Monday, July 29, 2013

BloggeRhythms 7/29/2013

Came across an article on Fox News.com from Associated Press, titled: “Four in five in US face near-poverty, no work”
 
The article began: “Four out of 5 U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives, a sign of deteriorating economic security and an elusive American dream.
 
Survey data exclusive to The Associated Press points to an increasingly globalized U.S. economy, the widening gap between rich and poor, and the loss of good-paying manufacturing jobs as reasons for the trend.”
 
And then came this, “The findings come as President Obama tries to renew his administration's emphasis on the economy, saying in recent speeches that his highest priority is to "rebuild ladders of opportunity" and reverse income inequality.”
 
Reading that paragraph caused me to think back some years ago. At that time, I was responsible for marketing, and primarily sales, at the nation’s largest financial provider of its type in a specialized segment of the equipment leasing and finance business.
 
While there were many reasons for our success, one of the most important was that we built and retained what we called an entrepreneurial spirit among our employees. The majority were relatively young for our industry, ambitious, creative, quick to learn, willing to work diligently toward their goals and maintained highly competitive spirits. In return, the rewards they earned, both financial and personal, for their success made the results well worth any and all the effort they extended.
 
Our business was publically owned and as it mushroomed in size, we drew the attention of one of the nations largest telecommunications entities, who decided it wanted to buy us, and did.
 
I bring this up today, because that situation presented one of the clearest pictures of “cultural” differences in organizational, philosophical, and managerial practice and implementation that I could ever imagine.
 
While these folks thought they were creative, aggressive, open-minded and rapid growth oriented, they were so mired in bureaucratic procedures, duplication of effort and fearful of anything not fitting their reams of manualized procedures, they needed permission and ten authorizing signatures to change a light bulb. 
 
Yet, from their perspective, and having no comparative input or experience to draw on, they were not only totally unable to see their own roadblocks, their self-created hurdles were perfectly acceptable to them. Trying to get them to grasp the immediacy required in job performance was like trying to teach a dinosaur to run in the Kentucky Derby.
 
There are countless examples I could offer, but I hope by now I've gotten my point across, which brings me back to today’s subject. 
 
Because here we have the incumbent who’s purposefully stifled the nation’s economic growth, placed insurmountable barriers to business success and expansion, made every effort to stem entrepreneurial endeavors and thrives on over-regulation and government intervention. Yet in his hourly speech says he wants to, "rebuild ladders of opportunity" and reverse income inequality.”
 
However, with someone like that in office, there’s simply no hope for any kind of economic success or real improvement. And it isn’t even necessarily a matter of purposefully trying to kill the American spirit or desire for growth and achievement. Because just like those running a corporate goliath that long ago turned into a lumbering, lethargic institutional block of immovable granite, the incumbent hasn't the skills, experience or insights to realize that the nation’s greatest financial and emplyment problems were created by himself.
 
That's it for today folks.
 
Adios

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