Responsible parties

The other day, I presented a letter of reprimand to one of my employees.  He's worked for me for eight years and has been a mainstay of the business during that time.  He is a good person, a reliable employee and a good family man.  His attention to quality has been outstanding until the past year or so.  

He has ruined three large embroidery jobs during the past eight months.  The combined total loss has been greater than the rest of our embroiderers combined.   His most recent mistake was so bad that we had to order and send the replacement goods to another embroiderer because the customer had very little faith in our ability to do the job.

Only a week after the latest quality issue, he made the ultimate in foolish mistakes by putting a needle through his finger.  This became a worker’s compensation claim.  Normally this is something that is only committed by rookies and it only happens once.  The only way that a needle can pierce a finger is by putting that finger under a needle while the machine is running.  Rookies learn quickly that when the needles are going up and down at a rate of four hundred fifty and a thousand times per minute, the wise choice is to stop the machine before clearing a stray thread or adjusting fabric.  For a veteran to do this is unthinkable.  Turning off the machine before clearing threads becomes second nature to experienced embroiderers.

As a side note, in twenty two years, we have not paid out a worker’s comp claim on this sort of injury until this year.  This is not a common occurrence at all. 

So my employee and I had a conversation.  I read him the letter, we spoke of the issues at hand and I asked if something was wrong in his life that was causing him to slip up so much.  His answer was that there was nothing wrong. 

We discussed the most recent mistake.  I was informed that he had done a sample and that it was approved.  I asked why the rest of the order was not like the sample.  I received a shoulder shrug.

We moved on.  The needle-through-finger trick.    How did it happen?  He said that it was an accident.  I asked if maybe he wasn't a little bit responsible for the accident.  He said that he was not.  It was the machine's fault.

I asked who had pushed the start button?  He did.  Who had put his finger under the machine after it was moving?  He did.  "So", I asked, "didn't you have some responsibility for this happening?"

"No," he replied.  "It was an accident."

"How did you get married?" I asked.  Sometimes I'll change the subject.

"My wife and I decided to do so," he said.

"Who asked whom?"

"I asked her."

"So you are responsible?"

"Yes," he said.

"And how about the accident?" I asked.

"It was an accident."

I gave up.  Our conversation was finished, save for one final request on his part.  "Since I am agreeing to the letter of reprimand," he said, "I would like a raise of fifty cents an hour.  You should take some risks as well."

I am older and calmer than I once was.  I politely told him that we would consider a raise if he actually survives the next six months without an issue.  I did not commit an assault upon his person. 

As my employee talked, I discovered that he will take responsibility for the good things in his life.  He does not take any credit for the bad things.  They are someone else’s fault.  That was his consistent assertion throughout the course of our discussion.  At the end of our discussion, I learned two lessons. 

The first was that I could not help but consider him to be a Victim.  His life is a complete loss because he chooses to assert no control over the bad things that happen to him.  They are always the result of someone or something other than him. 

The second was something that I told him.  As he continued to take responsibility for the good and deny the bad, I mentioned to him that we live in the United States.  I said that one of the fundamentals of our country is something called Freedom.  When a person takes responsibility for the good AND the bad, they set themselves free. 

Think about it and get back to me, okay?

Problem Solving

I am in the middle of solving a horse problem, so here we go.

Warning: Horse-related discussion below!

You'll hear horse people talk about how precious their little Sugar is and how much Sugar loves 'mummy'.   

Forget it.  Horses don't have the capacity for love or humor or any of the other emotions that makes us humans so, well, Special.  Most likely, if horses were driving the buses, we'd all be sitting way in the back, by the way.  A personality for a horse is pretty much black or white.  In the horse’s mind, either the horse comes first or the rider comes first.

This weekend, my horse, Sam, launched me.  It wasn't just a quick 'get off me because I don't want you around'.  This was a full-fledged space shuttle to the moon shot.  I was in the air long enough to realize that the clouds looked really fluffy and cute and that I might be able to touch one if I could just reach up a little higher.

After re-entry and recovery, I got up, assessed the personal damage, grabbed the end of the rein and worked Sam in a big circle, back and forth, as fast as he could move.  Then I remounted, rode him out of the pasture we were using and carefully dismounted.  I even got his tack all put away before collapsing in pain.  Adrenaline is a really good friend at times.

 The thing is, I was not angry.  I was troubled.  The next day, armed with ibuprofen and a longe line, Sam and I went to the arena and worked from the ground.  He seemed fine.  The incident, for him, was forgotten as though it had never happened.

It bothered me a lot, though.  Sam doesn’t buck like that unless he is frightened.  I don’t frighten him.  I reviewed our ride, what I saw when I took off his tack, what he’d been like prior to the actual incident.  I realized that he is very touchy down at his right rear leg and that when something touches him there, he twitches.  I noticed that the pair of saddle bags was off center and hanging down right over that area.

My horse wasn’t being mean, he was trying to get away from something that bothered him.  For my part, I just had not paid attention when he first started twitching.  He was being a horse and it was my fault for not taking his warnings seriously.

There are two lessons here.  First, with a horse, if there is a buck when you try to get him to canter or move, your response is normally to ride through it.  The horse will eventually figure out that kicking out is too much work and will get on with the task at hand.  I’d better add that the bucking will stop if the rider survives and remains on the horse.

If this is a continuing problem and you want it to be solved permanently, though, you have to look at the cause and then figure out what is needed to correct it.  In this case, I have to go back and work on desensitizing his hindquarters a whole lot.  I’ll do a lot of patting, a lot of rubbing and hang his saddle bags on him a lot in order to get them comfortable.

The second lesson is that I now know that Sam is not going to give me a lot of chances to listen to him.  If something is wrong, I’d better be a whole lot faster at recognizing it.  Otherwise, he will solve it himself and we’ll just have to hope that my protective gear works.  He’s pretty sure that he always comes first. 

The interesting thing is that both of these ideas are applicable to people.  No, we don’t ride people through a buck.  We do tend to push hard when they’re resisting, though.  It is in our nature.  And yes, people do tend to place self-preservation above the survival of, say, their company. 

I’m fairly recovered now.  Thanks for worrying.  I’ve been working with him for some time each day and will be riding him by Thursday evening. 

Self Reliance

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world. I remember an answer which when quite young I was prompted to make to a valued adviser, who was wont to importune me with the dear old doctrines of the church. On my saying, What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I live wholly from within? my friend suggested, — "But these impulses may be from below, not from above." I replied, "They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil's child, I will live then from the Devil." No law can be sacred to me but that of my nature. Good and bad are but names very readily transferable to that or this; the only right is what is after my constitution, the only wrong what is against it.   Ralph Waldo Emerson,  Self Reliance, Essays: First Series (1841).

Self Reliance.  The entire essay is a worth read, or re-read in my case.  I found my way to the essay today because of a speech by Jeff Danielson from Newsroom, the television series.  He gave it during a forum at a university.  I’d have to go watch the whole show to give a complete description.  It was an answer to the question of ‘why is the United States the greatest country on earth?’

He was preceded by two other participants who used the standard, “Freedom” and “melting pot” phrases.  His answer?  “It is NOT the greatest country on earth.”  He went on to say why.  Where we rank.  Facts, all negative, statements that are truths.  All reasons why we are not the best.

Why does it take a television show to speak on our behalf?  Why does it take an actor who has rehearsed his lines and a staged performance in order to tell the truth about the United States?   While I do not doubt his sincerity, I suddenly doubt the value of his performance beyond art.  He did say the truth.  I agree with his performance completely.  He did not tell us whether he, as a person, believes in what he said.  It looks a lot like, oh, Robin Williams playing the part of a gay man in “Birdcage”.  It was believable, it was funny and it did not tell us whether Robin actually was gay (I’ve no doubt that he was not). 

Today’s politicians are conformists.  They play party line, vote party line and voice popular opinions in order to get re-elected.  We travel further down the road toward sameness each day.  Nowadays, instead of seeing lightning fast changes in technology, about all we see are lightning fast enactments of party-line laws designed to allow us to give in just a little bit more and to give up just a little more freedom. 

I think the world of Emerson.  He wrote what he thought and lived his life by the guideline that was his own moral compass.  He did not seek party approval or permission from others to write and do as he did.  I follow that same principal.  It is a good thing to seek advice.  It is also great to get experience, to make mistakes and then resolve them.  It is often good to follow the rules to a certain extent, especially if there is proof that they produce a positive result. 

It is never good to do so blindly.  The uninformed ‘leaders’ that create our rules today are expecting us to do exactly that.  My life may slow down even more as I take some time out to discover exactly why I should obey a new law. 

Here is an epiphany.  A truly conservative person expects to take responsibility for his actions.  A truly liberal person wants to take the responsibility for someone else's actions. 

Only if you want to.

My partner has threatened to make me a hat that says “Don’t ask me about my horse”.  Do not do this unless you are prepared to spend an afternoon discussing him, watching the slide and movie presentation, be invited out to ride him.  I promise that your eyes will glaze over and your hearing will be forever altered.  There is no subject more important to me than my horse.  There is no quicker route to boredom on your part.

In recognizing this, I feel it important to include a warning whenever my horse will be used in an analogy, simile or metaphor.  One like this:

Warning:  Horse Analogy Below

You’ve been warned, buckaroo. 

My horse has taught me more about managing human beings than all of the classes, hands-on training and books I have ever experienced.  Horses have been called the best teachers.  For me, that is an absolute truth.

Horses resist change.  Take one out of a field, put it into a pen and tell it to move and the answer you get is, “Huh?”   After that, you get, “No way.”  With patience and a little work, the horse will eventually recognize that the easiest course is to move in the direction you want him to move.  Consistent instructions will give you the same exact results every single time. 

Nearly all horses will react in exactly the same way if treated the same.  Their language is universal and simple.  Put pressure on a spot, wait for the horse to try everything but the action that you desire, keep the pressure there and when the horse does the right thing, immediately release the pressure.  After a time, it takes very little pressure to get the horse to do what you want.   The horse has learned something new!

Employees resist change.  Try suggesting a way to improve performance and you get a blank stare.  Tie it to some sort of pressure and eventually you get cooperation.  Do it long enough and you would think that the employee might just eventually start carrying out the new process on his own.

The trouble is, employees are not horses.  How I wish they were sometimes.  The difference is in the size of our respective frontal lobes, the part of our brains that allow us to joke, love, desire and rebel.  Horses are pretty much unable to do any of that.  Humans do it all.  And if you want a human to keep doing his or her job properly, you have to find a way to make them want to do it.  They won’t just carry out their duties because we taught them. 

The art of management is not in the teaching of a method or the successful increase in productivity.  The art of management relates to getting staff members to want to do things the productive way.  Anything less than want creates a possibility that things will change back to the way that they were before. 

Because we all resist change.   

On planning ahead

August will shock me with the sixtieth anniversary of my introduction to this planet as a living being.  This past year has been one of contemplation, ill humor and realizations.

During the past year, I realized that while many people take the bullet train to maturity, wealth and success, arriving almost before they have begun the journey, my own path to adulthood has followed an old, rutted dirt road filled with mud puddles and hazards where I have slowly picked my way along, often following detours or getting completely lost.  I certainly won't be skidding into the end of my life, although I know that a good shower will be required before I meet my maker.

My youthful dreams of a private jet and millions of dollars have eluded me.  In fact, my business has never reached a million dollars in sales.  Team Mates is twenty three years old on November 2, 2014.  It has provided my family with a modest income, a home or two, a couple of cars and part of the educations of my children.  It has not, however, provided me with retirement savings.  In fact, I imagine that my company has been my traveling companion down the old country road, reaching toward profitability as I have wandered toward maturity.  It is clear that neither of us is even close to our respective ends.

It became obvious during the past year that my company would provide me with enough income to live a decent, if modest life for as long as I worked.  If I hired a replacement, the cost would be higher than what I cost right now.  Selling the company would result in a high tax bill, a very low net gain and the requirement that I continue to work.  I might as well stay with Team Mates.

As a former accountant, I was very capable of calculating all of my unattainable financial goals.  As a human being, I was depressed.  Not even a million dollars would be enough for retirement, even if I was extremely frugal.  I would never, ever be able to quit my job or do 'what I wanted to do' or live the carefree life that I have so often seen my friends living because they managed to do what I have not been able to do; they worked and saved and acted like adults with their money and with their lives.  They were able to retire.

One day, I looked up and saw the rutted dirt track meander into the distance and smiled.  Retirement is out of the question and there is so much that I want to do.  There is working with my horse, working with other horses, gardening, making wine, writing and reading.  There are my children and grandchildren. The list is endless.  I have so many hobbies and desires.  I have a limited attention span.  Call it ADHD for Adults if you wish.  Add to the mix that I work full time.  Is there any wonder that I am never finished?

I realized at that moment that in a way, I already find the time to do what I enjoy.  There is already enough time.  I rarely find that there were not enough hours in a day.  There are, in fact, exactly the right number.  If more are needed, they can be borrowed from the following day because there are always more after that.  In fact, borrowing days is essentially an interest-free, non-repayable loan that renews at the end of each day.

This led me, of course, to the idea that I don't have much  in the way of savings.  On consideration, though, I recognize that I have very little debt.  Whatever I absolutely need, I usually pay for very quickly, except the new or used truck needed for hauling the horses, which I can't actually buy at the moment.  As long as I work, I can pay for the things that I need.

So while retirement is out, life will be fine.  I'll pick younger friends who are still working.  That way I don't have to feel badly about not sitting around playing bridge in the afternoon.  Or commuting between Minnesota and Arizona and never really knowing what season it is.

In the meantime, I'm leaving the shop at five today, driving home to a quick glass of wine.  Then I'm tossing a saddle on Sam and we'll go riding down to the power plant where we'll pick a few raspberries and do some circles around trees.  When we're done, we will go back home where I'll put Sam in his paddock, wander through the gardens and maybe come up with a plan for burning the big brush pile this weekend.

That's far enough ahead for now.

It's a process

In the interest of disclosing as little history as possible, which would make this a novel rather than a short commentary, I'll just say that I have a strong interest in horses.  It all began about three years ago when one of my sons and his wife enticed me with their horses.  As with all things that capture my starving, attention deficit mind, the interest blossomed into a full-fledged need for a horse, a place to store him and some sort of ability to ride him.  

I have little experience with animals.  Cats have been a part of my life for many years, if they are actually considered participants in lives other than their own.  Oh and we have some koi.  I've never owned a dog although my dad had one once, a long time ago.  The dog only lasted about six months.  He really wasn't suited to our house when I was growing up.  

Buying a horse was really easy.  We traveled south for three hours after seeing one on Craig's List, discussing the fact that you should never ever buy the first horse you see.  Three hours and fifteen minutes after starting south, my checkbook was lighter and I was the proud owner of two horses.

That was when my learning began.  Having a horse is an investment of time and money that probably is better spent on other pursuits, like beating oneself about the head and shoulders with a large piece of lumber.  Vets have to make housecalls because we don't simply load them into the van for a checkup, hay has to be bought early in the year, before supplies run out, sufficient land has to be available for running, grazing and manure (never ever think that manure gets rid of itself).  And there is a time commitment or else you wind up with pasture statues who consume every dime you have without giving back a darned thing.

I love my horse.  He is amazing and magical and the only reason a person these days ever needs to have an equine partner is emotional and not even remotely logical or rational.

Horses are wonderful teachers.  They are.  No, they don't hold classroom hours and the tuition is high but not impossible.  The lessons, though, are all about management and learning and understanding.  I have, in fact, learned much about managing my company and employees.  I've learned about patience.  I have learned how to do something absolutely without expectation of reward, because a horse completely lacks the capacity to 'like' people or things.  They can't joke around, enjoy kisses and hugs, look forward to petting or any of those things that dogs and cats can do.  This is scientific fact, by the way.  Horses have an extremely underdeveloped frontal lobe which is where reasoning and love and playfulness are found.  

Assuming that I have now upset every horse owner who truly believes that their horse loves them, we shall move on. 

Teaching most subjects is pretty darned black and white, except history which apparently no longer exists.  Okay, I'm an older person so I'll say that it used to be black and white.  Some of this Common Core crap covers the whole color spectrum and will be eliminated from this (and any other) discussion.  Moving on here.  

Teaching involves facts, not emotions.  It assumes logical answers to questions.  One answer per question is helpful.  Horses are totally reactive and non-emotional.  They don't reason their way through things, they just answer.  Wrong answers are deadly in the wild.  If you learn to think like a horse, you remove the emotional value from your thought process and the answers, especially when it comes to managing a company or a person, are much more clear.  Rules make more sense.  Systems and processes are much easier to follow.  

I'm stopping right here.  That way there might be more to write in another blog.  Continuity, right?  Speaking of which, I'll have to say something about community again one of these days.

Community

I love epiphanies.  When one occurs, it just makes at least the whole day better, and sometimes even carries over for a week or so.

Yesterday I had one.  It didn't involve work, at least not directly.

It went something like this:  "It's time to recognize that we are no longer on our own."

We used to live in the suburbs.  We had our four tenths of an acre, surrounded by trees, sitting across from a park filled with baseball and softball fields.  The street was noisy and there was lots of traffic.  We had gardened the plot until there really wasn't much more to be done and the inside of the house was going to be next, just for something to do on weekends.

We didn't know a single neighbor.  Not one.  I could wave at one guy, whose name is Arthur, as I drove by his house.  Aside from that, nothing.  Oh, there was also Lance who lived behind us and hated us because our fence had been located on his property for twenty years.  He would have a few beers and come out once in awhile and rail at me over that.  I didn't really care.  Minnesota has beneficial use laws, so technically the property was mine. I found out that Lance had died, although I only found out after we moved.

We lived there for fifteen years.  And knew absolutely no one.

Two years ago, we packed up and moved to the country.  We bought five acres that had a house, a barn, a second large garage and then acquired two horses.  We moved in our own and spent the first few months waving at the few cars that passed by since we knew that most of the drivers lived on our gravel road.  One or two waved back.  What a thrill!

One day, not long after we moved in, a couple of the neighbors rode their horses up the driveway to introduce themselves and meet our horses.  Then we started getting invitations to various places for drinks, barbecues and so forth.  And then we found ourselves offering help when needed.  The ladies down at the corner needed some hay brought down from another barn.  Someone else was looking for hay.  Somebody needed a little extra shoveling help.  The list of friends grew, even though we couldn't even see most of our neighbors' houses.

Yesterday, I was looking at Facebook pictures of the neighbors all helping each other stack hay.  We couldn't help because we were borrowing a trailer from one of the neighbors in order to pick up two hundred bales that I needed for our own horses.  I did realize, with a sigh, that I'd be called on to do something down the road.  In fact, we're helping to take care of the petting zoo and kennel down on the corner over the coming weekend.

That's when the epiphany arrived.  It was a negative at first.  "If the ladies down the road couldn't take care of themselves, then they need to hire some help instead of relying on the rest of us to pitch in."  No, it doesn't sound nice.  And yet, that's what the suburbs and cities do to us.  "Leave me alone," is the standard neighbor cry.  "I never ask for help and never want to be asked" is the statement of the day.

Then I realized that the truth is, we now belong to a community.  People work together to make their lives better.  None of us is rich.  None of us has the resources to carry on alone.  We do our best to manage our own acreages and don't actually have to have contact on a regular basis.  The thing is, we do it anyway.  We borrow stuff from each other, we return it when we're done, we pop on over to the neighbor's to mow or shovel snow or load hay because we know that they appreciate the help.  That's how communities work.

We are no longer on our own.  We have actual neighbors in an actual neighborhood.  It is a little bit tiring on a social level because my community-serving muscles are atrophied from years of living in cities and hiding away.  Working them just takes a little time, though.  In the meantime, having neighbors makes me smile.