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Quotable Quotes: Mary Higgins Clark

Sunday, November 1st, 2009

Mary-Higgins-ClarkI just finished Mary Higgins Clark’s memoir. Hers is a name you see everywhere, books, TV movies and on the big screen. The memoir is a fast read, a fascinating peek into the world that shaped this master storyteller and some excellent insights on just plain living.

“When a child comes to you wanting to share something he or she has written of sketched, be generous with our praise. If it’s a written piece, don’t talk about the spelling or the penmanship; look for creativity and applaud it. The flame of inspiration needs to be encouraged. Put a glass around that small candle and protect it from discouragement or ridicule.

I wonder if any adult—parent or teacher—realizes that young people never forgive or forget being humiliated.”

This really hit home. In high school I took a creative writing class; one assignment was to write a short screenplay from which our teacher would choose a few to critique in class.

He started with the one he thought was best and proceeded through the others. Mine was among those chosen and he tore it to pieces, not professionally, but with sarcasm and zingers. He ended the critique by asking how any student could be so arrogant as to think that the writing had any value whatsoever.

Needless to say, the so-called anonymity was a joke and everyone knew who the authors were and my humiliation was extreme. It was 35 years before I creatively wrote again, but never stories—that desire was totally dead and buried.

Higgins Clark shares two old definitions of happiness that should resonate with everyone and if they don’t then you need to take a hard look at your values.

“If you want to be happy for a year, win the lottery. If you want to be happy for life, love what you do.” and “Something to have, someone to love, and something to hope for.”

Definitely food for thought as you start gearing up for the holidays.

Finally, following up thread I started Friday and have decided to continue tomorrow, “It is not always how we act, but how we react that tells the story of our lives.”

I hope you will join me tomorrow to see why, in many cases, coping is a far more productive activity than fixing, both at work and in life.

Your comments—priceless

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Image credit: Mark Coggins on flickr

Happy Culture Helps Weather Recession

Friday, September 18th, 2009

Southwest Airlines, like Zappos, has a corporate culture that is head and shoulders above most and is the envy of their competitors.

Southwest’s culture is so important that the company walked away from a deal to buy Frontier Air Lines.

It is that culture has helped Southwest weather the current financial storm and it zealously guards that culture because it knows it is the true foundation of its strength..

As Gary C. Kelly, Chairman, President and CEO, said in the during the Q2 Earnings Call,

“Excluding special items, we reported a second quarter profit of $59 million and that was $0.08 a share. And I would say given the deep recession that that is a very solid performance and, of course, I’m very proud of our people on every front. We continue to manage through the economic crisis with a lot of change and all the while our folks are delivering a very high-quality operation and outstanding customer service, so I’m very, very proud of them.”

The call was primarily with analysts, although many investors probably joined it, and the introduction included the following statement,

“This call will also include references to non-GAAP results; therefore, please see our earnings press release in the Investor Relations section of our website at Southwest.com for further information regarding our forward-looking statements and for a reconciliation of our non-GAAP results to our GAAP results.”

So if you’re Southwest and known for a fun culture, how do you incorporate that into something as eye-glazing as explaining GAAP, AKA Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, at your annual meeting?

Easily. You just ask David Holmes, known as the Rapping Flight Attendant, to explain it.

Your comments—priceless

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Image credit: NutsAboutSouthwest on YouTube

Wordless Wednesday: Never Too Old…

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

Remember the really bad culture? Here’s a picture of what happened.

Your comments—priceless

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Image credit: on YouTube

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