culture of care Archives - delightability

February 24, 2018February 24, 2018

Teachers Guns and Kids – Oh My

image of interesting architecture seen in Liverpool England - Gregory Olson - Author

[This article is from a talk I gave to members of the Olympic Club on February 22, 2018, Experiences Part II . The talk ties together the Experience Halo and the emotional scars that remain after school shootings. I’ve added a few links and shared it here for members of the Olympic Club and the broader public. I’ve turned off comments but feel free to reach me directly or comment and share on social media. My February 1, 2018 talk on Experiences while referenced here is not yet online.}

an 8 minute talk and an even quicker read

It was a beautiful spring day in 2003. Exams were over. Commencement was around the corner. It was a quiet Friday afternoon.

Then the sound of smashing glass and automatic gunfire broke the calm. tatt tatt tatt tatt tatt – tatt tatt tatt tatt tatt

Professor Susan Helper came face to face with the shooter. She slammed her office door just as he fired his gun, directly at her. The bullet came through the door, hit her in the chest, bounced off her collar-bone and onto the floor.

She was lucky. She was eventually rescued by police 4 hours later.
That was Case Western University.

School Shootings Continue

Since 2013, there’s been an average of 1 school shooting per week in the U.S.

Following the school shooting in Parkland, Florida last week, Professor Helper spoke out. It’s been 15 years since she was shot. Physically, she healed long ago. But, every time there is another school shooting her emotional healing cycle starts again.

She knows it’s completely irrational to feel affected by a shooting that happens across the country. But, she still fears for her safety and feels powerless.

A few weeks ago, I gave a talk about experiences. In that talk I introduced The Experience Hoop. I also mentioned that much of our experiences is all in our heads. And that requires another mental model, the Experience Halo.

The Experience Halo

The Experience Halo is that filmstrip that plays in your head. It’s shaped in part by your context, but also by your past experiences, brand baggage, and stories heard.

Our Experience Halo remembers. It reminds us of the brands we love and those we hate. Our halo recalls past experiences both good and bad. And, it also remembers stories, EVEN if those stories didn’t involve us, directly.

For example, if we hear of a potential investment opportunity – our Halo might conjure up warnings of Bernie Madoff Ponzi schemes or Enron – even though we may never have been affected by either one.

Happily, our Experience Halo also reminds us of good stories. Case in point: Mr. Burnham shared a wonderful story where as a boy he hit up his father for money to purchase a kite. His father refused and helped him build a kite instead. That story is now in our own Experience Halo. It didn’t happen to us, but if a kid in your life hits you up for money to buy a kite, you just might recall that story – even if you ultimately give them money.

With each new school shooting, Professor Helper’s Experience Halo AWAKENS.

I want to bring this a little closer to home.

School Shooting Club – Not the Club You Wish to Join

My friend Dana is a Biology Teacher at Marysville Pilchuck High School.

On October 24, 2014, Dana joined the School Shooting Club. On that day, a 15-year-old assassin shot five students in the school cafeteria before killing himself.

She hasn’t gotten over it. She can’t. Like Susan Helper her Experience Halo gets stoked with every new school shooting. I want to share with you what Dana recently said:

Two thoughts occurred to me this year that most people do not have to think about at work:

First, I was sitting in my desk in my empty classroom working on my computer during my prep period. I suddenly was conscious that my door was unlocked and I started to imagine a gunman coming in to kill me. Do you ever think about that at work? When I do, I imagine begging him to let me live because I have kids who need their mother. What would you beg?

Second, when my students cleared out after the last class, there was a lone backpack left behind. As I picked it up to find out who it belonged to, I suddenly felt panicked that it might be a bomb. I began to rush it to the door to throw it outside (I’m not trained in handling bombs, clearly) and then the student came back in to claim it. I laughed it off, but thought, “What the hell is wrong with me?”

Do you ever wonder if you might have a backpack bomb at your work? Obviously, you might if you are in law enforcement or the TSA, but I AM A BIOLOGY TEACHER.

I think about saving children from being shot at school when I am not thinking about teaching them, counseling them, making sure they are fed and safe, planning their futures, and just getting them to turn in their homework.

People are coming up with terrible reasons not to keep me safe. Not to keep children safe. I’ll always be on the side of kids, and, at this point, I’m listening to them for answers.

Reasonable People Agree Yet Inaction on Gun Reform Persists

Most Americans and politicians agree that a kid that can’t buy beer shouldn’t be able to buy an assault rifle. Or, that if you are deemed dangerous enough to put on the no-fly list then you ought to be put on the “can’t buy an assault rifle list”, too.

Sadly, that list doesn’t exist. Most other lists related to guns or gun deaths doesn’t exist either. You can thank the NRA and the members of congress they purchased for that.

But, this school shooting may have finally sparked a change.

High School Students Are Leading the Change

Surviving students of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting are forcing a new conversation. They’ve started movements such as #StudentsStandup, #NeverAgain, and #MarchForOurLives, a nationwide march on the 24th of next month.

It IS possible to support the 2nd amendment AND also support sensible gun reform.

In this movement, politicians will be shamed for inaction on sensible gun reforms while they continue to take money from the gun lobby.

If there is one group that is even better than cats or Russian trolls at hijacking the emotions of adults, its kids. After all, they aren’t buying their own Lucky Charms.

Our teachers are not bodyguards or first responders. They are educators trained to get other people to think.

And, it looks like now it’s the kids who are getting us to think. I only hope our lawmakers will listen, learn, and act.

January 13, 2018February 16, 2018

Board Free for Now

I recently completed service terms on two boards. On the first board, a University department, I was an inaugural board member who had served long past my term-limits. My second board position was for a social investor and international financial cooperative where I served two consecutive 3-year terms.

Benefits Galore

Each board experience broadened my perspective, provided me with opportunities to meet interesting people from other countries and expand my professional and leadership skills. Of course, I also cared about the organizations and their respective missions.

Culture of Care

While the University department is primarily concerned with preparing students for tomorrows STEM careers, the social investor is investing in people and organizations working in agricultural, renewable energy, and a plethora of social enterprises across 70 countries. In working with them, I gained a better understanding of how the world’s poorest people are most affected by climate change and extreme weather events. Both organizations are deeply empathetic and represent a #CultureOfCare, a concept I’d like to see expanded and normalized across the general population.

Perhaps There is Board Service in Your Future

If you lean forward a little and take initiative most people are happy to let you lead. If you haven’t served as a volunteer board member you might consider it. There are plenty of organizations who would benefit from more heads, hearts, and hands at the table. But, the organization isn’t the only one to benefit. Your service to others will forever change you, for good.

January 3, 2016

But, why not you?

But, why not you?
I want to challenge you. Think of the last time you didn’t act or didn’t say something and then something bad happened. It could have been debris you witnessed on the freeway that later caused a horrific accident, or a person experiencing homelessness shivering to stay warm in the bitter cold. You may have heard later on the news of people lying outside freezing to death, which caused you to reflect on the person you passed by earlier. You may have further thought of all of the potential warmth and life-giving jackets and blankets you possess, possibly sitting idle in your home. You may have even thought of a room that doesn’t get frequented in your home that could provide shelter to a person less fortunate, an economic refugee. Or, maybe your moment of inaction was the time you opted out of voting in a local election. Then later you discovered that the issue or winning candidate was decided by only a few votes. Little things do matter. Your actions matter. So does your inaction. If you don’t believe that, reflect for a moment on the provocative poem written by Pastor Martin Niemöller, “First they came .…” His poem is a powerful statement about the failure of Germans to speak out against the Nazis.

Your thoughts become your words and when shared with others, become conversations. Those conversations when acted upon become movements, community forms, and the world eventually shifts, hopefully in a wholesome, humane direction. This beliefs-thoughts-words-actions-community cycle has repeated across the millennia. In modern time, civil society no longer tolerates and accept things like slavery. Once was a day that people didn’t think twice about purchasing products made from cotton that was harvested by slaves, or burning coal that was broken down by “breaker boys,” the children that should have been in school, but instead broke big chunks of coal into little chunks of coal for wealthy mine owners. Mine owners didn’t think this as morally reprehensible as we do today. Other examples abound.

“The world moves, and ideas that were good once are not always good.”
Dwight D. Eisenhower
34th President of the United States
(1890-1969)

What actions or inaction are we involved in today that we’ll look back on 100 years from today and think to be morally reprehensible? It’s a question you should bring to your own dinner table. Does it matter than some products are ethically sourced while others marginalize people? It should matter because people matter. All people, everywhere.

“A good community will not be invented, discovered or “just grow.”
It must be forged from the purpose and quality of the lives of the people living in it.”
Arthur Ernest Morgan
Community Organizer, Educator, Civil Engineer, U.S. Administrator
(1878 – 1975)

But, how big is a community? Your community thinking should be at least as big as your interdependency. It is likely you drink coffee and eat chocolate and use a cell phone. Those items comprise resources not found in your region. That makes you dependent upon a larger community. You should (if you don’t already) care about that global community. Your care (and conversation) should ensnare others, similarly.

What the world needs now is for global citizens to rise up together, not in revolution and in more conflict, but in a culture of care, with informed engagement, to spark new thinking and new dialogue. It’s time we all had an honest conversation about the world we wish to live in a leave behind. You should be a part of that conversation. If not you, who?

about the author

Gregory Olson is the author of The Experience Design Blueprint, a book about designing better experiences and then making them come true. His latest book is L’ impossi preneurs: A Hopeful Journey Through Tomorrow, a light-hearted and deadly serious book about a brighter future where we live more meaningful lives, governments invest in people and sustainable progress, and technology serves humans.

Chapters that especially pertain to this blog post include Chapter 9: The Neighborhood in The Experience Design Blueprint and in L’ impossi preneurs: A Hopeful Journey Through Tomorrow:

Chapter 5: Wealth & Economy
Chapter 8: Social
Chapter 9: Environment

Gregory Olson founded strategy and design firm Delightability, LLC. with the belief that if you delight customers then success will follow. He believes that we all have the potential to do better, as individuals, organizations, and communities, but sometimes we need a little help. Gregory also serves as a volunteer board member for Oikocredit Northwest, a support association for social investor and financial institution, Oikocredit International.

September 24, 2015

A Culture of Care Begins With YOU!

A Culture of Care Begins With YOU!
When I first began writing this post I was targeting leadership, but then I realized many people with titles of leadership have adopted belief filters that will render this message inert. They’ll never see it and if they did, many will think their circumstances so unique the message doesn’t apply to them. But, you are smarter than this, so read on.

This week, 3 noteworthy things happened:

The CEO of Volkswagen resigned amid the discovery of emission cheating vehicle software and the subsequent battering of the company stock
Turing Pharmaceuticals bowed to public pressure and agreed to reverse an abrupt 5000 percent price hike of the life saving drug Daraprim
The former owner of the now defunct Peanut Corporation of America was sentenced to 28 years in prison for his role in a salmonella outbreak that killed 9 people and sickened hundreds

Pope Francis addresses the U.S. Congress
Amid these negative developments Pope Francis addressed members of the U.S. Congress.
I want to focus on a few words that Pope Francis shared, namely “culture of care”. Here they are in context.

“In Laudato Si’, I call for a courageous and responsible effort to “redirect our steps” (ibid., 61), and to avert the most serious effects of the environmental deterioration caused by human activity. I am convinced that we can make a difference and I have no doubt that the United States – and this Congress – have an important role to play. Now is the time for courageous actions and strategies, aimed at implementing a “culture of care” (ibid., 231) and “an integrated approach to combating poverty, restoring dignity to the excluded, and at the same time protecting nature” (ibid., 139). “We have the freedom needed to limit and direct technology” (ibid., 112); “to devise intelligent ways of… developing and limiting our power” (ibid., 78); and to put technology “at the service of another type of progress, one which is healthier, more human, more social, more integral” (ibid., 112). In this regard, I am confident that America’s outstanding academic and research institutions can make a vital contribution in the years ahead.”

Think about the possibilities for those words, “A Culture of Care”.

Reasonable Investor Test
I want to share a personal story. In 1998, I started a software company. As the founding CEO, it didn’t take long to realize I had two jobs, raising capital and building the organization’s operations. We hired an outside CEO to help and I took the reigns as the Chief Operating Officer. As the company grew I couldn’t be party to every decision, nor could I attend every meeting, though employees continued to seek my approval. I invented a test they could employ on their own, without me in the room. I called it the Reasonable Investor Test.

I explained it to them like this. Imagine yourself presenting your decision to a collection of 16 reasonable investors that politely assembled to hear your story.They are sitting across from you at a large table looking you directly in the eye. You are about to explain to them the decision you plan to make or the action you will take. If you can look them in the eye and justify the decision or expenditure, then it passes the test. If you would not be willing to do this then you probably should not make the decision or take the action you are considering.

I concocted this test after our CEO and VP of Sales decided to prematurely celebrate a customer win by indulging in a lavish and expensive meal for themselves. I begrudgingly approved the expense, but I didn’t think reasonable investors would have appreciated their invested money being spent this way. We never did win that customer and the CEO and VP of Sales never understood or embraced the Reasonable Investor Test. But, again you’re smarter than this, so read on.

Life beyond the spreadsheet or whim
A culture of care, like life, is a bit more complicated than what might initially appear favorable on a spreadsheet or what one might feel like doing at the moment. I’m guessing the former CEO of the Peanut Butter Corporation might today consider more stakeholders. I’m also guessing that the former CEO of Volkswagen might employ some sort of Reasonable Stakeholder Test for employees to use in guiding their own work or that of colleagues. Investors are not the only stakeholders just like spreadsheets are not the only tool. There are many other stakeholders to be considered, customers, employees, the environment. And closer to home, stakeholders might include neighbors, the community and even members of your household.

Freed from the shackles of inaction
Pope Francis shared great words with Congress. I hope members not only listened, but that they heard him. Imagine if Congress freed themselves of their own proverbial mental shackles and focused forward, to a new era, a “people-first” era that confronts reality, embraces science, respects natural resources, and advances prosperity for all households, even the people who don’t currently have one. Imagine possibilities where members act cooperatively, embracing a culture of care, leading the way the for the nation.

But, even if they don’t, a culture of care can begin with each of us. At home, in school, in our communities, at work, even in the online community. So what about you? How will you create a culture of care, in your home, in your work, in your community? You’ll likely need a test to go with it. What will be your equivalent Reasonable Investor Test? We really can all do better as individuals, organizations, and the world community. I hope you’ll do your part. Onward.

about the author

Gregory Olson is a consultant, speaker, and author. His latest book is L’ impossi preneurs: A Hopeful Journey Through Tomorrow.

Greg also authored, The Experience Design Blueprint, a book about designing better experiences and then making them come true. The models in the Experience Design BLUEPRINT are equally relevant to organizations of all types and sizes including start-up entrepreneurs, nonprofits, for-profits, and government.

See a book summary. Read the book reviews on Amazon. Read The Experience Design Blueprint on Kindle or any device using the free Kindle Reader application or read the full-color print edition.