Grateful for Police Protection . . . A Choice

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Ding dong.  Ding dong.  Ding dong.

Was that a doorbell I hear or am I asleep and dreaming. Ding dong.

Sure sounds like my doorbell, though I don’t know who in the world is ringing it at 12:30 am on a weekday evening.

Having gone to bed later than usual after helping my son with some homework, I wasn’t anxious to jump out of bed now that I was cozily settled in.  But perhaps one of my children had slipped out and was locked out.  Or a neighbor had an emergency need.  As I gathered my clothes the ringing continued.  My this must be important I thought….they are relentless.

As I headed down the stairs a beam from a very large flashlight criss cross the wall in front of me.  My first thought was is this the police? Uh oh, I worried . . . something isn’t right.

I carefully proceeded down the stairs to the front door where the light continued to stream through the side window.  I could see through the glass what I thought was a uniformed police officer.  But it was after midnight and I had no assurances this wasn’t the going to be the start of a home invasion.

Bravely I approached the door and looked out the window.  The man on the other side looked at me and said, “police, please open the door.”  I still hesitated.  He looked the part, but I didn’t want to expose my family to potential harm.   I looked beyond him to see the headlights of a car and as I quickly scanned the vehicle confirmed it was indeed the local police.

So, I cautiously opened the door about a foot, looked the office in the eye and said, “what?”  His response to me both shocked me and calmed me down all at once for never before had I encountered attention for something like this.  At least I knew my kids were safe and this wasn’t about them.

“Sir,” he said.  “Did you mean to leave your garage door open?”

Huh? I thought.  Was something stolen?  Had they caught someone driving one of my cars?  Was something leaking out?  “No officer,” I replied groggily.  “I don’t usually leave it open.”  He replied like a food server annoyed with having to deliver a recooked steak.  “Well, it’s not safe to leave it open over night.”

“My cat probably trip the emergency trigger when we shut it before going to bed,” I replied just as joyfully.  “You should close it,” he said, and abruptly turned and walked away.  “Good night and thank you,” I said as I shut the door.

On my best days I try to learn from every experience.  In this case I chose to give him the benefit of the doubt.  His intention was to project me and my belongings in spite of what I perceived as annoyance.  Working the late shift and having to stand on a strangers doorstep at 12:30 am repeatedly ringing their doorbell can’t be what he thought he was signing up for when he joined on the force.  There must be more stimulating activities to pursue.

So as I headed back up the stairs to bed, I chose to be grateful instead of being bothered by his less than friendly attitude.

The entire experience caused me to again evaluate how I think about law enforcement.  Through my involvement in local business organizations, I know a few of the local officers and they seem like pretty good people. But, on the one hand having grown up in a community where crime is relatively low and the local police blogs are more humorous than scary, my inclination is to be annoyed when I get pulled over because I forgot to put my new tags on my license plate (that’s another story).

Sometimes it seems like there are too many police cars looking for someone to bust vs. reacting to real criminal issues.  On the other hand, perhaps it is their very visible presence that allows our community to be so safe.

Candidly, I’ve never understood the attraction to law enforcement.  Some who choose this path seem to embrace the power that comes with wearing a badge. But they aren’t all this way I have learned, so I am grateful that there are those who choose this profession because they want to serve others.

After my latest police protection experience, my inclination is to remain grateful for the support of law enforcers.  But I am sure to be more careful about complying with the law and being more diligent about protecting myself.  After all, it was just three months ago in this community that someone tried to a home invasion kidnapping of a prominent business owner.  Which ironically is what created caution when opening the door late at night for this police officer.

Reality TV: Kids’ Choices and Consequences

Reality TV Texting the Kids and Consequences

So I sat here tonight with my just turned 13 year old daughter watching . . . “16 and Pregnant.”

For some reason my daughter is quite drawn to this show.  Later we watched “The Bachelorette,” which has it’s own level of drama.

In either case, watching these shows with my little girl inspires me to offer her advice or ask questions that might cause her to consider the choices being made by these reality TV players.  Bad move on my part of course.  She can’t (or won’t) express why she is drawn to 16 and Preggers and doesn’t really want to talk about it.  Later when we watched The Bachelorette together, at least I could relate to the drama that unfolded there.

So I sat, watched and wondered why there is an audience for such a heartbreaking show? All the while I hoped she was getting how challenging choosing teen parenting can be.  Now this is where the nuance of they didn’t “choose” to have a baby dad, it was an accident rears its head.  Accident or not, when these kids chose to engage in teenage sex, they stacked the deck against themselves and consequently are staring at much different lives than they or their parents may have expected.

I write this not to chastise teenagers for pursuing even the most basic of human desires, but rather to challenge parents of teenagers to consider how we choose to help them navigate through this critical transitional period in their lives.  Let’s face it, they are starting to look like adults and we are often proud that they are maturing so nicely.  Yet, they are still the children we cherish and at times don’t want to ever grow up!  So how to coach them through the tough teen years?  How much rope should we give them?  How paranoid should we feel?  How controlling should we be when the wrong type of friend shows up with them after school?  Because just when we feel like we can allow the trust we know they need, teen judgment rears it’s bobble head and causes us to jump in to save them. Sure their choices are tough, but ours may be even more complex.

If I could offer one parenting observation that has served me well for over the years it would be this.  Allow children to experience the consequences of their choices as early in life as possible.  I’m not suggesting letting them touch a hot stove or fall head first off the chair they shouldn’t be standing on.  Though those can be pretty lasting lessons.   As they suffer through the results of their behavior, give them much needed love while explaining “well honey, that’s what happens when you don’t listen” (or insert here whatever bad choice was made).

Our experience has been that sticking to this pattern of parenting over time can teach them something called judgment.  Which if you have a teenager, you know isn’t something that comes pre-packaged at this peer pressured age.  I have seen some parents always rescue their kids and I have watched other parents introduce consequences at very late ages.  Either way puts the kids at greater risk of not learning how to manage the decisions of their lives.  If it is the decisions that we make (big and small) that form us, it must be extremely difficult for a young person to make productive choices without a sense of where so many different options might take them.  The earlier they learn this the better.

I started this article sharing that I was watching what some might consider inane TV shows with my daughter.  I should choose to do this more often!  The opportunity for her to observe others’ poor choices is illuminating.  I just have to watch and listen and restrain myself from editorializing on what is already being played out before us.  In the age of Reality TV, I now look for shows with common place drama, because even shows like “American Choppers” display behavioral choices that we all can learn from.  Did I really just write that……wow.

Terry Sullivan

What Adults Do At Teenager Concerts

Employees Can Be A Challenge!

Being the boss of people is one of the most challenging aspects of management.  People are the one-eyed jack, deuces and jokers in the deck.  They are wild cards pure and simple.  No two people are the same.  And no one person is the same on different days.  Just as children don’t come with “instruction manuals,” neither do employees.  I often would drive home from work and complain to myself, geez these are supposed to be adults, yet they behave like children.  At least children have the excuse of not knowing any better.  The good news is that some common characteristics exists among us and for the observant boss, these are not all that difficult to identify.

Of course, there are employee management systems and employee development programs to help naïve bosses like me to get past this reality.  But if I had a nickel for every team building exercise I have implemented my kids college fund would overflow.  Staff retreats, incentive programs and holiday bonuses are all but short term fixes for the long term emotional challenges the humans we hire as employees possess.

There are new books on leadership published virtually every day.  But, the issues haven’t changed in a thousand years.  The workplace requires humans to do certain tasks so that the business can provide services or products and ultimately earn profits.  Businesses are businesses for this reason first or they wouldn’t stay as businesses.

So we focus on teaching the more ambitious humans how to lead.  We believe that arming them with enough tools, physcological training and incentives will help them deal with the daily emotional maze that comes with a workforce.

Sometimes it works.  More often than not, not so much.  When you factor in that most people rise into management because they were high achieving employees (and in many cases, individual performing high achievers), its no wonder so much effort is required to turn these doers into people facilitators.  It is an Everest like challenge with many many casualties along the way.

Bad Bosses or Poor Followers? Perception Matters

Bosses can be Boneheads.  We’ve all had one.  Some of us have been one. No one wants to work for one, to be sure.  Few will follow them very far.

I have worked for boneheads.  I have been called a bonehead.  And I have probably been the bonehead.  I didn’t like operating in either space as all were quite painful!

During the times I worked for less than stellar bosses, I promised myself I would never be such a dork.  I knew I could do it better because I had a better understanding about what employees like me cared about and how we wanted to be treated.  At least that is how I thought about it.

Discontent with bosses extends beyond the mere boneheads however. Many of those “in charge” have no clue about how their employees think or feel.  Some really don’t care.  If they would only listen more.  If they would just leave us alone to do our jobs.  We knew what we were doing and didn’t need someone looking over our shoulders.  Most of the time I cared about my followers, but my “style” likely caused them to think differently.

As a follower my assignments were almost always successful.  Customers and colleagues seemed to like me.  I was dependable, budget conscious and always willing to take initiative.  In fact, I was a great employee if I do say so myself!  I even had one boss tell me I was the best employee he ever had!  With all of this going for me — Mr. wonderful employee — it just never made sense that someone would not let me have the run of the house and of course, pay me more. A lot more please.

Like many followers I thought like this and was full of myself for years.  That is until I ascended to the top of the heap and became president.  All it took was my first meeting with my first employee to realize that perhaps I may have underestimated what I knew about working from the other side of the oak desk.  Over the next several years, I focused on trying to make my employees happy, because I believed happy employees equaled loyal and committed employees.  Nope. Unfortunately creating a happy workplace amidst growing workloads, budgets cuts in an organization struggling to survive, is like getting kids to like vegetables when all they want is candy. You almost have to force feed them and the after taste lingers like the wrong kind of onions.

For me the lingering after taste was part bewilderment about why followers would be mean when I was constantly trying to be nice.  It took me a couple of years to understand that they took the management decisions I had to make personally.  And I guess I would have done the same thing.