Jeffrey Toobin: When In Doubt Whip It Out!!

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, many people who can do so are working from home. People keep in touch with co-workers via Zoom or Web-ex meetings, instant messaging, emails, conference calls, and the like. 

Working from home means that you learn a little more about your co-workers' personal lives and quirks. Perhaps you hear or see their children or grandchildren in the background. Maybe you find out what sorts of books or music they enjoy. 

Maybe you find out that your co-worker's relationship with their spouse or significant other is much different than you thought. Maybe you see someone without makeup or with uncombed hair. Maybe a co-worker is less productive because their peers or supervisor can no longer just walk into their office or cubicle to get a hands on update on their status.

Speaking of hands on, however lawyer, blogger, New Yorker magazine contributor and CNN analyst Jeffery Toobin apparently forgot that there are some activities that shouldn't be shared with anyone else other than perhaps an intimate. 

Woman and Lover Fired After Lover Shares Sexy Pics/Text

I guess you probably ought to be careful sending out certain pictures. Not everyone knows how to keep their ever loving mouth shut. And when people start to talk, who knows where things will end up. One minute you're having a work affair and enjoying life while sending your good-n-plenty naughty texts, interesting pictures and double entendres. 

The next minute you've been fired, have your name in the newspaper as an example of what not to become, and are being sued for court costs by your former employer. So it goes. Some people can't be trusted. If nothing else this shows yet again just how powerful certain urges are, for both men and women. Like the song goes, Everybody wants some!!

A woman was fired from her job after her co-worker shared their sexts with four colleagues. Now, the woman’s former employer is hitting her with $25,000 in legal fees, The New York Post reports.

Jennifer Ricketts sent explicit text messages, “including intimate images and videos” of herself, to co-worker Stephen Nazario last year, but he ended up sharing those messages with four of their co-workers on Dec. 11, according to court documents. “I felt humiliated when it first happened,” Ricketts told The Post.

Open Workplaces Stink!

I work in the information technology field. I recently spent a few days in training. There's a new implementation process being rolled out for IT employees. This process will supposedly reduce the time elapsed between the point that a change request (user request, production breakdown, new project, etc.) is made and the point when the change request is completed. This will theoretically save the company time and money- something that upper management is always looking to do- as well as making workers more productive, also a key management goal. It's also supposed to reduce worker stress. 

One big change required is the virtual elimination of worker privacy from the environment. Most people will no longer have offices or even semi-private cubicles. Everyone except the most important executives or managers (at least three pay grades up from me) will sit at open tables.

This will allow people to share work. Sharing work is not only encouraged, it's required. No one will be allowed to analyze problems or write code by themselves or without real time peer review. Almost all work will be done by groups of two or more people. Team members will share pc's and monitors. Anything showing on "your" monitor will also show on two or three other monitors. In order to further limit "distractions", private phones linked to a particular worker will be discouraged and phased out. Instead there will be conference rooms for any phone conversations. Everyone will have multiple daily meetings where they stand up in front of their department and list their current accomplishments, remaining tasks, and areas where they might need help.

I don't doubt that some of these changes could result in more robust solutions produced sooner. And that is good. However as the old joke goes just because it takes one woman nine months to deliver a baby doesn't mean that you can hire nine women and deliver a baby in one month.

Judge Vonda Evans And Short Workdays

I work in a professional white collar environment. Usually (90% of the time) the work is constant and frantic. People have little time to do anything but their paid work. On other occasions work slows down and you see/hear people doing things like checking Facebook, buying things on Amazon, playing Sudoku, discussing sports, gossiping, talking to loved ones on the phone, complaining about spouses, or (ahem) writing blog posts. Some of the higher-ups don't like this very much but most people are professional. Work comes first. Unless your boss really doesn't like you or you go out of your way to embarrass your boss by ostentatiously slacking off, he or she probably won't demand that you account for every last minute of your work day. Everything generally should come out even in the end. I remember that once a boss questioned a co-worker who was leaving a few hours early. Without missing a beat the co-worker asked our mutual boss if he had heard of casual overtime. The boss replied that of course he had. The co-worker responded that then the boss could consider the early departure time casual undertime. 

Every company or organization has a different culture.The trick is to know your organization's written and unwritten rules. However, wherever you work, regularly getting to work two or three hours after the normal start time and consistently leaving two or three hours before the normal leave time is going to attract negative attention from co-workers and more importantly bosses. Doing something like that makes it very obvious that you're not doing the work that agreed to do. Your boss can't ignore this because if she doesn't correct it other workers will start to do the same thing. Your boss might see your actions as a direct challenge to her authority. Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Vonda Evans, a judge with a certain reputation for a short fuse and sharp tongue, has apparently decided that she will keep her own hours thank you very much. 

I'm Off The Clock!!!!

I previously wrote this post about among other things, how this movie scene resonated with me. I work in a financial sector of the IT arena. Way back in the day I was part of the on call rotation for an accounting system. If anything went wrong with the system after hours your pager would go off. If you didn't respond in a timely manner then you'd get a phone call. 

If the production support person hadn't heard from you in fifteen minutes they would contact the backup on call person and/or your boss. One big problem I had with this entire initiative was that initially our team didn't have the budget to fix the processes that were most likely to cause problems. Because our portfolio of responsibilities was huge, usually when someone was on call he or she would only know his or her given area of expertise. So when a particular accounting update process went bad the person on call might only know the reporting piece. 

So s/he would end up calling the accounting update specialist, who wasn't on call and wasn't going to be happy to be contacted at 2:30 AM. The most critical jobs always ran late at night. Eventually, via cross training and a boss that obtained enough funds to code fixes and upgrade databases, we reduced the frequency and intensity of problems. But it still was unpleasant to be on call. We were on salary so we didn't get any extra money if we had to tune a database or restart a reporting job at 2 AM. Perhaps if the company had to pay us more to be on call our previous boss would have pulled her head from her posterior and taken earlier steps to solve issues. I was reminded of all this history because in New York City there is a proposal to restrict the ability of employers to require workers to do work or answer emails from home after business hours.

Fox News and Sexual Harassment: Charles Payne Suspended

Sexual harassment is wrong. Adultery is also wrong. But in the Hughes-Payne affair we only know for sure that one of those things took place. This incident shows why it's usually a good idea to keep your work life and your sex life separate. Because if things go sideways there are any number of ways that a scorned lover can make your life miserable, mess with your money and perhaps even derail your career. Of course sex is one of the strongest urges known to men and women so it's not surprising that people constantly ignore common sense for a little slice of heaven. Sin in haste. Repent at leisure. It's just part of human nature. The analyst whose accusations of sexual harassment have led to Fox Business Network's Charles Payne being suspended has been identified as Scottie Nell Hughes. It emerged Thursday that Payne, who hosts Making Money, had been accused of having a three-year affair with a married political analyst who had worked for CNN. 

That woman was Hughes and their relationship was well-known within Fox News circles, ten sources told the Huffington Post. Hughes is best known for her pro-Trump appearances on CNN during last year, when she made a string of gaffes, including referring to Molotov cocktails as 'Mazel Tov cocktails'. But she also worked as an unpaid guest commentator on Fox from 2013-2016 - during which time she struck up an affair with the married father, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Ailes Out at Fox News

Once a year everyone in my company has to complete online training on how to prevent or not engage in sexual harassment. It's painfully obvious stuff. You don't have to believe in or accept 100% of the most radical feminist worldviews to understand that putting hands on someone without their permission, commenting on their body parts without invitation or God forbid making their promotion, continued employment, assignments or pleasant work environment contingent upon them having sex with you is illegal and something which could cost you your job and your employer a lot of money. Some of the examples which are used in my company's yearly training are so over the top that I couldn't believe that even the densest rockhead out there wouldn't already know that this stuff is out of bounds. But there's always someone out there who thinks that the rules don't apply to him. The latest example of this was former Fox News Boss Roger Ailes, who was accused by former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson of long running virtual textbook sexual harassment over several years of her employment at Fox News. You can read some of her complaint here. Among other things Ailes allegedly asked Carlson to turn around so he could look at her bottom and told her that she should have had sex with him a long time ago in order to help her career. Ailes' alleged statements to and activities around Carlson are exactly the sorts of things which I thought were so obviously sexual harassment as to not be worth mentioning in a corporate CYA training video. Now to be fair there are a fair number of married people who meet each other in a work environment. And I don't think that one pass is grounds for harassment. But Ailes was Carlson's boss. That alone should have made Ailes keep everything above board. Apparently Ailes' bosses, Rupert Murdoch and his sons, decided that Fox News could get along without Ailes. Ailes "resigned" with a reported $40 million payout. If someone "suggests" that you resign or be fired, resigning is probably the smart move, right? According to some reports the Murdoch sons and Ailes were never overly fond of each other. Ailes chafed at having to report to the younger Murdochs. Some other women, most of them anonymous, claimed to have been harassed by Ailes over the years. But what may have flipped the switch was alleged confirmation by Fox News' top star Megyn "Jesus is White" Kelly, that Ailes sexually harassed her some years ago. Kelly is the future of the network. Presumably the Murdochs want to keep her happy and around. It puts more money in their pockets.  

So Ailes will have to face Carlson's lawsuit on his own. Fox News is of course, depending on your POV, famous or infamous, for transparent desks, thigh level camera POV, and women who show off expanses of cleavage and legs. So all in all I'm not surprised that the man who created a sexually charged work environment allegedly sought to benefit from same. For most people it's usually a bad idea to get your honey where you get your money. And it's always a bad idea to tell someone to give it up or get out. Allegedly....

Fox Sports Florida Reporter Emily Austen Fired

There are some people who routinely make ethnic or racial comments and earn a good living doing just that. These people are usually comedians, writers or politicians who represent districts where the overwhelming majority of people look like them and/or agree with their point of view. Other people are better off just reading whatever is on the teleprompter, smiling and raking in the big bucks. When some people go off script and let you know what they really think they run into problems. There's a very thin line between a comment that is crass or ignorant but not meanspirited and one that is deliberately malicious. Who knows what's really in Emily Austen's (former Fox Sports Florida sideline reporter for the Tampa Bay Rays and Orlando Magic) heart. All the public can go by is what Austen said. I'm betting that Austen is probably wishing that she hadn't made the comments that she made during an interview with Barstool Sports.

Emily Austen won't be the sideline reporter for future Tampa Bay Rays games on Fox Sports Florida. Nor will she do that job for the Orlando Magic next season either. After unleashing a variety of racial and religious jokes during a live Facebook chat with Barstool Sports, Austen has gotten the ax from Fox's regional sports station. During a 35-minute video with three men, Austen made several controversial comments, among them:
• That she "didn't even know that Mexicans were that smart.''
• How the "Chinese guy is always the smartest guy in math class.''
• About how she "used to talk to Jews in Boca'' when she was a server, saying one customer was "stingy'' because he complained about how she poured his beer and that "they would complain and b---- about everything.''Austen, 27, also referred to Cleveland Cavaliers basketball player Kevin Love as a "little b - - - -.'' While this is the sort of anti-PC, bro-centric content that has made Barstool Sports a popular (and well-funded) Internet destination, Austen learned pretty quickly what flies on Barstool Sports doesn't necessarily fly at her workplace.  

I don't see this as political correctness run amok so much as I see someone who lost sight of who she was and how important she wasn't to her company. You have to be pretty stupid or pretty privileged to let something you're doing outside of your workplace interfere with your work. I listen to sports radio during my commute. It is a place where slightly different rules apply. Still there are standards. Questioning a player's masculinity in a crude fashion is inbounds I think. Being amazed that an entire ethnic group/nationality is not as dumb as you thought they were is out of bounds. You always need to have a clear understanding of your value to your employer. If your departure won't negatively change your company's revenue stream or stock price, you should probably be careful about what you say in public. The other lesson is something everyone should already know. Just because someone smiles at you doesn't mean they like you. You can hear the problematic comments starting at 24:31.

LINK

Do you think Austen deserved to be fired for her comments?

There's No Crying at Work!!!!

There is a common blues couplet that reads "Crying won't help you/Praying won't do you no good". I tend to agree with the spirit of those lyrics. Leaving aside the very serious events in war there are only a few situations when I would grudgingly concede that it is theoretically appropriate or excusable for a grown man to cry. These times are few and far between but would probably include such traumatic occurrences as the death of a parent, wife, sibling or child, the joyous occasions of a child's birth or daughter's wedding, and possibly such horrific fictional events as the shooting and eventual death of Sounder, Cochise's death or the Red Wedding. Snicker. These are my rules anyway. I'm not saying they should be yours. Humor aside, I am saying that for better or worse a man who runs around crying at every little thing will inevitably discover that he will lose respect from both men and women. A fellow who lets other men, women or life's ups and downs regularly reduce him to blubbering helplessness shouldn't be allowed to call himself a man in my view. There are very few problems that are solved by crying. And no matter what fresh hell we may find ourselves in at any given time it's a certainty that the world is going to keep turning. The Sun rose yesterday despite all the horrible atrocities that occurred to people who aren't you. And the Sun will rise tomorrow if you get some terrible news today. That's just the way the world works. As both of my grandfathers were prone to saying (fortunately jokingly by the time I arrived on the scene), "Hush up that crying before I give you something to cry about!" I view most crying by men, outside of the previously listed exceptions, as an announcement of utter incompetence, childishness and weakness. Life does not reward such behavior in general. As the Godfather informed us it's important to act like a man!! So whatever problems you face in your life remember that other people have faced them and survived. Or to quote an influential local DJ of my teen years , "Whenever you feel like you're nearing the end of your rope, don't slide off. Tie a knot. Keep hanging, keep remembering, that it ain't nobody bad like you." 

So it was with initial bemusement and later something close to growing horror that I read a piece in The Atlantic which argued that men and especially women should feel entitled to cry at work if they needed to do so. In fact women should have permission to cry more than men because equality and grrlpower or something. And looking negatively at people who cry at work is sexist.That was Olga Khazan's argument anyhow.

When the president of CBS News fired correspondent Mika Brzezinski a decade ago, she cried. And she regrets it. “There was no place for those tears in that moment,” she told the Huffington Post two years ago. “If anything, when you cry, you give away power.”
Of the 15 other high-profile women the news site interviewed about crying at work, the majority expressed negative views of some sort. Frances Hesselbein, former CEO of the Girl Scouts, put it most bluntly: “Tears belong within the family.”
In the office, crying is simply another unexpected emotional cue, like a guffaw or a jump for joy. But unlike those, it’s negative, so it snaps people to attention.
The ignominy of the office cry is still more of an issue for women than for men, because women cry more than men do. In her survey of 700 people, Anne Kreamer, author of It’s Always Personal: Navigating Emotion in the New Workplace, found that in the past year, 41 percent of women admitted to crying at work, but only 9 percent of men did.

Part of the explanation is hormonal: Men generate more testosterone, which inhibits crying, while women produce more prolactin, which seems to promote it. Anatomy also plays a role. Men have larger tear ducts than women, so more of their tears can well in their eyes without spilling out onto their cheeks. The only solution, it appears, is to normalize office crying for everyone. Not unlike other unpleasant things, crying happens. Men shouldn’t reap the unfair advantage of a mid-meeting misting, and women shouldn’t worry that on top of their own embarrassment, they’re being judged as manipulative and incompetent...

LINK

Now to be fair the social expectations are just a wee bit different for women. Outside of the workplace I don't view the spectacle of grown women crying with the same disdain I would have for grown men. Is that (horror of horrors) sexist? Perhaps so. I think most honest people will admit that, politics aside, they have slightly different expectations for men and women. It's just how the world works. Men and women are different. And that's a good thing. Still, man or woman, the workplace is not the place to have teary breakdowns. For men, in most work arenas I've been in, the loss of respect will be almost instantaneous and very difficult to retrieve. I don't think women face that exact same issue. A woman would often receive more confused sympathy than contempt. But even so, a grown woman who cries a lot at her workplace will have people wondering about her competence and stability. Ironically, one of the nastiest, meanest, most aggressive and most profane female co-workers I ever worked with was also a huge crybaby. I thought her tears were just another tool in her kit of emotional manipulation though she claimed not to be able to control them. So my thought is that encouraging people to cry at work is a horrible idea. It takes no account of how the world is today. We can argue and debate about how much of the difference in the frequency in men and women crying is due to biology or environmental factors. But regardless of whether you have XX or XY chromosomes, if you are routinely boo-hoo-hooing at work for reasons that don't include a loved one's death trust and believe that in many workplaces you will find yourself slowly marginalized and kept away from challenging or highly visible assignments and promotions.You need to put on your big boy/big girl pullups. Keep punching away at whatever problem afflicts you. If you really feel that you just need to have a good cry then I would strongly urge you to find yourself a private office or a bathroom stall and do what you need to do there. You won't share private moments with co-workers. You won't run the risk of having a crying jag in front of someone who may not know you that well and probably doesn't want to know you that well. Crying in front of a good friend, supportive and empathetic lover or spouse is utterly different from doing so in front of someone who evaluates your work, a rival peer who may crave your job, or an ambitious underling who resents reporting to you. 

I mean if I had a boss who broke down sobbing because another boss said something mean to him on the Tuesday conference call going forward am I really going to trust Fearless Leader's judgment and mental balance? No. No I am not. Although it is impossible to completely separate work from your emotions the bottom line is that you are at work in order to make money. All the emotional stuff needs to take a back seat while you're at work. Don't try to pretend it's not there. But don't start having crying fits at work either. I'm not interested in comforting you if you are a man; trying to comfort you if you are a woman could be misinterpreted by HR. Please keep your crying to yourself.

But that's just my take. What's your view?

McDonald's Meltdowns and Wal-Mart Head Butts

I work in a white-collar office environment. It's air conditioned in the summer and heated in the winter. I don't have to punch a time clock upon arrival, when I go to the bathroom, or upon leaving for the day. There is not a lot of cursing and yelling going on most days. Not every white-collar environment I've been in has been like this. A boss with a reputation for bullying once yelled something nasty at me. I had a very short, direct, and serious discussion with him where the upshot was he apologized. I later heard that he expressed admiration that I was willing to stand up to him. Whatever. Some former co-workers were quite passionate about their job and would routinely get into very LOUD profane nasty shouting matches with each other. They once got into it in front of a visiting company director. I don't know if they were disciplined or not but I do know that neither one was ever promoted. They're doing the same job today for close to the same pay that they were doing fifteen years ago. So you can connect the dots there I guess. I do not usually work with outside customers. I'm more adept with the written word than with verbal communication so this is probably for the best. There are many angry, frustrated customers who are eager to vent their spleen to an easy target, like say an employee who has certain rules to follow lest he or she lose his job. Having to take this sort of abuse coupled with just the normal problems and issues of work can cause some employees to lose it. The three below videos show some examples of what's really going on the front lines of customer-employee interaction. 

In the first video a Michigan area McDonald's customer is angry about an incorrect charge/wrong order and starts insulting the clerk in the harshest of language. In the second video a Texas Wal-Mart customer named Jessica Albitz is angry about something a tax preparer said to her, comes back the next day and (you guessed it) head butts the employee. Yeah. A scuffle breaks out. The unrepentant Albitz was charged with assault. If you're going to call someone out of her name I don't think you can get upset when she responds in kind. In the last video a Twin Cities teen McDonald's worker is apparently upset about his hours and money. He throws a temper tantrum in front of customers. He destroys company property. The teen and his manager were fired. The adult manager, Brandon Roberston, says it was unfair that he was fired because his possible responses were limited. Robertson could not put his hands on the teen. Robertson called police and did his best to calm the young man. I don't know what this says about our society but I do know there was a reason I don't patronize McDonald's or Wal-Mart. Seriously though I can't abide anyone (customers or fellow employees) yelling at me or cursing at me. It's not that kind of party. Although I am very protective of my job and have done some things I didn't think I would do in order to stay employed there are red lines for me. Verbal abuse crosses those lines. A boss can tell me I'm the worst most useless employee that she or he ever had and it won't get to me. But if someone yells or curses at me then we have an issue. But we're all different.








Brandon Robertson: Lonnie Johnson Confrontation
Jessica Albitz: Alice Keener brawl
Michigan McDonald's Cursing

Have you ever been in a serious employee-customer or workplace dispute?

How did you resolve it?

Was McDonald's right to fire Robertson?

Are people angrier in public these days?

Things Not To Say To Black People

Sometimes when people complain about 'political correctness" they are really complaining about not being able to openly insult certain people any more without worrying about the insulted person's feelings let alone losing their job. These are the people who get personally offended that at work they can't openly call a black person a n****** when they've already given most people the impression they use the slur pretty routinely with friends and family. So I don't pay a whole lot of attention to some complaints around political correctness. But there are other folks who haven't grown up around different people. As adults they do not routinely work with different people or have any of them within their circle of intimates (neighbors, spouses, in-laws, lovers, close friends, etc). And since they're in the majority they don't really need to know what a minority may consider offensive. So though some people may not mean harm by their statement or question, insult can still be taken. We all have difficulty seeing through other people's perceptions. It's not always easy to determine if someone is saying something from honest well meaning, if clueless curiosity, or instead is expressing racist malice. Often times black people try to discern the difference and decide if the situation is worth verbally chin-checking someone. I generally feel that it is worth the hassle to set someone straight. My experiences have been that when you give some people an inch they take a mile. I have usually regretted it when I've let stuff slide. However there is no right answer to this because we are all different with dissimilar tolerances for what we consider offensive, racist, or just off-color (pun intended). 

Settling conflicts with a co-worker is different from getting into it with your boss or other ranking leaders. Keeping your job or a viable career path could mean keeping your mouth shut. There are some common comments or actions which many black people have heard or experienced. Most of these things are generally considered offensive to a lesser or greater extent. I ran across this video while looking for something else and thought it humorous enough to share. I have experienced some of these comments (and more) at workplaces. Stereotypes stink.

The Curious Case of Civis the Creepy Clerk

I ain't fooling, you need schooling
Baby you know you need cooling
Baby way down inside, woman you need love
Muddy Waters- "You Need Love"

Perv or Philanthropist?

Some people are more touchy feely than others. They like showing affection in public, not just in private. This could arise from genetics. It could be caused by how your parents raised you. It could come from how long you were nursed or any number of other reasons, including geographic, ethnic or national cultural preferences. American, and from what I hear Northern European, cultures are each supposedly a little standoffish while Southern European, Middle Eastern and some West African cultures are more relaxed about touching. I couldn't tell you for sure. I've known effusive Germans and cold Italians. What I do know is that like anything else with humans there is a continuum of behavior among people who seemingly can't connect to others without reaching out and touching them and people who would prefer that workplace/non-sexual touching of any kind be discouraged. I tend to fall in the second category. Work is work. So please keep your hands to yourself unless we are related or we are already intimate(or planning to be). In some states there isn't always a difference between these two categories but I digress. Snicker. It is a fact though that in the workplace, especially when there is a gender and/or a sexuality difference, many people prefer minimal physical contact, and ESPECIALLY no form of physical contact that could be possibly misconstrued as flirtatious, harassing or sexual. A hand shake is okay. A hand on a woman's hip, thigh, chest or behind definitely isn't. A fist bump or hand slap for closing a deal is fine. A facial caress isn't. A brief hug or shoulder pat to a co-worker who just lost a parent, spouse or child is usually acceptable. A tight full body embrace with a peer who has returned from an overseas trip just might send out the wrong message. Just saying. And so on. 

Americans generally recognize some responses as being reasonable for someone who is providing your nookie and totally inappropriate for someone who is not handling that task. This isn't rocket science, folks. Unfortunately a grocery store clerk in West Michigan has forgotten that it is truly not his job to provide hugs and bottom pats for women who, in his opinion, look like they might need them. 

Whitehall — When is a hug more than a hug? That is, when does it stop being what a resident called a “handshake from the heart” and turn into something another termed “sort of creepy”? The question lies at the heart of a controversy roiling this small town in western Michigan. In August, supermarket clerk Fred Civis was arrested and fired from his job of 39 years after a customer he hugged reported him to the store and police. Many in town have rallied behind the popular cashier, launching a boycott that has slowed business at Plumb’s Valu-Rite Foods. The growing anger also led to death threats against a woman wrongly believed to be the complainant. A woman said the hulking clerk once wrapped both arms tightly around her, stroking her and whispering things in her ear as he nuzzled her neck. He then followed her around the store. “I know the difference between a friendly hug and a grope,” the woman wrote on a local TV news website.

The controversy began in July when Kendall Maczka was checking out at a self-service lane at Plumb’s. Civis came over and, after bagging her items, put his arm around her shoulders, brushing his hand against her backside, according to a police report. She snapped at Civis, who walked away silently. She told police Civis had been hugging her for three or four years. She said it wasn’t an issue until the latest incident. She said he embraced her only when she shopped alone. When she was with her husband, Civis ignored her.

LINK

Civis was apparently previously warned about his behavior. So right now this doesn't appear to be a case of an overreaction by someone who can't stand to be touched or a one time misreading of someone's body language. Misdemeanor assault charges seem like a bit much but I don't know if that fits what allegedly occurred. I'm no lawyer. Who knows? More information could arise. Of course if we are being completely honest some people's (and by people's here I mean women's) reactions to unsolicited hugs could vary widely on just who's doing the hugging but that's life. There is nothing unusual or unfair about the fact that women, like men, have different reactions to people depending on their perception of that person's attractiveness. Still, when you are at work, I don't think it's too much to ask that you don't go around groping or hugging other people. I mean, how difficult is that? The purpose of working is to earn money. You need to keep a roof over your head and food on the table. Perhaps you might make friends at work or even find someone who is more but that doesn't change what the primary imperative is. Nothing can be allowed to interfere with that. If I were to get fired from my job let it be for something like being a whistle blower about a bad product, standing up to a bigoted or incompetent supervisor or refusing to go along with bullying. 

I can't predict the future but I can safely say that I will NOT be fired from my job for putting my hands on women co-workers, customers or God forbid supervisors. Cause that would be kinda dumb.  I could never live that down. Can you imagine how the next job interview would go? "So, Shady is it? I understand you like to give hugs and pats on the bottom to women co-workers. Do you see any women around here that you think need physical comforting? We're just curious."

Thoughts?

Do the Right Thing!

Do you think you are a moral person? You probably do. There are very few people who consciously think of themselves as evil, immoral or heartless. Even people who kill puppies for a living usually have what they see as good reasons for doing so. From time to time we all have to make decisions, some small and some large about what sort of people we are. Generally these are not difficult and life altering major decisions like telling your dying friend that his wife cheated on him and he has been raising another man's children or escaping a sinking ship and realizing that the lifeboat only has enough room for two other people when you have three kids. All the same morals are morals no matter how minor the decisions seem to be. The choices we make in situations both big and small define the sort of people that we are trying to become. There aren't necessarily right answers to many of these questions but there are probably some answers that may seem right to you. Some questions are purely hypothetical; others are drawn from real life experiences, albeit not necessarily mine. What's the right thing to do in the following ten situations?

One
You're out in public. You notice that a highly attractive member of the opposite sex has some writing on a body part normally not visible to the general public. This could be a very important message. If this person didn't wish for you to read the writings on their (insert body part here) they wouldn't have ventured out dressed as they did, would they? So what do you do? Avert your eyes? Take a quick look and move on? Openly leer? Politely inform the person that they are showing more flesh than they may realize? Or saunter over to ask the person what the message says as you can't quite make it out from your vantage point? 

Two
You are with your unmarried significant other at an important family event. You think that s/he could be the ONE. This is your first chance to make an impression on their family. Your honey's parent makes an offhand comment to you on a sensitive topic (race/religion/culture/politics) that makes you see red. You wonder how a person this stupid manages to dress themselves every morning. But your special rider thinks their parent hung the moon. S/he told you beforehand that their parent had different views than you. S/he asked you to be nice. Arguing with their parent might destroy your relationship with Miss/Mr. Wonderful. So what do you do? Do you pretend agreement? Say nothing? Gracefully change the subject? Or let this ignoramus know how dumb they are? Would your answer change if you were married?

Three
At the grocery store you buy something cheap. The cashier makes a mistake. He returns too much change. E.g, he gives you back two $10 bills when your expected change was $2.10. Do you point out the mistake and return the money? Or do you take the money and keep it moving? After all it's not your fault he can't count.

Four
You're on a company critical project. You discover a catastrophic flaw. You need time to correct the problem. You may need to redesign everything. Without a fix you KNOW there will be massive failures, bad publicity, legal consequences, and increased costs. You tell your boss. Your boss says the project has been delayed long enough. She insists that you cut corners to make the target date. She doesn't trust your analysis. She says any problems can be fixed later. This is not a debate. She informs you that you will meet the date. She warns you against going to upper management, ownership or the press. The boss says this issue is closed. All she wants to hear from you is "Yes. We will meet the date". Getting on her bad side is a career limiting move. She has a long memory and highly placed friends throughout the company. So what do you do?

Five
You're attending a company training event. This week long class is required for your next promotion. You must create and deliver a multimedia presentation on various business cases. The instructor wants teamwork. He has randomly assigned everyone partners. The instructor will judge you on the final presentation and on cooperation with your partner. Your partner is a man infamous throughout the entire department for ignoring basic American hygiene. He last showered during the Clinton Administration. Soap, toothpaste, deodorant and daily clothing changes are foreign concepts to him. He can make you nauseous. The other students know this and definitely won't switch partners with you. What do you do? Grit it out without complaining? Tell the instructor that you can't work with this person? Or angrily tell Mr. Skunk that unused soap is worthless soap?

Six
A good friend has privately told you that the thrill is gone from their marriage. He or she is cheating. They are entirely unrepentant. Their spouse is completely clueless and still believes that Mr./Mrs. Cheater is wonderful. The cheater just wanted to vent. They don't want their spouse to know. They don't want THAT headache right now, especially since they're on their way to the no-tell motel. You are also REALLY good friends with their spouse and routinely see them, both with and without their adulterous other half. The faithful spouse believes that you are righteous. They would see your silence as a horrible betrayal. So what do you do? Mind your own business and let grown people work it out? Tell the other spouse what's going on?

Seven
You're at an impasse on a work assignment. Your task must be completed tomorrow but that looks unlikely. Your boss has gone home. There is another more experienced, higher ranking person who could immediately provide the solution. However, in the past when you asked him for help, he made a Broadway production of how busy he was. He said that if you wanted him to do your job for you then he wanted your salary. He ultimately gave you the answer you needed but not without a humiliating dressing down disguised as humor. You can ask him for assistance, eat a big load of crap, get the answers you need and meet deadlines. Or you can continue to fly solo. You'll stay late and will probably miss your project time commitments anyway even if you do eventually find the answer. Your boss will be VERY upset with you if you miss your deadlines. So what do you do?

Eight
Walking through a grocery store aisle you see a person knock an entire section of items off the shelf. They do not put anything back on the shelf and just continue on their way. What do you do? Do you also ignore the items on the floor because you didn't create the mess. Do you confront the person who knocked the items over? Do you start putting things back yourself?

Nine
You have a valuable investment. Selling it won't permit you to retire but you will be able to improve your savings, carry out some home improvement projects, and provide seed capital for your long postponed Evil Overlord project to rule the world. But before selling the asset and admiring your fat wallet you learn that a close family member (but not your spouse/sibling/parent) is in a serious financial jam. Rescuing them will cost roughly the expected profit from your asset sale. Do you help your kin? It will take years to recoup the lost cash. Do you stick to your original plans? Would your answer change if it were a first degree relative?

Ten

You've had a long hard day at work. You're dead on your feet. You're taking crowded public transportation home. You're about 20 minutes away from your stop. Fortunately you found a seat. Standing people are packed together like sardines. A visibly pregnant woman gets on the vehicle. There are no open seats. No one offers her a seat. She's in front of you. She's not verbally asking for your seat but she is making eye contact with you. Do you offer your seat? Is your answer dependent on your age or gender?

Federal Judge Richard Kopf Supports Professional Dress For Women: Called Sexist

This issue of professional dress never really goes away because humans are animals when you get down to it. I enjoy writing about it because it amuses me. A long time ago when I was working in a different industry and for a different company than I do now, I and a few of my fellow plebes were leaving for the day and happened to share a elevator ride down to the lobby with a firm partner. This man was known to be chronically irascible. I think we all hoped to just spend the 20-30 seconds needed to reach the lobby in silence. No such luck. The partner noticed that one of us, fortunately not me, was dressed in what he considered to be a cheap and unimpressive suit. As the firm's business model involved sending people worldwide selling or producing quite expensive accounting, financial and information technology solutions, the partner was concerned that my co-worker was not representing the firm professionally. The partner told the employee that "We pay you too much to dress as s**** as you do." He asked him where he got that suit and told him to take it back. We reached the lobby. Everyone else scattered but the partner and my hapless co-worker remained behind. The partner wasn't finished with his lecture. I learned the next day that after the partner had finished tearing this guy a new one, he arranged for his own tailor to create a group of new suits for the employee.

For certain businesses and at certain levels within those companies, how you dress is almost as or equally as important as what you know or how well you do your job. This has changed somewhat in America as casual workplaces have become more common but certain industries haven't really budged all that much. There are expectations of a professional demeanor and style. This is true for both men and women. I no longer am required to wear a suit every day but the managers two and definitely three levels above me are always in suits.

A Nebraska federal judge named Richard Kopf made what he thought was an obvious, self-deprecating and humorous short observation about the need for women lawyers to dress in appropriate, that is, non-sexy, attire. He did so on his blog, which you can read here if you're so inclined. 

True story. Around these parts there is a wonderfully talented and very pretty female lawyer who is in her late twenties. She is brilliant, she writes well, she speaks eloquently, she is zealous but not overly so, she is always prepared, she treats others, including her opponents, with civility and respect, she wears very short skirts and shows lots of her ample chest. I especially appreciate the last two attributes...

From the foregoing, and in my continuing effort to educate the bar, I have three rules that young women lawyers should follow when considering how to dress for court:

1. You can’t win. Men are both pigs and prudes. Get over it.

2. It is not about you. That goes double when you are appearing in front of a jury.

3. Think about the female law clerks. If they are likely to label you, like Jane Curtin, an ignorant slut behind your back, tone it down.

Leaving aside the oddity (to me) that a federal judge has his own blog, I understood the point the judge was making. He was speaking primarily of courtroom attire but as I pointed out these issues occur in every workplace. There have been several instances in my work history where people have been admonished, cautioned or disciplined for inappropriate attire. This included a woman sent home for wearing capri pants and a man bluntly told both on and off the record that his habit of wearing jeans guaranteed that he would never get promoted. And he never was.

Needless to say the judge's observations didn't go over very well with some people. Roughly half the comments on his original post are him explaining or apologizing while he made a more complete explanation/apology in a follow up post. Obviously all the usual suspects predictably weighed in to call him sexist, lecherous, accuse him of objectifying women and so on. I don't think his point was out of bounds. There are ways in which people can dress that are more appropriate for the nightclub or dance scene than the workplace. People notice and make assumptions. Making assumptions is wrong of course but people still do that. And noticing is always going to happen. I have written before that if a lady goes through the trouble to put certain things on display it would be rude for me not to notice. It's just human nature.

I don't think that women or men should or can spay/neuter themselves when they go into the workplace. But it's not too much to ask that explicitly sexy clothing be discouraged at work. It can lead to serious misunderstandings, lack of focus and harassment claims. Those last are worst case scenarios of course. But I think at the minimum it's somewhat disingenuous to have created a corporate environment where almost anything can be construed as sexual harassment and yet have some women dress in a manner that is designed to invite notice, commentary and sexual interest. It is true that your style of dress says absolutely nothing about your skill set. It is also true for women that if you come to work in a skirt that barely covers your lower half and a top that shows off your upper half, you will get a different level and kind of interest from (especially male) peers and supervisors. Anyone who claims otherwise is likely not being truthful. 

Pointing this out is not being sexist. It's being realistic. As I've written before if you have a skirt that is so short that you must struggle to get out of your chair without showing everyone everything or are wearing a top so low cut that men's eyes constantly drift, chances are your clothing might be a tad provocative for your workplace. That is unless you work for Hooters. It's all about time and place.

Thoughts?

Robert Gates' New Book Attacks Obama

I don't know how it's handled in the Federal government workforce but in the private institutions I've worked in, often but not always, when someone decides to leave for greener pastures, there is an exit interview, formal or not. This usually depends on how "important" you are, how long you've been there, whether you're direct hire or contract and how easy you are to replace. Your boss and/or the HR department want to know why you're leaving, what they could have done differently to make you stay, if you enjoyed your time working at Penetrode Inc., whether you might ever want to return, or if they would ever be interested in having you back. I've had a few of these. Usually both sides are professional and cautious. Although you and/or your boss might be secretly or not so secretly delighted that you are finally departing, the custom is often to play things close to the vest. After all no one wants to be sued or tip their hand about a possible lawsuit. And even ignoring legal unpleasantness, usually neither the employer or especially, a wise employee, wants to burn down a bridge they might want to come back across. So the employee mouths the necessary pieties about an exciting new opportunity he just couldn't pass up and the boss says she's sorry to lose such a key part of her team but happy that her former subordinate is moving on to bigger and better things.

Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates evidently decided that he would ignore those conventions in his new book Duty, which details his experiences under the Obama Administration. He himself says that he didn't really enjoy his time there. I think it's fair to infer that he didn't much like or respect many of the people he worked with. So if this book was his exit interview it was a big "F*** All Y'all!!" to his former team members.

• In a new memoir, former defense secretary Robert Gates unleashes harsh judgments about President Obama’s leadership and his commitment to the Afghanistan war, writing that by early 2010 he had concluded the president “doesn’t believe in his own strategy, and doesn’t consider the war to be his. For him, it’s all about getting out.”

• Leveling one of the more serious charges that a defense secretary could make against a commander in chief sending forces into combat, Gates asserts that Obama had more than doubts about the course he had charted in Afghanistan. The president was “skeptical if not outright convinced it would fail,” Gates writes

• “The controlling nature of the Obama White House, and its determination to take credit for every good thing that happened while giving none to the career folks in the trenches who had actually done the work, offended Secretary Clinton as much as it did me,” Mr Gates writes. In one meeting, Mr. Gates says that he challenged Mr. Biden and Thomas Donilon, then Mr. Obama’s deputy national security adviser, when they tried to pass orders to him on behalf of the president. “The last time I checked, neither of you are in the chain of command,” Mr. Gates says he told the two men. Mr. Gates said he expected to deal directly with the president on such orders.

• In particular, Mr. Gates said he was incensed by the National Security Staff and their controlling nature. “Much of my conflicts with the Obama administration during the first two years weren’t over policy initiatives from the White House but rather the NSS’s micromanagement and operational meddling,” he writes. “For an NSS staff member to call a four-star combatant commander or field commander would have been unthinkable when I worked at the White House – and probably cause for dismissal. It became routine under Obama.”

• In “Duty,” Gates describes his outwardly calm demeanor as a facade. Underneath, he writes, he was frequently “seething” and “running out of patience on multiple fronts.”

I don't think this is all that big of a deal nor is it unprecedented. Sometimes I think that everyone who is anyone in a Presidential Administration (and many who aren't) will write a book purporting to give the inside scoop and tell the "real story" of how everything went wrong when the President didn't listen to him. I'm sure that right now some intern in the event planning office is writing a book designed to settle scores. Controversy sells. But Gates' book does show that the President's initial team of rivals approach had some limitations. Perhaps the next President, when faced with the question of whether s/he should keep on a cabinet member from the opposite political party will remember Robert Gates' book and think better of it. 

Is this no big deal?

Have you ever badmouthed former employers/co-workers? 

Is it a mistake to keep people from a different party in key positions?

Do any of Gates revelations about the President's managerial style concern you?

Dwight Howard and Criticism

Dwight Howard decided to leave the LA Lakers to take less money with the Houston Rockets. While there were quite legitimate basketball related reasons behind this move statements from both Laker partisans and Howard himself suggest that Howard was not ready for the LA spotlight or for the occasionally pointed and direct criticism from fellow Laker and famously intense competitor, Kobe Bryant.

I don't like criticism that much. I don't know many people who actually do like criticism. It can hurt your ego when someone explores your shortcomings. The critic's tone and who they are can outweigh their valid content. It's one thing when someone who is more successful or experienced than you in your chosen field and/or has the authority to oversee your work gives you some pointers. It's a different matter entirely when a person who has been homeless for a decade starts lecturing you on your career or finances. A firm and fair critique or a blunt discussion behind closed doors resonates with me more than a person who, when pointing out something wrong or dumb I'm doing feels the need to a) inform the entire world and b) throw in gratuitous insults about my intelligence, competence or immutable attributes. Ideally, both the person giving the criticism and the target of the critique should separate the criticism from the person.

However, usually without someone to push you, you simply can't grow. You'll constantly make the same mistakes. That's true in both personal and business relationships. You need honest feedback that lets you know where, to use corporate speak, you have "room for growth". So even though I dislike criticism, I've occasionally sought it out. If I know what my weaknesses are hopefully I can make changes to develop in a positive direction. This means checking my ego and investigating if the criticism is valid and useful. That's more important (usually) than the tone or motivation.

Growing takes work and sacrifice. Often people who are the best in their field aren't super patient with those who haven't done the work. There's a reason for the saying "Nice guys finish last". Isiah Thomas was a ferocious competitor who didn't mind starting fights or finishing them. Magic Johnson might have had a famous smile but he would also give you a forearm to the throat if you came down the lane. Larry Bird would talk trash all day long while dropping a triple double on you. Was there any NBA player who hated losing or lack of preparation more than Michael Jordan? He could make grown men cry with his verbal attacks. He bullied and sometimes punched teammates. LeBron James may not appear as relentless as Jordan but that doesn't stop him from giving Mario Chambers extended harsh public corrections. These men and others like them required the best each day from their teammates. And they demanded better tomorrow. They wanted to win. People in different disciplines had that same drive. Whether it was James Brown fining musicians for fumbled notes, late arrivals and unshined shoes or Jimi Hendrix yelling at Dave Mason "Why can't you get it right?" when recording "All Along the Watchtower", the best of the best (with some notable exceptions) are often perfectionists.Even if they're soft-spoken or non-confrontational, top performers will call you out for mistakes.

How much criticism can you take? That's different for everyone. I have had occasion to give but more often receive criticism. If one can put a wall around their ego and try not to take (or give) things personally criticism can be quite useful. Sometimes there is no time to sugarcoat things. Your program works or it doesn't. Your project is on time, in scope and within budget or it's not. The higher the stakes are, the less inclined people will be to care about hurting your widdle feelings. I think, given the statements by Shaq, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Magic, that Dwight Howard might have made a mistake in letting his ego and pride interfere with becoming a better basketball player. That's easy for me to say because I don't have Kobe Bryant in my face screaming that I ran the play wrong or running me down on the team flight. Still, no one said becoming a champion would be easy. If I'm Dwight Howard, I must consider how badly I want success. What will I do to win that championship. Maybe hearing crap from a past his prime Kobe is not worth it. Maybe Kobe is done. Nevertheless when people of the calibre of Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Shaq, and Kobe all question your work ethic, skills and approach, maybe you should listen.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar speaks on Dwight.

Did you work with Dwight Howard? “No. I had a real good meeting with him when he first came to L.A. He was like, ‘Yeah,’ but that was the last time I spoke with him. . .He’s charming, he’s charismatic, very nice young man. Maturity wise, he doesn’t get it.

”Imagine if you could teach Howard the sky hook. “At least he’d have an offensive move. He gets the ball on offense, oh, my god, he doesn’t know what to do. It’s usually a turnover, people come and take the ball from him or tie his arms up. Offensively, he doesn’t get it. Hasn’t made any progress. We (the Lakers when Kareem was an assistant coach) played them in ‘09, and when I saw him this past season, he was the same player.”

Dwight Responds to critics

What did you think of Kobe Bryant’s comments that he could teach you how to be a winner? DH: “He didn’t say anything of that sort. People twisted a lot of stuff that he said. But in my personal opinion, I’m a winner. I’m a winner because I’ve been playing for nine years when the average career for an NBA player is three years. I’m a winner because I made it to the NBA from a small school in Atlanta, GA, with 16 people in a class. I’m a winner because I’m succeeding in life. I’ve had problems and I’m not better than the next man, but I’m going to push myself to be a winner when it comes to winning a championship. But he didn’t say anything like that and a lot of people twisted what he did say.”

QUESTIONS

1) How well do you take criticism?

2) Can you recall criticism in your job or other arenas that actually helped you?

3) If someone who dislikes you gives you criticism, do you automatically dismiss it?

4) Does Dwight Howard lack maturity? Will he ever get a championship?