You're Welcome

If the political parties in DC want to increase employment they should cut the minimum wage.  You're welcome.

I was listening to a podcast of "Leo Laporte, The Tech Guy" ( www.techguylabs.com )yesterday. During the show Mr. Laporte told his audience to contact their political representatives and encourage those representatives to pressure the FCC to disapprove the proposed merger between Commcast and Time Warner Cable. Mr. Laporte! Mind your own business! Just because you are knowledgeable about technical issues doesn't make you a leader or a change agent! If the companies merge and fail to satisfy you as a  customer you can go somewhere else to get your entertainment needs met!

At work the other day I noticed a document on a desk. At the top of the document in bold and underlining read: Ten Strategies for Conflict Resolution. Following that were ten bullet points, each one a tool or technique for "resolving conflict." At the bottom of the page on the right hand side in subscript read: Developed by Wholistic Stress Control Institute, Inc. Distributed by the State Wellness Program, a program of the Employee's Benefit Council. (I have never heard of any of these entities) As I looked over the document something bothered me. It wasn't so much what the document communicated as what it failed to communicate - ethics. No where in the document are the words "right" or "wrong" used. It did use the words - "situation", "compliment", "feelings", "issue", "opinions", "compliance", "agreement", "competition", "opposition", "conclu...

I had an experience at work yesterday that I think illustrates very clearly the clash between culture and counter-culture as it relates to ethics. Yesterday was payday and our paychecks/statements are in sealed envelopes with the employee's name and address on them. I carelessly selected the wrong envelope and opened it up. I immediately realized that I had accidentally opened the envelope of a coworker and informed my supervisor who told me to inform the coworker. When I explained what had happened to my coworker she became indignant insisting that "this is unacceptable". She informed the human resources department and eventually my coworker and I had a meeting with our supervisor and the department manager. At the conclusion of the meeting my coworker's feelings had been soothed and we all went on with our work. What is obvious to me when I look back on the situation is that psychology (feelings) was the driver here. I come to that conclusion because no in...