Brown nose to avoid the pinkslip?

During this trying times one may wonder if brown nosing can help one avoid the pink slip. Well if you think this article is about how to avoid being fired, no this is not the place. But I got your attention. Didn't I?

This is a listing about how common place is color associated in the corporate lingo. Here are few examples:
Blueprint
White wash
White knight
Pink slip
Brown nose
Brown bag
Red flag
Red herring
Green signal
Go green
Black mail
Black and white thinking
Gray thinking
Silver bullet
Golden parachute
Purple blood

Does 2x2 work?

If you subscribe to the skill-will matrix, it will say that your role as a manager is to move your employees to the NE corner of the matrix where the employee is highly able and willing to do the job and, once you got an employee there, to stay out of his/her way.

But does the skill-will matrix work? I think not. I think there is an important element missing in the approach. Consider this. Have you ever had an employee who is highly motivated (Willing)and skilled (Able) but is suddenly not performing as expected? What happened here? The difference is Engagement. I think it is not only important to have Able and Willing employees but it is necessary to keep them Engaged. We miss the best of performance of so many qualified people because we fail to engage them in the right way.

This is what I call the power of AWE - able, willing and engaged. So next time you think you have moved the employee up the ability-willingness continuum, ask yourself if you are doing enough to keep them engaged. Believe it the result will be much better than just staying out of the way of the able-willing employee as this famous 2x2 matrix suggests.

These waves

It pains to see these
break incessantly
like our human dreams -
as if that's one true reality
in this world so uncertain,
to submit at the shore
of our timid desire
with no chance to fulfill.
Right here this moment
and gone the very next.

But then,
in this surf-chain
I see unending hopes
of human spirit --
right when one breaks,
a new wave begins
its march towards the shore
of human aspiration.

As if nothing happened,
it whispers at the impending bank;
in silent defiance,
declares its indomitable color --
"I won't give up,
I won't give up."

Miraflores, Lima, Peru
February 20, 2010

14 years - wedding anniversary card

Part I
Fourteen years ago,
between my past & you
I chose you.
Between freedom & bondage
between destiny and duty
I chose you -
my inspiration and console
in success and failure.

Through last fourteen years -
you've been my anchor, my beacon,
my guard against slips.
Tolerating my impulse and oddity,
you walked with me
in love and lament,
in hope and longing.
For fourteen long years
you are my love,
my companion,
mother of my li'l angel.

For the next fourteen and next,
between my future & you
I chose you.

Part II
Today - I want to say
in as many ways
I love you.

Aqui te amo
Je t'aime
Ich liebe dich
Tomai bhalobasi khub
Ti amo
Ik hou van jou
Pyaar karta hu -

I love you
now and forever.

An idea without resource

An idea without resource
is like a:
musician without groove
painter without canvas
mother without child -
aching pang of creation,
deep yearning for fruition.


An idea without a resource
is like a:
leader without followers
cargoship without port
orator without platform -
immense potential,
a load, a message to deliver.

An idea without resource
is just that.
An idea in waiting!