Doesn’t it feel like Trump Impeachment trials are just like snowstorms? They just keep coming. Our second impeachment trial in less than a year is underway, though this one seems less exciting and equally unlikely to result in a meaningful, just outcome. As for outcomes, a bizarre year for the NFL wraps up with an underwhelming Super Bowl and yet another Tom Brady win.
Given the year we just had, at least that feels familiar… maybe we can all pretend things are just like 2018, 2016, 2014, 2004, 2003 and 2001.
As always, you can WATCH or LISTEN to this week’s content…. or just scroll down for some things personal, professional practical and political:
Leading the Congregation.
Managing to Adjust.
SALT in our Wounds
Stop Spreading the News
Something Personal: Leading the Congregation
I could not be more excited, or nervous, for a big event taking place this weekend! On Sunday, Valentine's Day, one of my oldest, closest friends is getting married! We all know the dangers of COVID weddings, bit this one will be small, brief and outdoors. We'll be masked, socially distant and eager as all hell to go home and warm back up. I mean, who gets married outdoors in February?!? But the warmth and love will get us through.
But more than the risks associated with potentially contagious gatherings, it is actually the wedding officiant who is the real source of my anxiety for this weekend's nuptials. No, I'm not afraid of any rabbi or priest. This weekend, the power is vested in ME. And with great power, I bear the serious responsibility of joining Lauren and Jeff in less-than-holy matrimony. Because thanks to 30 seconds and about $30 on the internet, I am actually licensed to do so in the State of New York.
The idea of getting ordained online to perform wedding ceremonies seems like a ridiculous one. Of course, for others, the idea of spending years of academic studies to become ordained as a rabbi, minister or priest might be just as absurd. But I am grateful and humbled to have been asked to perform this ceremony, but also realize that if they were looking for this to be a solemn affair, I would not have been their choice. So now... pressure is on to make this fun, but sweet, but entertaining, but meaningful, but thoughtful, but memorable, but COVID-sensitive, but all-encompassing, but... oh crap, now I'm psyching myself out.
As a minister in the Universal Life Church (a non-religious, yet grounded organization that believes in the spirituality of the human connection),I've been asked to do this before, but this one feels different for many reasons, so if anyone has any good advice, tips or ideas, I'm open to all suggestions!
Something Professional: Managing to Adjust
Our now (ex-)Revelation team has been integrating into the broader Jellyfish organization for several weeks now, and we're beginning to get settled. Of course, that means adapting to new processes, tools and capabilities, as well as getting to know the many talented people across the world. What's been especially interesting for me, as a longtime manager and leader at different organizations, is Jellyfish's very matrix model... one that I’ve never experienced in a corporate environment. In fact, as an organization, there are no direct line managers. Capability leads drive discipline growth and innovation, client-focused teams work across capabilities on different projects, and every employee has a personal support network (peers, HR, finance support).
For every one of us joining the organization, it means re-thinking how we communicate, collaborate, ask for help and plot our potential. It's also got me thinking a lot about both traditional and non-traditional management, as well as everything I’ve formally and informally learned. The question I've been pondering: Is no management better than bad management? And the answer is definitely yes. At companies across the world, bad management is so prevalent that it's led to an entire industry: management training/coaching. Tens of thousands of books have been written on the subject. It's often so bad, that workplace studies have shown that the most useful thing a manager can do to help employees is simply leave them alone when they are working productively, rather than offer misguided help. Workplace culture, along with other factors, teaches managers the wrong habits, and once poor management techniques become habitual, they can become difficult to do away with.
The reason why management breaks down is that most managers care more about their own individual success than that of their team... not realizing they are connected. Those in management may not admit it, or even realize it, but they’re usually self-focused, even if they really do have good intentions. The "American dream" doesn’t encourage managers to prioritize the success of others over their own, and certainly doesn't incentivize the elimination of direct line management as an organizational priority. For decades, even centuries... mid- and even senior-level managers learned that not rocking the boat, and avoiding any expression of frustration, was the way to get ahead in the workplace. To climb up the corporate ladder to positions such as senior manager, executive, or chairperson of the board, you’d need to stay in line. Most workplace cultures breed pretense, frown on dissent and expect perfection from imperfect humans.
The current corporate culture perpetuates a constant need to self-promote and self-protect. It can be exhausting. So the next question we must ask ourselves is how can we challenge the ideas of those higher up in the organization when we feel like our needs in the workplace aren’t being met?
Another reason why management breaks down: Deceit. It has, unfortunately, become a core management characteristic. Huge amounts of time and energy are devoted to it. Management may deceive employees about how much they care, or whether they're even open to feedback. Managers may ask for opinions, appear engaged, nod their head to show that they understand. More often than not, however, their mind is already made up. They will often invoke the voice of a powerful authority to get their own way. My friend, and incredible leadership coach, Vipul Kapadia would call this "exerting positional power."
A multi-directional approach breaks down hierarchies and frees what would have been a manager-employee relationship to be a little more honest. Unlike the traditional, one-way performance reviews, feedback from a number of senior, peer and junior colleagues creates a better conclusion about how to improve. It is a big shift away from the traditional way of doing things. But the impact of an honest exchange on personal relationships and business productivity will make this completely worthwhile.
Most managers mean well, but they are often distracted by their need to succeed and the pressures that come with that. Thus, they fail to fulfill their responsibilities to support the people they manage. Changing mindsets takes time, but my goals this year will be to fight the urge for immediate results, manage my own expectations of perfection and limit the association of "punishment with accountability."
Something Political: SALT In Our Wounds
If you live in New York, New Jersey or California, chances are you've heard of the SALT tax. My congressman, Tom Suozzi, has been leading the charge against it for several years now, and even collaborating with other elected officials in a bi-partisan way to bring about its repeal. The problem is: the rest of the country.
So what is it, and why does it matter? Passed at the end of 2017, the State and Local Tax act established a new limit on the amount of taxes that can be deducted in your federal tax returns. Now, with this Trump-era law still on the books, we can only deduct up to $10,000 for state and local taxes. Many areas of the country pay FAR more than that. Some states have tried to create workarounds to help, but this is something that crushes middle class taxpayers (as well as the most wealthy Americans). Essentially, it punishes voters in some states to pay for Trump’s $1.5 trillion tax cut for corporations. Many Democrats have been trying to restore unlimited SALT deductions, but it is politically divisive because pushing for its repeal would require Democrats to vote for something widely seen as a tax cut for the rich... while simultaneously proposing tax increases to make the tax code more progressive.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has said that getting rid of the SALT deduction cap would be among his top priorities as of last week, and Governor Cuomo is pushing hard (he has no say, unfortunately), but it is more challenging for Democrats in low-tax states, where few voters end up owing more than $10,000 in state income and property taxes.
Suozzi fought vocally to repeal this in its entirety. “The SALT deduction is based upon basic fairness,” he said last month. “You shouldn’t be taxed on taxes you have already paid.” So the next few weeks and months will be interesting, as a SALT repeal would likely be part of broader, more sweeping reform legislation.
Something Practical: Stop Spreading the News
Since the inauguration of President Joe Biden last month, I've found myself pulling back from reading and watching the news every day. Sure, I've been busier with an uptick of work. Don't get me wrong, I still wake up in the morning and reach for my phone, spend a few minutes catching up on Twitter and peruse key headlines/updates. But I also find myself using that time to read more thoughtful newsletters, human interest pieces and books(!).
Some actively seek out the news; Others let it find them. But it is everywhere now.
It starts with curiosity. We consume... and then we want to consume more. But then some frustration sets in because there isn't enough time to consume everything we find interesting. In the past, reading the news made you worldly, knowledgeable and sophisticated. It connected us to things happening all over the world. But bad, scary, frustrating and annoying news seemed to pour in throughout the day for the better part of the last four years. It made many of us anxious, pessimistic, distracted, and became an addiction. What was once compartmentalized then began to blend together: politics, business, sports, entertainment, etc. So right after the election, I pulled back. In the time since, I've truly seen how detrimental it can be for our mental and physical health.
The news, itself, can act like a drug. A barrage of inputs can re-wire our brains, and not always in a positive way. For those of us who bounce around from headline to tweet to snippet and back again, we become more multi-task oriented and less capable of focusing and thinking critically. The part of our brain where attention span and morality come from, the anterior cingulate cortex, begins to deteriorate. And then, like a negative feedback loop, we gravitate towards the crap we can digest, and away from the meaningful information that we cannot process without strenuous brain power. We can no longer read beyond the headlines. Our attention spans grow shorter. We've actually become less thoughtful.
The news business is a business. The industry has evolved to maintain our attention as a means of generating revenue. Catchy headlines are used to sell newspapers. Now they attract clicks to websites. This drives advertising revenue and/or subscriptions and keeps the companies in business. The New York Times CEO, Meredith Levien, ascended into her role from the business, revenue and operations side of the company, not the news division. They talk about a "separation of church and state," but journalists also want to stay employed.
For far too long, most "news" has been bad news. It seems more relevant and essential for our own evolutionary survival: Knowing what the danger is helps us to avoid it. Scientists believe that this negativity bias is twice as impactful as positive information. If you're following the logic, the news is bad for our health. How many times have we been on vacation, disconnected from the news, and felt BETTER about ourselves, liberated and relaxed, more hopeful about the world? It's one thing to know things, and quite another to be consumed by them. What good does knowing about a devastating hurricane in the Gulf do if you're unable or unwilling to help? Does it matter to learn that the polar ice caps are the warmest they’ve ever been if you are not curious enough to dig deeper and understand the impact of man-made climate change on global weather patterns?
I've read about mental health coaches recommending to push through 30 days of no news. Delete the news apps and Twitter. Avoid the television and newspapers. Me telling you to cut out the news, to cut yourself off completely, would be unrealistic. But what about establishing personal news breaks? One day a week? How about limiting exposure to 30 minutes a day? News breaks are better than breaking news. Or... Another practical tip for breaking up with the news is to allow yourself only to ingest and receive information/news about certain topics. It could be work-related, or something diversionary, like sports or music. Warren Buffet calls this his "Circle of Competence" (his is mostly stock market-focused). Or limit your news diet to a weekly news roundup or more focused news from specific, trusted journalists, thus blocking out all other outside noise. Of course, if all else fails, complete news abstinence should be considered as a last resort.
In the meantime, thanks for spending some time here with me this week.