Lessons learned

This week I found myself in a bit of a shit-storm at work. In short, an incident occurred at a camp I worked at recently, and instead of coming forward with all the proper information, I decided to go along with a story that was created to brush the situation under the rug. My boss, the Major, saw this as lying, and it obviously pissed him off. Then I lost something, and didn?t go through all the proper reporting procedures (not maliciously, just because I?m an idiot), and this also pissed him off. So?he decided to bring me down to base to give me a good talking to. He imparted some pretty good lessons, and I?d like to pass these along to you?

? When you have a good team, they?re there to support you. Think about farting. No seriously, think about it. Ok, now that you?re done giggling?. If you fart in a group of friends, you take credit for it, right? You?re not concerned if they know. If you?re part of a strong team, it?s the same thing. Take credit for it, and don?t try and pass that stink onto somebody else.

? Reporting is important. Why? All decisions are part of a bigger picture. Whether you?re right, wrong, or somewhere in between ? whether you screwed up or did the best thing ever, your decision goes beyond yourself. You need to let people (superiors) know about what?s going on. If you did well, lessons can be learned, the business can grow. If you screwed up, your superiors can fix it better than you can. Fess up, because leaders have flexibility in most matters.

? While leaders have flexibility, it is absolutely essential that they stick to their integrity. That goes for everybody. Ultimately, integrity (or, our reputation) is all we have. Once we?ve compromised that integrity, it?s gone forever. You will always be challenged on it. You lay a thousand bricks and you?re known as a brick layer, but you blow one goat, and you?re known as the goat blower for the rest of your life. One exception to the rule means people will expect multiple exceptions. You may have to hurt people along the way, but that?s part of the burden of leadership.

? And last but not least, a lesson on being a leader in a hierarchy: It's hard to wrap your brain around, but really....nothing you think matters. I know, that sounds dramatic. But in reality, you're basically a piece in the plan of somebody above you. If you remember that, it will help you think properly in your decision making process, and make the best decisions in the interest of your company. This is obviously extremely important in the Army (?Take that hill!? ?Well?.I don?t think that?s a good idea?), but it?s in play in the business world as well.

Now get back to work, crazy.

Follow up to "additional...", so read that one first!

After a good 20 minutes of debate with Petite, I'd like to add some clarifications and stipulations to my Hiroshima argument.
First and foremost, I'd like to limit the debate to events, not necessarily inventions. The steam engine, the combustion engine, penicillin, the micro chip, birth control, etc etc, were all absurdly important. I'm not debating this fact. However, important inventions lead to important events...and I'm just talking about events. Second, I make that bold statement with the belief that an all out nuclear war between the US and USSR during the 80s or 90s could have lead to nuclear holocaust and nuclear winter. We're talking end of the world level shit. With those kind of implications, I can only think of ONE specific event that would be more important. Sputnik. Sputnik launches the space race, which progresses satellite technology to the point where ICBMs (inter-continental ballistic missiles) are possible to the extent that we and the Russians could blow each other back to the ice age. Which is exactly what would occur if we were to experience nuclear winter. However, as you all know, I love debate. So...bring it.

Additional left over randomness....specificially random to today.

Sorry for the two straight posts of randomness, but I have some things to talk about. Tomorrow I’m going to hit on the interesting week I’ve had, and some valuable lessons the Major taught me yesterday – but tomorrow is for tomorrow. Back to today.

· Today is the 64th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. I would argue that this is one of the top 5, if not THE, most important event in modern history. Before heading right to the comment section before reading the rest of this post to say, “But John, what about _____, that’s wayyyyyy more important, dummy!” I just want you to think about something. While many American soldiers have died in the resulting 64 years, there has not been a war between super-powers, or even major powers for that matter, since the conclusion of WWII. What do you think the war would have looked like between the US and Russia (and the subsequent allies that would have been pulled in) had both nations not been terrified of mutual assured destruction at the hand of the Bomb? Better yet, when that war would have entered the terribly long and drawn out stage (like both world wars before it), do you think for a second that one of the two countries wouldn’t have eventually started slinging nukes to try and end it? Just a thought.

· Now a lighter note. Today driving across Rt. 80 (I know, another driving story), I saw a flatbed truck carrying a carwash. Like, one of the ones you drive into, stop, and it auto-washes your car. Some of the equipment was in it, and the outside of the carwash was a nice brick façade. I can’t even begin to explain how awesome this was, and I’m immensely disappointed I didn’t have my camera with me. My camera phone just would not have done it justice. Now here’s the question – how much money would you pay to drive up the back ramp of a flatbed, get a carwash (while still progressing towards your destination), roll off the back all Knight Rider style, and then continue on your day? We’re not even putting a price on the story value of this, and the pictures that could be had. I’m not a rich man, but I’d probably pay $200, easy. I mean, not $200 over and over again, but definitely once for the experience. And it’d have to come with the full wax and buff treatment and all that for the money. But whatever…I just may be on to something here!

· I’m going on a 5 day hiking trip next week (sorry, no blogs), and I decided to invest in a sweet hammock. This hammock has a little bit of everything. It’s got a built on bug net, it comes with a great rain cover, and all things considering it’s pretty comfy. I think I overpaid a bit for what amounts to a large sheet of plastic, but for 5 days of not sleeping on the ground it was well worth it. Last night I decided to give it a test-run…ya know, make sure I could set it up properly, make sure it wouldn’t fall out of the tree, etc etc…before I was tired and frustrated after hiking 12 miles on the first day with a bunch of whiny kids. The bag said “Assembly time: 2.5 minutes”. HA! Maybe 2.5 minutes per suggested knot. But I digress. 25 good minutes later I finally have the siesta swing to a standard where I think I could probably survive the night, and I’m thinking – OK, it’s now or never. Let’s give this a go. I get in, and am actually asleep pretty quickly. Victory is mine! Not so fast, Lombardi….Moral of the story? Before thinking this is a good idea, check the goddamn weather report. It got down to about 42 degrees last night. I was unprepared. I was also back inside at about 3AM. Yeah…better luck next week, champ.

Now get back to work, crazy.

Hodgepodge

Here's what I happen to be thinking about today...

· Today the only rock station in State College (and really in all of north-central PA) went off the air unannounced. No warning, no goodbye, not even an explanation on their website. A few years ago the same exact thing happened to my favorite alternative-rock station in Philly. Here’s what I want to know – what could possibly be the motive of just shutting down a station over night without any explanation to their listeners? Even if the station isn’t doing well, why not allow the DJs to say their goodbyes and have a bit of a swan song? It just seems absurd to me. That’s not the way we do business in the rest of the world, so why is it acceptable for radio?

· I don’t know much of anything about cars. Neither does Mike Petite. However, over the past 2 years we’ve both learned the same valuable lesson: if you don’t do any regular maintenance to your car whatsoever, at very least you need to occasionally check your oil. If you don’t check your oil, when that light goes on, you pretty much need to immediately pull over and put oil in it. Otherwise you wreck your engine. This same rule applies for overheating. If you’re overheating, don’t try and make it those extra 5 miles back home. You’ll wreck your engine that way too. Just pull over and get a tow-truck….it’s cheaper than a new car / engine. Learn from my mistakes!

· REI’s customer service gets a 10/10 in my book. The US Postal Service sent back some equipment I need for a 5 day hike coming up because my landlord didn’t submit my name as a tenant (nor did I take the initiative to do it). It’s a big package, and with standard shipping it just wouldn’t have gotten here in time, so I was willing to pay the extra money to get it here in a few days. However, REI is 3-day’ing it to me for free. Outstanding. They also have really cheap outdoor gear, and some good clearance stuff. I’ll happily advertise for them since they’re hooking me up.

· For some reason as male-type adults we tend to have an aversion for cartoon movies (unless you’re dorks like my friends and watch tons of anime, but that’s a whole ‘nother story). Well one of my favorite movies of all time is Shrek, a couple weeks ago I watched Wall-e and just yesterday I saw Cars. These movies sometimes are kinda corny because they’re obviously geared towards children, but I’ve got to say, just because it’s animated we shouldn’t over rate them. A good movie is a good movie is a good movie regardless of whether or not the actors are real.

· Great service is underrated. Because I’ve spent a bunch of years paying my rent on tips, I’m pretty critical of my waiters and bartenders. This weekend with company here we really had excellent service everywhere we went. Because of this, I tipped absurdly well. Excellent service can definitely make or break going out for me, and while great company could have pushed through bad service, the great service definitely helped. Moral of the story: if you think your server did a fantastic job, reward them as such. They get paid $2.83/hr.

· I’ve just picked back up “Thank You For Arguing” by Jay Heinrichs. Very, very good book. It’s basically about the art of persuasion, but if you even have the slightest interest in debate, conversation, and rhetoric, it’s a must read.

· 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon: 1) I’m friends with Jeff Zubernis, who was in the 6th Sense (Silence, village idiot!) 2) with Bruce Willis 3) who was in Four Rooms with Marissa Tomei 4) who was in Lover boy with Kevin Bacon!

Now get back to work, crazy.