Friday, August 1, 2008
The troublesome foursome
A minister, doctor, and consultant were playing golf one day and had the misfortune of playing behind a very slow foursome. The consultant inquired, "What's with these people? We've been waiting more than 30 minutes! This is ridiculous." The doctor quickly agreed, "They're hopeless, I've never seen such a lack of consideration."Just then the minister spotted one of the ground crew approaching. He called him over to complain about the group.
The ground crew member told the trio the slow foursome was a group of former firefighters that had been blinded when putting out an inferno in the clubhouse. The course’s owner lets them play whenever they want.
With this new information the minister committed to pray for the sightless foursome.
“That’s nice,” added the doctor. “I know an optometrist that might be able to help them. I’ll call him tomorrow morning and see what he can do.”
Meanwhile, the consultant wondered why the former firemen couldn’t play at night.
Life Lesson: different people look at things differently.
Labels: Anecdote, Diversity, Problem_Solving
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Words, cultures, and communication
Words often mean different things in different cultures. This video is a comical look at how one word means something different in eastern and western cultures. It gives great insight into the frustration surrounding communication in a multicultural workplace. Of course, proper training can reduce or eliminate the communication problems. Enjoy the video.
Labels: Communication, Diversity, Video
Monday, June 30, 2008
Endless bins of jeans
One of the advantages of my career has been seeing how various products are manufactured. In the early days I was always puzzled as to how employees on assembly lines could enjoy the repetitiveness since work is always a continuum through which the end is never reached.
This changed one day in the final assembly plant of HIS Jeans in Tennessee. I watched as the pieces of fabric slowly took the look of the final product as they moved through the factory.
When we arrived at the last spot in the process before folding and packing, I was amazed at the sea of canvas laundry bins leading up to a sewing station where the button was placed on the waist. There stood a lady with her back to the ocean standing next to a single bin. I watched as she reached into the bin, took out a pair of jeans, reached into another basket and took out the snap, and then fastened the snap to the jeans.
Harold, who was giving me the tour, said she had been doing the same job for 23 years. He wanted me to notice that she never looked at the snap but was still able to sew it on with the logo consistently horizontal. Over the years she had learned instinctively how to handle this requirement, a task that was a struggle to many others.
However this quality aspect of the lady was not the most impressive or intriguing characteristic of the lady. You see, she had the biggest smile of all the workers I had seen in the factory. Almost spellbound by her enthusiasm I watched her for an extended period. Pick up jean, pick up snap, sew, place completed jeans in another basket, repeat. And every time she completed a bin there were dozens more waiting.
As an individual that loves to check-off completed assignments on a task list I had to know why she was so positive. I asked her why she loved her job so much. She looked me in the eye to reply without slowing down her sewing, “Its bought my house, paid for the first three college educations in my family, buys gifts for my grandchildren, and is helping me save up for retirement. And all the while I do this I am able to see in my head how this has helped my family and praise my Lord for how good He is to me.”
Humbled by her words, I realized that we each have different motivators in our lives. Her blessing is that she found a job that aligned with her motivational factors. Her job was not work, it was a piece of good fortune.
Life Lesson: Diversity comes in many forms.
This changed one day in the final assembly plant of HIS Jeans in Tennessee. I watched as the pieces of fabric slowly took the look of the final product as they moved through the factory.
When we arrived at the last spot in the process before folding and packing, I was amazed at the sea of canvas laundry bins leading up to a sewing station where the button was placed on the waist. There stood a lady with her back to the ocean standing next to a single bin. I watched as she reached into the bin, took out a pair of jeans, reached into another basket and took out the snap, and then fastened the snap to the jeans.
Harold, who was giving me the tour, said she had been doing the same job for 23 years. He wanted me to notice that she never looked at the snap but was still able to sew it on with the logo consistently horizontal. Over the years she had learned instinctively how to handle this requirement, a task that was a struggle to many others.
However this quality aspect of the lady was not the most impressive or intriguing characteristic of the lady. You see, she had the biggest smile of all the workers I had seen in the factory. Almost spellbound by her enthusiasm I watched her for an extended period. Pick up jean, pick up snap, sew, place completed jeans in another basket, repeat. And every time she completed a bin there were dozens more waiting.
As an individual that loves to check-off completed assignments on a task list I had to know why she was so positive. I asked her why she loved her job so much. She looked me in the eye to reply without slowing down her sewing, “Its bought my house, paid for the first three college educations in my family, buys gifts for my grandchildren, and is helping me save up for retirement. And all the while I do this I am able to see in my head how this has helped my family and praise my Lord for how good He is to me.”
Humbled by her words, I realized that we each have different motivators in our lives. Her blessing is that she found a job that aligned with her motivational factors. Her job was not work, it was a piece of good fortune.
Life Lesson: Diversity comes in many forms.
Labels: Attitude, Diversity, Motivation
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Multiculturalism – Smart business or racism
The Ayn Rand Institute has called multiculturalism “the new racism” that would turn a country into “country into a collection of separatist groups”. They are joined by others believing multiculturalism positions one culture above another culture without stating which culture belongs at the top. This, they contend, will lead to the creation of “separatist groups competing with each other for power”.Yet if you read yesterday’s definition of culture with an inquisitive mind, you may have already figured out that every individual on this planet is already individually multicultural. Each of us belongs to different multiple different cultures at the same time.
For example, we are members of a specific generational culture. The Baby Boomer generation experienced the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King. However each member of the Baby Boomer generation is also a member of an ethnic culture. In the African-American culture, Martin Luther King’s death had a much more profound impact than that of JFK. In European-American homes JFK’s death was a more significant event.
If we were not multicultural as individuals, the events would have had exactly the same effect on every person. Due to the multicultural aspects of our character, events are perceived differently. Neither is better than the other, they are just different.
True multiculturalism is not about any single element of a persona. It is about the dozens of cultures each of us has within us. See MBC Global’s Cultural Bridges to see a sampling of more than 20 cultural categories. You will see each one represents a portion of the way you think, act, and react.
Monday, January 21, 2008
The content of one's character
When we look back over the course of history there are several speeches that still ring with passion and spirit to invoke modern emotion. Kennedy’s “Ask Not” challenge, Lincoln’s Gettysburg address, and Martin Luther King's “I Have a Dream” speeches have stood the test of time.In his speech, Dr. King challenged us to look at people based on the "content of their character". We tend to gloss over the specific meaning of what he had to say. Most think that "content of character" simply means we should judge people for who they are beneath the pigmentation of their skin. Although this is true, if we are really to appreciate the content of character we must understand what creates one's character in the first place.
Character is nothing more than a group of cultures. It is what we have learned from our experiences based on our experiences in whatever religious, economic, geographical, recreational, vocational, physical inventory, gender, sexual orientation, and racial cultures. Character is the cultures taught to us by her parents, witnessed in our friends, impressed upon us by the media, and demonstrated by our heroes.
King's words prompt us to look into the soul of a person instead of pre-judging outward appearances.
Pre-judging is easy.
Read how pre-judging cost some sales people over $12 million in sales by clicking here.
Labels: Diversity, Leadership
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