My intention in this post is to bring attention to what I’m planning in this series of posts. I’m shooting for an attitudinal shift for each of us, a shift from being somehow subservient to being on the top of the heap. My last post, You – the New Monarch, called on us to shift our view of government. This post is calling for a shift in our view of business and making money.
If your upbringing was anything like mine, you were expected to go through school including university and then go and get a good job. My memories of Grade 12 and career-counselling backed that view. At no point did my counsellor bring up as a topic something along the lines of, “Well Rick, how about going into business for yourself. What kind of enterprise might you like to start?” I was advised to get a university degree first, which is what I did, and then look for a job, but look for a job was the beginning and end of where my future was.
This approach was in lockstep with our political paradigm, which had someone at the top of the heap and you and I way down underneath. My parents were in sync as was pretty much everyone with that way of thinking. When it came to the idea of running your own business, working for yourself they were against it. Mum’s father had done something along the lines of starting his own business, never did hear the full story, and my dad and his brother ran their own carpentry business until my uncle did a few suspicious things and the whole enterprise collapsed. No, the secret to a successful life was to find a good job.
Mum in particular was so happy when she found out that I was going to work for IBM. When I later quit IBM and went into business for myself, she was heartbroken and fearful for my future. And while I’m speaking of IBM, I can see how so many of my attitudes about starting my own business began with IBM’s business practices.
I’ve lost track of IBM since they left and don’t know if they kept up with their policies but back in the 60’s and 70’s when I was working for them, their #1 principle was Respect for the individual. All of us were made aware of this policy during our initial training. At the time I was too young and naïve to think much of it but as the years went by I saw it put into practice over and over. IBM had what they called an open-door policy. That meant that if any employee had a gripe with how things were going they could complain to their manager about it and it would be addressed. Not only that, if the employee thought that the complaint wasn’t handled well, it could be taken to the next level up, and over and over all the way to the top. I remember an incident in Ottawa after our department was moved to a new building. We had an extreme shortage of telephone extensions that went on and on for weeks. Finally after much complaining one of us, I forget who, complained directly to head office. Within a day or two someone came down from Toronto and within a week we all had an extension phone.
Another example that was unusual was that all of us were treated differently regarding salary and positions. Managers were required to regularly meet with their people and do salary and performance reviews. Some of us with basically the same job could be paid differently depending on how these meetings turned out. Although these meetings were always done in strict confidence, we would often swap data after a few beer after work. And sometimes we were disturbed if Joe got more money than the rest of us for doing the same job and in our opinion, not as well. We learned to live with those facts and no one made a big deal of it.
I became aware during my early days at IBM of a way that a business could be run, with everyone having different jobs and pay scales and yet treated equally. I had no idea back then that this way of being in business would dovetail so nicely into this idea of mine.
In this new paradigm, everyone starts equally the owner of their own business, themselves. After that it’s all agreement. I might take a traditional job with someone for the training and experience, looking like me working for IBM. Or I might not. It’s all opportunity and judgment. What’s best for me at this time in my life.
It’s this powerful attitudinal shift that’s part of a new education, in which we’re taught to think of ourselves differently, as a self-driven economic machine, looking at what we would like to be and do in life as a grownup. Even going and working for someone is taken on differently, more as a contractor doing something specific for someone for a specific and agreed upon rate. Getting a job working for someone else is a practical way of learning skills, at least at first. It’s part of the attitude shift. Part of the education includes thinking about adjusting to failed intentions, not viewing them as failure that means something about us, but just something we tried that didn’t turn out the way we wanted. Back up and try again or try something else. Again, all part of our education. It’s not about winning, it’s about going for it.
It’s that attitude shift again. From earliest childhood we’ll be taught that there is no one in society above us, nor below us. We’re all equal in responsibility for our lives, self-governance, the importance of our lives. Sure, none of us will be equal in much else, but we’ll also learn that nothing else matters. Everything is by agreement, even including referees in our agreements for times when we have disputes. There is no one coming to tell us what to do, nor coming to bail us out when we make mistakes. That attitude shift will come about after a few generations of each and every child taught that he/she is an end to her/his self. Perhaps then each of us will know and understand that famous quote of Helen Keller’s, “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”
A World of Honour 