EOCAWKI: Delivering the Goods and Bringing Home the Bacon (Literally!)

I cranked out baloney
for corporations for 40 years.
How different can sausage making be? 

It seems like yesterday that I was bringing my sons to work with me on special days. Today, we swapped roles. I spent the morning tagging along with my oldest son, Chris, who is co-owner of a company that makes artisanal sausage here in Richmond, VA.  Along with getting a first hand understanding of the myriad chores, regulations and responsibilities that come with small business ownership -- and helping to prepare bacon for smoking -- I had the eye-opening opportunity to ride along on a series of deliveries to a few local branches of two large supermarket chains. One chain’s been around for a while; the other is a relative newcomer to this market.

As a shopper, I never thought much about how the products I pick up off the shelves or pluck out of the refrigerated cases got there.  But it turns out that the process of getting food into supermarkets is more complex than I had imagined. There are strict protocols involved in presenting the product at each store. They involve signing in, presenting the list of product, scanning the product in and, some cases, placing the product in the case.  But most interesting to me was the pivotal role played by “The Receiver,” the person who facilitates this process at each store.  The processes might be similar, but human interaction changes everything.  The differences between supermarket chains and among the stores in each chain was striking.

Getting the bacon ready for the smoker.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the new kid in town has a very slick and relatively painless process, made better by the professionalism and cordiality of the receivers. By contrast, the other chain was a bit less buttoned up and some of the receivers we encountered were indifferent at best and in one case, downright hostile. In fact, I told Chris at one point that that particular receiver was the most unpleasant person I had ever encountered in real life. And that’s after 40 years in the corporate world.

To be fair, unpleasant encounters in the corporate world are mostly just uncomfortable. I’ve encountered some passive aggression and even some overt hostility.  But never have I dealt professionally with someone who was as intentionally obstructive and downright nasty as this particular person.  (Let’s call her Roxy.)  I don’t want to be judgmental; I don’t know what’s happening in Roxy’s life to make her as mean as she seems to be.  And it was actually quite funny to watch the vendors waiting with us -- mostly larger older men -- practically quaking at the prospect of unintentionally unleashing this tiny ball of pent up fury.  It turned out this was not difficult to do.  

After we were kept waiting for half an hour outside a sealed door on a hot loading dock, Roxy finally raised the door and asked Chris who he was with. When he told her the name of his company she informed him in a tone I can only describe as scornful, that this wasn’t his scheduled delivery time and he would have to come back. The thing is, Roxy makes the schedule but doesn’t tell the vendors when their scheduled time is so it’s actually impossible to arrive at the assigned time. Chris kept his composure admirably.  He simply said, “Well, we’re here now. How do you want to proceed?” This produced a loud, disdainful sigh. She returned to her desk for about 30 seconds then agreed to admit us but instructed us to stand several feet away from her while she stared into a nearby bin. Finally, after another minute or so, we were cleared for final approach. I had the boxes on a hand truck for Roxy to scan. I moved them toward her desk but she instructed me to move then “into the light.”  Well, since the whole place was rather dimly lit, I had some difficulty following this guidance and she made her annoyance clear to me. But we cleared that hurdle, arranged the sausage in its case and cleared out. On the way out, Roxy was tormenting her next victim and we scooted by the growing line of waiting vendors who reminded me of nothing so much as the people lined up to get soup from the Soup Nazi in Seinfeld.

It turns out that while Roxy is an extreme case, (as Chris observed, terrifying in the moment but hysterically funny in retrospect), what you see “backstage” in a supermarket might be reflective of the customer experience out front.  Perhaps it’s true that a company culture that is genuine and deeply rooted is reflected not only by those who serve the customer directly but also by those who work behind that door that’s labeled “Employees Only.”  Today’s encounter with Roxy actually has me rethinking where I’ll do my supermarket shopping. And with Lidl, Aldi and Publix joining the already competitive Richmond supermaket scrum, I'm spoiled for choice.

EOCAWKI: Sometimes the hand of God is at the end of your wrist

Recently, Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich) told a town hall meeting that if climate change is real then God will fix it. He said in part, "...I believe that there is a creator in God who is much bigger than us. And I'm confident that, if there's a real problem, he can take care of it."
Rep. Walberg's view of climate change reminded me of this old story:

A fellow was stuck on his rooftop in a flood. He was praying to God for help.
Soon a man in a rowboat came by and the fellow shouted to the man on the roof, "Jump in, I can save you."The stranded fellow shouted back, "No, it's OK, I'm praying to God and he is going to save me."

So the rowboat went on.
Then a motorboat came by. "The fellow in the motorboat shouted, "Jump in, I can save you."
To this the stranded man said, "No thanks, I'm praying to God and he is going to save me. I have faith."
So the motorboat went on.
Then a helicopter came by and the pilot shouted down, "Grab this rope and I will lift you to safety."
To this the stranded man again replied, "No thanks, I'm praying to God and he is going to save me. I have faith."
So the helicopter reluctantly flew away.
Soon the water rose above the rooftop and the man drowned. He went to Heaven. He finally got his chance to discuss this whole situation with God, at which point he exclaimed, "I had faith in you but you didn't save me, you let me drown. I don't understand why!"
To this God replied, "I sent you a rowboat and a motorboat and a helicopter, what more did you expect?"

Climate change is a real problem. The scientific consensus is that it is largely man-made. And God is already taking care of it. Through us. I believe that our Creator endowed mankind with the wisdom, good judgment, skills and science to recognize problems, and with everything we need to correct them. That's what the Paris Accord is intended to do.

I tend to perceive the Deity in terms of an all-present and loving parent who is the source of our life and who instills and nurtures in the children of this planet the sense and capacity to set things right when they head in the wrong direction.

Everyone likes dramatic, highly visible miracles and sometimes those do occur. But most often miracles arrive in plain brown wrappers placed right under our noses. Consider just how miraculous it is that nearly every country on this war-ravaged planet came together to form a consensus around climate change and agree on the way to address it. Even North Korea! The only nations that didn't sign on initially were Nicaragua and Syria. And now President Trump says the United States will make it a trio of outliers.

Yet despite this latest development, I am confident that mankind ultimately will fulfill our responsibility to care for and heal the one planet God gave us. After all, it's what a responsible child would do to honor a Loving Parent.

EOCAWKI: The Power to Offend

It’s been about 27 years since I went on a job interview in which a senior executive of the company for which I was about to work asked me, “What religion are you?” Even back then this was an extraordinary, not to say inappropriate question for a job interview.  But the fact that he asked it amused me so I smiled and said, “Catholic,” to which he replied, “Oh yeah?  You’re a fish-eater, huh? A bead twirler?” And then he laughed uproariously. He explained that he, too, was Catholic and those terms had been used to describe him so it was all right. And you know what? It was.

During that same interview he asked me, “Do you ever put your feet up on your desk?” I answered truthfully, “Sometimes.”  He shot back, “You’re lazy!”  Amazingly, I got the job and soon confirmed what I suspected: this particular exec was a gruff vestige from an earlier age. But he wasn’t a bad guy. Political correctness was already on the march back then but somehow it hadn’t caught up to him. He wasn’t stupid, but he thought and spoke in very simple, stark terms, without guile or pretense. And sometimes his plain insight cut through a lot of corporate B.S. His black and white view of the world and work was shaped in a different, earlier age. It wasn’t meant to offend, and although some were surprised and offended by him, few who knew him were.

The exec who interviewed me made no secret of the fact that he didn’t like it when women went on maternity leave. He considered it a great inconvenience. So, when he suspected that a female executive who reported to him was expecting, he sent his secretary down to do a little subtle snooping. Of course, the female exec saw through this clumsy attempt and called her boss. She told him, “I know why you sent Linda down and I have to tell you something. I can’t have children.”  His response? “Oh, that’s a tremendous relief. Thank you for telling me.”  Insensitive? Yes, indeed, absolutely.  Offensive? It would have been easy to be outraged, but the female exec knew the guy’s background, understood that he wasn’t trying to offend her and laughed it off. Indeed, those who worked for him often found his inadvertent insensitivity amusing and it became the fodder for many good stories.

"One of our biggest problems as a society isn’t the color of our skins but how thin they’ve become."

Today, of course, things would be different. The exec in question would have been chastised, sent for diversity and sensitivity training and maybe even fired or hauled into court. Fortunately for him and all of us, he retired before it came to that. For all of the earnest preaching about tolerance that takes place in the workplace, the reality is that there would be a lot less tolerance for a relic like him today. And I think that’s because we have become more inclined to surrender to others the power to offend us, whether that is the intention or not. In fact, I believe that one of our biggest problems as a society isn’t the color of our skins but how thin they’ve become.

"Who knows what transgressions our self righteous early 21st century society will have committed in the eyes of those who live 100 or even 50 years from now."

We sometimes hear public figures apologizing for using words or phrases that might not have even known were offensive because they've taken on whole new meanings in popular culture. Or worse, how often do people take offense at valid words the meaning of which they don’t understand, simply because the words sound like other words that are considered offensive? (I’d list some but I don’t want to piss anyone off.)  On top of that, our prevailing tendency is to make judgments about people from another age using the standards that are in place today. But who knows what transgressions our self righteous early 21st century society will have committed in the eyes of those who live 100 or even 50 years from now.

"Don’t hand over to anyone else the power to offend you."

So, I would offer this advice:  Don’t hand over to anyone else the power to offend you.  Start off assuming good intentions on the part of others. If it turns out that someone really is trying to offend you, they won’t be successful if you let it roll off your back. That’ll piss ‘em off good and you’ll be happier if you do.

EOCAWKI: Optimize This

As someone who relied on personal relationships with my friends in the media and was accustomed to a high degree of autonomy and creative license in my writing, I confess that the advent of social media sometimes took me out of my “comfort zone" at work.  It’s not that I don’t use social media personally, but I found it harder to adapt to the restrictions it imposed on a professional level. For example, I like nice tight prose but simply could not see how 140 characters could possibly be enough to convey anything meaningful, much less explain a complex matter.  

One of the hardest things to get used to was the requirement to submit much of my work to the “SEO” or “Search Engine Optimization” group for review before it was published or distributed. I certainly understood the need to make sure that our material could be found online easily, but it felt to me a bit like the quality of prose took a backseat to whether it was searchable.  Very often, what I thought was a clever or compelling word or phrase was altered or eliminated in favor of something much more run-of-the-mill but more “searchable.” Since I really liked coming up with funny or unusual ways to say things, it bothered me a bit that that particular skill did not seem to have as much value as it used to have. Yet, since SEO was the goal, I did try to consider it in my writing. I thought perhaps the easiest way to do that would be to deliberately use terms that someone is most likely to search for. But that didn’t pan out.  According to Google, (Who else??) the top 10 search terms last year were:

1. Powerball

2. Prince

3. Hurricane Matthew

4. Pokémon Go

5. Slither.io

6. Olympics

7. David Bowie

8. Trump

9. Election

10. Hillary Clinton

Also high on the list were “Gmail”, “Craigslist”, “Amazon”, “Yahoo”, and “Porn.”  

Since I worked exclusively in the financial services field, weaving those particular terms into a typical press release in a way that made some sense would have required a good deal more creativity than I have. And I don’t think I’d have gotten away with it in any case. So, I decided to retire instead and haven’t looked back. Now I can forget about being searchable and focus on things that are important, like picking the right Powerball numbers or playing Pokémon Go.  Or maybe I’ll sit here and write this stuff and post it online where no one can find it. Then I’ll go swim some laps. After all the 2020 Tokyo Olympics are just three years away.

EOCAWKI: I've Got a Secret. To Tell the Truth

One of the nicest compliments I ever received was paid by a senior journalist at a well-respected publication who observed upon my retirement that I always “played it straight.” I took that to mean that I represented my employers well but never intentionally misled anyone or worse yet, lied outright. That’s not always easy to do when people want information that you have but just can’t share. Walking the sometimes fine line between circumspection and deception can be tough for a PR person, but it’s vitally important because in professional life, as in personal life, trust is the key to enduring and effective relationships, and trust is built on truth.  

I tried to maintain a strict separation between my personal and professional lives but I'm glad to say that they were frequently bridged when trust led to mutual respect, admiration and friendship. In fact, my oldest and dearest friends are people I met at work; many are current or former journalists whom I would trust with my life. Sadly, I suspect it’s a lot tougher today to forge those kinds of bonds.

In a world of “alternative facts” and science denial, where high public officials and their representatives seem willing to lie brazenly, repeat outright falsehoods and viciously attack those who challenge them, it can be much more difficult to discern the truth that underpins trust. At the same time it’s never been more important to do so. For that reason, I offer a few thoughts that might be helpful:

If a flack tells you something that’s new

But you feel that it just can’t be true

Then hold onto your horses

And check out other sources.

That’s always the right thing to do.

When your boss has a tale set to tell

But you know that it’s false, full and well

If he will not belay it

Then refuse to relay it.

It’s something you just shouldn’t sell.

When officials elected to lead

Insist that you pay them all heed,

But their words are so phony

And they’re full of baloney

It’s essential then not to accede.

If the truth is dispensed with wholesale

Then democracy’s destined to fail.

But the answer’s not hate

It’s our own Fourth Estate

Where the truth and the facts should prevail.

EOCAWKI: Quiet Please. We Have a Statement

As a PR guy for large financial institutions for four decades I have, as you might imagine, had many occasions to prepare public statements dealing with a a number of different matters, some good and some, let's just say, not so hot. If you could read through all of them, I'm sure you'd be struck by the recurrence of certain words, phrases and ideas that somehow seem to end up in a lot public statements issued by many large companies and public figures. So it seems only logical to collect those key words and phrases in one all-purpose statement that, with a few strategic choices, can be used for a variety of situations.  One idea for this universal statement follows.  Simply circle the appropriate words or phrases in parenthesis to create a plausible media statement to be read by some hapless spokesperson to cynical members of the press and public.  To deal with follow up questions, consider using the Jargon Master Matrix. (See EOCAWKI posting dated September 22, 2016)

My good friend Barry Koling, who was also my boss for the better part of 20 years, reminds that we do not comment on current litigation, pending litigation, matters involving individual clients, employment matters, matters pertaining to individual employees, current regulatory issues, past regulatory issues, rumors and speculation or any matter that might conceivably fall into one of these categories. For everything else, try this:

All Purpose Public Statement

• We (regret / deny / applaud) recent events which (are / are not) consistent with (our culture / our customers' interests / shareholders interests / industry best practices / the laws and regulations that govern our business.) 
• Management of our organization (strongly condemns / wholeheartedly endorses and encourages) such actions. 
• We intend to (look into this matter thoroughly / cooperate fully with the government's investigation / continue to pursue this approach).  
• This event is (an isolated incident and not reflective of systemic issues / clear evidence of the effectiveness of our longstanding focus on client/community/shareholder interests)  
• We are committed to making those affected by this matter whole / sharing the benefits of this action with our shareholders, employees and customers). 
• Those responsible for these actions (are no longer employed by our company / will be identified and dealt with appropriately / have been recognized and suitably rewarded). 
• We look forward to (putting this matter behind us / continued success).

EOCAWKI: When All is Said and Pun...

In 1983 while working in the PR department at what was then Marine Midland Bank in New York, I decided to submit an entry to a relatively new writing competition established by San Jose State University. It was the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, essentially a bad writing competition named in honor of the author who wrote the novel that begins with the phrase, "It was a dark and stormy night."  (No. It wasn't Snoopy.) The contest called for the opening line of a bad novel. My entry was: "Behar's swift feet carried him through the temple as his master, 'The American,' lay dying on a cot in the servant's hut." I entered just for fun and was quite surprised and delighted weeks later to receive a certificate of "Dishonorable Mention." By today's standards, my entry isn't great but I was really happy to get that Dishonorable Mention and I keep the certificate framed in my office to this day.  The contest has evolved over the years and the entries are often quite brilliant and extremely funny. (You can check out the latest at the contest web site, http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/2015win.html)
     I also enjoyed those Washington Post competitions that had different criteria each week. For example, one called for removing a single letter from the name of a large company to create something else. So that produced things like "Itibank, for the small saver," and "General Ills, medicinal breakfast cereal."
  There are few things better than words, nicely arranged or altered to make people laugh. On the flip side, unintentionally misused words can feel like cold air hitting a chipped tooth. Someone once told me I was "in the wrong vernacular." He probably meant vocation. And someone once described to a friend how he had something "embezzled" on his belt buckle. Emblazoned, perhaps, or engraved? The comic Norm Crosby has been around forever and built his whole bit on such malapropisms. (More recently, when I heard "alternative facts," I wasn't sure whether to laugh out loud or howl in agony.)
    In any case, artfully misused words, words used in unexpected contexts, or puns can draw a laugh or a good-natured groan.
    Following are a few cringe-worthy examples to prime the pump. I'd love to see more. They don't have to be in any particular format. Anything that takes a word, well-known slogan or catch-phrase and uses or paraphrases it in a different way would be great.  If you have any to share please post them in a comment or send them my way. I think we can all use a chuckle these days, especially since the Cubs lost the World Series last year. Wait. Sorry. How did that alternative fact slip in there?

"He had worked his whole life for this. Now, America's Top Chef he could do what he needed to do -- rid the country of processed food, especially that silly canned cheese that so many people insisted on sprinkling on their pasta. He'd show them how much better it is to buy a fresh chunk and shred it yourself. Yes, he was ready... ready to make America grate again."

****

As a landscape designer, Jake sometimes didn't know who he was working for. This time, though, it was clear. He was sketching out the base paths for a  baseball field that would be part of a new housing subdivision and Dan Webber was well-known among real estate developers for his love of the national pastime. There could be no question about it. Diamonds are for Webber. 

****

"There she was, waiting, just like she said she would be. I drank in those liquid eyes and could almost taste those imploring lips, while her non-stop legs made a round trip to my heart starting from below my belt. She called me Little Caesar because she was hot and I was ready."

EOCAWKI: Kicking the Bucket List

It's been just over 5 months since I retired, capping a 40-year career in financial services public relations. (Imagine me in that field for 40 years?? I know, right?)  Anyway, the one question I hear most these days is, "Are you enjoying retirement?" The second most frequent question is, "What are you doing?" The answer to the first is yes, absolutely. The answer to the second is, I'm really not sure. I haven't been bored at all, but if you ask me what I did on on any given day the answer is likely to be disappointingly mundane. I get the feeling that when you retire, people expect you to immediately start off on amazing adventures from some bucket list. Sorry to disappoint, but I'm not sure that's what retirement is really like for most people. Take today, for example.

Sublime retirement time in the company of people I love!

     Over breakfast Roni and I read the paper and did two crossword puzzles. I went to the dentist for my regular checkup then Roni and I met for lunch. After lunch, she headed off to work and I went to buy this new laptop I'm writing this on. (The old one sort of exploded. But that's another story.)
     Laptop secured, I went to get my first haircut in many, many months. I was getting quite shaggy and figured it was time to chop the curls. (Doesn't "chop the curls" sound like a Brooklyn euphemism for something either sexual or aquatic?)  And so it goes on most days

     Aside from the day-to-day routine, Roni and I have traveled a bit and are planning some more trips. We visited friends in France and spent some time in England and Iceland. Closer to home we met up with friends in DC, rented a house in the mountains for a New Years weekend family gathering and have gone up a few times to see our son and daughter-in-law and other family and friends in New York. (As much as I miss my late dog, I have to admit it's great to be able to leave without worrying about pets. There's our cockatiel, Didgie,to think of, but he speaks English and can fend for himself for a while.)

Roni and I built this table and benches, the first of

many more projects to come.

 We've stayed busy at home, too. We built from scratch a table and benches to go on our new screened deck and, based on our success, we're planning to learn to do more woodworking and furniture building.
     I cook more than I used to and enjoy it more than ever. (Food is good. It makes me happy.) I swim laps and work out in the gym from time to time.  I've learned to meditate and it's made a real difference for me.
     I'm spending some time working for ACTS, a non-profit on whose board I serve as Secretary. It's an organization that provides financial and other support to people facing crises that threaten the stability of their lives and homes. They do amazing work and it's a privilege to do what I can to support them. One of my jobs will be to help beef up their website, ACTSRVA.org.
     I've been tidying up at home, focusing first on our garden shed, with plans to clean out the garage and attic where relics of our life have been accumulating for 26 years.  And, that's really it.
     So, I haven't scaled the Matterhorn but neither have I been sitting on my hands or on my butt in front of the TV.  Yet, for all their regularity, the days seem to fly by faster than they did when I was employed. In the course of those routine days I've met, talked to and learned from some very nice people with all kinds of outlooks on life. Someone recently observed that you never know what impact you're having on the people you meet everyday, even when it seems like you're not having any.  So, who knows. I guess it's  possible that in the course of our travels -- and even in the course of our day to day lives -- we're all in some way having an impact on the world at large. I hope it's a positive impact. The only thing I can say for sure is that so far retirement has been a blast and my shed is clean. That's a start. Let's give it another 40 years and see what happens.