Trash Run

I had a facinating self awareness experience yesterday morning. I arrived to work, and as I walked up to the front door, I notice a trash can was overflowing. Of course, an overflowing trash can speaks volumes to your customers about you and your business. I also rarely encounter this issue, so I knew my team might have had a momentary lapse in upkeeping.
After checking in with the supervisor, I informed her if it wasn't a hassle to her shift, I wanted to start by cleaning up the trash. She apologized about it and said that it wouldn't be an issue.
As I put gloves on, I went about the ugly task of emptying out the trash can (which it always surprises me why people put more trash in a can that is obviously full---another human metaphor, for another time).
One of my regular customers saw me, greeted me and said "Don't you have people that do this for you?". We both had a good laugh and we went on with our day.
It struck me as odd, that this seems to be the default thought for people. I have encountered this before with such phases as:

"Why are you doing the grunt work?"
"It's good to see a manager do the dirty work for once"
"Don't you have more important things to do? You're the manager"

What does that mean about the American business culture? Have we pushed managers up the ladder, and not leaders? Why is it odd that I do the work I expect my team to perform?
Are people so jaded about their superiors, that they might take a small pleasure in seeing them do 'grunt' work. If you follow popular TV, it would appear so with shows like "Undercover Boss"---teaching bosses about their own companies and how they treat their own employees.

I have always led with my heart. Stephen R. Covey put it best when he said, "The ''Inside-Out'' approach... to start first with self; even more fundamentally, to start with the most inside part of self / with your paradigms, your character, and your motives. The inside-out approach says that private victories precede public victories, that making and keeping promises to ourselves recedes making and keeping promises to others. It says it is futile to put personality ahead of character, to try to improve relationships with others before improving ourselves". No matter how many times I tried to test this I have failed. Humans are far more intelligent than we think. If there is a duality about you, people feel it and consciously or unconsciously will work against it.

For a third of my life I have worked retail business. Often, the starting point for many American workers. What sort of example do we give these first time workers? Do they leave their first jobs disenchanted or cynical? Is this where the deep rooted entitlement paradigm comes from? Feeling half empty, when the boss taxes them too much? How does this affect them later in other business sectors? Do they and you carry the weight and paradigms of your past experience? Perphas imposing heavy taxes on any boss you encounter? Finally, do we let these experiences become our reality, born out of frustrations on TV with out of touched bosses such as Michael Scott, brilliantly portrayed by Steve Carell. Does it sink into our culture around happy hour discussions, dinner table and social gatherings? Even more important, What are we going to do about it?
I have to place the first move on this board to the managers, supervisors and executives. This bold move must come from them first, to restore lost trust and build an experience that inspires a good work ethic. It also begins at home. Holding family accountable, and setting the example and expectation at a young age. As a parent first teaches children about trust, so must our leadership first be trustworthy.

Of course, managers have other tasks and responsibilities to perform, but the dividends from being in the frontlines as a leader pay out time and time again. You see those examples too, just see the leadership of the Churchills, Lincolns, and other leaders who hold the camaraderie of their followers close to them.

I am nowhere near their status, but taking out the trash brings me back to my roots, keeps me humble, and maybe sets a positive expectation to a future leader.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone 3G S

History of Halloween Part 2 (1880s-1930s) The Golden Age

In the 1880s, immigrants from Europe brought their Halloween customs and traditions to the states. The first celebrations were considered "play parties" and public harvest events held in New England. The Potato Famine of 1846 brought many more immigrants, especially Irish immigrants, and helped bring Halloween celebration to the national stage. The American Halloween tradition of going door to door asking for money or food later became known as "trick or treating", a tradition that is practiced today. By the late 1880s, Halloween was more about community and neighborhood socials than about ghosts, ghouls and witchcraft. Diane C. Arkins, author of Halloween Merrymaking, describes this period as the "Golden Age" of Halloween. Arkins describes the traditional Halloween gatherings as " fun, food, and frolics served with a side of mild-manner seasonal frights." Parties during this time focused more on stylistic costumes rather than gory, bloody or horrifying costumes. Even the old Celtic beliefs of fortune telling became more of a game rather than actual future predictions. Arkins describes a popular game involving cleaning out walnut shells, filling them with a paper fortune and having guest chant "Elf that haunts the walnut tree, what has fate in store for me?" Modern Halloween traditions that originated from the Golden Age, include:

• Parties and social gatherings
• Invitations
• Halloween theme food
• Halloween theme games and decorations
• Pumpkin carving

Pumpkin carving is an Irish-American tradition most associated with Halloween.

The story of the Jack-O'Lantern has its start from the story of Stingy Jack. Neither allowed in Heaven nor wanted by Hell, the soul of Jack travels the world with only a burning coal to guide him. The Irish called him, "Jack of the Lantern" which in turn became "Jack O'Lantern." To keep bad spirits and Stingy Jack away, people carved faces into turnips and potatoes, placed a candle inside and set them on their windowsills. The pumpkin, a native American fruit later replaced the turnip and potato of Ireland.

References

Arkins, Diane C. (2004) Halloween Merrymaking, an illustrated celebration of fun, food, and frolics from halloweens past

Pelican Publishing Company, Inc., Gretna, Louisiana

Halloween Pictures (2009) Wikimedia Commons. Retrieved on August 23rd, 2009 from: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/

History (2008) The Real Story of Halloween. History.com. A & E Television Networks.

Retrieved on August 23, 2009 from: http://www.history.com/content/halloween