Don't Steal Software

I was on Craigslist today and came across this post.
In response I flagged the post as in violation of Craigslist rules and sent "sale-569449932" the below email. And yes I did give him/her a link to this blog, which I hope they find with this post.There are a few things here that amaze me. First, it is really bold to openly post for the world to see that you do not care about software licensing. Stealing software is a crime, and just really shady.

Second, it takes a narrow minded person to not realize that it is stealing and you are stealing from lots of people. It is not just Bill Gates; it's the Gates Foundation (you cannot argue it's not a good cause), the developers that wrote the software, and some seriously hard working people at Microsoft (that are not rich) which I have had the pleasure of working with during my career.

Thirdly, as much as I like working with Microsoft they are not the only software option. Lots of companies that are not Microsoft exist. If you don't want to buy Microsoft software do a Google search on "mac office software" and NeoOffice comes up on page two. It would take less time than doing a Craigslist post.

If you want something with a little more functionality for a really low price try OpenOSX
for $30.

With so many options out there why resort to something that shows such poor character?

Doing Well Just Isn't Enough

In college I was part of a group of guys that met regularly to keep each other accountable in our lives, our relationship, and our walk with God. One of our goals, or mottos if you will, was "To Be Good Men Speaking Well." I was reminded of that motto today when I read this speech given Anna Quindlen at an American University graduation ceremony. For a while I lost track of my priorities and mixed up what was really important in my life. The desire to do well surpassed the desire to do good. Looking around it is easy to see how doing well can take precedence over doing good. We put our faith and happiness in the next promotion, the bigger house, the nicer cloths, and the newer car.

But the promotion, house, cloths and car can't give back. They just lead to the newer car, bigger house, and next promotion. Today reflect on what you are known for. Are you known for doing well or doing good? I'm not against doing well. I want to do well, but when all is said and done doing good will create more happiness and a longer legacy for you and those you are good to.

Speech by Anna Quindlen:
"I'm a novelist. My work is human nature. Real life is all I know. Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work. You will walk out of here this afternoon with only one thing that no one else has. There will be hundreds of people out there with your same degree: there will be thousands of people doing what you want to do for a living. But you will be the only person alive who has sole custody of your life. Your particular life. Your entire life. Not just your life at a desk, or your life on a bus, or in a car, or at the computer. Not just the life of your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank accounts but also your soul.

People don't talk about the soul very much anymore. It's so much easier to write a resume than to craft a spirit. But a resume is cold comfort on a winter's night, or when you're sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you've received your test results and they're not so good.

Here is my resume: I am a good mother to three children. I have tried never to let my work stand in the way of being a good parent. I no longer consider myself the centre of the universe. I show up. I listen. I try to laugh. I am a good friend to my husband. I have tried to make marriage vows mean what they say. I am a good friend to my friends and they to me. Without them, there would be nothing to say to you today, because I would be a cardboard cut out. But I call them on the phone, and I meet them for lunch. I would be rotten, at best mediocre at my job if those other things were not true.

You cannot be really first rate at your work if your work is all you are. So here's what I wanted to tell you today: Get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger pay cheque, the larger house. Do you think you'd care so very much about those things if you blew an aneurysm one afternoon, or found a lump in your breast?

Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze at the seaside, a life in which you stop and watch how a red-tailed hawk circles over the water, or the way a baby scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a sweet with her thumb and first finger.

Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work. Pick up the phone. Send an email. Write a letter. Get a life in which you are generous. And realize that life is the best thing ever, and that you have no business taking it for granted. Care so deeply about its goodness that you want to spread it around. Take money you would have spent on beer and give it to charity. Work in a soup kitchen. Be a big brother or sister. All of you want to do well. But if you do not do good too, then doing well will never be enough.

It is so easy to waste our lives, our days, our hours, and our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the color of our kids' eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again. It is so easy to exist instead of to live.

I learned to live many years ago. I learned to love the journey, not the destination. I learned that it is not a dress rehearsal, and that today is the only guarantee you get. I learned to look at all the good in the world and try to give some of it back because I believed in it, completely and utterly. And I tried to do that, in part, by telling others what I had learned. By telling them this: Consider the lilies of the field. Look at the fuzz on a baby's ear. Read in the back yard with the sun on your face. Learn to be happy. And think of life as a terminal illness, because if you do, you will live it with joy and passion as it ought to be lived".

"The Gratitude Dance"

Okay...so I just finished my "Extreme Marketing" post and was reading some of my fav blogs. On Escape From Cubicle Nation I found a link to The Gratitude Dance which I had to share.

I love this for two reasons. First because it fits well with the header from my blog. Sometimes my posts having nothing to do with what is up there, but I think they are all important things. Second because it makes you smile, and smiling is good.

• spur conversation
• create joy
• foster thought
• speak well
• love another
• practice forgiveness
• embrace change
• enjoy life
• impart knowledge

When you wake up tomorrow, do the gratitude dance.

Do You Have Different Types of Ethics?

Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking at Westmont (my alma mater) to the Business Ethics class. There were even a few pre-med students in the class so they got to hear the story of a doctor bound student who took a different road.
In preparing some material I began to formulate some questions regarding having multiple types of ethics. I asked the class, "Have you heard of Marriage Ethics, Sports Ethics, Driving Ethics, or Raising Kids Ethics?" They all said, “No.” But they were taking a class called “Business Ethics”. Why do we have an entire subject dedicated to Ethics in Business?

Yesterday morning I had breakfast with my college coach and we were talking about how it is often easy to justify a different set of ethics in sports. A similar example came up in my conversations with the class when one of the students talked about the last World Cup the USA Women's soccer team won. I had not heard this but the USA goal keeper had stopped a shot during a shoot-out that won them the game. After the game was over a slow motion replay showed the goal keeper steeping forward towards the shooter. In soccer this is illegal as you can only move laterally to stop the ball during a shoot-out. In keeping with a single sports theme, would you slide tackle someone in soccer knowing you could not get the ball to keep them from scoring?

If you knew it meant the difference between winning or losing the World Cup would you take a step forward? It is cheating and against the rules, but could you justify it for that? I don't know if the goal keeper did it on purpose or accident, but she did break the rules.

As a separate example if it meant paying the rent or not paying the rent, would your normal ethical actions change? Do your ethics change when you have more to lose?

During my research I found a quote that my buddy DJ had told me a while back from John Maxwell and made it the topic of discussion with the class.
“There's no such thing as business ethics—there's only ethics. People try to use one set of ethics for their professional life, another for their spiritual life, and still another at home with their family. That gets them into trouble. Ethics is ethics. If you desire to be ethical, you live by one standard across the board.”

The discussion in class was great and they really had awesome insight. Way better insight than I had during college. They even asked me some questions that I had not thought about with regard to a few personal experiences I shared with them. The short of it came to the fact that when there is more at stake you are more willing to move the ethical line. I even got a question during one of the discussions from a student asking if there was any way to “spin” a message so that it did not seem so bad. He didn't use the term “spin” but I think that was the underlying question. It is the dilemma of a whole truth versus half truth. If you tell half the truth does it cancel out not telling the whole truth, and is a half truth more ethical when there is more at stake? I say no, but my experience has showed me that when more is at stake what is ethical becomes hard to see.
I have not read John Maxwell's book, but his underlying premises is The Golden Rule still applies to life. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Thanks to moms around the world (especially mine), you were right.

Another Reason to Be Nice

My current read is Why Smart Executives Fail, by Sydney Finkelstein. I’m about half way through the book and read a small section that reminded me of a time in my career when nice would have been better. The title of the section was

Arrogance + Hatred + Disrespect for Your Competitor = Disaster.

The main point of the section was how this philosophy can lead to blindness for partner opportunities, but is it also a meaningful topic of where your companies focus should be. At a point in my career my company had a new CEO (an extremely successful one) that brought a new mantra into our company that made it into the Top 5 company goals: "Kill (Competitor Name)". It seemed the goal was to create a hatred for our competitor so strong that we would rally around the cause to crush them what ever it took…though it didn’t have this affect.

(What are the first organizations you think of that rallied around hatred of anything? All the ones I think of do not come with a very good connotation.)

Our competitor made roughly 10 times our revenue, and though there were many things about the competitor I did not like they were the obvious leader in revenue and market share. All of us felt our product was better and that we provided a better level of service, but I slowly began to see a shift in focus for my company. Rather than our focus remaining on building better products and providing the BEST level of service to our customers, we slowly begin to shift our focus to kill the competitor.

The longer this goal existed the worse place to work our office became. Our long time customers began saying doing business with us was like doing business with our competitor: we were arrogant, didn’t listen to our customers, and made promises we could not live up to. We also began to lose key employees that felt working for us was in some ways sacrificing their professional integrity. Company culture shifted from “help each other and our customers be successful” to “don’t screw up or you’re fired.”

Eventually the CEO left and a new CEO with a more “lovecat” philosophy took over and attempted to right the ship, but much of the damage was done. I stayed on and worked with my former and new colleagues to climb back to a place where we were known for great product and great service, but it was a tough uphill climb. The company is still recovering in many ways from the "kill" mantra.

The point of this ramble is company focus should be on building great product and providing the BEST service to the industry. You should remain focused on competitors in the market place, but do not make it a rallying cry. Rallying a company around the mantra “Kill Competitor” is difficult. As a manager what are you going to tell your employees to do to kill the competitor? (Outside of literally...) It is much easier to rally a company around “Build Great Product & Provide the BEST Service”.

Do not love or hate your competitor, but rather respect their position in the market place. If you are going to love something, love building great product and providing great service. It is a way better thing to love.