Do leaders lose their moral compass or did they have a faulty one all along?

Recent news of international and national business and government leaders with faulty judgment have made the news and stirred conversation.

Here are my thoughts: 1) Many organizations (large to small; government, business or non-profit) have policies that reward those who deliver flashy “results”--regardless of harm along the way, who tell leaders what they want to hear, and who are willing to bend the rules. 2) Organizations brand as "not-a-team-player" individuals who have a less flexible moral standard. 3) Regardless of the "talk" of doing right, organization leader do not "walk" the talk. 4) Those who are rewarded for their "flexibility" and "team player" ability surround themselves with like-minded folks as they advance. 5) The process is self-perpetuating and those with a faulty moral compass continue to advance.

There are some who hold onto their beliefs and act based on their sense of morality. For example, I have long admired Senator Richard Lugar from Indiana. I believe he has a strong moral compass and uses it to guide his political decisions. And, no I don't support his political party or any other specific political party. 

In my 12 years in a large major corporation I saw those who got ahead by treading on others, by corruption, and by trickery. A few got caught along the way. Others did not. Frequently these individuals were on the "fast track" and were held up to the rest of us as examples to follow. I remember one entrepreneurial-spirited young man who used company time to build his own business over a period of two years; he then leave the company to run an already strong corporation. Many of the rest of us chaffed when upper management held him up as a positive example. 

Another “flexible” manager finagled his way into a top communications job by chicanery and was caught at last when the ad agency made public his demand for kickbacks. Yet, for years, the organization rewarded him instead of praising and promoting those who had a good moral compass along with skill and true dedication to the company. Many of us were aware of his outside “girlfriends,” yet we were helpless as he ruined the career of less “flexible” underlings and by-passed for promotion those with real talent who did not blindly praise him. 

Do I think the recent publicity will make a difference or make those folks change? No, absolutely not. They feel above the rules and do not feel badly about what they are doing. They do not think they will be caught because they are doing “nothing wrong," since they don't have a sense of right-and-wrong that we would recognize.

Until all organizations have a culture that “walks the talk” and has leadership that values skilled individuals who have a moral compass, nothing will change. 

One final note: please do NOT confuse having a strong sense of moral right-and-wrong with being “overtly, publicly religious” or with professing to be a follower of any specific religion. The two are not synonomous.

Answering "How Are You?" in Southern

Something a bookstore owner in Roanoke, Virginia, asked me a couple of years ago has been rattling around in my brain. "Why is it," she asked, "that when I (who grew up in another state and recently moved to the Valley of Virginia), "ask people how are they, they don't respond by asking me how I am?"

That was a new question to me and I couldn't help but think that I, who grew up in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, in Rockbridge County, Virginia, have always had a bit of reluctance to respond to that question and to ask it back to the questioner. Why is that?

Having pondered that question, I have a few guesses. My thoughts may be based on snippets of information jumbled together in a stew of opinion, but I'll share them anyway. Perhaps a reader who is experienced in linguistics and history can tell me if I'm even close to the factual evidence. Of course, my friendly bookstore owner who didn't grow up in the Shenandoah Valley may be overgeneralizing. 

My theories on why we "mountain people" aren't comfortable with the typical "HowAreYOU?" accompanied by "FineHowAreYOU" line of questioning are: 1) We consider it a personal intrusive question. 2) We don't want to reveal personal detail, and a "fine" response would be an untruth, and we are not comfortable with untruths. 3) We don't want to get involved with strangers on personal issues. 4) We want to be polite and respectful. 5) We want to keep a distance from strangers.

When I think back on the core values of my mountain, Scot-Irish, Presbyterian childhood, I view: privacy, honesty, tending-to-your-own business, being respectful, being polite and having manners, and being suspicious of outsiders. Now, I'm not saying these are all admirable traits; I'm just saying, these are core values I inferred from those around me.

The call-and-response "HowAreYou" ritual brings these values into collision. First, we are a bit shocked that someone who is not family or a close neighbor asks an intrusive question because the questioner is being nosy and crossing an invisible border. Then, we remember our manners and want to polite but we don't want to answer that the mortgage is past due, we just lost our job, the kids were arrested for drugs and we don't know where the next meal is coming from. (Ok, I'm exaggerating a bit.) So the manners kick in, and we fake a smile and reply "fine." Honesty versus manners. Keep your distance from others.

However, we don't want to be intrusive into the questioner's life, so we don't follow up with the "and how are you?" easily. We don't want to put that stranger into the same uncomfortable position we were in. 

I’ve just returned to live in the Shenandoah Valley, this time at the top of the Valley in Winchester, Virginia. For over 30 years I lived in Indiana, where Hoosiers have mid-Western politeness. I’ve visited 48 of the 50 states, Canada, Europe, the Caribbean, and South America. It’s easy for me to ask and answer in Spanish “Como estas?” “Estoy bien, y tu?” because it’s what I’ve learned from phrase books. Yes, I can go through the “HowAreYOU?” ritual with only minimal distress now. If the situation demands it, I even ask “and how are you?”

But I know this is different than when an old-timer from “back home” asks “how are mama and them?”

Sunrise and sunset are different at the eastern edge of the time zone!

With sunny skies, little wind, warmish temperatures and fall color decorating the trees, today was a lovely day in Winchester, VA. But it just seems to get dark so much earlier here than in Indianapolis, IN.

How can that be, I wondered. Then, answered my own question. I'm on the eastern edge of the Eastern Time Zone, more than 600 miles east of Indianapolis, which is close to the western edge of the time zone.

If I were an early riser, which I'm not, perhaps I would see the sun rise minutes earlier than the folks in Indy. However, by 6 pm, it's dark here now.

What a difference a few hundred miles make!

I'm looking forward to spring and the return of Daylight Savings Time.

I can say it freely now: I like bluegrass music

Remember when you were a kid and went somewhere with your parents and tried to pretend that you were not really with them? Well, I did that a few times. I don't think I fooled anyone, including my parents.

It was sort of the same way with bluegrass/country music. My father, who's now 91, used to play guitar (not very well) and sing songs made popular by Bill Monroe, Ralph and Carter Stanley, Mother Maybelle, Hank Williams, and Patsy Cline. I used to pretend I didn't hear him. 

As a teen and young adult, I was trying to "prove to them" (whoever they were) that I wasn't a hillbilly and that I could indeed thrive in non-hillbilly conditions. I used to cringe at the fiddle sounds in Orange Blossom Special and pretend I wasn't captivated by the rhythm of Wildwood Flower.

I'm not sure what changed. Did I gain enough self-confidence to be myself? Did I gain enough knowledge of musical theory that I could appreciate the nuances of sound from opera to rock to bluegrass? Did I gain enough life experience to emphathize with the emotions in bluegrass and country music: love lost, love unrequited, hard times?

Somewhere in my mid-to-late 20s, I began to tap my feet to bluegrass, to sing-along, to hear the beauty of bluegrass harmony, to listen in amazement at the sounds of a dobro and a licketysplit banjo or fiddle.

Yes, I'm a child of the 60s and I "Cain't Get No Satisfaction" and I grooved to "InaGaddadavida," and knew "There's a Bad Moon Risin.'"

I weep with pleasure listening to Mozart. All I want is "R-E-S-P-E-C-T" and want to feel like a "Natural Woman."

However, I would like to ride "The Orange Blossom Special." I would like to hear the "Wabash Cannonball" rumble past. I occassionally have seen "The Wildwood Flower" here in the mountains of Virginia.

Yes, I do like bluegrass music.

I miss the "old" hardwear store; I'm glad it's gone

When I was eight or nine years old, I didn't think of myself as a tomboy. (Does anyone even use that expression now?) Of course, I didn't think of myelf as a sissy either. What I did know was that it was more fun to tag along with my Dad to the hardware store than to go to the department store with my Mom.


Hardware stores had a better smell and had aisles full of mysterious implements that I couldn't reach. It was a man's domain, and I was a visitor to this strage land. Maybe the smell was of metal rusting combined with oil, but I liked it. The deities were the men who knew where everything from a molly bolt to a belt for the tractor was kept. I don't remember any women staff.


The way I remember it (which may/may not be the way it really was) is that it was ok for a little girl to tag along with Dad, but when I was over 18 and went in the hardware stores by myself to select a tool or supply, I was looked at suspiciously, as if I had the wrong religion or had wandered into the wrong territory--sort of like Gary Powers flying over Russia.


Now, the big box stores that sell hardware may have a department called hardware. But they are more than that. They actively market to women. There are sections that sell home appliances such as vacuum cleaners, dishwasher. And just wander down the curtain and window covering aisles, called home decor. There are women who actually know where the molly bolts are and who can direct me to the lumber section of the stores.

Yes, I miss the mystery and smell, but I like that men and women seem to be equally ignored by the staff. Well, in fairness, there are actually helpful staff who've shown my everything from the deck stain to the molly bolts.

In fact the last time I went into the "hardware" store which is now a home improvement store, searching for a variable speed drill, I knew more about it than the "helper." I'm glad I was able to visit those mostly disappeared wooden-floored, male-dominated stores as a girl.

Boomers Do Social Media

Enough with the talk about digital natives and digital immigrants. Some of us Boomers have been working with computers since before the Millenials were even born. Ok, so there wasn't all the fun stuff to do--such as games, etc. And yes, we were using them for WORK.

However, some of us have decades of experience and do use social media and do use smartphones for work AND fun. We're individuals, and so are our colleagues in Gen X and Y and the Millenials.

Why go to my high school reunion—41 years later?

The 1968 graduating class from Natural Bridge High School held several reunions. I never ventured back until the one held in 2001—or 2002, I can’t remember. Nor can I remember my reasons for attending. Once again, a class reunion is planned—for Labor Day weekend 2009. Why am I planning to attend?
1. I never thought I’d live to be old—past 30, that is—and I want to see who else is surprised at still being alive.
2. Talk with others who experienced the same place long ago and far away that no longer exists. A high school with 400 students grades 8-12. No air-conditioning. No art classes. No sass to teachers and no messing up. Did they have the same or different experience as I, even though we were in the same time-space continuum? How did those experiences shape their lives?
3. Encounter my frenemies from that era and determine their current attitudes about themselves, the world and me.
4. Be amazed at how many of my classmates remained in the same geographic area.
5. Explore the influences from those years that shaped me into the being I am now.
6. To rejoice in myself. I survived; and to celebrate with other survivors.