Cindy Lou Who

Cindy brought company to visit today – at least 35 people in the last 3 hours have come to my blog looking for Cindy’s little anti-Hollywood rant.

Please.  Osborne is so twentieth-of-March.  Stick a fork in her, she’s done, just like Richard “Cakewalk” Perle.

9:49:14 PM    comment []

WARNING:  Hanging by a thread…the war and family thing, continued…

Our Salon blog buddy Dave the Ponytailed Writer comments on my last “Hanging by a thread” post:

…there is a difference between wanting to go to war before it starts and wanting to win it after it starts. In my opinion, we had no need to invade Iraq, but now that we have, we have no choice but to finish what we started, and win the damn thing ASAP. Once you've started climbing up a vertical surface, you can't always simply jump off, but must finish the climb. Do you think that recognizing this difference might make things easier between you and your husband?

If I had a relative fighting in Iraq, I'd want him/her back, safe, ASAP. But I'm not sure that abandoning the fight midway through would make him/her any safer, especially if he/she were still in the area to deal with the consequences.

I replied, in regards to my stepson:

… I expect him to do as he is ordered, and I expect him to kick Feyadeen ass while he's there. I expect him to be a good soldier and live up to the family name. That's the way he was raised. My husband knows that's how I feel -- that's the way we live.

As I see the Iraq/MidEast situation (a business analogy, okay?): 

I've worked for companies with truly great products, fabulously smart and productive people, with idiots for managers and leaders.  As long as I was employed by these companies, I worked to serve my customers and their needs.  If a manager got in the way of serving my customers, I demanded to know why.  And if they were offering the wrong products, I demanded to know why (I’ve single-handedly killed off a new product launch asking that simple question, "Why would the customer want this?"). 

Great products, great team, sucky management trying to sell the wrong thing to the wrong people at the wrong time.  It takes guts, perseverance and ethics to stand up to management and ask the questions, demand the right thing by the people you serve.

Why, damn it?  Why?  Is this the only damned product you have?  How does this serve us all, the customers, the stakeholders?  Show me where it does.  Show me the happy faces, the business studies and opportunity analysis statements, show me the ROI.  I’m not seeing it.  Don’t tell me, Look, we’ve got a great roll-out plan – that’s not product and that’s not what the customer wants, a great roll-out. 

Frankly, I don’t think management even knows who the customers are or what they want, let alone who the stakeholders are; why should we dedicate any human and economic capital promote this product  when it may fail altogether to serve the customer’s interests?

Since in this case this product’s already launched, this acquisition is already committed, what will management do to fix the bugs and make this product right?  How will management truly satisfy the needs of the customers?

That's where my head's at.  And I want answers AND solutions, pronto.   These poor folks are stuck on the line in production, trying to make silk purses out of sow’s ears while management keeps blowing smoke up our butts.

Maybe I’ll have to type this up on letterhead and send it intercompany mail to my spouse.

On second thought, he’s not too good with analogies.

1:36:06 PM    comment []

While driving through at Taco Bell

We’re in a rush to get to a school program; this means squeezing in dinner for the kids between after-school errands and running back to the school.

The usual order placed at the speaker – hard shell tacos for my daughter, soft shell for my son.  Fish around for change as I pull up to the window.

A young man says, Hi, how are you doing today? That’s five-thirty-one.

I say, Good, thanks, as I find that elusive penny.  I’m really thinking, Not too good, thanks.

As I turn to put the change in his hand, the young man squints and leans out the window a little, looks at me.  He says, Did you say, Not too good?

Umm, no, I said, Good, thanks…but I was thinking that.

Ah, me too, he says as his unlined brow furrows a bit.

Yeah, it’s this war stuff getting to me.

He says, Yeah, me too, I’ve got friends there now.  I’m worried and I don’t like this at all.

I nod.  I hesitate, then dish: My stepson’s going this week, we’re very concerned too.

He nods now.  Hope it’s over quickly.  Here’s your receipt, thanks very much.

Thank you.

I turn and ask my daughter as I pull up to the next window to pick up our order.  Did I say Good, thanks, or did I say Not too good, thanks - ?

She grins.  You said, Good, thanks.  He read your mind, didn’t he?

You just read my mind, too, I said, as I closed the window and drove off.

9:59:27 AM    comment []