The dichotomy between the trajectory of the stock market over the last year and the state of the general economy in the U.S. has been the subject of many a pundit’s ruminations. There are many articles about the unfair advantage of the wealthy. The conclusion is that the disparate economic experience of the pandemic is evidence of systemic forces that ensure the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. As I read them, it seems something is missing from the analyses.
Wealth inequality is not so simple
Posted in The People
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“Culture” is hot right now
I was speaking recently with the CEO of a successful, growing e-commerce services company. The subject was organizational culture, and how to consciously create it. Coincidentally, another call a day later with the CFO of a 2,000 person biotech company on the East Coast was about the exact same thing.
It seems that the attention being paid to the concept of “culture” in a business has never been higher, since the point where it was introduced by the founder of modern management theory, Peter Drucker, in 2006. Now, each day a new service firm is created to support what appears to be a growing market for guidance in building a desired culture.
It’s always been a critical element of why some organizations endure and others don’t. The form of the topic, its scope and perspective, its terminology have changed, however. Now, “culture” has come to be the most prominent word to describe the collection of behaviors that are considered required, or at least promoted, throughout an organization, by those who hold the most authority and thus potential influence on the lives of others in the organization.
Posted in Strategy and the Big Picture, The People
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Can we truly eliminate segregation?
The word “segregation” means the action or state of setting someone or something apart from other people or things. In its most negative application to humans, it means labeling people according to a caste system that ranges from the most privileged to the worst treated. The people who have been segregated into the lesser ranks can experience life as property, i.e., slavery, or as barely alive, such as the “untouchable” caste in India’s history. The people who are at the top of the pyramid of privilege in a segregated structure are those to whom authority, resources and choices flow. In its most benign application, it means making sure the bag of sugar doesn’t say “salt”.
Posted in The People
Tagged diversity, equality, inclusion, respect
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Who’s “we”…?
Whenever a news organization interviews someone about the Big Issues, we invariably hear the person interviewed starting sentences like this: “We should…”, and “We shouldn’t…”, and “What we need to do is…” Then they fill in the blank with a sweeping statement of a solution that assumes knowledge of what the true problem is.
Those being interviewed rarely represent people who are actually able to make decisions and enact those solutions. Usually, we hear from politicians, advisors, consultants, academicians, pundits, people who used to be in roles accountable for solving such issues and celebrities. The question I never hear being asked, but which is central to the value of the opinion being offered, is “Who’s ‘we’?”
Posted in Politics and Business, The People
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