Monthly Archives: November 2015

What 44 Feels Like

In November, I celebrated my 44th birthday. What significance does 44 have? Barack Obama is the 44th president. 44 is the international direct dial code for the United Kingdom. The .44 magnum is a serious hand gun. Vicks Formula 44 is good when you have a cough. Ok, that was random.

Birthdays are interesting when you get old right? When you’re a kid, they are great and it’s all about presents and parties. When you are in college, they are great because it’s all about free drinks. Now, it’s mix isn’t it? I sort of feel like the #44 looks in the picture above. I feel grateful to get a card and phone call from my mom and well wishes from my Facebook friends and my boss took me out to lunch and a conference room of strangers at work sang to me. But the reality of life starts to set in as well. I’ve had friends die of cancer and friends lose a child. I also feel old when my teenager leans over to me at the latest James Bond movie and says “wow, that guy is so old, how does he do all those stunts and everything.” Well, Daniel Craig is our current James Bond and he was 44 when Skyfall came out and he’s 47 now which isn’t that much older than me. Side note, I’m not sure you follow James Bond, but you should really read this interview with Daniel Craig in Time Out London – it’s refreshingly honest and funny.

The symmetry of 44 is interesting to me. It’s the ying and the yang, the good and the bad, the hopeful and discouraging. I often find myself very appreciative but then I’m also more and more crabby. I’m 44, my kids are teenagers, I’m in middle management and am someone’s boss that is supposed to have the answers. The world is a complicated place – the problems seem more real and serious in today’s world. On a personal level if you eat too much red meat or birthday cake or have too many beers, you worry about your cholesterol and triglycerides and blood sugar. We also worry about terror attacks in faraway places like Paris and right here at home. Even in youth sports, it’s fun to watch kids play a sport at a high level right? So, you’re proud of them and you want them to do well but then you see kids get cut from a team for the first time or a coach tells a team that they “shit the bed” or “got their asses handed to them.” We’ve had coaches say that to our kids – really classy right? I can understand professional coaches saying that but not in youth soccer.

So, 44 is probably going to be more work than 24 and less fun than 14 but I’m hopeful and curious about 44 – I’ll let you know how it goes.

Vote Local On Tuesday – Build The Pipeline

So, this is an “off year” election right? Isn’t that what most people call it because our national offices are not on the ballot? Maybe we should call it a “local year” or a “talent pool” year instead because there are a lot of important things on our ballots. You can and should vote for your school board representatives, and at least in Minnesota, your school district referendums – is there anything more important in your local community than the schools? What about the city council? Sometimes people joke that that job is all about stop signs and speed bumps but not in the suburbs where I live – they make important decisions about my taxes that impact transit/traffic, development, and public safety. Any interest in those things?

Even if you say you don’t care about some of these local issues or if you’re too busy to get involved or learn about the issues and the candidates, there’s another reason to vote local. In the corporate world, leadership and human resources talk a lot about the talent pipeline. Who’s the next person that’s ready for a leadership role? If you look at the demographics, the baby boomers are retiring – god bless them – they worked hard, they have experience, but it’s time for them to open the next chapter of their lives. So, you ask yourself two questions – who’s going to take their place and are they ready? In my experience in the corporate world, this is where an impact is being made on diversity. You can count how many women and people of color are in the C-Suite, and we should be doing that. But, another very important measure is about the pipeline. Do we have a diverse candidate pool for key jobs? Are we bringing diverse candidates into the company now and spending time and energy developing them so they are ready to lead?

So, how do you define diversity? There are lots of ways to do it by things like gender and ethnicity but what about experience and thoughtfulness? There’s something to be said for the need for experience both in life and in solving important problems and in managing people – that sets you up to be better at it than people with no experience right? So, why don’t we think about our local elections as the way we build a talent pool for our elected officials? What if we look at our presidential candidates? Are we happy with that talent pool? I’m not. There are people who have served in an elected or appointed capacity but there is no way that they deserve to be president of this great country. There are also people who have never been elected to anything or served anyone and there is no way that they deserve to be president either but they actually start to look pretty good when compared to the other group.

So, let’s vote local this week and build the pipeline for the future. Maybe our kids will actually have national elections where they have to choose between great candidates who are thoughtful, diverse, and experienced? Maybe our kids and their friends will be those leaders? Wouldn’t that be something?