My Aching Back

We hosted a small dinner party last night with some wonderful friends. Company for us means cooking up too much good food, drinking nice wines (plural intended!) and getting the house all cleaned up beforehand.  It's one of my favorite things to do; I love friends, food and wine and the impetus to clean the house is a nice side benefit.

By the time our guests arrived, I was exhausted and in a lot of pain, despite 3x the normal dose of OTC painkillers and a lot of stretching.  I had a wonderful time but I was not at my cheery best.  To our guests and my lovely wife, I hope I wasn't too disappointing; I really was doing my best to smile through it all and you made my evening wonderful despite it all.

I've had back issues for about 12 years now. In a technical sense, I have a herniated disc at L4-L5 and a bulging disc at L5-S1.  Basically that means my lower back is really messed up.  I've managed this pretty well with exercise, physical therapy, pharmaceuticals, spinal injections, care in activity and a stiff upper lip for all of those years.  I buy automobiles based on how good the driver's seat is.  I have a lumbar support on every chair I inhabit on a regular basis and use an inflatable one on airplanes.  I lift with my legs.

(this is not actually my MRI, but you get the idea)

None of this works any more.  And back pain itself isn't the big issue. The herniated disc is sitting on a nerve that travels down my right leg. In the past, this has caused some intermittent pain, to the point of having to use a cane at times to get around. Now and for the past three months, pain is a constant and unwanted companion, ranging from merely bothersome to excruciating -- and trending more and more towards the latter. Picture a knife stuck into the back of your hip. And twisting. And continuing to your toes.

I have a few friends who have chronic pain issues from fibromyalgia, arthritis and the like.  I have a (small) appreciation for what they are going through and they've been a help and an inspiration.  I also know several people that have had spine or neck surgery and they've also been a source of great encouragement and advice.  And it's now time to fix me.

So in late January, I'm going under the knife. I have a superb surgeon who is doing what is now the most conservative option; a partial laminectomy (removal of some bone from my L4 and L5 vertebrae) and removal of the bulging part of the offending disc. There were other options, but this is the one he recommended and the one I chose.  We discussed my MRI and played with a spine model for 30 minutes; it was great and I have full confidence that this is right for me.  He's also a PharmD and we spoke of that for a while too; I have the right guy.

This may not fix me permanently; the other disc is still a potential issue and the herniation could recur there or in the "repaired" disc. But it's a start -- and it's not fusion, which I am not willing to concede to just yet, and my surgeon tells me I do not need. Yet.

This should give me immediate relief after the recovery period and allow me to live again without constant pain and enjoy being a functioning human again; I'm not a fan of being opened up but I can't wait to do this.  I will stay one night in the hospital and then I'll be ambulatory but I won't be able to drive or fly for 2 weeks (this was originally quoted as a month but I appealed to the jury and he admitted that if I get help handling bags and such the 2 weeks was reasonable).  I may stretch it to 3 weeks.

To everyone who has offered me encouragement over the last several months, and sometimes helped me do the things I couldn't do on my own, I can't thank you enough.  This especially goes for my wonderful wife, who has put up for a long time with my inability at times to get things done around the house, my waking up shouting in the middle of the night, and the really foul moods that chronic pain can put me in.  For her especially, I'm hoping that this works.

To my friends: come visit me! If anything is going to kill me, it's going to be the stir-craziness of 2-3 weeks in the house.

Cheers, good fortune and especially good health to all of you for 2012.

What Kind of Friend am I?

It is puzzling to me that many people still refer to a subset of my friends as my "Twitter Friends" because I originally connected (and still interact) with them on the social networking platform Twitter.

I've often said that the beauty of Twitter, and what separates it from Facebook and other platforms, is its simplicity and malleability.  With a limit of 140 characters per message, verbosity (and at times depth) is not easy.  But extensions, clever applications and the imagination and critical mass of the twitterverse makes it a very rich tool for communication - and for community.

This offers a flexibility that allows one to utilize Twitter in a very personal way.  Some people have created a large group of "virtual" friends; others connect with people around the globe that they'd be unlikely to meet otherwise or network with their professional peers.  Some just sit back in the virtual shadows and read the flow of posts. Some communicate with friends that they met outside of social media.  Many, including myself, do all of the above.

As a much-too-frequent business traveler, I originally used Twitter, and followed local Baltimore people, as a way of becoming and staying connected to my community.  What I discovered was a richness of social connection that made me a part of this city that I had never been since I moved here 14 years ago.  I don't just chat online.  Whenever I can, I get out and meet people.  I now count my "Twitter friends" as some of my dearest and closest, and my Twitter and non-Twitter social circles now intersect to a great degree.

So when does "Twitter friend" become just "friend"?  And why the distinction?  Do you have a "bar spouse"? Do you work for a "LinkedIn employer"?  Have a "web dog"?  Dating a "supermarket guy"? Hire a "Google electrician"?

What do my "Twitter friends" and I do?  We chat with each other.  We share and debate the news.  We have parties. We make each other laugh - and sometimes cry.  We share food and wine and all that is good in life.  We have disagreements and drama.  We celebrate our triumphs.  We welcome births.  We grieve deaths.

We embrace.

We embrace each other in the same way as any other friendship.  We are a powerful community of friendship and love and if you define us by how we discovered each other, you are missing the point entirely.  We may have met through a network of machines but our relationships are 100% human.  And these relationships are just as complex and wondrous as any other. More so if anything, since we have so many ways to communicate.

I'd like to wish Happy and Warm Holidays to my wonderful Twitter friends, my lovely Internet wife and of course my adorable web cats.

And if you follow me on Twitter, I'd like you to come out and meet me sometime, so we can be just Friends.  I am a good friend.

Thanks and Wishes

It’s the time of year when we engage in a lot of reflection.  We should do this all year but it’s nice to have a traditional season to sort out what we are blessed with, what we aspire to, and what we’re going to do about it.  Beginning with Thanksgiving here in the US and continuing through New Year’s Day, we are all taught to look back and then forward (and are subjected to an avalanche of commercial messages instructing us in how to do so and how much to spend) in order to achieve our primary goal in life: happiness.

So without further ado, and with minimal commercial content, here are a few things I’m thankful for and some of my wishes for the 2011 holidays.

What I’m Thankful For

• I am gainfully employed.  In this economy, that’s something to be thankful for indeed.  I am very fortunate to have a good job doing something I love.
• I am economically secure (related to the above).  Materially, my family wants for nothing (if you don’t count ridiculous desires).  We have a nice house, enjoy good food and wine, and can fix or replace stuff when it breaks.  I’m not “in the 1%” – far from it – but I truly couldn’t ask for more.  If I do so on occasion, indulge me; I’m American, after all.
• There is enough left over that I can be generous with my family, my friends and the causes I believe in.  This, to me, is the essence of economic security.
• I am in relative good health.  I’ve had a few challenges this year but I have absolutely nothing to complain about and a lot to be thankful for.
• I have an amazing family, and they are all doing well in their lives and health.
• I have equally amazing friends of all shapes, sizes and ages. I feel that after many years I’ve finally become part of the community that I live in, despite my ridiculous business travel schedule. This is in no small part because my friends make an effort to reach out to me and because we have the social communication tools to do so.  So yes, among other things, I’m thankful for Twitter.
• Despite all of our problems and challenges I still believe that this is the greatest country in the world to live in.  I’m thankful I was born to it and can participate in our great national roller coaster.

My Holiday Wishes

I already have the iPad; I made my lovely wife give it to me early.  Anything material beyond that is superfluous.  So a few non-material things that I’d love to see for the holidays:

• I want the people in my life who are in poor health to get better.  Now would be good.  Above all, this is my most fervent wish.
• I want my family and friends to smile a lot.  And to reach out for help when they feel they can’t.  And I want the power to correct that.
• I want our elected officials to collectively grow a pair and start acting in the interest and service of the country instead of in the service of ideology, maximum campaign contributions and the next election. Sometimes I ask too much but this is about my wishes, right?
• I want the Patriots and the Ravens to win out their regular season schedules, and meet in the AFC Championship.  Then I want the Pats to win BIG on their way to a Super Bowl victory.  This may be partly inconsistent with my second wish -- sorry Baltimore.
• I want to never forget for a moment what I have (see “What I’m Thankful For” above).

If you want to do something for me this holiday season (and I know you do!), there is something on my list that you can help with.  Please give whatever you can to the American Cancer Society, or any other organization that helps fight cancer.  This disease is affecting many of the people I love and care for and we need to keep making progress towards a cure.  I’d appreciate that a lot more than a sweater.

Happy, warm, peaceful and joyous holidays to everyone!

Mobbies!

The voters have spoken, and the 2011 Mobbies awards are now behind us.  For the uninitiated, Mobbies are the annual awards sponsored by the Baltimore Sun celebrating the great community of bloggers and social media stars in the Baltimore metro area. 

 

This blog was nominated for Best Personal Blog – whoever you were, thank you and I was flattered, but I had no hope or expectations of winning; there were so many more blogs that not only have broader appeal, but are authored by people much more dedicated to the little things, like posting with some frequency.  So I spent the voting period promoting other nominees.  A few of them, I’m happy to say, took home the gold from the party on November 15^th.  My fondest hope was not to finish DFL in my category (DFL being a sailing term meaning “behind all others” – figure it out).

Congratulations to all of the winners, and indeed to all of the nominees.  But I’ll offer a few special congratulations here to a few of my favorites among the winners.  You got (some of) my votes and you are among the people that make Baltimore’s social media scene special and vibrant.  The City of Baltimore and our lives are richer for your efforts!

Best New Blog: Jessica Platt, for Get Jessed Up.  This blog chronicles Jess’ attempts (mostly quite successful) to invoke the fashion style of the stars for women with real bodies and real budgets.  Even for the fashion-challenged (I am president of that club), her blog is entertaining and fun.  Jess is a delightful person and - if you can believe this - is even more lovely in person than in her photos.  She’s promised a special Puerto Rico Edition of GJU when she comes to visit the island in December and I’m holding her to it.  Jess also placed 2^nd in Best Lifestyle Blog. Follow Jess on Twitter at @JessCPlatt.

Best on Twitter (Personal): Sarah Wainio for @SarahRachael.  Another delightful (and beautiful) woman, Sarah is friendly, witty, and has a superb aesthetic sense.  Following her imaginative and fun Mobbies promotion was hysterical and more than worth the price of admission.  Follow her for a never ending stream of optimism and charm.  She also has a cool cat.  And she understands very intimately the meaning of Honor.  Visit her in other social media venues by sauntering over here.

Best Photo Blog: Joe Sterne.  A gifted photographer and true Baltimore wit, Joe has a great eye, a wonderful sense of humor (visual and otherwise), a great body of work and he loves his city.  His city loves him right back.  If you are in need of a photographer in the Baltimore area, hire this guy.  Follow him also at @MrJoeSterne.

Best Sports Blog: the team at I Hate JJ Redick.  The definitive Baltimore sports blog – irreverent, insightful and quirky, just like our city.  This blog is a deserving repeat winner from 2010.  I won a free NFL jersey a while back from them and when I was asked to select my player, editor-in-chief Phil didn’t even flinch that I named Tom Brady (hey, I’m from Boston).  Follow them on Twitter at @IHateJJRedick.

Best on Twitter (Organization): @bad_decisions, the best friendly neighborhood dive in the city, and the best bartender (John) that I know.  Another repeat winner.

There were so many great people producing so much great media that to choose winners among the nominees seems almost unfair.  Voting was held over several days and you could vote every day for each category - many others got votes from me as well as the winners above.  Any omission above of any other winners does not imply that I didn’t love or vote for them too – congratulations to all of you!  Click here to see the complete list and check out some of the best that Baltimore has to offer.

And - for the record - this blog came in 23rd out of 46 in the Best Personal Blog category.  Top 50%! Among this company, I’m very happy with that!

-- Late Breaking! Molly White Marketing (@MollyWhite) was named Bloggers' Choice in the Tech Blog category - congrats Molly!!

Paterno and Principles

  Principles only mean something when you stick to them when it's inconvenient.

- Laine Hanson (played by Joan Allen) in The Contender (2000) 

I would like to take the preceding quote and put it on large billboards in State College, Pennsylvania – and in fact anywhere else in the country where anyone thought that Joe Paterno got a raw deal. 

I felt physically ill at the revelations coming out of Penn State about the long-term sexual abuse of children by assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky. This was only compounded by additional disclosures that several people at Penn State in positions of authority – including head coach Paterno – were aware of this behavior, but the allegations were not reported to anyone in law enforcement. For almost ten years, while additional children were allegedly assaulted by Mr. Sandusky, silence prevailed in State College. 

Finally, on the evening of November 9 (late in my opinion), Paterno as well as PSU President Graham Spanier were ousted from their jobs, effective immediately. On the previous day it was reported that Paterno would be allowed to retire at the end of the current season, and he announced that himself on the morning of  November 9; I am grateful that the PSU Board of Trustees reconsidered and did the right thing. 

Then came another affront which made me angrier yet. It seems that scores of people, both within and outside of the Penn State community, believe that Paterno should have “at least” been allowed to remain as head coach through the rest of the season, and retire in some relative dignity. After all, hadn’t he built this football program into a national power? Had he not been responsible for the development of hundreds of young men into sportsmen and citizens, emphasizing scholarship and principle? Wasn’t he now the winningest head coach in NCAA Division I history? 

Does he deserve a break? He didn’t, after all, break the law. Even Pennsylvania's attorney general said that it appeared Paterno had met his obligations under state law; he reported the allegations to his boss. This is JoePa after all, right? A track record of 45 years of inspired leadership! The words “raw deal” and “he is a victim too” surfaced. 

No! No, no, no, NO. What are we thinking? 

Yes, Paterno was a coach, mentor, builder, winner, and arguably fulfilled his obligations under the law – all of that. And none of that matters any more with the revelation that he was aware of children being abused, and did not do everything in his power to make sure that it would not and could not continue. And all it would have taken is a single phone call to the police. Yes, it would have caused immediate scandal. It would have sent the University and the local community into turmoil. In a word, it would have been inconvenient – to say the least. 

This is where the quote I started with resonates. I had a great deal of respect for this man before this horrid affair came to light. And I get it that he was idolized by many. And 45 years is a long time. But on one occasion, he (among others) abdicated his responsibility as a leader and as a citizen and thereby allowed a predator to continue raping children. And he then stood on the posture that he had followed organizational procedure in dealing with this tragedy. Every last shred of any principles he once exhibited for his entire career was thereby rendered meaningless for me. 

The final tragedy is that so many people still venerate this man and think he deserves any consideration whatsoever, as a reward for the balance of the good he did. To those people, I say: read the billboard.

Why I'm Leaving Facebook

I love the idea of Facebook, and I’m certainly grateful for what it has offered to me.  I stay in touch with my friends, my close and distant relatives, and some organizations I care about to a much greater extent that I was able to do before.  I started my Facebook account a few years ago for a simple reason; to keep in touch with my nieces and nephews, from whom I’d hear little if I didn’t “friend” them.  I’ve since expanded my use to other friends, other relatives, sharing interesting content, steering people to this blog, and (perhaps most importantly) keeping track of birthdays.  There are also the peripheral activities of games, giving virtual cookies, and other such fun nonsense.  These I could take or (more likely) leave.

For me, Facebook was a good value.  I got a platform for discussion and contact, it got to show me some ads that were keyed to who I was connecting with and what I was showing interest in.  I may have clicked on one of them once.  This was Facebook’s value proposition, and it was pretty clear to me in the same way television strikes its bargain with us; I’ll give you 42 minutes of content if you tolerate 18 minutes of commercial content (I know, that’s probably not quite how it is given product placement in TV programming today.  Forgive me the simplification).

With the changes announced today in the "F8" conference, those lines, and the value proposition, are now very purposefully going to be blurred beyond the ability of a normal person’s comprehension.  Facebook is no longer satisfied with knowing that you like the Beastie Boys.  It's going to become linked with every kind of content delivery and type of application possible.  It wants to know what and when you watch, listen to, and cook; how you exercise, travel, and socialize.  It wants to map you as a person, determine your influence over others, and package you into a neat, “frictionless” (they love that word) collection of data.  You can choose who to share your updates with, but the data – the value you give to Facebook – is available to any marketer that pays them for it.  And the kind of data that they can collect this way is absolute gold to marketers.

A lot of people are excited over the prospect of having innumerable apps linked to their Facebook account, from music and video services to workout and cooking apps, and putting together the “story of their life” on the upcoming new profile page.  I’m not excited -- frankly, I’m creeped out.

 

I understand these new applications will have value for some people – they just don’t have value for me to the extent that I want to trade my data for them.  And I’m not sure the excited people are thinking about the other side of the value proposition; what they are giving Facebook in return for the ability to listen to the same song that their friend is listening to (I can do this without Facebook, incidentally).  I have no qualms about this and I won't judge people who strike this bargain.  I do hope for their sake that they understand the bargain they've struck.  Facebook, my friends, is not free.

I’ve always found a higher value in Twitter; I use it much more than Facebook.  I like its flexibility and I like the variety of people that I can engage with.  It certainly isn’t as user-friendly as Facebook, and it is nowhere near as slick as the new iteration of Facebook will be.  But it suits me, and I understand what I’m giving up in privacy when I use it.  I’ve bought into that proposition.  I am also on LinkedIn for professional networking, and I’ve been exploring Google Plus, which I’m now liking a lot more than Facebook (although the “Like” button is curiously missing from G+, so my Facebook friends don’t know that).

So, sometime in the next week or so, when I can get the word out and plan for other ways of connecting with my family and friends, I’m going to consign my Facebook account to the dustbin.  Adjusting to this will require some effort on my part; I’m going to have to be more creative in keeping in touch with some people.  After all, the major value of Facebook is that it’s where everybody is (at least for now).  I'll probably blog more.  I’m going to have to be, ironically, more social – writing emails, making phone calls, and maybe even visiting some of you.  I think you are worth the effort.

If you want to reach me, please don’t hesitate to look me up on G+, follow me on Twitter (@chrismaddox), send me an email or, if you want, you can actually call me.  I still use my cell phone in “voice mode”.  Call me old-fashioned.

What is Your Mission? - Part I

I’m somewhat of a traditionalist when it comes to business strategy formulation, even if not so traditional in my means and methods of management.  I’m an adherent to traditional methods of strategy formation – the steps to turn a mission into a strategy, and from there to tactics.  A central tenet of this is that everything you do in your business should flow directly from your mission.  Any activity that does not contribute to your stated mission is a waste of time and resources.

I believe a business needs a stated mission, and that it should be prominently displayed and reinforced with your customers, employees, and other stakeholders.  If they don’t know who you are and what you’re trying to achieve, it is hard to motivate them to get on board; employees won’t understand how to contribute, and ultimately your customers will go elsewhere.

This does not close the door on innovation and change.   To the contrary, that should be a featured part of your mission.

I had the opportunity to craft a new mission statement for my organization, a manufacturing plant, when I took the reins in 2009.  The organization at that time had a lot going for it; great people, customers, and physical assets.  It had, however, succumbed to inertia – embracing the idea that the way things had been done in the past meant continued success in the future.  This leads only to non-competitiveness, and ultimately failure.  The existing mission statement was mostly about “listening to the voice of the customer” and meeting corporate KPIs.  Really?  Your mission is to make your quarterly stats?

Our new mission statement is not short; it is not a marketing vehicle and contains no snappy catch phrases. It pointedly addresses what we do on behalf of all of our stakeholders (more about that in Part II).   Most of the new statement was accepted very well within the organization, but one statement, in the last line, raised more than a few eyebrows:

We acknowledge our weaknesses, and recognize them as opportunities for improvement.

The objections were not unreasonable; admitting weakness is difficult.  Doing so in full view of your stakeholders, more so.  My response to the objections was that this is the hallmark of a learning organization.  The plant had always expressed pride in its Operational Excellence programs – and yet suggestions that improvement meant that something wasn’t quite right in the first place were greeted with derision and fear.  This is incongruous.  In business, particularly in the hypercompetitive global market in which we operate, continuous improvement is imperative to survival.  In this context, admitting weakness is a strength; it is the absolutely necessary first step to improvement.

I had a great strategy professor in business school whose favorite statement was “Culture eats strategy for lunch”.  If that’s true – and I believe it is – changing the culture was a prerequisite to executing our strategy.  And thus a culture of transparency, reflection and learning had to be part of our mission.

I held firm and the statement is now indeed part of our mission statement, and a key part of our culture.  Our mission statement is displayed prominently in the plant.  I’m happy to report that our organization has taken it to heart; we ask for criticism now and instead of cowering from it, we turn it into actionable plans.  Customers and potential customers comment often (and favorably) on that phrase and on our transparency and eagerness to learn and improve.  Every misstep has become an opportunity to examine ourselves and to learn.  We retain customers even when we make mistakes, because we immediately acknowledge our error and apply corrective and preventative measures.  We owe our customers, and ourselves, no less.

If you are making a buying decision, I would urge you to consider this in your selection.  An organization that professes perfection is lying to you, and quite possibly to itself.  The former is opaque and disingenuous; the latter, in business terms, is fatal.