The Blog of Glenn McLaurin

“We cross our bridges when we come to them and burn them behind us, with nothing to show for our progress except a memory of the smell of smoke, and a presumption that once our eyes watered.”
- “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” by Tom Stoppard

If you have not yet read Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, go out and do so.  And once you finish, start searching for productions of it in your area — most likely, a local college will perform it at some time or another — and go see it.

Famed entrepreneur Seth Godin recently posted an excerpt from his latest book, discussing the methods of encouraging productivity utilized by Henry Ford. By paying his workers twice the average salary and basing their wages on productivity, he sparked a new era of manufacturing and industrial management styles — the effects of which are still felt to this day.

The implications of Ford’s tactics have been enormous, effectively serving as a driving force behind most of America’s industrial development. Unfortunately for millions of American workers, however, the last decade has seen an unprecedented rise in outsourcing — companies no longer needed to motivate “push-button” workers with high pay when desperate people in developing nations would presumably work just as hard for much, much less. At some point, the American workers simply could not be productive enough to justify maintaining their jobs.

Or, as Godin puts it:

"This is the central conceit of our economy. People in productive
industries get paid a lot even though they could likely be replaced by
someone else working for less money.

This is why we’re insecure.

Obedience works fine on the well-organized, standardized factory
floor. But what happens when we start using our heads, not our hands,
when our collars change from blue to white?"

Like it or not, a paradigm shift has occurred, and the rules of the game are not what they once were. In a time when even tax accountants can be outsourced, what we do and how we do it becomes all the more critical. I, for one, have no idea what the answers may be — but we can no longer rely on a carrot dangling before our eyes to motivate us to move forward.

Update: Newly Corporate just updated with a post regarding “free agents” — that is, the methodology of newer employees hunting for the best connections and the best jobs, not necessarily a lifetime commitment to one particular country. The folks over there have included a great guide to understanding and taking advantage of this trend; I found it a fitting complement (and potential answer) to Godin’s question of “what happens when we start using our heads, not our hands, when our collars change from blue to white?”

I hate that I have not been able to tend to my blog as much as I like, but other pressures have been siphoning away my writing time. I expect a break in the action in the near future and hope to offer some real updates then; I did not want to leave the blog stagnant until that point, however, and wanted to draw attention to a terrific post on Timothy Ferriss’ Experiments in Lifestyle Design site. A piece from last week includes an interview with Dan Pink (Al Gore’s speechwriter); hate or love the politics, some great advice can be found in the article.

Below is my personal favorite selection, but I strongly recommend that everyone check out the extended interview. Public speaking is an essential skill for anyone who wishes to make his or her voice heard… even if you never plan to present to an auditorium or convention center, the methods of delivery suggested by Pink are just as effective in a one-on-one interview, sales pitch, or general conversation.

"Q: What are the keys to world-class delivery?
A:   Authenticity. Don’t ape someone else’s style. don’t try to be Barack
Obama or Tom Peters or Margaret Thatcher. It’ll only underscore how far
you are from being one of these outstanding speechifiers. As trite as
it may sound, just try to be you. If “you” is someone who’s slightly
uneasy, who says “uh” a few times on stage, no problem. As long as
you’re authentic — and as long as you have something interesting and
relevant to say –- you’ll be fine. I’ve found audiences are extremely
tolerant of people who are less polished but who have something
valuable to convey. But their b.s. detectors go off big time when they
see a super-polished presenter spewing vaporous nothings. Again,
assuming you have a point and can explain why it matters, just work on
being the best version of you can be."

Effective communication is absolutely essential to successful exchanges of ideas, expressions of emotion, and forming the connections which prove beneficial and lasting for both parties. Luckily for all of us, it also happens to be a skill we can practice everyday, if we so desire.

Eat lunch with someone new. Draft that email you have been meaning to write. Bring up that idea you have been toying around with and see what happens. Make yourself clear, be tactful, and act with authenticity… and your words can carry you a long ways.

Agree? Disagree? I would love to hear some responses and perhaps follow up this post with some other tips for effective communication.

The April event over at Creative Writing is an attempt to define the concept of “Powerful Writing” in thirty words or less. I naturally cannot turn down such an idea-sparking, word-churning challenge… So here goes my twenty-six word entry:

“Words combining perfectly, letters and energy melding into flawless art. The passion of the creator defines powerful writing; the impact immediate, the beauty not easily forgotten.”

(more…)

Ryan Holiday’s latest post, ‘Meditative Isolation’ is, as usual, an interesting and thought-provoking piece. But as I read it, I couldn’t help but feel that the topic he was addressing was one I felt very familiar with. And then I remembered, back in December, I posted this brief commentary on thinking in the shower.

So, while I am tempted to say ‘well, I reckon this proves that great minds think alike’ and leave the issue at that, this topic is one of increasing pertinence in society today. We have so much interruption and interaction in our lives, we simply do not give our minds the opportunity to wander — and as professional blogger Michael Graham points out, even when given scant moments of free time, we instead seek out rapidly-passing interests which dominate our lives.  A generation has been produced that is more plugged-in and wired-up than ever before, with access stores of information expanding a rate far faster than we could ever consume, but I fear that these advancements will be meaningless if we can never find the isolation to take it all in and build on what we are learning.  How can we, collectively, continue to prosume when we hardly have the chance to comprehend what we consume?

Finding those moments of silence all boils down to courage and perseverance — like Ryan says, to get that free time, “[y]ou have to demand it, steal it, fight for it,” but then once you have it, you need the willpower to not give in and let go.

In response to a challenge hosted by G. L. Hoffman’s business blog What Would Dad Say, Ms. Andrea Zak of SchizoFrenetic recently submitted a piece entitled “Defining a Generation, Y, that is.”

I cannot agree more with her analysis of major events which will shape the generation to which I belong: “The Events of 9/11,” “The Ubiquity of Technology,” and “Election Season 2008.” I highly encourage everyone to read her article in its entirety; perhaps this is a throwback to my earlier post on sources of inspiration, but her writing and G.L. Hoffman’s original post have motivated me to seriously consider which events of the past eight years will ultimately define my generation.

On a lighter note, I recently discovered Garfield Minus Garfield, which is quite possibly the most bizarre webcomic I have ever stumbled across. Words cannot quite explain it, it simply must be experienced.