Month: May 2015

1 – First Important Lesson – Cleaning Lady.

During my second month of college, our professor

Gave us a pop quiz. I was a conscientious student

And had breezed through the questions until I read

The last one:

“What is the first name of the woman who cleans the school?”

Surely this was some kind of joke. I had seen the

Cleaning woman several times. She was tall,

Dark-haired and in her 50’s, but how would I know her name?

I handed in my paper, leaving the last question

Blank. Just before class ended, one student asked if

The last question would count toward our quiz grade.

“Absolutely, ” said the professor. “In your careers,

You will meet many people.  All are significant…They

Deserve your attention and care, even if all you do

Is smile and say “hello.”

I’ve never forgotten that lesson. I also learned her

Name was Dorothy.

2. – Second Important Lesson – Pickup in the Rain

One night at 11:30 p.m., an older African American

Woman was standing on the side of an Alabama highway

Trying to endure a lashing rain storm. Her car had

Broken down and she desperately needed a ride.

Soaking wet, she decided to flag down the next car.

A young white man stopped to help her, generally

Unheard of in those conflict-filled 1960’s. The man

Took her to safety, helped her get assistance and

Put her into a taxicab.

She seemed to be in a big hurry, but wrote down his

Address and thanked him. Seven days went by and a

Knock came on the man’s door. To his surprise, a

Giant console color TV was delivered to his home. A

Special note was attached.

It read:

“Thank you so much for assisting me on the highway

The other night. The rain drenched not only my

Clothes, but also my spirits.  Then you came along.

Because of you, I was able to make it to my dying

Husband’s’ bedside just before he passed away…God

Bless you for helping me and unselfishly serving

Others.”

Sincerely,

Mrs. Nat King Cole.

3 – Third Important Lesson – Always remember those

Who serve.

In the days when an ice cream sundae cost much less,

A 10-year-old boy entered a hotel coffee shop and

Sat at a table. A waitress put a glass of water in

Front of him.

“How much is an ice cream sundae?” he asked.

“Fifty cents,” replied the waitress.

The little boy pulled his hand out of his pocket and

Studied the coins in it.

“Well, how much is a plain dish of ice cream?” he inquired.

By now more people were waiting for a table and the

Waitress was growing impatient.

“Thirty-five cents,” she brusquely replied.

The little boy again counted his coins.

“I’ll have the plain ice cream,” he said.

The waitress brought the ice cream, put the bill on

The table and walked away. The boy finished the ice

Cream, paid the cashier and left.  When the waitress

Came back, she began to cry as she wiped down the

Table.  There, placed neatly beside the empty dish,

Were two nickels and five pennies.

You see,  he couldn’t  have the sundae, because he had

To have enough left to leave her a tip.

4 – Fourth Important Lesson.. – The obstacle in Our Path.

In ancient times, a King had a boulder placed on a

Roadway.  Then he hid himself and watched to see if

Anyone would remove the huge rock.  Some of the

King’s wealthiest merchants and courtiers came by

And simply walked around it.  Many loudly blamed the

King for not keeping the roads clear, but none did

Anything about getting the stone out of the way.

Then a peasant came along carrying a load of

Vegetables.  Upon approaching the boulder, the

peasant laid down his burden and tried to move the

stone to the side of the road.  After much pushing

and straining, he finally succeeded. After the

peasant picked up his load of vegetables, he noticed

a purse lying in the road where the boulder had

been. The purse contained many gold coins and a note

from the King indicating that the gold was for the

person who removed the boulder from the roadway.  The

peasant learned what many of us never understand!

Every obstacle presents an opportunity to improve

our condition.

5 – Fifth Important Lesson – Giving When it Counts…

Many years ago, when I worked as a volunteer at a

hospital, I got to know a little girl named Liz who

was suffering from a rare & serious disease.  Her only

chance of recovery appeared to be a blood

transfusion from her 5-year old brother, who had

miraculously survived the same disease and had

developed the antibodies needed to combat the

illness.  The doctor explained the situation to her

little brother, and asked the little boy if he would

be willing to give his blood to his sister.

I saw him hesitate for only a moment before taking a

deep breath and saying, “Yes I’ll do it if it will save

her.”  As the transfusion progressed, he lay in bed

next to his sister and smiled, as we all did, seeing

the color returning to her cheek. Then his face

grew pale and his smile faded.

He looked up at the doctor and asked with a

trembling voice, “Will I start to die right away”.

Being young, the little boy had misunderstood the

doctor; he thought he was going to have to give his

sister all of his blood in order to save her.

Now you have choices.

1 Delete this email, or
2. Forward it other people.

I hope that you will choose No. 2 and remember,
Most importantly….

Live with no regrets, Treat people the way you want to be treated, Work like you don’t need the money,

Love like you’ve never been hurt, and Dance like you do when nobody’s watching.

Pass It On…
You never know how or when you’ll be paid!

She makes the case that the smartest thing each one of us can do is face the fact that we are all irrationally biased. We all have opinions that are not based on facts or direct experience but rather on thinking shortcuts. You see thinking takes a lot of energy and discipline but our brains are built for efficiency so it is always designing shortcuts. The name of these mental-shortcuts is stereotypes.

When we hold tight to stereotypes they become prejudices. Once we have a prejudice we’re constantly selecting evidence to support our prejudice so we don’t have to go to the effort of opening our minds to new data or considering that in this specific case, what is usually true is not true.

These thinking shortcuts of stereotyping and prejudice are difficult to tame. We have spent thousands of years finding security believing that our tribe offers protection from other tribes who want to kill us and take our stuff. So when we see people that are a lot like us we tend to trust them. When we worry about people who do not seem to be a lot alike us as to how they look, what they like to eat, how they like to live, or appear to have different standards and values, we seek to protect ourselves. This is the natural state of human emotions…and it is increasingly dysfunctional.

Never before in history have human beings been exposed to so many other human beings who are not like us.

I grew up on a ranch near a small-town populated by Leave it to Beaver families.

Yet, today my grandchildren attend schools with multi-ethnic students, some who have come from parts of the world that I have had no desire to visit.

I did not know that homosexuality existed in human beings until I was 16. I did not have any gay friends until I was in my 50s.

I did not have a serious understanding of non-Christian religious beliefs until I was in my 40s.

I think my mind has been more challenged in the last 15 years of my life than in the previous 50.

And that is simply awesome because it forces me to literally… stop and think.

Professor Banaji points out that we live in an age where political correctness has made explicit forms of bias relatively rare. We don’t openly talk about feelings of racism, or why we have a hard time believing that women would be successful CEOs or Presidents. But her research conclusively points out that our implicit biases and prejudices are pervasive. We simply have automatic preferences toward people who look like us, act like us, and seem to believe what we believe.

As many of you know I constantly deal with unconscious bias as I help women advance in leadership. Most men have a strong belief that typical male behaviors of assertiveness and taking control is ideal leadership behavior because that’s what they are biased to believe from working in business structures that favor those behaviors. So they tend to give women who act in these “male” ways more leadership opportunities.

The problem is our research (Apple to Zappos) clearly indicates that in today’s radically competitive business environment, old-school, stereotypical male leadership is more likely to fail than succeed. And yet when women who use male leadership strategies fail, the secret opinion of many males is that the core cause of failure is that women are not
“strong enough” to be effective…as if the male style of hard power causes effectiveness.

What is true is that hard power style seems to create efficiency and quash innovation. The new book, Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader is about the transformation of Steve Jobs and shows that his later success was not driven by his previous hard power craziness, but rather his evolution to an empowering collaborator…which are more typically female traits.

What impacted Jobs to overcome his previous blind spot is the humility that comes from failure and the SMART Power modeling of Pixar CEO Ed Catmull.

Our own growth comes from opening our minds to new possibilities. Economists have discovered that opportunity is usually a function of seeing what was previously unseen but is right in front of us. Our unconscious bias is psychological blindness. We literally don’t see opportunity when we are either judgmental or fearful.

The only solution to overcoming biases is to become more aware of what they are. When you feel yourself making snap judgments ask yourself… “What if the opposite could also be true?”

The question I came away with from Dr. Banaji session is “What am I blind to?”

Will