feel it necessary to express that I agree and support this status 100%.

However, with this equality, one must also accept scrutiny and challenges as all non-minority groups receive, it should be acceptable to question First Nations spending, natural resources utilization etc, or appropriateness of LGBT parades, etc, or women's rights issues.

But, it is socially and (small p) politically incorrect to challenge any activity of these groups - as well (large P) Political suicide to counter the positions held or presented by these groups.

Questioning a Native Blockade of a major highway is not accepted as a public disturbance, rather questioning the heritage and rights of a First Nations Society. Even this statement I am sure will raise hairs on the neck of teh average reader.. But a non first Nations Blockade is certainly looked on with a different view that a Native one - and is reported on, and justified at a completely different level of acceptance.

So, the deserved equality should be a double edged sword, to obtain the rights and the respect that are deserved, but as an equal, should be willing and publicly accepted to be questioned and challenged.

The cake and eat it too seems to be a fit, where it is Taboo to publicly challenge these groups as equals, yet, equality for all of the rights and freedoms. Equality is a broad state - the good, the bad and the ugly.

My "in jest" suggestion of the "Adult Drinking Game" for CBC listeners, is not a critique of the minority topics that are woven into near every story, rather questioning the balance of this programming.

Next time, before tagging a challenger of a minority activity as an anti-minority bigot.. maybe it is just a step that these groups are actually gaining equality thus the scrutiny that comes with it.

Now.. how do I make the RIGHT decision???

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Making The Right Decisions

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Having detailed a few tools on how to avoid making WRONG decisions or getting blind-sided in my article "A Little Help Deciding". Now, it is worth spending a little time a tool to assist in making the RIGHT decisions.

This tool is valuable in both a personal requirement for decision making, or as a manager/owner of a business creating direction for staff and equipping them to make decisions for the success of your organization.

Scenario One: Personal - each arrow detailed below will represent individual choices and decisions that you face every day in your personal life

Scenario Two: Business - each arrow detailed below represents a staff member and the roles they serve within your organization.

As you follow down through the framework below, you may choose to select either of the Scenarios (above) or both.

The most important step in insuring your decisions are the correct ones, is to talk time, to determine what your overall goal is for your success. This is a critical step and may take minutes to hours to decide. Your goal cannot be a vague  broad scoping one.. ie: want my business to be successful, or I want to be rich. I MUST be very specific and measurable. Rather than wanting your business to be a success, you may want to be much more specific as to what will make it a success. Sell more??  - nope still too vague. Maybe, I want my business to grow 15% and insuring that we have 85% repeat customers and grow my customer base by 15%.
With the personal Scenario, rather than a goal of being rich, you may be much more specific. I want to decrease my spending by 20%, and invest that savings in investments. In two years I want a positive net worth.
Regardless of what you decided your goal to success it - is it so critical that it is narrow in focus, exactly what you want, and achievable. And it need not involve money, ic can be how you want to be perceived  liked, raise your children, or different career choices.

Once you have defined your goal, imagine it in the illustration below at the point of an arrow..

Now this is where it gets interesting, you will be faced (or your staff will be tasked) with many decisions, most common, we assess the choice and make the decision on the circumstances that surround us at the moment. Staff will make decisions based on the small section of the business that they are familiar, often in the dark of other requirements of the company success.. Therefore if we fill in the arrow to your goal, it will probably look like this:

The secret is to attempt to align individual decisions, or staff members - all directed toward your goal. EVERY decision, from what you eat, to what house you buy. In business, every staff member MUST be clearly instructed to ask the following:

Does this [choice] bring me closer to [my goal]? 

If the answer is yes, then it should be seriously considered, if the answer is no, then no matter how tempting, then that is not a direction to follow.

If this exercise is achieved for every decision, or each staff member follows this framework, then coming closer to your objectives will look more like this:

So why does it matter if all of your arrows align towards your goal. Well it is obvious that with every choice moving you towards your objective, then it will be reached much less painfully and significantly faster, and in a business scenario - much cheaper. 

Now lets take a look at grade 6 vector mathematics, to illustrate the efficiency of aligning your decisions and staff.

If you apply 100% of your effort toward one goal, and 100% of your effort towards a different goal. Then your net progress towards success is wasted effort, and you achieve much less that an addition of your two efforts.Or in a business scenario  you have one staff member you are paying for a day of work travelling in one direction, and another in a slightly different direction, you are only getting 1.5 days work and paying for 2. 

In extreme cases, full effort may be made for 2 choices, but counter each other (in respect to your goal) and you have worked hard, to achieve virtually nothing. In business, you may be paying for 2 days work, yet virtually throwing the money away. A real life example of a business case, would be a company deciding on a goal described above - 85% customer retention, 15% addition of new customers and a 15% revenue growth. Accounting decides on a new process that will make their work much easier, and a company at first glance much more efficient. However, the new process is clumsy, complicated for the customer.. resulting in losing customers, and pushing away new clients. Obviously, the decision to implement a new accounting system was not run through the simple question.. "Will changing our accounting system get us closer to our goal of 85% customer retention, 15% new clients, and 15% revenue growth". Expensive step in the wrong direction. This is how it looks like in vector addition. 

Now that you have clearly defined your goal and you hold every decision up to it, facing 2 decisions, applying 100% of your effort to both.. you waste no time, you leap towards your goal. You are not distracted by "fun", or "tempting" decisions that steer you away from your goal. ALL decisions become very simple.. Do they get me closer to my goal.. yes or no.. That easy.

Business, you are paying 2 staff to work 8 hours. Working toward the same goal. you get 16 hours worth of work for your 16 hours of pay. 

For personal decision making - define your goal.. and think of these arrows.

For Business.. as an owner or manager, define your business goals, communicate it clearly and often to ALL staff. and measure, measure, measure the success.

Cant' get there from here!

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"...vague goal like “be happy” or “be rich” or wishy washy objectives."

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It seems obvious as you are assigned as navigator; map unfolded giving forewarning of upcoming exits to the driver. The map in front of you is a mess of intersecting lines, but with a keen eye on the destination, the peripheral lines, not marked with a highlighter are unimportant peripheral clutter, as you focus on the road you are travelling and which exit is next to get you nearer to your destination.

I wonder what age; a person becomes capable of reading and interpreting a map, and how to target a destination, and more importantly not to follow roads that take you in the wrong direction. But I am confident in my belief by the time we become adults; this is a natural and easy task.

What seems to be impossibly difficult at times, as adults, is managing the endless number of decisions we need to make in our personal and professional lives... so many choices, so many options, so many ramifications of our every decision. Decisions that will take us off in many different directions, decisions that affect other decisions. A daily, even hourly, exercise that every human must endure.

Let’s go back to navigating now, the map on your lap, a driver anxiously awaiting notification on what is the next exit, what highway should we be on. But, this time, you are not fortunate to have a highlighted trip marked out, and even worse.. no destination identified. Now the map is a large unfolded confusing mess of lines, colors, numbers, and pictures.

I think you see where I am going with this (even without a map)

In order to make correct decisions in our lives, we need a destination. Not a vague goal like “be happy” or “be rich” or wishy washy objectives. We need to make specific, tangible destinations. Something that every decision (EVERY), can be help up against the destination. As we reach crossroads (nice play on words there I must say), the decisions are crystal clear when we pause to say “Will this get me closer to my goal”. If not, then it is not the right decision. Major or minor work and personal decisions can be held up to destinations that you have defined for each.

Driving down the highway, and taking an exit that leads you to something interesting, may result in a meandering country side drive that takes you far away from your planned destination.. And could even possibly take you to a point that getting to your destination is impractical, so you offhandedly select a new goal, then another, then another as you drive endlessly in circles around the continent. Never reaching the well thought out and desired outcome of your trip.

These side roads are tempting, and often appealing for the short term, but can lead to failure in the big picture. Personal decisions are easy to send us off to travel in endless circles. 

Unfolding your personal or professional map, be very specific, measurable when placing a mark on it, circling it and committing to that is where you end up. Then as you encounter traffic circles, off ramps, crossroads, detours the choices are very simple and uncluttered and all of the other roads on the map are just indeed unimportant peripheral clutter.

“Will this [insert choice of decision here] bring me closer to my goal?”.. repeat, repeat, repeat.

...there are way fewer crazy people in the world !!

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"I am now challenged with learning, how does this happen? How can someone so bright believe in something so completely illogical?" 

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When I began this blogging thing several weeks ago, I suppose it was yet another opportunity to simply listen to myself talk. To provide a venue for me to rant or more accurately, enjoy the luxury of taking very complex issues and applying an oversimplified view of them. I have been chastised on several occasions for doing exactly that – oversimplifying, but in my defence... to get right down to the finer points on every topic would be a full time job slaving away at my keyboard. HOWEVER, I was very excited to have a chat with a loyal reader, and she could see clearly what I was trying to achieve.  A catalyst for thought, teeing up the topic (so to speak), so my readers can on their own take the simplistic analysis I have provided and apply more complex scenarios to them. I have done this exercise, and I am pleased to have the simple framework of ideas stand up quite nicely when applied to more complex scenarios.

OK enough navel gazing.

Much better than expected, I have grown to have a good number of readers, and even better still, have been approached in person more than once, to hear first hand, a reaction to my posts. Although I confess, I have lived under the assumption that I am too old and stuck in my opinion to fundamentally change my thoughts on people. I am quick to judge (good or bad), and am very sceptical of those impassioned with their own special interest beliefs.

Fanatics on any issue, I painted with a broad brush, I firmly believed that those among us that blindly hang onto groundless, hypocritical, non-factual beliefs were obviously intellectually challenged, lacking the ability to see that these commitments to a cause and socially inept.

I was wrong, very wrong. My blogs have become a point of debate (in person) several times over the last weeks. Nothing gets the blood pumping like a good debate, but I was learning, and listening more than usual. Blind faith in a topic is an amazing thing to observe. Hearing the passion and unwavering commitment to a topic, regardless if the fact supports it, is an incredible human observation.

In a back and forth conversation with a very well education professional person several days ago in regards to Hydro Fracking, with absolute conviction in their words, they compared the people involved in this gas exploration to Nazis, and more specifically Hitler. I was slack jawed of course, but it was life changing fore to me to hear such insane comments from an otherwise brilliant person.

I have observed this intense loyalty to issues in conversation with other “normal” people and paid less attention to the content of their discussion, and focused on the phenomenon of blind belief.

How does an educated, worldly, responsible adult, get brainwashed or find logic defying thoughts so permanently and deeply engrained in their grey matter? I am stumped. It was easier to read these fanatics, and hear the propaganda when I assumed the originators to all of these were weak minded gullible orators. I am now challenged with learning, how does this happen? How can someone so bright believe in something so completely illogical?

Now life is much harder, knowing now that there are way fewer crazy people in the world.