The Dumbification of the American People

One of my favorite made-up German phrases is "Der Verdummheit der Amerikanishebevoelkerung", which I translate as given in the title.  Seeing as my wife, a native German speaker, hasn't corrected me, I may have actually gotten this right.  However, this may not apply only to Americans and you can decide for yourself if this shoe fits.

In my neighborhood today we had an accident.  A house on Winthrop Street that had caught fire and burned on July 4th (we saw it as we came back from watching fireworks) was being demolished.  An excavator was ripping the house apart systematically.  My beloved wife saw the work in progress as she walked the dog and commented to me that the operator was driving the machine all over the rubble pile and the machine looked very unsteady as it teetered and tottered atop the pile.

Sure enough, the machine tipped backwards.  But that's not why Americans are dumb.  No, what has me all riled up is the way the accident was portrayed in the media.  I had the opportunity to walk by the accident before the excavator was righted.  It had landed on the roofs of the house next door and its garage.  I remarked to another neighbor that this certainly demonstrated the strength of our houses for the damage was minimal.  The roof upon which the bucket rested was not caved in, it didn't even look as though the roof was penetrated, just a little crushed.  The garage roof fared worse, but didn't look like it would take a roofer more than half a day to repair.

So, with a large exavator boom and bucket resting on the house, relatively minor damage was done, in my opinion. 

Oh, but the media.  "Demolition vehicle crushes occupied house" decries the Stoneham Sun. "Crushes"?  Oh, please.  The neighbor "barely managed to escape" claimed the broadcast on New England News.  Oh, seriously; she watched the darn thing slowly topple over and refused to leave her home for hours because she was fine.  (In all fairness, WBZTV was more balanced in its coverage, identifing simply that the excavator crashed into the house.)  

However, most of the images provided by the news organizations were from behind the exavactor.  These images mask the fact that the garage is a stand alone structure and the excavator landed on the roof of the den, which is a one story extension.  The images used make it look like fully half of the two story house was utterly crushed.  It was such an obvious manipulation that one of my children said, "They're [the news channel] is making it look like a total disaster!  It was nothing like that!"  

My point is that the hyping of the accident (which was pretty stupid from my outside perspective; but then again, I've never driven an excavator) creates a false impression.  One could easily conclude that the driver was grossly negligent, that the elderly resident was in serious danger, that Stoneham has huge oversight issues, that the damaged home is unusable.

And here is why I find that so reprehensible and alarming.  If our media organizations can turn such a small non-event into something that attempts to approach epic proportions, when where do they go with the important news?  By filling the American people up with exaggerated fluff, there is no room for serious news, serious matters and serious discussions.

In Jason Calacanis' essay, "The 120% Solution", Jason claims, 

... On average, we’ve:

1. Spent well over 20% more than we should have on the price of homes.
   
2. Built homes that are well over 20% larger than they need to be.
   
3. Purchased 20% more consumer electronics than we needed. (In my case, 300%).
   
4. Extended home ownership rates 20% beyond where they should be (to the mid-to-high risk credit folks).
   
5. Gotten 20% fatter than we should be.
   

I would like to add that I think we have paid attention to only 20% of what we should have.  And being fed a diet of sensationalism is the root cause.

Re-examining Assumptions

Last Friday I met with someone who surprised me in a way I've not been surprised in a long time. This experience has sat with me since then and is inspiring me to re-examine my assumption model.

You see, the meeting was a first conversation about a position in a company and, truth be told, I was very unsure about the prospects and viability of the company. It has been in existence for over a decade, has a good size staff, but, although a web company, did not have significant traffic and, although established, had significantly lower revenue (and higher percentage overhead) than I had expected and with which I am comfortable. In short, there were warning flags.

My assumptions were that the company was not fully executing on its potential, or that perhaps the competition caught up to it and surpassed it. So that is where I focused my pre-conversation research.

The person with whom I met on Friday impressed me. First, he wasted no time in spelling out that he expected significant growth and he laid out the core thinking to his expectations. He made sense and had a fresh perspective on the problem, which is that the company's traditional domain is no longer its current domain, or more accurately, its current growth opportunity domain. The company has to move from one focus -- let's say "newsletters and messaging for the on-line widget industry" is what the company believes is its current domain -- to a new focus -- let's call that "automated marketplace for connecting widget manufacturers to widget consumers" as its new domain. This person's thinking is revolutionary for the company.

Unfortunately for my "pre-screening interview", it was also revolutionary for me. I assumed that we would be talking about one thing -- the company's market position, brand, existing product line, and immediate growth strategy -- so I didn't scour the information I had sufficiently to anticipate where the conversation would go.

From my project and program management experience, I know that it is critical to identify and document the personal and project assumptions for efforts. One of my favorite books on risk management, "Risk Management, Tricks of the Trade for Project Managers" by Rita Mulcahy is a canon that embodies the assumption identification in the processes. I've used assumption identification to pull out critical risk factors in my product management work; it's been a huge differentiator that has helped me get past personalities and focus on functionality, opportunity and risks in new product development.

So I am more than chagrined that I slipped on this. That made me wonder if assumption examination is part of the professional zeitgeist. It doesn't seem to be. Looking around for conversations on how assumptions are recognized and incorporated into various processes, I found an article from EE Times Asia on Re-examing Assumptions, plenty on assumptions at the software engineering level, a little blurb on program risk management from PgMP by Paul Sanghera in Google Book Search, a news article on SEI from 2003. Much more on the engineering side than the business process side, in my opinion, although New Product Forecasting by Kenneth B. Kahn has a section on assumption management that caught my eye.

There is opportunity here. Seemingly there is need for some assumption evangelism -- how are you going to check into your working assumptions about the important things in your life? I know what I'm going do about it in mine.

Reflections on a marathon

I recently ran my first marathon. Simply stated; it wasn't easy.

In the best of circumstances, a marathon isn't supposed to be easy. Add to the mixture that I am not a natural endurance athlete and the equation becomes much more challenging to solve. Add that I was part of a sizable "reduction in work force" just two days before, and the challenge became yet even more steep.

Nonetheless, I did it. I (mostly) ran 26.2 miles, which is in my book a Really Big Distance, with my best friend along side me, cajoling and exhorting me to push through to the finish. It took me more than 4 hours and 35 minutes, which is in my book a Really Long Time. But I did it.

I will likely loose two toe nails and the blisters haven't quite healed, but are looking much better. But I did it. And I will do it again.

I have turned myself into a runner -- I really like it and look forward to it -- and I have turned myself into an endurance athlete -- I can swim, ride and run some pretty long distances now -- and I have tested my physical and mental mettle.

I ran a marathon, and I will do it again, and I will do better. That makes me feel really good.

Now that I am in the job market, having completed my marathon, looking for the next and best opportunity that can take full advantage of my passions, skills, determination, interests, and experiences, my marathon is more than just a race I ran. It is a mark of what I can achieve and a measure of how determination can see one through difficult challenges.

More on Things Physical

I've had a change of heart.

In following up with a number of doctors on the on-going issues related to having been hit by a car while riding my bike, I've had my self assessment changed.

While admittedly no younger, having all those doctors and other advisors say, "Well, you're still young..." as a preamble to their anaysis certainly has had an effect. I'm not feeling quite as old as I did in November when dealing with the injuries was more immediate. I've been through a winter of rehabilitation and have emerged into Spring with renewed passion.

On my first race of the season, even though I was pushed up into the next age group by the reality of my birth date, I was 10 seconds faster than my time last year -- and I did really well on that race last year.

Last night, I went running with my training partner. We ran further and faster together, keeping each other from flagging at different time and turned in a really respectable time for around 8.5 miles. Next week we push up to to around 10 miles.

Yes, I still need to swim, ride and run, plus stretch out and rest to keep my body flexible and strong and hold off the decay of spondylolisthesis. Having been hit by a car and the resulting long term injuries certainly complicates matters and requires significant additional time every day to restore strength and flexibility.

But, gosh darn it, I can do it. I am doing it!

Nothing like a new mind set to undo a year of aging.

On Things Physical

I'm no spring chicken.

There, I've admitted it. For those who know me, this isn't news. For those who don't know me, I am not deluding myself into believing that they care about this. But admitting that we are changing as we age is part of the optional wisdom available from aging.

Like lots of men my age I have a bunch of aches and injuries. Sometimes -- only sometimes mind you -- when I get together with my friends, we spend a few moments enumerating those aches and pains. Fortunately, we quickly realize that we're sounding like stereotypical old men and laugh it off.

For me, I have a repaired knee, a broken back and pain in my shoulder. And I still get out to swim, ride and run nearly every day. Because if I don't...

Because if I don't then I will really be an old man before my time.

All things physical wear out. My printer wears out. I get more comments on my printer repair posting than anything else. Gosh, but I wish I could write about taking a few screws out, pulling out the bad vertebra and epoxy the broken protuberance back into place. The printer I can repair. My back I have to manage.

Another part of that wisdom thing is knowing when you need to push against the ache and pains and when you need to respect them. And it isn't always obvious. Recognizing the difference takes experience. The danger, I think, is erring on the side of not doing enough.

So, when the shoulder aches, I can choose to not go swimming. But that lets the shoulder get weaker, which makes it ache more, so I postpone swimming even more. Et cetera until I can't go swimming because I've let my body weaken to the point of unusability.

At some point, my printer will wear out to the point of being too expensive to repair. We don't really have that luxury with our bodies. All the wonderful things that we can do in hospitals are still a shadow of the miracle of our own bodies.

Use it or loose it. Even if it takes more time to warm up and more time to stretch out. No one is a spring chicken for ever. It's what you do after you've stopped being young that makes the difference.