Sometimes I just want to weep ... or poke my head out the window and scream, "I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!"
Radio Shack, already in trouble and closing stores, decides that delivering layoff notices by email is an acceptable way to treat people. Spokeswoman Kay Jackson was quoted in an AP article as saying electronic notification was quicker and allowed more privacy than breaking the news in person. "It was important to notify people as quickly as possible," she said. "They had 30 minutes to collect their thoughts, make phone calls and say goodbye to employees before they went to meet with senior leaders." Wow! Thirty minutes. What generous thoughtfulness.
Intel, the icon of "smart," decides to layoff 10% of its workforce as if all that smart came from somewhere other than people. And it’s not just Intel, other smart firms such as HP, Apple, Sun Microsystems and Seagate Technologies have or are in the process of adding to the ranks of the "downsized." All in the name of "efficiency" and the "bottomline" ...
....................... Later ...................................
In the midst of this rant, I received an email that turned me around and reminded me that we can’t focus on the negative, we have to celebrate the light wherever it shows up. The email came from Dave Lovetro, North American Innovation Coordinator at Eka Chemicals, who wrote it as a story, almost a fairy-tale that grew out of four, week-long, action-learning innovation camps held over a period of two years. Here's the story ...
"Once upon a time at a Bright Concept Camp in Chicago, several Campers dreamed about a way that Eka Chemicals could 'touch each and every Eka employee with a message of Innovation.' On that day, the phrase,
We Deliver...........Innovation! TM
was born. Other Campers at future Bright Concept Camps were told about this dream ... so they searched for a way to make this dream to come true.
Before long, a group of eight or nine Campers started talking about the possibility of an "I-Booth" that would take innovation to the people rather than making them come to it. That idea grew, took wings and not long after that ... "ICO" was born as a mobil innovation center. Its first trip was to the Columbus plant where over 90% of the employees of that site participated in two-hour sessions and generated 556 ideas related to a strategic challenge. These were distilled into 12 concepts and each concept team created a video-taped presentation for later judging."
After I read this, I decided that I could weep or grin ... but grinning is more fun. So, I hope this brief story brings you a grin and a renewal of hope.
The novelist-philospher Albert Camus once said, "Great ideas, it is said, come into the world as gently as doves. Perhaps, then, if we listen attentively, we shall hear amid the uproar of empires and nations a faint flutter of wings, the gentle stirring of life and hope."
Wishing you a hope filled week.
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