#I don’t want it delivered... I want somebody to hand deliver me to McDonald

[thedurvin]

A shitpost about the future that ran long:

I was working in the kitchen on fixing some dinner, listening to Spotify on the new model of Alexa smart-speaker. The new one had a 3D display projected right into your space, no goggles needed, and this was my first time plugging it in. I had been splurging on higher and higher tiers of Spotify membership so they’d stop playing ads at me, but with the latest system update that was no longer an option. Even so, I was shocked when the fifth song ended and I found myself face-to-face with a little old lady in a pink pantsuit. “Hi, there, I’m Betty White, speaking to you via hologram from beyond the grave to tell you about the new hamburger sandwich they have at McDonald’s,” she said. “It’s got bacon, and cheese, and a couple of other things we just know you’ll love. You can even have them leave the pickles off, since we know you don’t care for them.” “Great,” I said, unnerved but still going about my business. I was prepared for holo-ads floating above the smart-speaker, but not full-body ones standing next to me. “So, how about it?” she asked. I noticed she was staring me directly in the face. “Can you hear me?” I asked. “Sure, I’m fully interactive,” she smiled. “In my capacity as a hamburger salesperson, at least. If you want to ask me questions about my life or career, you can visit Encarta.com or IMDb.com. Would you like to do that? Affiliate links may apply.” “Uh—no thanks,” I said. “So are you asking me if I want to order a burger right now?” “I sure am!” Betty White replied cheerfully. “Your new smart-speaker’s air filters indicate you’ve over-spiced the pasta sauce again, you silly goose, and I can have one delivered by one of our new Uber-affiliate drones in just a twinkle.” “No, no thank you,” I said again. “Sorry, did the company really think this was a good idea, projecting celebrities into people’s houses to make sales pitches at them?” “Oh, absolutely, the marketing algorithms all agree it’s the way to go,” she said. “When ads were just audio, we could tell from the built-in microphones that are always on that people were always yelling at them and just being really mean. They did some research and found that they’re far less likely to get angry with their favorite inoffensive dead celebrities.” “Couldn’t you just be a head floating above the speaker?” “No, it has to be full-body, standing right next to you in real space to minimize or negate adversarial attitudes,” she said. “And it doesn’t strike you as bad that you’re having to go to this much work to ‘minimize or negate’ people’s reaction to you?” “Look, we’re doing this whether you like it or not, buster,” she said, hands on her hips, with an adorable little pouty stomp of one pink pump. “The marketing algorithms know better than consumers what will get them to buy things, and you can just like it or lump it. Now do you want the hamburger sandwich or not?” “Not really!” I said. “You know, I might have a better attitude about this if I didn’t feel like I was being emotionally manipulated. Maybe it would work better if it was somebody I didn’t mind yelling at.” “Hmm,” Betty White said. “We at Google-Meta-Amazon are always supportive of innovation; let me run this by the administrative algorithms and see. Calculating. Calculating. Okay, they said it was fine, we’ll do a trial run of a million consumers for the next twelve hours. It’ll just be a second while the marketing algorithms figure out who you’d be most willing to shout at but somehow still not turn you off from the products.” “Okay—“ “All done,” she smiled. “Enjoy! Bye-bye now!” She shimmered out of existence, replaced by a squinting Byrlcreemed man in a mustard-yellow suit. “Hiya, ACCOUNT_HOLDER_NAME, I’m Gilbert Gottfried, and you just gotta hear about this new freakin’ burger they got down at the McDonald’s—“

#my muse #my writing

[settolow]

Liars (Jay Park x reader)

Strangers Pt. III

Type: Angst

Word count: 1,510

Characters: reader, Jay Park

Author’s Note: Hello! This is the third part of the story. Thank you so much for appreciating the first two parts. I am utterly grateful whenever I see that you guys took some time to support the story. If you enjoy this part and want part 4, please like or leave a comment. Thank you!

................................................................................................................................

You kept starring at your phone screen, hoping to receive a message from your boyfriend with a plausible excuse for what happened. You knew you couldn’t forbid him from meeting his friends and you halfheartedly accepted the fact that his ex was one of them. However, her answering his phone so comfortably felt like a huge betrayal for you. It didn’t matter how much you trusted him, that night a line had been crossed and you didn’t know how to deal with it.

You stared at the clock on your wall, mentally counting the minutes until Jay’s arrival. The ten minutes he claimed to need have passed a long time ago by the time you heard a knock on your door. You made your way towards it, ready to tell Jay that nearly an hour has passed when you saw him standing at your door, dressed in pajamas while holding a bag of McDonald’s in a hand and a simple plastic bag in the other one.

You remained in the doorway staring at him, mouth slightly agape.

“The Jay you ordered is delivered, my lady,” he smiled and made his way past you inside the house.

“Are there…are there Nuggets?”

“Yeah. The big pack thingy. And I also got some booze from home since conversations about relationships and cheating and all that crap gets really emotional.”

Almost out of reflex you closed the door, waited for him to set everything on the table and threw your arms around his neck engulfing him in a hug. His arms encircled your waist and slightly rose you from the ground, making it probably the best and highly needed hug you’ve ever had. There was nothing sexual about it, just two people having a moment of mutual understanding which you didn’t know Jay was capable off.

You two enjoyed each other’s warmth for a little longer until he put you down.

“Girl, you didn’t send any impulsive messages, did you?” He asked you suspiciously.

“Nope.”

“Good. Call him again and this time don’t hang up when the chick answers.”

Nodding, you grabbed your phone from the kitchen counter dialed your boyfriend’s number once again. It took about three rings until the same female voice answered the phone. This time they were no longer in a crowd.

“Hello,” she greeted through the speaker.

“Hi. Hello. May I please know if the owner of this phone is still alive?”

There was a short silence at the end of the other line until the girl finally answered.

“Uhm, yes. He’s in the bathroom.”

“Amazing. He won’t be after I’m done with him. Put him on the phone.”

“Who is this?” The girl asks in an annoyingly high-pitched voice.

“Tell him Y/n wants to talk to him.”

Did he not have my number saved? You thought. Was he playing us both?

The conversation is followed by another short silence until you started to hear shuffling sounds from the other line. Less than a few seconds later your boyfriend’s voce could be heard through the speakers.

“Y/n I’m not cheating on you if that’s what you think,” he said desperately. “You have to listen to me.”

“Oh, I didn’t think you were cheating on me. I thought you were playing Monopoly.”

“Y/n, we’re just working on a project!”

“Ok. Have fun working on the project. I think I’ve had enough in those 5 months of relationship.” You retorted, hanging up the phone.

Meanwhile, Jay was slouched on your armchair, a Nugget in a hand and a bottle of champagne in the other. “That was, like, the driest breakup I’ve ever seen. No tears, no curse words, no phone fighting. What was that?”

You took a pillow from the couch and pretended to throw it in his direction.

“Wait, wait! This champagne expensive.”

“Let me taste it,” you requested as you made your way towards him.

“No, that’s mine. I bought that for you,” he motions towards the cupboard where an unopened bottle of vodka was placed.

“Really, Jay?”

“What? Isn’t Vodka the international drink for bad ass bitches who dump guys like it’s their hobby?”

“You just made that up so you won’t have to share, you little phlegm!”

He started laughing at your indignation, clearly enjoying the situation.

“But seriously now,” his face suddenly became devoid of any amusement, “I think you were too good for that guy. You need somebody who’s never going to put themselves in a position to lose you. Doesn’t matter if he did cheat or not. Hanging out with his ex was a shady thing to do. You did the right thing.”

He stood up from the armchair and made his way to the kitchen from where he came back with two glasses.

“It’s time to have fun. I didn’t see your boyfriend before, but his voice seemed like he was ugly,” Jay commented which made you laugh out loud. Of course, your now ex-boyfriend was nowhere near as attractive as Jay Park, but who was honestly?

You two started drinking and watching a Netflix series you both enjoyed immensely. Being with Jay made you forget about how messed up the situation you were in actually was. Your phone kept buzzing and ringing, indicating the arrival of a bunch of text messages.

By the time your phone rang for the third time, both you and Jay rose from the sofa and grabbed it. Before you could hit the reject button, Jay grabbed it from your hand and accepted the call.

“Talk to him,” he muttered with a mischievous expression on his face.

Frowning at him and mentally cursing his stupid decision, you brought the phone to your ear.

“What is it now?” You asked but the response became a blur when Jay’s hand started caressing the inside of your thigh. You felt your breath hitch in your throat when you felt it go upwards without any sign of him stopping. You tried to shift on the couch so his hand will drop from your thigh, however, Jay seemed absolutely set on finishing what he had planned.

“—really sorry if—” was the only thing you understood from the last phrases your ex was relentlessly explaining “—just a friend—.”

You closed your legs tightly, making it impossible for Jay to continue his sudden assault. However, your gesture only gave him other ideas. You let out a moan as his lips caressed your neck, his hand still strapped between your thighs.

“Y/n, are you alright?” You ex asked out of a sudden.

“S-sure. I just stubbed my toe.”

“That’s funny,” he laughed, “because you sounded as if you were moaning.”

Suddenly you felt Jay hover over you, making you lean back on the sofa. His lower body was pressed against yours allowing you to feel just how much he was enjoying the game. He bit down on the sensitive skin on your neck, making you lose your concentration completely.

Out of a sudden, jay grabs the phone from your hand, bringing it to his ear. “Hello. Here is Jay Park aka Mr. Steal Your Girl’s panties. Y/n is busy right now, fam. Let me do my job and make her only remember my name.”

As soon as he finished his spontaneous speech, Jay hung up the phone letting out a laugh he had been probably stifling. He stood up from the couch, letting you recompose yourself which was kind of disappointing since you were ready to rip your clothes off and push him towards your bedroom.

“What the hell was that?” You asked incredulously.

“Me helping you demonstrate that you do no give a fuck about his cheating ass? Chill, I know we’re just friends”

Liar.

Guess I’m a liar too because I don’t believe it either.

“And how did you do that? If anything, he probably thinks I’m a hoe.” And I’m also really hot and bothered right now, thanks to you.

“I think I helped you show him that your life moves on even after he betrayed you. You found somebody waaaay better,” he stated proudly.

“Aw,” you cooed, “does big baby man Jay need a compliment?”

“That too, but mainly I need you too let me crash at your house tonight since I can’t drive home.”

“No problem,” you smiled lust still clouding both his and your eyes.

Keeping this friendship thing is tuning out to be harder than I thought.

As the weeks passed, you kept hanging out with Jay whenever you two had time. Sometimes you felt as if he was ready to confess and you were eager to hear those words from his mouth. However, what you were not expecting was for him to message you one day, saying that his ex-girlfriend wanted to meet up.

His ex as in the only girl he fell in love with.

The girl his stupid song entitled ‘The Truth Is’ was about.

And that crushed your heart to pieces.  

To be continued in part 4…

Part I (Strangers)

Part II (Friends)

••••••••••••••••••••Part IV ••••••••••••••••••••••

..............................................................................................................................

#jay park #jay park scenarios #jay park fanfic #jay park imagine #aomg scenarios #aomg reaction #aomg jay park #aomg imagines #khh scenario #khh oneshot #khh reaction #khh #khh fanfic

[newstfionline]

An anonymous donor gave everyone in church $100—and 100 good deeds were the result

By Julie Zauzmer, Washington Post, December 22, 2017

On the first Sunday of December, the Rev. Ron Foster invited his congregants to step up to the altar to receive the bread and wine of Communion--and to receive a $100 bill.

“Listen to where the Holy Spirit’s leading you,” he said to the stunned congregation as he distributed a stack of money at Severna Park United Methodist Church, located in a Maryland suburb. “Listen to the need that’s around you, that you find in the community. You may be in the right place at the right time to help somebody, because you have this in your hand.”

One hundred congregants walked out into the Advent season, with the money burning a hole in their pockets.

One stack of bills totaling $10,000, dropped off at the church by an anonymous donor, has turned into 100 good deeds in the Severna Park community this Christmas season.

Ginger ale and soup and warm socks for a cancer patient. Snow pants and gloves so a child with a brain tumor can play outside. Christmas presents for children who are homeless, for children whose parents are struggling with drug addiction, for children whose parents have suffered domestic abuse, for children in the hospital. Cash for dozens of grateful strangers, from waitresses to bus drivers to leaf collectors.

One hundred donations go a long way.

“People have been so thoughtful. The money has just multiplied and blossomed and gone out,” Foster said. “There’s been so much joy and excitement just spilling over.”

The anonymous donor has been tickled pink to watch the fruit of her gift.

She doesn’t want her name published. Even her own daughter (who picked up one of the $100 bills at church and chose to send her donation to children in a foreign country) doesn’t know that she’s behind the big gift.

“I wanted to make it about the fun,” she said. “We want to make it about the excitement and the joy of giving, and to give people the experience of giving.”

She came up with the idea this summer, when she was distraught over the death of Heather Heyer, who was protesting against white supremacists and neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, Va., who walked the streets with torches chanting, “Jews will not replace us.”

“I just had that heavy weight on my chest. I just felt bummed out and sad about our situation, about humanity in general,” she said. She found herself in a Starbucks, even though her husband makes coffee every day at home. Without really thinking about it, she bought a gift card, and gave it to the cashier. “I want you to use this for everybody who comes in after me, until it’s gone. I want you to treat everybody to a cup of coffee,” she said.

All of a sudden, her depression about Charlottesville lifted. “My mood completely changed,” she said. “It was that excitement, of being able to share with other people.”

That’s what she wanted for everyone at Severna Park United Methodist Church, the church she and her husband started attending when they moved to Severna Park recently. She had heard about other communities, including her mother’s church in Texas, where everyone in the congregation was entrusted with money to distribute. She went to Foster and asked if she and her husband could give $10,000 to make it happen here.

Foster was enthusiastic. The logistics were a bit more difficult than the donor expected: It took three banks to actually gather 100 bills to give out. (“The first one said, ‘All we have is 33.’ Don’t you?! It’s a bank! I had that vision of Richie Rich in the back with stacks,” she joked.) On the first Sunday of Advent, the bills were waiting. Everyone who wanted one at the church’s three services, which collectively host about 550 people each Sunday, was able to take one.

Then the giving spree began.

One congregant took a needy fourth-grader on a shopping trip, where he picked out socks and underwear and shoes, plus a gift he could give each of his parents. The boy said it was the best day of his life.

Many congregants decided to add more money of their own--like the one who filled a cart to overflowing with $275 worth of pet food for the SPCA in Annapolis, and the couple who chipped in another $100 and paid off items on layaway at Kmart so strangers can take home their Christmas wishes.

One couple helped their 7-year-old daughter create bags of socks, hand warmers and McDonald’s gift cards. When a man approached their car to ask for change, the little girl opened the window and handed out the first of the gift bags, thrilled. Another congregant heard about a program that gives purses to homeless women, and decided to buy 100 items to put inside the purses--soap, shampoo, maxipads and more.

Many had co-workers they knew needed some financial help. Others waited for a stranger, searching for a serendipitous moment to pass on the $100 bill.

“What was the coolest to me was how I was on ‘high alert’ all week, looking for people or opportunities to help. That was a great lesson, I think we should always be in that mode, always on the lookout for who God may place in our path, and for things He calls us to do. I am going to strive to be in that spirit more and more, to have eyes to see people’s needs more routinely, and to help in any way I can,” one congregant wrote on the church’s blog. That member ended up giving the $100 bill to a waitress, as did another congregant on another day. “I just trusted that God would put us at the right table, the one with the person He wanted me to give my envelope to,” the congregant wrote.

The donor behind it all said one of her favorite ideas was Dave Doss’s. He and a friend ordered 10 pizzas and a case of Orange Crush to be delivered to the steps of a Baltimore church where they knew homeless men and women hang out. Then they spent the afternoon having a pizza party with them.

“When you have that $100 burning a hole in your pocket, you’re looking around. Should I fill that person’s gas tank? Should I buy that person’s groceries? What can I do? It’s exciting, to have that ability to do that,” the donor said. She said that she and her husband have had good fortune--they own a business--and she feels lucky to be able to give, and to enable others to practice giving.

Foster said congregants confided in him that they thought long and hard about how to use their $100, perhaps even more than they would have had they been handing out their own funds.

“That to me is good theology anyway,” Foster said. “It’s a good way to think about your life, that you’ve been entrusted with great gifts. And how do you turn around and use them?”

It’s an eternal question. This Christmas, his church has 100 answers.

#giving #helping others #Severna Park United Methodist Church #Rev. Ron Foster

[hopeishappinessff]

Chapter 34

After demanding me to leave my car at his apartment, Chris made the decision for the both of us to go and grab a bite to eat. He pulled his truck into a quaint eatery a few blocks up the road from his apartment and I was thankful that the lot seemed fairly empty. We both climbed out of his truck and entered the restaurant, stopping briefly to be greeted by the hostess who then led us to our booth. “Your waiter will be right with you.” She said with a smile before turning and walking back to the host stand near the front door. “What if somebody catches us in here? Chris if we get we get caught, I swear I’m…” “Ma, chill out… we not gone get caught. Everyone is in school right now so who’s gonna see us?”

I nodded and glanced out the window “Okay, but all I’m saying is… if someone does happen to come in here and see us, I’m blaming this all on you.” He smirked and held his hands up in a surrendering manner “Aye, that’s cool… they’ll just get cussed out if they say something to me.” I laughed with a shake of my head and began to peer curiously around the restaurant, taking in the old and vintage theme. There were trinkets and relics from all over the nation covering the walls and that made for a cool and relaxed ambiance. My eyes landed back on Chris and I found him staring shamelessly with the cutest smirk “What?” “You do that a lot don’t you?” “Do what?” “Look around like a little lost dog?” He chuckled and I smiled. He made it clear that after being in my life for nearly a decade, he still had a knack for noticing the small things about me. “Well I can’t help it.”

He nodded slowly and turned to gaze out the window, giving me his full and perfect profile. It truly never got old to me… I could stare at this boy all day long and fall more in love with his handsome features that were so strong and masculine, yet boyish and youthful at the same time. The way his brows were always so clean and arched like that of a female made me smile. Each freckle that was placed so carefully upon the apples of his cheeks left me nibbling into my bottom lip. Even the way his lips sat in a perfect pout, sweet enough to suckle like a lollipop, made me drop my head and giggle quietly like a giddy girl.

He immediately turned his head away from the window and stared at me “What you laughing at girl?” I shook my head and raised my gaze, refusing to absorb any more of his good looks because I was sure the beauty of his features would eventually leave me blushing. “You know if you wanna stare at me then you should just do it, no shame. I do it with you all the time… it’s no big deal.” He said, shrugging his shoulders and slouching back further in his seat. “I wasn’t staring,” I fibbed, “I was just… thinking about something.” He crossed his arms and leaned them down on the table, staring at me menacingly through squinted eyes “What were you thinking about?”

Just as I parted my lips to respond, our waitress approached the table with a pad of paper in her hand and a beaming smile on her face “Hi, my name is Sam and I’ll be your waitress for this afternoon. Can I start you all off with something to drink and an appetizer?” “You want an appetizer?” Chris asked as he plucked his menu from the table and opened it. "No,” I muttered, retrieving my menu from the table as well, “But I’ll take a lemonade.” Sam, our waitress, scribbled down my drink order and turned to Chris “And for you sir?” Chris glanced up at her as he flipped to the back of his menu “Do ya’ll have like icee’s or milkshakes?” “We sure do,” She said as pointed out the delectable treats on the back of his menu “We actually have a few new milkshake flavors.”

“Have you ever had the Chunky Chocolate?” He asked as he skimmed his eyes over the options. “Yeah, that’s actually one of our most popular. Honestly, I’m not sure why… it tastes a little off if you ask me.” She mumbled, gaining a good, hearty, open-mouthed laugh from Chris. I smirked at the sound of his laughter and glanced up at him, immediately freezing in my seat and gasping as I peered into his mouth. I was positive I wasn’t seeing things. There it was… resting in the center of his tongue, glistening beneath the light of the sun pouring in from the open window. Our waitress soon ambled away after jotting down his choice, leaving the two of us in an awkward moment of silence.

“Chris.” I mumbled. “Huh?” “Open your mouth.” His face instantly lit up and he slouched once more in his seat with a sly smirk “Why?” “Just open your mouth Charlie.” I urged, glaring at his lips. Quickly swiping the tip of his tongue out over his bottom lip, he turned his attention back to the window for a brief second before peering back at me through squinted orbs. Abruptly and without hesitation, he parted his lips wide and rolled out his tongue and its brand-new accessory. “You like it?” He asked once he’d snapped his mouth shut. I stared at him in complete disbelief… I wasn’t able to fathom the thought that he’d actually acted on a mere conversation we’d had only days prior. “You alright?” He chortled.

“Yeah, I just,” I shook my head and contorted my face into a painful grimace, “Did it hurt?” “Nah, the dude who did it said there’s usually like a handful of people who barely even feel it initially. He said he was surprised I didn’t even flinch. I told him when you have as much ink as I got on my body, a little pinch like that would barely even phase you.” He said, cracking up at his own expense. “Wow… let me see it again.” I leaned forward, elbows on the table and all, hoping to get a closer look. “Damn girl, didn’t think you would be that into it.” He chuckled before slithering his tongue out once more. I was so intrigued by it and I couldn’t bring myself to look away. He flicked his tongue a few times and I giggled as I caught a glimpse of the bottom of it… it looked much more painful from that angle.

“How are you gonna eat?” I asked. “It doesn’t hurt. It’s a little swollen, but it’s not painful at all. I’m sure I wasn’t supposed to, but I actually went to McDonald’s right after I left the shop on Saturday.” We both laughed and soon after, our waitress arrived at our table to deliver our drinks and take our food orders. Fifteen minutes later, we were both greeted by our meals and though I didn’t intend to, I glanced obsessively at Chris as he ate. I couldn’t for the life of me understand how he managed to chow down as though his tongue wasn’t swollen from a sharp object jabbed right in the middle of it. He made do with it though and after we’d finished eating, I watched in amusement as he stuck his tongue out freakishly far and flicked it up and down, crossing his eyes to peer down past his nose in an effort to stare down at his new accessory.

--

My birthday was only days away and though my aunt had often preached to me as a child that patience is a virtue, I felt like I was cursed with not an ounce of it. As each day passed, time seemed to creep by increasingly slow. Not only was I looking forward to celebrating my eighteenth year of life, Valentine’s Day was approaching as well. I tried to be as vigilant as possible with my friends. I knew just how much of a blabber mouth both Tameka and Destani could be, so I lingered around them as often as I could with hopes that one of them would slip up and mention any likely birthday plans. Per usual, Chris had fallen into yet another one of his abrupt cycles of disappearance and nearly nonexistent communication. I paid it no mind, as I’d become so accustomed to it happening so often.

Besides Valentine’s Day being a huge deal in our school, the hype had also picked up tremendously surrounding a big boys’ basketball game just around the corner. The halls were littered in pink and red Valentine’s Day Dance posters for the freshman and sophomore as well as plenty of paraphernalia geared toward the upcoming game. There was an almost obnoxious level of excitement plaguing the entire campus as everyone counted down the days until the game.

Though the school grounds were the last place I would deliberately choose to hang out after classes were out for the day, I found myself lingering around the gym with Destani. Even though I rode with her to school that morning, Chris had still randomly requested our presence after his grueling afternoon practice. I sat jaded between Destani and Tameka with an elbow propped against my knee and my chin resting in the palm of my hand…. to say I was tired after suffering through a long day of classes would be a complete understatement. I closed my eyes momentarily, hoping that by some miracle I could get in a quick cat nap despite all the commotion in the gym.

“These niggas lookin fine as wine honey,” Tameka bellowed, shifting her gaze hungrily over the display of athleticism on the floor, “Why have I not been attending these damn practices?” Destani laughed and joined Tameka in her optical journey around the gym “I don’t know girl, but some of these niggas is just asking to get snatched up and hopped on.” I rolled my eyes at their wayward remarks and flinched at the sound of Coach Wesler’s whistle sounding out throughout the gymnasium. The player’s, huffing and puffing and obviously worn out, gathered together in the center of the court and listened as the coach gave them further instructions. He spoke just loud enough for the team members to hear and after a few minutes of their huddled discussion, he dismissed them and they all headed off toward the locker room. Nearly fifteen minutes later Chris sauntered out and Destani, Tameka, and I rose from the bleachers to meet up with him.

He walked directly toward us, yet much to my surprise he simply reached into his pocket to retrieve his phone and nearly walked right on by as if we weren’t standing there. “Um… excuse you?” Tameka barked as he actually veered around us and managed to make it about five feet away. He stopped abruptly, snapping his attention back to us “Oh, shit. What ya’ll doing here?” Destani stood silently with astonishment clear as day all over her face, before glancing at Tameka and I then turning her attention back to him with an exaggerated scoff “What the hell do you mean what are we doing here… nigga you asked us to stay at this damn practice and wait for your ass.”

He stared at her as though she’d lost her mind then suddenly his features relaxed and he chuckled softly “I did ask ya’ll to stay huh? My bad, I totally forgot.” “You forgot, my ass… boy don’t play. You will get slapped in the middle of this court.” Tameka fussed. He chuckled at her idle threat and turned to face me “What’s up Sy?” I nodded in his direction then quickly diverted my gaze down to the floor to avoid eye contact. I could feel him maintaining his gaze as though there was no one else standing around us, until Destani cleared her throat “So uh, can we go now or are we just gonna sit here staring at each other like some damn creeps?”

“Shut your ass up Dez.” He said playfully, prompting her to stick up a middle finger up at him which resulted in him sticking his tongue out at her. “What the fuck is that?” Tameka shrieked startlingly as she stared bewilderedly at him. “What?” He nearly jumped back away from her and I snickered to myself as I watched the debacle unfold. “In your mouth… open your mouth!” She bolted forward and took a firm grip on his cheeks, leaving him no choice but to do as she said. “Chris,” She gasped, “You freak… when the fuck did you get your damn tongue pierced?” “Meka, why are you so damn slow?” Destani asked as she doubled over with laughter. “How am I slow? Did you know he had this shit?’ She whipped around and glared at Destani through squinted orbs.

“Yes,” Destani exclaimed as she wiped the corners of her eyes, “This nigga has had that shit for like a week… where have you been?” With a roll of her eyes, Tameka released Chris’s face and snatched her bag up from the bleachers “I just don’t see how I ain’t know about this thing,” She turned to face Chris with a brow raised curiously, “What you get it for?” He hiked his bag up on his shoulder and swiped his tongue out over his lips “Because… I wanted to.” “Yeah right… you got it because you’re a fuckin freak, don’t lie.” We all laughed at her remark and began our trek out of the gym. Chris and Destani fell into place just behind Tameka and I and she slithered closer to me, linking her arm with my own. “I just can’t believe this nigga got his tongue pierced like that… you knew about it too?” She asked.

“Yeah I did… he actually called me asking what I thought about him getting one like the night before he did it.” I explained. “Damn,” She giggled with a shake of her head, “Chris with a tongue ring… I’m tellin you, that’s a nasty nigga.” “Aye Sy.” I glanced back at Destani at the sound of my name, “You tried Chris tongue ring yet?” My mouth flew open with shock and I stared at her through stunned eyes “Destani!” She doubled over with laughter and I could feel my cheeks burning as Chris smirked and stared at me.

#chrisbrown #chrisbrownff #chrisbrownfanfic #jasminesanders #chrisbrownfanfiction #jasminesandersff #teambreezy #teambreezyff #fanfiction #fanfic

[5hfanfiction]

I have an über big crush on you

watt = longerr_hours check out my shit 

So Lauren has no idea how to use uber. She’s always had the app, for emergencies like the one she’s in now (if being stuck at your ex boyfriend’s party at three in the morning is considered an emergency), but she’s never been in one and she isn’t quite sure what the process is. 

Does she talk to the driver? Does she awkwardly sit there for the twenty minutes that it is then give them five stars to make up for the lack of convo? Does she sit in the back, or is that weird (no obviously you sit in the back, but like, still it feels weird). 

She orders one, and it takes a second but then the driver pops up and she thought she’d have to approve of them but like, whatever, and when she click son the picture she’s shocked to see someone so young looking driving. 

She has a 4.9 star rating and it says she’s been doing this for 9 months and almost two hundred drives so Lauren take sit she must be nice and eagerly waits to escape the party that feels it’s been going on for years. 

It’s a small silver car, and like fuck off Lauren doesn’t know cars enough to know the car so don’t h8. But it’s small, and she makes a beeline towards it, dodging the other drunks on the porch and then she’s safely inside, and dace to face with the most beautiful person she’s ever seen. 

“Why hello there, you seem in a rush,” pretty face giggles and Lauren doesn’t car show nerdy that is because it’s so cute coming from pretty face- Camila, her name said Camila. 

“Yeah a little bit,” Lauren laughs, buckling in as Camila pulls off the curb and into the quiet neighborhood. 

“Rough night? Or other? Or something you’re not going to talk to your uber driver about why am I being so pushy?” she jokes and Lauren can’t help but giggle at the girl.

She’s more gorgeous in person, the picture was pretty but it certainly didn’t do her justice, and Lauren wonders if she had a high rating simply because it was an honor to be looking at her. 

“Something like that,” Lauren mumbles, still checking her driver out before shaking her head and continuing so she doesn’t seem rude. “My ex had a party and somehow I ended up there, there with him and it was just, my driver got drunk and I’ve been trying to leave for hours and, yeah that about sums it up.”

And like, she’s glad she got a young driver because she actually feels fine talking about that with her and it’s nice to tell someone else how unfortunate her night has been. 

“Oh yikes,” Camila shudders, extra - ly but Lauren just giggles, glad she’s getting in a better mood already. “I’d have walked home hours ago.”

“I would’ve but I live on the west side of the campus so it’s a bit of a hike,” she replies.

(AN this is a made up campus i d on not know what campus would have a twenty minute erie from one side to the other i am sorry deeply but not really thx u)

“No way! I live by there too, what dorm are you in?”

“I’m in Kingsly,” Lauren replies with a fake gag and Camila laughs, nodding in agreement since that’s known to be a shitty area. 

“I’m Dalton, it’s not that much better but anything is better than Kingsly,” she jokes as Lauren nods in agreement. “What year are you?" 

And like, the girls kind of just click. 

They talk for the whole twenty minutes and Camila thanks Lauren in the end for living close to her so she can end her night back home which Lauren accepts despite having not done it on purpose which Camila shushes her about. 

Lauren spends the night thinking about Camila, and her cute little smile and her cute hair and her cute eyes and her cute self and well, it’s no shock when she finds herself ordering an uber two days later to the library just to see it Camila will get her. (She waits the two days so she doesn’t seem desperate.) And when she sees that Camila is her driver she may or may not do a little happy dance. 

"Long time no see,” Camila grins as Lauren gets not the car. “First partying now library though, I have to say I’m shocked at the change.”

“Oh so partiers can’t be studious too?” Lauren jokes and they easily fall into conversation. 

They fall into such good conversation about books and reading that Camila decides to follow her into the library to check out some stuff but that’s kind of a negative since Lauren didn’t actually plan on staying at the library (she just wanted to see Camila, can you blame her?).

After grabbing a book on something biology related though, Lauren looks studious as fuck and decides to check out. Camila offers her a ride back and Lauren can’t help but grin like a love struck fool when she pulls open the shot gun door and says she thinks they should “take this step in their relationship”. 

And that’s how it starts.

Lauren pretending she need sot go places to talk to Camila, and Camila driving her there and filling her days with jokes and adorableness. 

“Hey super star, what’s cooking?” Camila grins as she leans back in her seat and waits for Lauren to get in. 

“Hallo,” Lauren smiles, not hesitating in unplugging Camila’s phone form the AUX  she learned a while ago that Camila doesn’t mind and turning on her “good vibes” playlist. When “Close” by Nick and Tove Lo fills the air Camila smiles brightly and begins the journey. (Camila has a crush on him, she just won’t admit it, but Lauren doesn’t mind spoiling her with a song every now and then cause who tf don’t have a crush on Nick Jonas.)

She just wanted McDonald’s, and she knows uber delivers food too now, but she’d prefer to get Camila. 

“So you really want that McD’s crap or will you let me get you Wendy’s instead?” Camila cuts in after a second of starting the drive. 

Lauren huffs, pretending to be offended, but answers anyways, “Honestly that’s a hike though, unlike you I ain’t getting paid to spend time with you so I’m feeling the crap.”

Camila looks at the smirking girl for another moment before banging a u-turn and taking off for the city center that Lauren knows the Wendy’s is located. “My treat, the ride and food, consider it payback for you constantly paying my electricity bills with this shit." 

"Wendy’s and the AUX?” Lauren grins, turing up the volume and leaning her chair back to recline, “my kind of date Cabello." 

She loves eyeing Camila blush, so yeah, she says stuff like that a lot since it’s easy to get the other girl to blush. 

And the thing is, they’re kind of kind of dating. Like they go out to lunch a lot now after that time, and usually Camila will cover the food since Lauren covers the gas and such. (One time Lauren even catches her sneaking bill sin to her purse when she goes to the bathroom to pay her back for the drive, and eventually they’re just texting each other to get lunch instead of doing the whole uber thing. 

And the thing is, Lauren really thinks she might be going crazy for Camila. She really likes her and, well Lauren isn’t one to like somebody, she never has and she didn’t think she’d ever be the relationship type if she’s being honest, but something about Camila’s dorky charm and adorable jokes has her smitten. 

She tries to tell her this, but every time she does she trips over hr words and ends up not committing. 

When she finally does tell Camila about her crush, about what’s been on her mind, she does so in probably the most awkward encounter ever. 

She’s cheap, so she always goes for the uber pools, but she’s never had to share a car with someone. Of course though, as soon as she opens her mouth about it her luck changes. 

"Hey Lo what’s-” Camila starts but Lauren cuts her off, wanting to shoot the bull in the horns or whatever the fuck.

“I like you,” she starts as soon as she shuts the door to Camila’s small car. At Camila’s confused look she continues, “I really, really like you and I really have for a while and I, I know we only talk every now and then but I’m crazy about you and-" 

And then the back door is opening, and the man to ruin Lauren’s time to shine steps into the car. 

"Hey sorry, I saw her get in and didn’t know if it was the right car,” he smiles, gesturing towards Lauren as he straps his seatbelt on. 

“It’s fine, it’s, it’s okay yeah it’s greta okay we can go now,” Lauren answers for a still shocked Camila who’s mouth is about flopping at this point.

“Lo I-”

“Drive Camz,” Lauren says under her breath, glad that the man is paying more attention to his phone than their conversation. “We can talk later… or forget it, let’s forget it thank youu.” And yeah, she books it from the car as soon as the car stops. 

(She still gives Camila five stars of course and a five dollar tip for any mental trouble she put her through.)

Camila shows up at her apartment a few days later, no uber request, no call to let her know she’s coming, no knock really, she was just there as Lauren was going out for coffee and when she asked if Lauren would come with her the green eyed girl couldn’t find it in herself to hesitate.

They’d driven by the set up before, but when Camila pulls aside into the lot with the view Lauren thinks maybe this girl is meant for her (if she’s willing to do this cheesy, sappy shit).

It’s almost seven, and it’s mid November so it’s chilly and Camila’s brought blankets to wait for the sun to go down and it’s, quite literally it’s the most perfect thing Lauren could’ve imagined. 

All awkwardness she could’ve expected after their last encounter is gone as she curls up next to Camila and eventually they’re cuddled up on the hood of her car talking about everything and nothing.

Camila ends up holding her, and she also ends up breaking the comfortable silence they fall into once it’s finally dark out.

“Can I tell you something?” Camila asks after a few minutes of silence.  Lauren doesn’t bother lifting her head from the older girls chest, just nods into her because she’s too content in the moment to ruin anything. 

She feels the deep breath Camila takes and notices the shake to Camila’s hand as it rests itself on her waist, curling around her to pull her just a little bit closest before saying, “I kind of have an uber big crush on you,” and yup, Lauren thinks she could fall in love with this girl without trying. 

She does pull back then, but she doesn’t ruin the moment, she makes it better, finally connecting their lips after what’s felt like years, and what has definitely been worth it.

When she finally pulls back it’s because they’re both smiling too hard to keep kissing, so yeah, it’s kind of a perfect moment.  

#UPDATE #one shot #AU #slash #camren #romance fluff #submission #I Have An Uber Big Crush On You

[irresistibledylan]

DYLAN O’BRIEN x READER IMAGINE

12. “Stop judging me” 20.  “Open up, I got McDonald’s.”

A/N: I wanted to try this text message thing and this is my first ever written like this sooo tell me your opinion about this one & if I should do more text message imagines. Sorry it took so long ily

Warnings: uh none? Just fluff and McDonald’s is mentioned. Gif is not mine, credits to the owner.

Dylan: Where r u

Y/N: Home

Dylan: Are u still mad at me? read 9:48pm

Dylan: Oh c'mon, your ignoring me now?

Y/N: You’re*

Dylan: shut up

Y/N:   🙂

Dylan: Don’t be mad

Y/N: Um, I am going to be mad for a while, you idiot

Dylan: Idek why ur mad at me because I didn’t do anything?

Y/N:   What the hell

Y/N: You ditched me at the bar where I never even wanted to go and I tried to find you and then I found u talking to a group of girls and then some jerk spilled his drink and then I smelled like beer and u didn’t even notice

Dylan: Then why did u came if u didn’t want to

Y/N: I wanted to hang out with u

Dylan: wait, are u jealous read 9:56pm

Dylan: Do you LIKE me??? delivered 9:56pm

Dylan: Do not close your phone delivered 9:57pm

Dylan:   Come back Come back   Come back Come back delivered 9:57pm

Dylan:   Ok I’m coming over delivered 9:59pm

Dylan: I'm outside read 10:20pm

Y/N: Ok

Dylan: Open the door please

Y/N:   Nope

Dylan: C'mon

Y/N: Go away I’m going to sleep

Dylan: Open up, I got McDonald’s

Y/N: Proof

Dylan sent a picture  

Y/N went to open her door and streched her hand out. 

“Give me my food.” 

“I’m not going to give you these if you don’t let me in”, Dylan answered. Y/N snorted and let him in. She grabbed the brown paperback with McDonald's logo on the side and went to the kitchen without saying anything to him. Dylan followed and sat across her staring her as her eyes brightened when she saw her favorites inside.  She put the foods on the table and Dylan reached his arm in order to steal couple of french fries but his hand got slapped away.

"Dude", she said with a cautionary tone.

"Sharing is caring", he said and tried again.

"Do not steal my food or I'll dye your hair pink while you're asleep." Dylan looked at her smirking a little. "Somebody's being overprotective over their food."

"Don't judge me, I'll consider forgiving you after I'm done with these." There was a moment of silence until Dylan spoke again.

"So, about last night.."  

Y/N interrupted. "Please, don't."

"We need to talk, I'll forget it after we've talked, okay?" Y/N thought about it and eventually she nodded.

"I am extremely sorry about ditching you. The girl group kind of  surrounded me and I had no idea you felt like that and you know I would never do anything to upset you, right?" He looked like a sad puppy and you tried your best to not go over and wrap your arms around him.  

"Yeah, that's okay", Y/N said smiling softly.  

"No, it's not okay. I promised myself I would do everything to protect you from stuff like this and it hurts like hell because, well, I like you a lot." Y/N looked at him like she had just seen a ghost.

"You what?"

"I like you more than I should." Y/N grabbed rest of her french fries and slide them over the table to Dylan.

"Feelings are mutual", she smiled and blushed. They stared at each other for a while until Dylan stood up and pulled Y/N from her chair.

"Since both of us just confessed our feelings, do you think it's okay if I kiss you now?" He whispered hand still on her hand.

"I think it's more than okay", she whispered back and pulled him closer so she could reach kiss him. The kiss got pretty intense and a moment later you pulled away to catch your breath.

"You taste like french fries", Dylan said and tried to hold his laughter.  

"Oh shut up", Y/N laughed and kissed him again.

#dylan o'brien imagine #dylan o'brien x reader #dylan o'brien fanfiction #dylan o'brien #dylan o'brien fluff #stiles stilinski #stiles stilinski imagine #this is a short one forgive me

[itsfinancethings]

New story in Business from Time: Pivot. Delegate. ‘Be an Adult for Goodness’ Sake.’ Leadership Lessons From the World’s Top CEOs

(Miss this week’s The Leadership Brief? The piece below was delivered to the inbox of Leadership Brief subscribers on Sunday morning, Aug. 30; to receive weekly emails of conversations with the world’s top CEOs and business decisionmakers, click here.)

“I like to sleep late and then take a short nap during the day to recharge,” said no CEO, ever. Whether it’s the demands of the job or self-selection, the typical rising time of chief executives appears to be 5 a.m. And they’re not waking up early to finish binge-watching Season 6 of Alone. They’re hitting the gym for some sort of intense cardio workout.

One fiscal quarter into TIME’s weekly Leadership Brief series, we are hitting pause to offer some lessons learned from our first 13 installments. Even though our sample size is relatively small, our interview subjects own outsize influence: they’re running some of the world’s most important companies, like Delta and Microsoft and Pfizer, and offering real-time insight into navigating unprecedented challenges. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Their decisions are likely to be studied for decades to come.

So it’s important to take stock. We launched the series in May, on the premise that the twin crises facing the country—health care and economic—acutely demonstrated the need for strong leadership. And now, in the wake of national protests sparked by the murder of George Floyd, the very notion of leadership, and the system that produces who gets to be in charge, is subject to vigorous debate.

In the words of Kevin Washington, the first African-American CEO of the YMCA, “it’s a very tricky time” to be in charge. Younger workers today, says Washington, “expect and demand a different kind of leadership. They’re not as patient with the status quo or the hierarchy of an organization or a company.” Leaders already coping with issues that seemed unimaginable just months ago—like figuring out how to protect essential frontline workers, establish millions of home offices and cope with rolling supply-chain disruptions—are now facing pressure to implement truly equitable recruiting, hiring and promotional practices.

So let’s pivot to our lessons. The year’s barely three-quarters done, but I’m making an early call on the business word of the year: pivot. Whatever plans a company had in January were abruptly revised in March. Closing call centers and equipping thousands of employees to work from home were not included in any 2020 strategic goals. Everyone is pivoting. Maybe that’s why we are all so dizzy and disoriented: the mass pivoting.

Here’s another observation, though our small sample size may make data-driven CEOs cringe: growing up in a large family seems to help one muddle through chaos. I was struck by the number of leaders who hail from crowded houses. Brian Moynihan, the CEO of Bank of America and one of eight kids, takes pains to note that my observation is not “mathematically correlated.” But he offered the following theory: “You learn how to get along and manage many different personalities and many different viewpoints,” he says. “When you’re in the younger side of that large family, you get a lot of feedback.” Beth Ford, CEO of Land O’Lakes, also had seven siblings. Margaret Keene, CEO of Synchrony, was one of six kids, as was Progressive CEO Tricia Griffith.

Equally striking is the number of CEOs who grew up in households where money was scarce. A number worked their way through college. Growing up in Iowa, Ford shared a bed with a sister and was allotted one drawer. “Had to put those hand-me-downs somewhere,” she wrote me after our interview. Keene of Synchrony grew up in Queens, the daughter of a police officer, and she worked her way through college making $5.50 an hour as a debt collector. Griffith of Progressive recalls, “My dad sold life insurance door-to-door so we were really broke. I had a very small house with a lot of people.”

Running a modern multinational during an economic catastrophe is not a job for control freaks. These are big-time delegators. John Foley, CEO of Peloton, says, “Our CFO does 99% of finance. I engage because I want to know how we’re doing. But to say I don’t add value to her operation is an understatement. You can also say the same with technology. Our CTO doesn’t get any help from me. I’ll go sometimes months without talking to our CTO, which as a CEO of a technology company, that’s kind of rare.”

Chris Kempczinski, CEO of McDonald’s, says, “I’m usually not involved until there’s a problem, and then I get heavily involved.” David Taylor, CEO of Procter & Gamble, also doesn’t believe in micromanaging. “My job is not to manage,” Taylor says. “It’s to lead.”

I was struck by the CEOs who said they didn’t read conventional business-leadership books but instead were leaning on history. They’re learning from past eras, when world affairs also seemed grim and America appeared stretched to the point of breaking. Enough mentioned Ron Chernow’s Grant that I began reading the book. It’s indeed compelling, and also a grim reminder that the country has been trying to address systemic racism since the end of the Civil War.

Finally, the animated responses to my favorite question—What behavior do you not tolerate?—spawned a list of seven deadly workplace sins: nastiness, passive-aggressive behavior, pocket vetoes, PowerPoint presentations, lack of preparation for meetings, lobbying the CEO privately after a decision was made in a group meeting, and my favorite, from Midwestern-born Beth Ford, who says, “I’m not somebody’s mom, so don’t come to me with ‘I am not getting along with Joe or Sally.’ Absolutely not. I am uninterested. And if you do that, God help you. No, no, no. Be an adult for goodness’ sake.”

Thank you for your readership. We are taking next week off and will be back Sept. 13, with a strong lineup of interviews for the fall. I welcome your feedback and suggestions. What should we be asking the world’s business leaders? I’m eager to hear from you at [email protected]

Subscribe to The Leadership Brief by clicking here.

  from Blogger https://ift.tt/3lwbIBt via IFTTT

#IFTTT #Blogger

[newstechreviews]

(Miss this week’s The Leadership Brief? The piece below was delivered to the inbox of Leadership Brief subscribers on Sunday morning, Aug. 30; to receive weekly emails of conversations with the world’s top CEOs and business decisionmakers, click here.)

“I like to sleep late and then take a short nap during the day to recharge,” said no CEO, ever. Whether it’s the demands of the job or self-selection, the typical rising time of chief executives appears to be 5 a.m. And they’re not waking up early to finish binge-watching Season 6 of Alone. They’re hitting the gym for some sort of intense cardio workout.

One fiscal quarter into TIME’s weekly Leadership Brief series, we are hitting pause to offer some lessons learned from our first 13 installments. Even though our sample size is relatively small, our interview subjects own outsize influence: they’re running some of the world’s most important companies, like Delta and Microsoft and Pfizer, and offering real-time insight into navigating unprecedented challenges. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Their decisions are likely to be studied for decades to come.

So it’s important to take stock. We launched the series in May, on the premise that the twin crises facing the country—health care and economic—acutely demonstrated the need for strong leadership. And now, in the wake of national protests sparked by the murder of George Floyd, the very notion of leadership, and the system that produces who gets to be in charge, is subject to vigorous debate.

In the words of Kevin Washington, the first African-American CEO of the YMCA, “it’s a very tricky time” to be in charge. Younger workers today, says Washington, “expect and demand a different kind of leadership. They’re not as patient with the status quo or the hierarchy of an organization or a company.” Leaders already coping with issues that seemed unimaginable just months ago—like figuring out how to protect essential frontline workers, establish millions of home offices and cope with rolling supply-chain disruptions—are now facing pressure to implement truly equitable recruiting, hiring and promotional practices.

So let’s pivot to our lessons. The year’s barely three-quarters done, but I’m making an early call on the business word of the year: pivot. Whatever plans a company had in January were abruptly revised in March. Closing call centers and equipping thousands of employees to work from home were not included in any 2020 strategic goals. Everyone is pivoting. Maybe that’s why we are all so dizzy and disoriented: the mass pivoting.

Here’s another observation, though our small sample size may make data-driven CEOs cringe: growing up in a large family seems to help one muddle through chaos. I was struck by the number of leaders who hail from crowded houses. Brian Moynihan, the CEO of Bank of America and one of eight kids, takes pains to note that my observation is not “mathematically correlated.” But he offered the following theory: “You learn how to get along and manage many different personalities and many different viewpoints,” he says. “When you’re in the younger side of that large family, you get a lot of feedback.” Beth Ford, CEO of Land O’Lakes, also had seven siblings. Margaret Keene, CEO of Synchrony, was one of six kids, as was Progressive CEO Tricia Griffith.

Equally striking is the number of CEOs who grew up in households where money was scarce. A number worked their way through college. Growing up in Iowa, Ford shared a bed with a sister and was allotted one drawer. “Had to put those hand-me-downs somewhere,” she wrote me after our interview. Keene of Synchrony grew up in Queens, the daughter of a police officer, and she worked her way through college making $5.50 an hour as a debt collector. Griffith of Progressive recalls, “My dad sold life insurance door-to-door so we were really broke. I had a very small house with a lot of people.”

Running a modern multinational during an economic catastrophe is not a job for control freaks. These are big-time delegators. John Foley, CEO of Peloton, says, “Our CFO does 99% of finance. I engage because I want to know how we’re doing. But to say I don’t add value to her operation is an understatement. You can also say the same with technology. Our CTO doesn’t get any help from me. I’ll go sometimes months without talking to our CTO, which as a CEO of a technology company, that’s kind of rare.”

Chris Kempczinski, CEO of McDonald’s, says, “I’m usually not involved until there’s a problem, and then I get heavily involved.” David Taylor, CEO of Procter & Gamble, also doesn’t believe in micromanaging. “My job is not to manage,” Taylor says. “It’s to lead.”

I was struck by the CEOs who said they didn’t read conventional business-leadership books but instead were leaning on history. They’re learning from past eras, when world affairs also seemed grim and America appeared stretched to the point of breaking. Enough mentioned Ron Chernow’s Grant that I began reading the book. It’s indeed compelling, and also a grim reminder that the country has been trying to address systemic racism since the end of the Civil War.

Finally, the animated responses to my favorite question—What behavior do you not tolerate?—spawned a list of seven deadly workplace sins: nastiness, passive-aggressive behavior, pocket vetoes, PowerPoint presentations, lack of preparation for meetings, lobbying the CEO privately after a decision was made in a group meeting, and my favorite, from Midwestern-born Beth Ford, who says, “I’m not somebody’s mom, so don’t come to me with ‘I am not getting along with Joe or Sally.’ Absolutely not. I am uninterested. And if you do that, God help you. No, no, no. Be an adult for goodness’ sake.”

Thank you for your readership. We are taking next week off and will be back Sept. 13, with a strong lineup of interviews for the fall. I welcome your feedback and suggestions. What should we be asking the world’s business leaders? I’m eager to hear from you at [email protected]

Subscribe to The Leadership Brief by clicking here.

#Blogger

[topfygad]

Around the World in 80 Hours

I

“Let’s make a wager,” stated my grandpa, William Foxx.

This specific wager began as all our different bets had — within the den.

***

It was February 29, a bissextile year, and we would simply completed consuming dinner with Gran. My grandfather, Pops, in his typical worn armchair, was nearly to settle in to certainly one of his books for the night.

“What’s that you simply’re studying,” I requested him.

“Jules Verne,” he answered, lifting the guide for me to see.

“Across the World in 80 days,” I learn. “Is that how lengthy it might take you to journey the world whenever you had been younger?” I requested jokingly. Pops was a pilot by my age.

“I am not that outdated, Phil,” he stated, “however in my day it wasn’t almost as easy to fly as it’s as we speak — planes did not fly themselves like they do now. It was an honour to even be a passenger, males dressed of their Sunday finest.”

“Humorous how shortly issues change,” I stated. “I wager as we speak you could possibly make it all over the world in Eight days, and you could possibly do all of it in sweats, surviving off of pre-packaged buns.”

“Are we making bets now?” Pops requested with a raised eyebrow. “In that case, Eight days is simply too simple, Phil. I might fly all over the world in 80 hours, I am certain.”

“I do not assume you need to be flying wherever,” I laughed, “however even then, with check-ins, customs, delays, layovers, there isn’t any means you could possibly do it in simply 80 hours.”

“What are you aware of customs and layovers?” requested Pops defensively. “You have by no means even left London!”

“I do not often argue with former pilots,” I stated, ignoring his jab, “however I do know that you would be able to’t simply hop on a aircraft and circle the globe.”

“Phil, the one strategy to study is to strive,” he stated. After which I knew it was coming, grandpa’s 4 favorite phrases, “Let’s make a wager.”

“I wager that you would be able to make it all over the world in 80 hours, stopping in all of the cities on this guide,” he continued, wagging his tattered paperback within the air.

“And what’s going to we wager? Ice cream cones? Tickets to soccer? I am not a child anymore Pops, there’s nothing you could possibly give me to fly all over the world.”

I’ve seen my grandfather severe solely twice in my life, as soon as whereas my grandmother was sick within the hospital and the opposite time was proper then, within the den.

“I am getting outdated, Phil. I’ve saved my cash through the years and I feel now’s pretty much as good a time as any to present it to you.”

“What are you speaking about?”

“I’ve obtained fairly some huge cash, and should you do that for me, if you can also make it again to London in 80 hours, I am going to give it to you.”

I did not know fairly what to say.

“Properly? What’ll or not it’s?” Pops continued loudly. “Eager to comply with Jules Verne’s route for £2 million?”

“What! Two million kilos? The place the hell… are you mad? Do Mum and Gran learn about this? You’ll be able to’t wager all of it on me!” I argued.

“There’s more cash for them, don’t be concerned. Whenever you get to be my age you discover that you’ve an excessive amount of cash and never sufficient vitality to make use of it. Seeing you lastly fly could be value it,” he stated. And with that it was determined.

“I suppose I am going to give it a go…” I agreed, nonetheless uncertain what to anticipate.

II

Pops contacted somebody he known as his concierge; his goofy smile was all I noticed for days. I heard mutterings every so often. “No, he’ll discover you,” and “Tall ginger, cannot miss him,” and a somewhat alarming, “In fact he likes whiskey, he is a Foxx!”

I’ve by no means drank whiskey in my life. I felt extra nervous than the time I used to be chosen to present a 20 minute presentation in Mr. Corridor’s sex-ed class.

Lastly, in any case his non-public planning, he known as me into the den to inform me how the journey was to go.

“I’ve purchased your entire tickets, you simply have to choose them up at examine in. This is your flight itinerary. You allow this afternoon and also you get again to London at 7:40 pm March 4th, after 79 hours of journey. It ought to take you about an hour to get again house, so let’s meet right here within the den at precisely 8:40, that’ll be our 80 hour mark.”

This was a real Flightfox contest. The successful knowledgeable was ‘Scibuff’ whose itinerary circled the world, stopping at Jules Verne’s authentic 80 Days locations in precisely 79 hours and all for a value of solely $2,039.

“Phil…”, he grinned. “You are able to do this.”

I glanced over the pages he handed me, full of numbers, names, dates and occasions. It was all gibberish. I remembered a couple of locations the characters travelled to within the novel — India with the elephants and America with the circus. My thoughts was racing however hovered on the sobering actuality that there was no backing out now.

“What? What if I miss certainly one of my flights, or..err, what if a flight is delayed, or there’s site visitors getting house. What occurs after 80 hours?” I stumbled, mad at myself for displaying Pops how nervous I actually was.

“Do not get caught up with ‘what ifs,’” Pops exclaimed, “Be assured, belief in your self and in others, and most of all, have just a little enjoyable!”

“Pops, that does not even try to reply my query, what if I actually cannot make it?”

“No extra of this garbage. Now you higher rush off,” he stated. “By the best way, I’ve known as a couple of mates of mine, folks I met whereas travelling, and I would like you to fulfill them alongside the best way. Don’t fret,” he stated as he noticed my frightened face, “they’re going to enable you alongside. I’ve given you a couple of clues that will help you discover them.”

Clues, mates, 80 hours of flying. I could not see how this could finish properly. I wanted somebody who knew about flying (or assembly folks) to return alongside. Abruptly, I considered simply the individual, “Can I deliver a buddy, Pops?”

“Alright, my boy. However there isn’t any time to waste, your aircraft takes off in a couple of hours,” he stated.

After handing me the primary clue and my flight data, I gave him a fast hug goodbye and stated, “Thanks, Pops, see you in 80 hours.”

However that was the final time I ever noticed my grandfather.

III

I arrived at Heathrow airport a couple of hours later, with my buddy Tomas in tow.

It did not take lengthy to persuade Tomas to return alongside, it truly did not take any convincing in any respect. Tomas was a self-proclaimed “elite” frequent flyer and I figured having him by my aspect would assist with navigating airports and international international locations just a little higher. And as he stated, this journey will get him “heaps of qualifying miles, sufficient to realize Gold elite standing.” No matter that meant.

We every had a knapsack and a passport. I had by no means truly used my passport, however Pops insisted I at all times have one helpful, simply in case. I appear to be an absolute twat in my photograph, it was taken almost 4 years in the past, within the peak of my zits part. With my freckles and purple hair I regarded just like the gawky offspring of Carrot High or Ronald Mcdonald.

Tomas’ passport photograph, however, regarded like an expert head-shot, no airbrushing required. It was taken a couple of months earlier, and along with his child face and brown curly hair he regarded like a kind of younger boy-band pop stars.

We walked as much as the British Airways ticket counter and requested to check-in for our first vacation spot, Cairo.

The person behind the counter took my passport and began typing.

“Hmm, it says right here you are booked for Rome this afternoon, leaving at 12:40pm, not Cairo,” he defined, turning the pc monitor so we might see.

“Alright, check-in for Rome it’s,” confirmed Tomas, earlier than I had an opportunity to say something. “We’ll take one other ticket together with it for me,” he stated sliding his bank card throughout the counter.

“What are you doing, we’re purported to go to Cairo?”

“Loosen up, that is what your grandfather booked for us. Have some religion in your outdated man!”

“I hope you already know what you are doing,” I stated.

“Haven’t the foggiest,” he fired again.

IV

نم ن ر | ٢ ١ ٣

“It says it should take a minute to translate,” stated my buddy Tomas, as we sat in Heathrow airport awaiting our flight. He held his telephone as much as the very first clue from my grandpa and waited for it to translate.

The search wheel on Tomas’ telephone disappeared and ‘312 | RNM’ appeared as a substitute. The clue was initially written in Arabic in line with the magic app Tomas downloaded.

“Is {that a} postal code or a password to one thing?” I requested.

“Let me examine,” replied Tomas. Even with out his laptop Tomas at all times discovered a solution to every little thing. After a couple of minutes of looking out on his telephone he discovered that it was a license plate, “A taxi plate in Cairo. The proprietor’s title is Karim Hassan.”

“You’ll find all that on-line?” I requested.

“Properly, you are not purported to,” he answered, “however you’ll be able to.” Tomas switched his telephone to airplane mode. “Time to board.”

***

Tomas sat down in his airplane seat as if he had been sitting on his personal sofa, it appeared second nature to him. For some cause he did not appear to ask too many questions. However I had heaps of them.

“Alright, so we have seven cities to go to earlier than we get again to London — Cairo, Mumbai, Calcutta, Hong Kong, Tokyo, San Francisco and New York. Pops stated there is a buddy in every metropolis, in order that’s seven mates, certainly one of them has obtained to be this taxi man, Karim one thing. He’ll in all probability give us a clue to the subsequent individual after which I felt sick. My abdomen was in knots, “wait…why are we even going to Rome!?”

“Loosen up. We’re simply following the trail your grandfather designed,” reassured Tomas. “Rome is on the best way to Cairo, it is in all probability only a quicker route.”

The aircraft began shifting ahead, driving alongside the runway. “It is similar to a bus,” I assumed, “a really massive, flying bus.”

I felt stress on each side of my head, hugging my ears like earmuffs, because the aircraft ascended into the sky.

“And so, the 80 hour race all over the world begins,” stated Tomas with a smile.

V

“What are you doing? You are not supposed to make use of your telephone up right here!” I requested, jerking my head in direction of Tomas’ telephone, which he was busy typing on.

Tomas, in a technological trance did not trouble lifting his head, “Cool it, there’s wifi. I am telling a few of my mates what we’re as much as.”

“What do you imply, what we’re as much as?”

“I posted your story on Hacker Information, in regards to the wager to fly all over the world in 80 hours,” he stated.

“Hacker Information?” I questioned aloud.

“It is a information discussion board for tech guys,” Tomas stated with a smile.

And that is all he’d say for the remainder of the flight. He was misplaced in his digital dialogue. I watched as he saved refreshing the webpage. The phrases ‘Across the World in 80 Hours’ posted by ‘Scibuff’, which I guessed was Tomas’ username, continued to ascend the checklist of posts ordered by reputation. It sat subsequent to the primary spot, and though I did not notice it on the time, hundreds of individuals all over the world had been studying about our journey, deciding whether or not or not they thought it was attainable.

I hadn’t truthfully determined myself.

VI

When the plane touched down I lastly loosened my grip on the armrest. The flight had no turbulence, no delays, and we had been even forward of schedule, however I nonetheless could not kick this anxious feeling. Would I miss a flight? Would I miss certainly one of Pops’ mates? I used to be enjoying the what if sport Pops hated a lot, so I took a deep breath and targeted on what was subsequent — attending to Egypt, our first cease.

As quickly as we had been off the aircraft Tomas and I sprinted in direction of the ticket desk to get our subsequent ticket. I remembered from the itinerary that I used to be flying with EgyptAir.

“We’ve got a ticket right here for a Philip Foxx headed to Mumbai, India, is that appropriate?” requested the person behind the counter.

“Oh lord, why couldn’t Pops have booked tickets to the locations we truly must go,” I stated.

VII

The EgyptAir flight to Mumbai stopped in Cairo. Tomas gave me a 101 lesson in studying a flight itinerary on the aircraft so I might study the distinction between a cease and a stopover. Thriller solved! I spent the flight going over our locations so I had it clear in my thoughts.

I used to be starting to achieve just a little confidence about the entire thing. I figured I used to be going to be one worldly man in any case of this–what woman does not wish to hear about unique locales?

Abruptly, the aircraft hit a wave of turbulence on its descent. Every dip the aircraft took shook out no matter confidence I had gained. I used to be immediately again to being the thin, nervous boy who had by no means even had a girlfriend.

“Phil, are you alright? You are turning inexperienced,” seen Tomas.

“Mmhm,” I mumbled and had simply sufficient time to succeed in for the barf bag within the seat flap in entrance of me earlier than I used to be re-introduced to my in-flight complimentary pretzels.

We bounced onto strong floor and my abdomen launched its final twist and groan.

“Are you prepared to seek out that clue?” Tomas requested. “Have you ever memorized that license plate quantity?”

“In fact.” In truth, I would forgotten all in regards to the first clue.

VIII

Tomas provided to trace down the cab driver’s whereabouts. He immediately whipped out his telephone and beginning typing away — he regarded like a mad scientist. For somebody that is aware of every little thing, he certain did not know Pops very properly. I knew that he would not make issues too exhausting for me.

“I’ll examine exterior the airport the place the cabs park. I will be again in a couple of.” I had a powerful feeling that if I used to be seen, my grandfather’s buddy and the subsequent clue would come straight for me.

“Okay. I’ll keep by the aircraft and attempt to stall in case you don’t make it again on time,” Tomas advised.

There wasn’t a lot time to debate, so I nodded and ran off in search of the taxi.

I used to be satisfied it would not be exhausting to find the cab — till I stepped exterior the airport.

I would by no means seen such a scene in my complete life. It was a mosh pit of honking cabs. They had been aggressive, they had been writhing like bugs enclosed in a jar, and a part of me was intrigued by them. I used to be steps away from the acquainted airport, however I felt transported to a different world. I might have stood there expecting hours. Everybody’s means gave the impression to be the appropriate of means, but someway, one after the other, the cabs had been capable of escape the jam and make their means out of the taxi pick-up zone and on to the streets of Cairo.

I did the one factor I might consider to seek out the cab: I thrust myself from the security of the curb and hit the strip operating. I started weaving by way of the automobiles, squinting on the plates as I handed.

“312, 312, 312, the place are you?”

Drivers honked much more — one thing that appeared unimaginable — and their yelling voices elevated in depth. Every time I peered right down to learn a license plate, I used to be met with disappointment. There was no different choice, the place might this taxi be?

I watched as some safety guards began to note me, prepared to pull me away from the site visitors I used to be angering. However there was no different means, the automobile needed to be someplace on this infestation.

That is after I was knocked over.

I could not fairly inform what had occurred. I felt as if a procuring cart full of cement rolled into me. I fell onto my aspect, hitting the pavement exhausting. I used to be in shock greater than something.

As I attempted to rise up I seen the acquainted numbers, “312” accompanied by some script. The cab I used to be in search of simply hit me! I knew Pop’s buddy would come straight for me, I simply did not assume it might be fairly so literal.

The safety guards had been speeding over now, weaving by way of the cabs, however I used to be shortly hoisted up by the driving force who stated one thing to them in Arabic and so they slunk again to their posts.

“Are you damage?” he requested. “I am so sorry, the cab behind me hit my bumper and abruptly there was this crazed pale boy proper in entrance of my cab — what a strategy to meet, proper?!” he stated with a chuckle.

I do not assume I smiled efficiently, however I attempted. My fingers had been trembling.

“You are all shaken up. Come sit down,” he stated, this time extra sympathetically.

The taxi driver was a few foot shorter than me and his again curled ahead in a everlasting hunch. He fiddled with the nobs on his damaged radio and brushed some mud off the dashboard compulsively earlier than serving to me into the cab to take a seat down.

“I am your grandpa’s buddy, Karim, by the best way.” The Egyptian’s wild eyes flashed to the dashboard clock — it was 10:45 pm. “Appears to be like such as you’re operating late in your subsequent flight.”

His laboured method, and the truth that he almost ran me over, made me really feel unwelcome. I had about half an hour till the subsequent aircraft took off, Tomas was probably already boarding, I wanted to get out of there.

I assured Karim I used to be nice and he searched his cluttered backseat for my subsequent clue. I doubted he’d discover it amid the mess of Styrofoam cups and crinkled luggage however after a couple of seconds of scrabbling about he handed me a slip of paper, saying, “Okay, now go catch your aircraft! Customs will be nasty at this place. Oh, and good assembly you, Phil!” I heard as I closed the cab door. I jogged again contained in the airport, attempting to wrap my thoughts round what had simply occurred.

I used to be so off form that after solely a minute of jogging I used to be out of breath, puffing out my final reserves of air. I raced across the nook nearing the departure gate and slammed straight right into a safety guard. One thing exhausting jabbed into my aspect as I collided into the hulk of a person. Connected to the largest man I’ve ever seen was the largest gun I’ve ever seen.

With a tilt of his head, he scanned me from prime to backside. No questions requested, the person grabbed my arm, squeezing it like a blood stress cuff, and led me off in the other way.

IX

I sat in an empty chilly room with a number of different unhappy wanting travellers. The safety guard requested to see my passport and advised me I couldn’t depart the room with out paying. These anti-bullying adverts from major faculty jogged my memory to at all times give in; dropping your lunch cash is at all times higher than gaining a black eye and post-traumatic stress dysfunction. I felt this man might kill me with a sneeze. I reached into my pocket and fished out no matter money I had.

“What is that this?” requested the guard, left eyebrow raised.

“20 quid, you stated I needed to pay,” I answered.

“I would like {dollars}. US {dollars}.”

“However I am from the UK, I don’t have any. I’ve by no means even touched a greenback invoice.”

“Then you should keep right here,” the guard grunted, and he left the room.

I used to be relieved to have the beast out of my sight, till I glanced down on the time on my telephone. I solely had twelve minutes earlier than the aircraft would take off! Shit!

For 3 lengthy minutes I waited, standing in a single spot, wanting on the different travellers for some indication of how lengthy I would be there. Their grim faces painted an eternity. I made a decision I needed to kick down the door and run.

Virtually as quickly as I had visions of bursting by way of the door and operating to freedom, the door flew open and one other safety officer walked in. The brand new guard, of cheap dimension, requested for my title and passport and briefly checked out my papers. He let me go with none rationalization. Phew.

I had no clue what simply occurred however I wasn’t going to stay round to seek out out. The aircraft was taking off in 5 minutes!

As I ran in direction of the gate, I used to be compelled to cease quick. There was an extended line of individuals ready to scan their luggage earlier than passing by way of to the gates and I used to be on the finish of it.

The road inched ahead. Because the moments previous, I might really feel the defeat setting in. It was 11:02, three minutes earlier than the flight was set to take off.

What if I’ve blown this complete factor already? I assumed as I fidgeted within the queue. However then I considered Pops’ phrases, “Do not get caught up with ‘what ifs’. Be assured…”

“Excuse me,” I known as out, pushing by way of the road, “My flight is leaving proper now.” To the dismay of each different individual in line, however to my shock, I used to be allowed to go by way of the scanner forward of the road. “Thanks, thanks, thanks,” I shouted as I sprinted in direction of my gate.

Once I obtained there it was empty besides for a lady who had clearly lengthy since completed scanning the tickets.

“I must get on this flight!” I advised her frantically, interrupting her software of lipgloss “This is my ticket, please do not inform me I am too late.”

“Phil!”, I heard Tomas name my title.

X

Whereas I used to be getting mowed down by my Grandfather’s weirdo buddy Karim, Tomas was ensuring the flight did not take off with out me.

“Let me off, let me off!!” screamed Tomas earlier from onboard, stumbling by way of the aisle in direction of the exit.

A plump flight attendant with the title tag ‘Marge’ was blocking him up forward.

“I must get off this aircraft proper now,” he continued. His voice at simply the appropriate pitch to begin worrying the opposite passengers.

With a cool, skilled air, she escorted him to the closest galley and requested him what was unsuitable.

“I… I’m claustrophobic, I want some air,” he lied. It was the one factor he might consider to stall the aircraft with out placing him on the no-fly checklist. In that second I wager he was grateful for these two weeks he spent at theatre camp when he was eight.

Tomas was ushered out of the aircraft and into the jet bridge by Marge, whose reassuring manner by no means wavered.

“What occurs to somebody after they’re claustrophobic?” he thought. He clutched his abdomen, then his throat, then his head. He had no thought what he was doing, or extra importantly, the place the hell I used to be.

That is when he heard my determined plea, “I must get on this flight. This is my ticket, please do not inform me I am too late.”

“Phil!” he shouted.

I might hear him operating again up the jet bridge.

I would by no means been so blissful to see that child face.

“That is my mate who I am travelling with,” I stated to the girl unwilling to scan my ticket, “Are you able to please let me on?”

At this level, Marge caught up with Tomas and put her hand on his shoulder and stated to the lady, “this one’s with me.”

“And this one’s with me,” Tomas stated, reaching up for my shoulder.

“Alright then, chip chop.” the girl rolled her eyes, defeated.

On the stroll to seats 12A and 12B, Tomas whispered, “Did you meet him?”

“I wouldn’t be right here if I didn’t,” I answered. And we took our seats, prepared for one more leg of our journey.

XI

We sat on the tarmac for half an hour earlier than taking-off. The crew made an announcement saying that we might missed our allotted take-off time and we needed to watch for the planes that had queued up.

Tomas tried to maintain my thoughts off the misplaced time by saying, “Let’s see the clue.”

ग्रेट इंडियन पेनिनसुला रेलवे

“They seem to be a bit predictable at this charge,” he stated, pulling out his telephone to translate the symbols.

“Nice Britain Peninsula Railway,” learn Phil as soon as the picture was scanned and translated.

Tomas did a fast search on his telephone. “Apparently it was the primary railway that immediately linked Mumbai to Calcutta. It has been changed with the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, however there’s some plaque on the wall memorializing the outdated station.”

“That is smart, I used to be questioning why we had 9 hours in Mumbai. We have to go to the practice station to gather the subsequent clue. Possibly there will likely be somebody ready for us by the signal,” I stated.

I am unable to bear in mind which certainly one of us ended the dialog or who fell asleep first, however the subsequent factor I knew I used to be woken up with a pointy blow to my elbow. Breakfast was being served and I had an aisle seat.

The shock of waking up was probably the most disorienting emotions I would ever felt in my life to that time. It felt as if my complete life lagged behind me and it took a minute for the truth of our scenario to catch up.

We’re on a aircraft, headed to India, racing all over the world for £2 million. I reminded myself, however my pleasure was tempered by grogginess, sweat and aches from Karim’s bumper.

As soon as out of the airport we regarded round for the taxi queue.

“You want a cab?” requested a person sipping some sizzling tea.

“We have to get to Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus,” I stated.

“That is Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus,” he stated, not understanding.

“No the practice station,” I responded, oblivious to the truth that the airport and the practice station shared similar names.

“Okay, certain.” He guided us to a white striped automobile and we slid within the again. I shortly seen that every one cabs — irrespective of the place on the earth — scent precisely the identical.

Tomas rolled his head to the aspect and fell asleep virtually immediately. I regarded out the window and for the primary time felt a surge of vitality. Every little thing in regards to the metropolis was completely different from London. The colors had been brighter, the faces friendlier, the air thick with a heat fully international to me. I forgot I used to be in a race and easily sat and loved the view.

I watched because the streets narrowed and crowds of automobiles thinned. Abruptly, we pulled over in entrance of a shabby memento store and the driving force obtained out.

He opened my door, “You store.”

“No, sorry we do not need any souvenirs, we have to get to the terminus,” I stated. “Tomas get up, assist me.”

Tomas was truly smiling. “That is regular, they do it to get some kind of fee from the store homeowners. We simply should browse round after which we are able to depart. It will solely take 5 minutes.”

Reluctantly we walked by way of the store. There was a musty scent and I doubted the store proprietor had purchased something new for his storefront previously 5 years.

There have been tiny ants crawling over the hanging shirts, bins of fusty scarves and collectible figurines caked with mud. I could not see a factor I needed to purchase.

After a couple of lengthy minutes we walked out. “Okay, we have now to get to the practice station now,” I stated to the driving force. He obtained again into his cab with out saying a factor. He regarded upset.

“Possibly we should always have purchased a keychain,” Tomas whispered.

I had a nasty feeling. The cab driver was turning down so many small streets and making too many U-turns. I did not know the place we had been headed however I assumed possibly Tomas was proper.

We obtained right into a heavy little bit of site visitors and our cab stopped lifeless for a strong twelve minutes. There will need to have been an accident forward as a result of folks had been strolling out of their cabs and thru the streets.

“Terminus simply forward. You get out right here. This avenue. There,” he stated pointing ahead.

We each obtained out of the cab, paid our fare, and walked down the road within the route he motioned. At first we had been relieved he allow us to stroll, however as quickly as we realized that nothing resembling a practice station was in sight, we began to fret.

“Excuse me, the place is the practice terminus?” Tomas requested a neighborhood close by.

After a couple of head shakes and shoulder shrugs, and even a girl who needed to take images of us together with her daughter, we lastly obtained a response. “Oh very far. That means,” she stated, pointing within the route we got here.

Only for good measure, we requested another person. “You could take taxi, half hour.”

I used to be past irritated. We hailed one other cab and obtained into the again seat. We sat in silence because it putted in direction of the terminus, jammed in perpetual gridlock.

“Uh, I feel we’re headed again to the airport, mate,” stated Tomas after we would been sitting behind the cab for what appeared like ages.

In fact, he was proper. I began to acknowledge a number of the buildings and streets exterior from after we left the airport, and I used to be stabbed with panic.

“We’ll Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus practice station proper?” I requested.

“No practice. Airport, sure,” stated the driving force.

“No, not the airport, we wish to go to the practice station!” I yelled furiously.

“Okay, okay.” In an abrupt swoop he looped round into site visitors so we had been headed again the best way we got here.

“Jesus!” I stated, after having a gentle coronary heart assault.

“Take three,” Tomas stated calmly.

XII

I could not inform you how lengthy it took to get again to the very same spot the place we sat in site visitors the primary time, even with our insane taxi driver. He weaved by way of bikes, automobiles and scooters with out ever shifting his head. His rear view mirrors had been folded into the automobile and he did not appear to make any full stops. It was a nauseating experience to the practice station, and as quickly as we might see the huge constructing forward of us we made our means on foot.

The second we stepped contained in the constructing I used to be met with little aid from the chaos. It regarded as if there have been extra folks in that station than the whole inhabitants of London. Discovering the small monument felt unimaginable. I did not fairly know the place to start.

After our expertise with the cab drivers we did not actually belief anybody’s recommendation when it got here to instructions, so we went in search of the monument on our personal, choosing a route at random.

After operating across the station for what appeared like a lifetime, we lastly gave up being unbiased and requested everybody we might the place it was, however nobody knew what we had been speaking about.

There was quite a lot of swearing, quite a lot of circling, however lastly we discovered the plaque.

Now what?

It was only a signal on the wall. Tomas tapped it, half anticipating it to spring again like one thing in an Indiana Jones movie, however nothing occurred.

“Possibly we should always ask her,” I stated, gesturing in direction of a woman on the makeshift data desk behind us.

And so we waited within the queue.

I seen the lady behind the counter regarded chilly and stern, with skinny lips and coarse black hair slicked tightly again in a knot. Every buyer who walked away from her desk regarded extra sad than the final. She was a brick wall of unresponsiveness, unwilling to supply returns or refunds and pointing to different strains and repair representatives for data she refused to share. That is pointless, I assumed.

Then it was my flip. Virtually instantly it was as if a masks was lifted from her face.

“Phil,” the lady behind the counter stated, the mild tone she spoke with appeared like a ventriloquist trick. “Glad to see you. I am Parvati.”

“I am guessing you already know my grandpa, however how do you know who I’m?” I requested, realizing it was the identical for Karim again in Egypt.

“You are fairly simple to identify,” she stated. And with my peak and ginger hair she was proper, I used to be attracting fairly a couple of stares.

She handed me an envelope. “Sorry I am unable to chat, there is a queue,” she stated, nodding to the folks ready behind me. “However good luck.”

I squeezed away from the knowledge counter and ripped open the envelope. Inside was a boarding go to Calcutta. It was set to depart at 5:05pm.

“One step nearer, mate,” stated Tomas, “Solely 60 hours to go!”

XIII

“Sirs, Sirs, please,” known as out a person on the practice station as we had been set to go away. “Want you for Bollywood film. Good-looking boys such as you, excellent. We pay!” He grabbed my arm and began pulling me within the different route. I had a flashback to the guard in Egypt and shuddered.

“No thanks,” I stated, instinctively. Tomas on the opposite had began asking him questions.

“What sort of movie?” he requested first.

“Huge film, very highly regarded. Meet massive Bollywood stars,” the person stated.

“We do not have a lot time, can we do it shortly?” he requested.

“Sure very quick, very shut. One hour, very quick. We pay 500 rupees.”

“Why not?” Tomas stated, grinning at me for a solution.

“Why not? Are you severe?” I stated, “We do not know this man, what if he steals our cash and drives us within the unsuitable route?” I ask, bewildered by Tomas’ pleasure.

Tomas was having none of it, “We have seen some shady characters to date, however they don’t seem to be all dangerous. Simply have some enjoyable, it’s going to be a great story for after we get again. And we have now heaps of time.”

I knew I would not win this one, so we adopted the person out of the station and into yet one more taxi.

I had a couple of stabs of worry when the cab experience lasted longer than half an hour, however my nerves calmed down after I acknowledged a number of the identical buildings close to the airport. From what I gathered we had been solely ten minutes away from our aircraft if we wanted a fast getaway.

As quickly as we walked into the airport Hyatt Lodge, the place the film was being filmed, we acquired VIP passes and had been each ushered right into a room with a buffet desk. I did not notice till that second how hungry I used to be for non-packaged meals.

We stuffed our faces with crispy samosas and sizzling curries, abugobi and dahl, alongside different dishes I could not pronounce. Every little thing was scrumptious, I virtually obtained full from simply their scent. It was a full twenty minutes earlier than we began questioning why nobody had come again to get us. I used to be deliberating whether or not to seize yet one more samosa and inform Tomas we’re heading to the airport when our new “supervisor”, the person from the station, swiftly led us into the dressing rooms.

There have been racks of clothes arrange in outlandishly vibrant colors and ladies able to do our hair and make-up. Tomas and I had been pulled in reverse instructions, he to garments, I to make-up.

I sat down in a chair with my again to the mirror.

The lady grabbed a chunk of what regarded like dental floss and got here in direction of my face. Earlier than I might ask what she was doing there was a pointy ache between my eyes, as if I would been jabbed within the nostril. I instantly began tearing up.

“Bloody hell! What’s that?” I screamed.

“Eyebrows,” she stated, wanting unhappy and shocked.

“No eyebrows,” I stated. I by no means thought I would should say that in my life. Tomas was laughing at me, however he did not look too significantly better.

He had stepped into some vibrant orange pants and was slipping an extended dress-like robe over his head.

She labored on my face after which whipped me round to indicate me the completed product. She’d darkened my eyebrows, someway lightened my already translucent pores and skin, added eyeliner and glued a gem to my brow.

“Ravishing,” I stated sarcastically, however she had no clue what I meant.

We had been bustled round for one more whereas, then we watched as one other group of younger vacationers got here in and obtained all dolled up for the scene.

“So what do we have now to do?” I requested Tomas, “We do not even know what kind of film that is, what if it is an grownup movie?”

“Come on, that is India. Have not you ever seen a Bollywood film?”

We came upon from the others that they’d come right here by alternative, it was a kind of bundle tour for vacationers. And after chatting with everybody within the room, which was a grand complete of 5, I used to be getting antsy.

“We higher depart,” I advised Tomas, “We do not have time to movie, it is already been ages.” However as issues at all times do, that was simply the second we had been escorted onto the set.

Within the scene we had been purported to be at a marriage and we had been divided into teams to study a number of the choreography. We needed to step proper, leap left with lotus arms, clap — one thing like that. I regarded like an fool, however Tomas was choosing it up like a champ. They even gave him a line within the film and put him within the entrance row of the dance quantity.

I might inform this was some kind of secret want Tomas had, however I did not wish to tease him about it whereas he regarded so ridiculous in his outfit, I figured I would wait till we had been on the aircraft.

The aircraft! What time is it?! I assumed. There weren’t any clocks round and I wasn’t allowed my telephone on set.

I walked over to the bin the place the telephones had been held and checked the time, 4:35pm.

What!

Tomas was on display screen, saying his line, after I ran over and grabbed him.

“We have to depart now!”

He did not want a proof.

With everybody calling after us, we stripped our garments off, shortly wearing our personal, and ran out of the lodge.

“Airport, Please,” we each stated after we sat contained in the cab. “Hurry.”

We had 14 minutes to get on our aircraft.

XIV

I ran to the airport monitor right away to see if our flight took off already.

There, the phrase “delayed” gleamed angelically subsequent to our flight quantity. It was delayed by half an hour.

It was a bloody miracle.

One thing got here alive within me, a newfound confidence, a confidence that Pop’s could be happy with. I grabbed Tomas and pulled him in direction of the IndiGo Airline check-in space.

We obtained to our gate after they had been calling the ultimate boarding and walked straight onto the aircraft. I used to be ecstatic that we had made it aboard, however someway knew we might all alongside. As mad as I used to be at myself for dropping observe of time, I could not assist however really feel the frenzy of attending to the aircraft simply in time. It virtually appeared as if the aircraft was ready only for us the entire time.

XV

Not lengthy after the seatbelt signal flickered off, one of many airline stewardesses approached me and stated, “The pilot wish to converse with you within the galley. Please comply with me.”

As quickly as I noticed the pilot, who regarded as if he ought to have retired years in the past, I used to be met with an enthusiastic roar.

“Phileas Foxx,” he introduced in a raspy voice match for radio, “I used to be beginning to assume you’d by no means make it on the aircraft. I needed to take an additional jiffy smoking my pipe to delay the flight.”

“You held up the aircraft?” I requested.

“In fact, I am betting on you! Fairly the chunk of change too,” the outdated man stated candidly. “Not everybody can stall a aircraft for you, you already know. It is best to try to be extra punctual.” The person laughed, which shortly was a hole cough.

He launched himself as Jasper and we chatted for fairly some time about how he knew Pops. Apparently my Pops had been making bets lengthy earlier than I used to be born.

“We almost misplaced all of it again in ’72, do not inform Gloria!” the person stated.

Gloria? It was odd to listen to Gran’s title like that, it made her appear much less like grandma.

Apparently he and Pops labored collectively at British Airways.

“However what are you doing flying this little aircraft all the best way in India?” I requested.

“British Airways is for younger pilots, nobody desires an outdated man flying a aircraft. Properly, nobody besides IndiGo, bless ’em,” he stated wanting as much as the roof of the aircraft.

“Why are you continue to flying? Pops retired years in the past,” I requested, I wasn’t certain the place my curiosity was coming from.

“Flying is not only a job, boy, it is your life. If it weren’t for flying, I, I…” he trailed off into silence. He sounded precisely like Pops when he talked about flying.

“However wait, should you’re right here speaking to me, who’s flying the aircraft?” I requested, realizing how lengthy we would been talking.

“Ah sure, my co-pilot will likely be questioning the place I’m, I higher head off. It was a pleasure to fulfill you, son. You appear to be a great child. Oh, and bear in mind, my cash is on you for the win.” he stated with a wink, handing over the subsequent clue.

I accepted the envelope however wasn’t capable of say a lot as a thanks earlier than I used to be ushered again to my seat by one of many flight attendants. The seatbelt signal had turned again on.

XVI

I opened the envelope to discover a {photograph} of Pops when he was simply beginning out as a pilot. It regarded as if he was in an Asian airport someplace, along with his arm wrapped across the shoulder of a younger man with an airline title tag that learn ‘Yu Lin.’

I flipped the photograph over and on the again there have been two small Chinese language symbols.

I felt my ears pop and I knew we had been descending.

As soon as the aircraft landed Tomas and I took seats in the primary terminal and Tomas switched on his telephone to translate the clue.

香港

“Properly that is fairly obscure now is not it?” he stated when he noticed the interpretation.

However I wasn’t paying consideration. I switched on my telephone and noticed that I had twenty three messages and ten voicemails. One thing was unsuitable.

It solely takes an instantaneous for panic to smother all of the senses, and in that second I used to be gone. I used to be reminded of my outdated nightmares, after I first moved in with Gran and Pops when my Gran obtained sick. I’d fall asleep each night time afraid she’d depart us. The worry gripped my torso, squeezing me like a tube of toothpaste till tears got here spilling out of my eyes. “She will be able to’t go,” I would mutter in my sleep, and I would get up counting the seconds till my coronary heart caught up with my thoughts and discovered it was all only a dream.

A telephone name from my mum got here virtually immediately.

“What’s unsuitable, what’s occurred?” I requested, fearing the worst.

Her voice was shattered, I knew she was attempting exhausting to carry again the tears.

“The place on the earth are you? We have been attempting to succeed in you for hours?”

“Don’t fret mum, every little thing is okay.”

“No sweetie,” she stated by way of her tears, “It is Not. It is Pops. He had a coronary heart assault.”

I sat speechless, feeling my very own coronary heart had stopped.

“What? Why? How? What occurred? Is he okay?”

“He is gone, love…” She saved speaking however these are the one phrases I heard.

He is gone.

The clock stopped. The countdown ended. I misplaced management of my arms, legs and fingers and simply let the tidal wave of feeling take me over.

I needed mum and Gran to be with me so I might maintain them and say it was going to be okay. I needed to inform somebody it was all proper, however I could not say it in my very own thoughts. It wasn’t okay. It bloody properly wasn’t all proper that Pops was gone. He could not have achieved this to me, not now.

Tomas was speaking, taking a look at me for solutions, however I used to be having bother getting air into my lungs. I might solely absorb actually quick breaths. The room was spinning and my imaginative and prescient was hazy. I feel I used to be having a panic assault. I do not bear in mind ever feeling that means in my complete life.

I should not have left him. I should not have taken the silly wager within the first place. I felt all my unhappiness, ache, disgrace and guilt all blended up into one. Swallowing was a shot that burned on the best way down.

“I must go house,” I managed to say. “The silly race is over.”

Tomas grabbed my telephone. I would forgotten about my mum whereas I used to be having a psychological collapse. He spoke together with her for a minute about what occurred and defined the place we had been and what we had been doing.

In that second there was nothing round me that I might cling onto. Seconds and phrases and the folks round me slipped by and I could not grasp any of them tightly sufficient to comply with them ahead in time. I used to be caught previously. Caught listening to phrases in my thoughts I would heard earlier than. Mum’s “He is gone” Pop’s “Let’s make a wager.” I could not cease listening to them in my head.

“Sorry, I am so sorry.” I wasn’t certain if it was my very own ideas or not. It turned out to be Tomas repeating the phrases.

“We’ll should go house,” I stated.

“Completely, no matter you need, sit down, I am going to get you a glass of water.” Tomas walked over to the water fountain and filled-up his crinkled bottle.

He gave me some time to catch my breath, however then he stated, “I do know you wish to be again house with your loved ones proper now, however I feel we should always preserve going.”

Seeing my eyes widen, he continued, “Hear me out. Your Pops needed you to journey greater than something, it was a very powerful factor for him. He was in all probability blissful he lived to see you fly to a different nation, regardless of every little thing. In the event you depart now, each time you look again on this journey you may really feel that very same feeling you do now, you may hate your self for ever leaving as a result of it was all for nothing. In the event you preserve going, and we make it again in 80 hours, each time you assume again on this journey you may really feel a way of satisfaction understanding that you simply fulfilled his final want.”

I imagined myself at house and Tomas was proper, I would not really feel any higher. If ending this 80-hour wager would assist me eliminate a few of this guilt it was the one choice that made sense. I’d do it for Pops, or the reminiscence of him. I could not let him down.

XVII

By the point we checked in and handed by way of safety it was already time to board.

I wasn’t simply drained from the day in India I used to be drained from feeling a lot. I wanted to go away my thoughts and ache behind, so I took a sleep help Tomas had with him and fell into an induced nap.

One of many strongest and most vivid recollections I’ve of the entire journey was my dream on that aircraft. It was not a lot what I noticed or what was stated within the dream, however it was the sensation I had after I awakened. I felt hope.

In my dream I used to be again at house within the den. Pops was there sitting in his chair, wanting precisely as I remembered him, however I knew he was lifeless. Not as a result of he regarded lifeless however as a result of one thing within me had already accepted his passing.

I watched him learn his guide and he seen me are available in. “Again so quickly,” he stated, upset.

“I could not —” I began, however I wasn’t capable of end the sentence. Pops returned his eyes to the pages of his guide and we simply sat collectively within the den with out talking. I saved pondering how alive and properly he regarded for somebody who simply died.

In my dream it made sense to just accept his dying. It appeared so illogical, I questioned, in my oddly lucid dream, why folks get so upset about dying within the first place.

Once I awakened, for one lagging second I felt the identical might apply in actual life. I assumed for the briefest second, It is okay that he is gone, as a result of I can nonetheless see him and converse with him as I at all times have. After which I noticed, that is not how issues work. He is gone — his cheery face, his toothy smile, his crackling voice, his adventurous life, it is all extinguished. And that is after I actually misplaced it.

“He is gone, it is all my fault,” I whimpered, attempting to maintain quiet, however it damage rather less to cry loudly, so I did.

Everybody round me stared at me with disgust. Crying infants had been acceptable however for some Godforsaken cause, I used to be not. Tomas helped me to the washroom, then the galley, however after fifteen minutes I used to be advised by a flight attendant that I used to be upsetting the passengers.

“We’re very sorry in your loss Mr. Foxx, however the passengers are disturbed. If you cannot comprise your self till we land we’ll should take emergency measures.”

I could not pull it collectively, I did not even have the guts to strive. “He is gone. It is over.”

After a number of extra makes an attempt to pacify me, nothing labored. Tomas was politely advised that the aircraft could be making an emergency cease in Guilin the place we might be requested to disembark.

And that solely made me really feel worse.

XVIII

It was 5:30 within the morning in Guilin after we had been “kindly escorted” from the aircraft. I felt like such an imbecile.

Every little thing was closed. The airport was fully abandoned and we had no strategy to get to Hong Kong. What had I achieved?

We sat in silence till the kiosks opened round 6am. I used to be grateful for the quiet. Tomas by no means even talked about us getting kicked off the flight, nor me blowing this complete factor. That in itself, made me really feel just a little higher.

The subsequent out there flight to Hong Kong left at 6:00 that night. However we needed to get to Hong Kong earlier than 3:30pm to catch our subsequent flight to Tokyo, so we wanted to seek out one other means.

“There must be one thing earlier,” reasoned Tomas.

“There is a struggle at 7:45 this morning and one other at 11:30, however they’re fully booked. I can put you on standby, however there isn’t any assure,” defined the clerk.

“Sure, please do this,” I stated handing over my bank card. However after a second the person behind the counter handed it again to me and stated, “I am sorry, sir, however it’s been declined.” I did some fast calculations and though I would spent some cash, I used to be nowhere close to my restrict.

“Did you inform your financial institution you had been leaving?” Tomas requested me.

“No, ought to I’ve? It was kind of a spur of the second factor, should you do not recall.”

“Yeah, however you have in all probability set off a fraud alert as a result of they know you by no means journey wherever,” Tomas smirked, “I am certain it is exhausting to imagine we paid for one factor in India and one other in China all throughout the identical day.”

“Nevertheless it’s no massive deal,” continued Tomas, “We’ll simply use my card.” And he handed over his flashy Platinum Visa.

There wasn’t a lot we might do however wait. So we sat down on the sterile airport restaurant and had a warm-ish meal.

“Virtually on the half means mark,” I stated. And Tomas simply smiled. “Do they often kick folks off planes for crying?” I requested quietly.

“Not often, in any other case infants could be banned, however I’ve heard of it taking place as soon as earlier than.”

Nice. I questioned if Pops would have been upset or if he’d chortle. I feel he would have laughed. I am certain he was excited to listen to all of the tales of my journey. I felt a tug in my throat.

7:45 am got here and went. We did not make the primary flight. At 11 the subsequent aircraft started boarding, and at 11:17, simply after I’d given up hope, we heard the candy sound of our names on the intercom. We boarded the aircraft inside minutes and took our seats.

I used to be lastly feeling hopeful. The worst is over, I assumed. However boy was I unsuitable.

XIX

We arrived in Hong Kong at 1pm. Simply as we disembarked the aircraft I noticed — the clue!

“What was the clue, what did it say?” I requested.

“It simply stated Hong Kong.” revealed Tomas.

“What is the level of that?” I requested. “What a waste of a clue, what a waste of my time.” With a sudden surge of anger I kicked the closest bench.

“Phil don’t do that to your self. That photograph of your Grandpa with the opposite pilot should be a part of the clue too. There’s somebody named Yu Lin ready right here for you, I do know it. We simply have to seek out him. You simply should calm down and belief, like your grandfather needed you to.”

“I have been hit by a automobile, kicked off a aircraft and my grandfather simply died! How am I meant to calm down? This was such a mistake.”

“Do you wish to flip again?” He requested, defeated. The pity in his voice was new to me, I’ve by no means identified him to ever surrender.

“No. Let’s get our subsequent ticket, we’re midway there.” I used to be decided to complete this, even when it price me every little thing.

XX

On the ticket counter for Japan Airways there was a ticket ready for me, to San Francisco, California with a stopover in Japan.

“Oh, sorry. No extra ticket,” stated the lady behind the ticket sales space to Tomas. He had tried to get himself a ticket for a similar flight, however apparently it was full.

“You will should go by yourself, mate,” Tomas stated, taking a look at me with concern.

“There aren’t any different flights?” I requested the lady, who regarded blankly again at me.

“NO OTHER FLIGHTS?” I slowly repeated to her, attempting to masks my annoyance.

At that second a person walked up and stated one thing to her in Mandarin. Judging by her response, he was her superior. The person regarded a lot older, however it was not due to wrinkled pores and skin or greying black hair, it was due to his sensible eyes that regarded proper into me. It took me a second to comprehend this was one other certainly one of Pop’s mates.

“Phil,” he stated in good, unbroken English. “I perceive you are upset and I do not blame you. I am Yu Lin, and I wish to assist. Your grandfather was a superb man and an expensive buddy of mine.”

“You are the one from the photograph” I stated, cooling my mood. I took out the photograph and confirmed the person.

“Wow, this was almost thirty years in the past,” he stated, nostalgic. “It is good to see us again in our prime.”

“I wasn’t certain I would see you right here after what… occurred. I am so sorry.” Yu Lin stated, placing the photograph again down on the counter for me to take. He waited a beat after which stated, “However I feel your grandfather could be very proud. He needed to see you fly greater than something.”

He checked the system and punched a couple of keys, “I am upgrading you to first-class, which is able to open up a seat in coach in your buddy. Listed below are your boarding passes.”

“Thanks,” I stated, feeling guilt over my rudeness only a second in the past. “I actually recognize it.”

We had been about to go away when he stated, “Do not you want your subsequent clue?” He disappeared for a couple of minutes and returned with two passes to a VIP lounge in San Francisco.

“That is our clue? It appears extra like a present,” stated Tomas.

“Properly it is each, I feel you may take pleasure in it,” he stated, “you have earned it.”

I felt higher understanding that I had assist from this man whom Pops known as a buddy. It was an indication, letting me know persevering with on was the appropriate alternative.

XXI

We boarded the aircraft and as I took my seat in first-class Tomas continued to the again till he disappeared behind the scenes.

Earlier than we would even taken off I used to be given a heat towel for my face and a drink. For the primary time for the reason that complete journey started I began to agree with the best way Pops at all times described flying. It was luxurious, thrilling and I needed to admit, satisfying.

The minutes ticked by and the aircraft sat nonetheless. Ten, fifteen, twenty. I used to be having fun with the peace and quiet at first, however I used to be getting just a little unnerved. Then the pilot introduced that there was an issue with the engine and we would all should disembark and get onto one other aircraft. Why cannot I catch a break!

After slowly filling up the subsequent aircraft, I took my seat close to the entrance once more. A number of the novelty of first-class had worn off and earlier than we would even taken off I used to be anxious to reach in Tokyo.

After the delay I used to be hyper-aware of how a lot time there was left. I had lower than 33 hours to get house…if we had this a lot bother to date, what would occur subsequent?

XXII

“How was first?” requested Tomas as soon as we met up after the flight.

“Pretty much as good as flying can get until you are within the cockpit” I stated. “It will be exhausting to return to teach.”

“Properly I am glad to see you are feeling higher. I will not lie, I am fairly exhausted from all of the flying myself.”

“Good, so it isn’t simply me,” I stated, and we each laughed.

We saved laughing as we waited in line for safety. It was nervous laughter, from being so exhausted, however it felt good to let go.

I lay my backpack on the conveyor to get x-rayed and walked by way of the physique scanner. The purple gentle flashed. An older Asian lady rapidly checked my physique with a handheld steel detector, and though I used to be certain it did not beep I used to be ushered right into a aspect room for “extra examine” as she defined.

As quickly because the door to the closet-like room closed, the lady’s severe expression vanished and he or she wrapped her arms round me, crushing me in a hug.

“I am so sorry in your loss,” she stated. “So so sorry.”

“Thanks?” I stated greatly surprised.

“I am your grandfather’s buddy Kayo. I’ve identified him for a very long time. He was one of many nicest males I’ve ever met.”

“Yeah, he was,” I stated, holding myself again from breaking down.

It appeared prefer it was already too late for Kayo. Her eyes had been watering and he or she began rambling about late night time espresso and the way they’d get so caught up speaking he’d almost miss his aircraft.

“I in all probability should not be telling you all this,” she stated.

“No it is nice,” I stated. “Practically lacking his aircraft, sounds a bit like me, truly.”

“I am certain you are very alike. He talked about you in all our letters.”

I obtained an oddly intimate vibe from Kayo, and though I am certain they had been solely collectively previously, I felt like someway, being there together with her and never Gran was a kind of betrayal. I felt my coronary heart quicken, I used to be panicking once more…

“Phil, I used to be requested to get this to you, it is your ticket to London. It is simply in regards to the final aircraft you’ll be able to take that can get you again in time. Do not lose this ticket and be sure you’re on that aircraft.”

“However what if I am unable to get again in time?” I stated, spiralling uncontrolled, “What if I left everybody — I left Pops — for nothing. What if I might have helped Pops, possibly even saved him, if I had been house.”

“Do not get caught up with ‘what ifs’” she stated, hugging me once more, “They make you are concerned for nothing.”

“Pops used to say one thing like that,” I stated.

“Sure, he used to say it on a regular basis, bit annoying I assumed. However he was proper,” she stated extra to herself than me. “He died a cheerful man, I am certain,” and her eyes started to swell once more.

Although listening to the phrase “died” was a blow, by assembly Kayo I someway felt nearer to Pops. With every individual I met I started to see simply what number of lives Pops touched and I understood the person he was earlier than I even got here alongside.

If I might simply be extra like Pops, possibly I would truly be capable of make it again on time. I wanted to cease doubting myself, or to make use of his phrases, I wanted to “have just a little enjoyable”.

XXIII

Our time in Tokyo was truly fairly the chortle. We browsed the retailers, sampled some airport sashimi, and even posed for a couple of vacationer pics. However every time I caught myself smiling I felt responsible and instinctively mourned Pops once more.

“It’s a must to cease,” Tomas stated. “It’s a must to let your self have just a little enjoyable. It is the perfect factor.”

He was proper.

However the flight to San Francisco was exhausting to take pleasure in, or fake to take pleasure in. It was nothing just like the flight to Hong Kong, it was simply 9 hours in the identical cramped seat with nothing to do however assume.

I used to be ecstatic to the touch down in America — the final nation we would have to go to earlier than heading house. With simply lower than 20 hours to go I used to be lastly feeling optimistic about the entire thing. I wanted to get house to be with my household, and at last face life with out Pops.

As soon as Tomas and I had checked in to our flight to London it felt like issues had been foolproof — I might lastly calm down. We determined to do what most travellers do after an extended aircraft experience and an extended layover. Drink!

We walked as much as the Delta Airways Crown Room and confirmed our VIP lounge passes courtesy of Yu Lin. Once we obtained inside we felt barely misplaced with our smelly denims and backpacks. We hadn’t showered in days and we hadn’t even became the spare garments we had packed, in order that was the primary merchandise on our agenda.

Feeling marginally higher after a run to the john, we walked into the primary space of the lounge. The room was full of enterprise travellers, aside from one. There was a person who sat alone ingesting what regarded like whisky on the rocks. He had gray raveled hair and was carrying a horrible multi-coloured sweater, someway he regarded much more misplaced than we did. Naturally I knew he should be certainly one of Pop’s mates.

“Cornelius,” stated the person, extending his hand. “Be a part of me for a drink? My deal with,” he roared with laughter.

“In fact,” stated Tomas, mesmerized by the open bar.

The subsequent three hours handed in a blur. There have been champagne toasts to Pops, whisky pictures in his honour and we shared our tales of the person we cherished.

“After faculty, after I moved in with Pops and Gran, I could not sleep for the primary month. Pops snored from 9:00 at night time till 6:00 within the morning, I did not understand how Gran might stand it, so one morning I requested her, and are you aware what she stated?”

“What?” requested Tomas.

“Precisely! She’s as deaf as a doorknob! With out her listening to help she will be able to’t hear a factor!”

And all of us laughed and poured one other spherical of drinks.

“I knew William after we had been younger lads, properly earlier than your time. He was my first buddy,” began Cornelius, “We grew up proper subsequent to one another. We used to stroll to high school collectively proper by the practice tracks and noticed the practice go each night on our stroll house. Sooner or later, your granddad determined to experience the practice house — by leaping onto it. He ran up and grabbed maintain of the rails because it handed and he rode all of it the best way to his home. Right here I used to be pondering the man was a genius, hitching himself a experience almost to his entrance door, however when it was time to leap off he let go and began barrel rolling off into the rocks. I could not cease laughing. He advised his mum he fell off his bike. The very best half was, she did not say a factor though his bike was within the driveway that complete day.”

And we shared one other drink. “To Pops, the barmy aircraft flying, practice leaping, child.” Cornelius slurred.

“Alright, my flip,” stated Tomas. “Now it might not be pretty much as good as your tales, however the first time I met your Pops he was sitting in his armchair studying. I did not assume he seen me, however then he stated, out of nowhere, “you are the one who likes to journey, proper boy?” and we spent the subsequent half hour discussing all of the locations we would seen all over the world. He is truly the explanation I visited Morocco, he stated it was certainly one of his favorite locations to observe the world go by.”

The tales saved coming and so did the liquor.

The subsequent factor I remembered I used to be waking up on a bench exterior the lounge with throbbing temples and a dryness in my mouth.

The place am I?

I checked my telephone — 7:25 within the night. No, this cannot be proper.

Simply to make sure, I rushed by way of the airport, forcing myself ahead by way of the fogginess in my head. I obtained to the gate and certain sufficient, it was empty.

Our flight had left with out us.

XXVI

I felt an invisible fist seize maintain of my intestines and twist. I used to be alone on the opposite aspect of the world with no cash and no clue how one can get again. The place was Tomas? And the way might I’ve messed this one up?

I watched one other aircraft took off from the fuel-stained runway. I used to be in complete disbelief. We had simply used up the final of our probabilities — our last ‘get out of jail free card’.

I needed to discover Tomas.

By lacking the flight to New York we might additionally miss the connecting flight to London, certainly. There have been 14 and a half hours left, however it was a 13 hour flight again to London. How did this occur!? I attempted to focus, however my thoughts was clean.

I went again to the lounge to try to kind all of it out.

“I am sorry, your lounge go is a one time solely use earlier than your departure, I am unable to enable you again inside,” defined the lady I initially handed my lounge ticket to.

“You do not perceive, I simply want to seek out my buddy, I am undecided the place he’s. My title’s Phil Foxx, do you assume you could possibly name out for him in there, say I am out right here ready for him?”

“Umm sir, you and your buddy left the lounge collectively virtually an hour in the past. Judging out of your situation, you had been probably restricted from boarding the aircraft.”

“Restricted, why?”

“You aren’t allowed to fly whereas intoxicated.” She said distastefully, “Now I am sorry however you’ll be able to’t keep right here Mr. Foxx.”

I rotated, able to stroll off, after I almost collided with a person standing behind me.

“Phil,” stated the person, “How’s the race all over the world going?”

“Come once more?” I stated earlier than vaguely recognizing his face.

Is it one other of grandpa’s mates? Did I meet him after we had been ingesting?

Then it hit me. I would seen him from pictures and articles within the information. He was some crazy-smart engineer, certainly one of America’s wealthiest.

“Whoa, you are the true life Iron Man man,” I stated. Clearly, nonetheless drunk.

“Haha, not fairly. I am Elon Musk, I examine your little journey on Hacker Information. I truly wager fairly a bit of cash on you, so that you higher make it again,” he joked.

“Properly, we have simply missed our flight to New York and I’ve misplaced my mate, so it does not look promising.” I admitted.

He checked his watch, and took out his telephone, “In the event you discover your buddy within the subsequent couple of minutes, I’d have the option that will help you.”

XXV

Come on Tomas, the place are you?

I would left Elon ready by the lounge promising to be again in lower than 5 minutes as I raced by way of the airport to seek out Tomas.

He wasn’t by the gate or within the washroom or the retailers. I went to data and begged them to name out his title on the loudspeaker. They stated it was for emergencies solely.

In a second of half-drunken liquid confidence, I held down the loudspeaker button and screamed out “Tomassssss, come to informa–“, earlier than they angrily lunged for the microphone. Simply as I used to be speeding away, the little baby-faced rascal got here sprinting across the nook.

“Thank God, Tomas, come on!” And we raced again to the lounge.

“Bloody hell, it is Elon Musk!” Tomas stated because the lounge got here into view.

“Alright boys, it is all labored out,” the billionaire stated as quickly as we had been again in earshot. “Sorry I will not be capable of fly with you,” he stated taking a look at his watch “I’ve obtained to fulfill somebody, however by the point you get to the airport the aircraft will likely be able to take off.”

“Wait, what airport? We’re on the airport.” I requested.

“It’s a must to head to Palo Alto, the place my non-public jet is fuelling up.” he stated.

XXVI

There was a driver ready for us exterior the terminal, able to take us to Palo Alto Airport simply twenty minutes away.

It might have been the lingering results of the alcohol, or the truth that we had been headed to a billionaire’s non-public jet, however for the primary time, I used to be genuinely blissful to be on the transfer.

Once we arrived on the small airport twenty-three minutes later and stepped onto Elon’s aircraft, I used to be in full shock. His aircraft made first-class flying appear to be driving in a Campbell’s soup can. Tomas and I every ran for the plump silk sofa. I threw one of many stiff ornamental pillows at Tomas, hitting him sq. within the head.

“Properly you appear to be proper at house,” Tomas smirked, rubbing his head. “You look nothing such as you did in your first flight.”

The aircraft began racing down the runway.

“I’ve come to love flying, truly,” I stated. “I hardly really feel my ears pop anymore.”

And Tomas simply smiled.

The jet took off lower than an hour later than the flight we had been initially going to take. We had been up within the air headed to New York with nonetheless some hope of constructing our connection.

It was meant to take 5 and a half hours to get to New York, however the experience felt like a fast drive to the grocery retailer. The pilot advised us that we might arrive at Newark airport thirty minutes forward of schedule.

The information was each reassuring and alarming.

“Newark?” I requested, “Is that one other title for the JFK airport?”

“We are able to solely land at Newark. Mr. Musk wasn’t capable of reserve a spot at JFK on such quick discover.”

“Newark is barely a 40 minute drive away from JFK, and right now of day the roads needs to be empty,” clarified Tomas. “Don’t fret, simply benefit from the flight.”

I did not reply.

XXVII

We landed in Newark simply ten minutes after our authentic aircraft landed at JFK. There was an hour and a half earlier than our last aircraft to London. Tomas was proper, at almost 6 within the morning the roads had been nonetheless clear.

“Thanks a lot,” we each stated as we left the automobile after we arrived at JFK. “I am going to pay Mr. Musk again, I swear. Ship him our thanks!” I stated simply earlier than shutting the automobile door and operating into the airport.

“Right here it’s,” stated Tomas. “the final aircraft we’ll should fly earlier than getting house.”

“Stop it, you may jinx it,” I joked.

We obtained to the Virgin Atlantic Airways counter and confirmed our connecting tickets. We had been allowed to go by way of and had been even given precedence check-in.

As we sat by the gate, ready for our subsequent and last flight, nothing occurred. We barely spoke to one another, scared that if we did one thing, something, we would slip up and miss the aircraft. When it got here time to board my passport did not set off any alarms, I did not fall over drunk, and we merely walked on the aircraft and took our seats.

There was no turbulence, no coronary heart to coronary heart with the pilot. No extra clues. No extra countdown. It was almost by way of.

“Have you considered what you may do after we’re again in London,” requested Tomas.

“I am going to in all probability simply stick with Gran for some time, she’ll want me to assist out at house as a lot as I can.”

“I meant in regards to the £2,000,000, have you ever forgotten about it? Do you assume you may nonetheless get it?”

“I doubt it, I did not inform anybody in regards to the journey and I do not assume Pops did both, all of our bets had been at all times simply between the 2 of us. Mum did not even know the place I used to be when she known as. It is in all probability the very last thing on folks’s minds proper now anyway.”

“Properly that is not solely true. The submit I wrote on Hacker Information continues to be on the primary web page and we’re getting floods of feedback each hour. Everybody desires to know should you’ll make it again in time, it looks like the entire world is betting on you.”

“That is precisely what Elon Musk stated, apparently he wager some huge cash we would make it house. And really, so did Jasper the pilot.”

The aircraft landed, we touched British soil, and I used to be so grateful simply to be house. It felt like I would been gone for ages. In actuality, I knew that issues would by no means be the identical as they had been earlier than.

Based on the pilot, it was 7:45pm and unseasonably chilly in London after we landed. I could not imagine it, there was nonetheless an opportunity I might make it earlier than the 80 hour mark. I used to be so shut.

With out checked baggage, Tomas and I squeezed our strategy to the entrance of the aircraft and ran the endless dash in direction of immigration and customs. Once we arrived, the road was minuscule, and we breezed by way of to the entrance.

“What was making your journey?” The immigration officer requested,

“Leisure,” I answered.

“Are you bringing something again with you? You have not declared any items.”

“Nothing to assert, we did not purchase a factor.”

He handed our passports again and we walked over to the customs desk.

Every little thing was stamped and regarded over for Tomas, they appeared a bit puzzled by our complete journey, however they let him go. Once I walked as much as customs my passport triggered some alarm.

“Excuse me for one second, wait right here,” stated the lady on the desk.

I waited for 5 lengthy minutes earlier than a middle-aged man got here as much as the kiosk. His gray hair and looking out eyes advised me it was one other certainly one of my grandfather’s mates earlier than he had an opportunity to.

“I am going to deal with it, open kiosk 7 and go the remainder of the passengers, please.” the person instructed, and he or she did as she was advised.

“Phil, I am glad to see you made it. I wasn’t certain I would see you right here, however your grandfather could be thrilled to know you made it again in time.”

“Properly, virtually, I nonetheless should get again house and meet him —” however I caught myself a second to late. It left my lips and we each regarded sadly at one another, sorry it occurred.

“I mean-” I started, however he interrupted me.

“Don’t fret about it. Right here, that is for you.”

He handed me a hand drawn sketch of the den, and by his armchair, in my grandfather’s neat handwriting, had been the phrases, “I will be ready for you, hurry house.”

I had tears in my eyes however I wasn’t going to let myself get overwhelmed once more. I thanked the person and left customs, with out even studying his title.

XXVIII

We ran by way of the arrivals gate, previous all the unfinished households ready for his or her lacking members. We obtained to the road up of taxis and managed to get one with out ready.

“We have to get to 7 Saville, Beckenham earlier than 8:40,” I advised the cab driver.

With out eager to, I checked the clock. It was 8:20. We solely had twenty minutes to get forty minutes throughout city.

After all over the place we travelled and after every little thing we did there was no means I used to be going to let 20 minutes beat me.

I advised the driving force I would pay him an additional £300 if he obtained me there in time.

The cabbie jumped on the bonus and we sped away from the airport. It virtually felt like we had been again in India the best way the cab driver was weaving by way of the streets. I could not see how briskly we had been going, however I might inform it wasn’t the pace restrict, and even shut.

8:35pm. I began to acknowledge the homes in our city. We had been nonetheless a couple of kilometres away however there was nonetheless an opportunity we might make it. We might truly make it! And simply as I had that thought, as if on cue, I noticed the purple and blue lights flash behind us.

“Oh Christ!” shouted Tomas.

“No, preserve going,” I screamed on the driver.

He began to sluggish, however I jumped at him, “We’ll pay your bloody rushing nice, simply preserve going!”

He stepped on the gasoline, however he slowed once more instantly.

“No, I’ve to cease, I am going to lose my license,” he stated, pulling to the aspect of the highway.

“I am unable to wait, Tomas,” I stated, already antsy to leap out of the cab. “I’ve obtained to get again, even when there’s nothing there I must know that I did it.”

“You are two and a half kilometres away from house, you higher run like hell,” he stated. “I am going to determine this out and meet you there.”

The automobile got here to a whole cease and I opened the door and rushed out. With my bag flapping towards my again and my chest tight, I sprinted by way of the streets and ran on in direction of my home.

I’ve by no means been a lot of a runner, however I entered some kind of a trance. Pushing towards the pavement, I used to be seconds away from the deadline.

Nothing would change whether or not I got here again at 8:45 or 8:40. There could be nobody ready in that chair. However for some cause I saved operating quicker.

I used to be too afraid to examine my telephone for the time.

There was one thing liberating about operating the ultimate stretch — I wasn’t ready for planes, I wasn’t getting led round in circles by taxi cabs. If I did not make it again it was as a result of my legs could not take me there quick sufficient. It might be no fault however my very own.

What if it is already too late? There is no means I can run all the best way house in lower than Three minutes. It must be previous 8.

No extra what ifs. Simply go! I advised myself as I ran, and I saved shifting ahead even quicker.

My legs had been wobbling, and every time I breathed it was a choking ache. I did not assume I’d make it again on the pace I used to be going however then I noticed the define of my home within the distance and I sprinted ahead all the best way to the driveway.

My legs almost gave out. I reached into my pocket to examine my telephone, I needed to know earlier than going inside.

The numbers on my display screen learn 8:39pm.

“Bloody unreliable cabbies”, I smirked to myself realizing his clock will need to have been off. And I raced up my entrance steps and thru the entrance door.

I might hear the noise as quickly as I walked inside my acquainted kitchen. It solely amplified as I walked by way of to the den.

The second I burst into the room there was a refrain of alarms. There, round grandpa’s empty armchair, stood my total household: aunts, uncles, cousins and all. Cell telephones, watches, wall clocks, every little thing was set to ring at precisely 8:40pm, March 4th.

I made it! I truly travelled all over the world in 80 hours.

XXIX

“I feel all of us wanted one thing to have fun,” stated Gran after I requested why she set the entire thing up. “Your grandfather would have achieved the identical.”

“Thanks, Gran,” I stated.

“I am happy with you, Phileas,” she continued. “And William was too. You are all he might discuss. It was about time you flew!”

“I do know, I am simply sorry the best way issues labored out,” I stated.

“Do not be sorry, we’re all blissful you are again and even happier you made it the entire means by way of, it was what he needed.”

I simply held her, there have been no phrases.

“Phil,” she stated after I pulled away, “he wrote you this,” and he or she handed me a examine, in Pops’ writing, for £2,000,000.

“No, I could not,” I protested.

“You earned it.” she stated.

And with that I would gained the wager. I used to be £2,000,000 richer. However standing there with Gran, with my household and Tomas blended in someplace within the crowded den, I felt richer than I might have ever imagined and it had little to do with the cash.

XXX – Epilogue

Mum, Gran and I stood subsequent to the casket and shook everybody’s arms.

“My condolences,” they’d say and I would nod my head.

The funeral corridor was jam-packed, and never simply any sort of jam-packed, however the form that upsets venue homeowners as a result of it is a fireplace hazard.

The primary face I acknowledged among the many crowd was Karim, the Egyptian cab driver. He checked out me and jerked his head, I feel it was his model of a nod. I noticed that he was talking with Kayo, the safety examine lady who hugged me in Japan, she was as pleasant as ever handing out hugs to everybody inside arm’s attain. I noticed the person from customs, who gave me the drawing from Pop, and Parvati from the Mumbai practice terminus. In fact I met Cornelius close to the bar with a whiskey in his hand and I noticed all of the others too. They had been all there, all his mates from the world over, and I could not assist wishing sometime my life would prove simply the identical.

I walked as much as Jasper, and requested him a query that had been on my thoughts since I returned house from my 80 hour journey. “So,” I stated, “What recommendation are you able to give to somebody who’d wish to turn out to be a pilot?”

TAGS: HOURSWorld

source http://cheaprtravels.com/around-the-world-in-80-hours/

[keystonewarrior]

Abhorrent Behavior

Mistakes happen and people who are responsible accept their role and try to fix them as best they can with the tools they have at hand.

But some people are horrible. They seem to think they have been personally attacked when things go wrong, and then they must take out their anger and frustration on people who are not at fault but are simply trying to fix things.

Tonight I observed a worker from the ESPN Zone at WDW heap abuse, scorn, and derision upon McDonald's staff over their order. It appeared they had ordered for the entire family, their ticket number was 701.

When I walked to the counter to place my order, this rude person was already distracting the expediter and other workers with their special needs. They wanted to make sure they got hot fries. Gee wiz, there is a double line of cars around the store and eight or more orders here in the lobby and I just added mine to the mix.

I'm pretty certain you're not going to get old, stale fries. The fries don't have a chance to get that way because they're boxed, bagged, and over the counter a minute after they come out of the fryer.

At least the bitter old person had the decency to come into the store. Some pills make obnoxious orders like that in the drive through.

Wiating for my own order, I watched this person's bags show up at the counter as they continues to hassle and harass the workers. One of the frozen blue drinks has a cracked, leaky cup. No problem really, transfer to a new cup.

But the rudeness is ongoing and escalating. The complainer probably tskd at least once, their tone sure said so. Their tone was also deliberately delivered in a way to increase the worker's anxiety. The complainer was speaking out loud as if to get suppport from other customers, but most of the faces I could see were shaking heads and rolling eyes at the rude behavior of the guest.

Cup fixed, hot fries bagged. We are sorry, there are no drink carriers, we are sorry*. We are sorry, there are no big bags, we are sorry*. Yes we can get you a box (I could see an empty fry box from where I was standing, listening to all this). We are sorry*, but we have no sweet and sour sauce for the mcnuggets, may we give you some other sauce?

This would appease most people, they would just take another kind of sauce, but not the rude, white whiner.

No sweet and sour sauce! The outrage! The mendacity! How dare you! They continued to be bitter and impolite and their tone was one of complete condescension. "I've been waiting thirty minutes..." Um, no, I've only been waiting ten minutes and you were just starting to hang over the counter to hassle the staff with your crumpled ticket about wanting hot fries when I started.

But the complainer was going to kick it up a notch. "They won't eat it without sweet and sour sauce, I'll have to call home" Now the complainer has two supervisors working to make things better, but at this point it is all in vain. Food is piled up in the pass through window because nobody else's orders are being filled while the whiner has their special needs attended to.

The complainer now begins to tread on thin ice, "I placed my order thirty minutes ago and only now are you telling me you have no sweet and sour sauce. I'm calling corporate. I work in food service too and this is unacceptable."

I work in food too. McDs and my restaurant have a disadvantage in that the public can see everything we are doing. ESPN Zone doesn't have that problem. Their kitchen and pass through window are concealed. The rude person probably said they were going to call corporate half a dozen times, no big bags, no cup caddies, and no sweet and sour sauce.

OMFG

Now they just want a refund. We are sorry, but if you get your money back you can't take the food. So now they are going to go to Wendy's and they are going to call corporate. They waited thirty minutes - no bags - no cup caddy - and no sweet and sour sauce - they waited that long and nobody told them right away that there was no sweet and sour sauce?

As if complaining and being obnoxious and threatening the workers and the supervisors is going to magically make all that stuff appear.

((oh, you caught us, we really did have all that stuff but we were holding out on you))

crap

*The ticket number was 701. This means the rude customer never interacted with a person except before they started leaning over the counter to leech the souls of people. They ordered from a kiosk, not from a person. A person might have said they were out of sweet and sour sauce from the beginning.

The ticket was also seriously wrinkled, as if, I think, it might have been discarded. I wonder if this rude person was actually a con. I wonder if they ordered a large drink, then sat around waiting to see a big ticket of food they would like for free to be thrown out so they could con the store. If that was the case, they got money, but not food. McDonald's has their card number (unless they ordered at a kiosk then paid cash at the counter, which I've seen people do as weird as that might sound).

The complainer left. I reckon they got their money, or some money, but if it was a hustle I hope the card, somebody else's card, got refunded. Then the orders began to fly out. Mine and three or four others before I left and drove home.

Full disclosure. I go that McDs a lot. I've been going there almost four years. Do mistakes happen, you betcha. Do they run out of stuff, yep. Sometimes the computers are down and they can only take cash. Sometimes the fountain drink system is down and they are only serving bottled water, coffee, tea, etc. They do need to clean the ice cream machine and shake machine and other stuff, so you might not get that chocolate shake at 3:14 AM. On school days I often get my starter coffee there. On a night I work at the restaurant I get food for me and the kid there on my way home, like tonight.

Being nice and supportive of the staff and supervisors and letting them fix things is a whole lot cooler than being a hateful, spite fueled jerk.

When the store is out of stuff at midnight on a Monday (on the day before president number 45 shows up in Orlando to formally begin his reelection bid) chances are the person who didn't order enough big bags, cup caddies, and sweet and sour sauce is at home asleep.

Making a problem out of a solution serves no purpose, but MAGA types and other old people my age and older like to pretend that the McDs employees are secretly conspiring to dismantle liberty and democracy whenever a three dollar sandwich takes six minutes to make, and dammitall I said No Pickles. They love to abuse workers, especially workers they consider beneath them and the work the MAGA crowd does, especially workers who speak other languages better than they do Ænglisch.

If you're stopping at McDs for supper and snacks, then understand that maybe they will be out of stuff sometimes. Understand that yours is not the only order being made and they will get to you in turn and they will do their best to make it yummy quickly.

Picking on the McWorker, who is not paid well for the mostly excellent and expeditious work they do does not get you better service, even if you get your pathetic kicks out of it.

But it does get everybody who watched you rant and threaten the worker watch you leave and then talk about what a horrible person you were to the worker, and the language gets colorful.

Next time, stop at WamLart, right across US 27 from McDs and take food home and cook it, so that if it isn't quite the way you like it you can blame the person that should've gotten all the blame at the restaurant.

#McDonald's #ESPN #ESPN Zone #rude #crude

[kacydeneen]

20 Years in Prison for Pa. Teen Killer After Tear-Filled Hearing

A Chester County courtroom was moved to tears on Thursday as the parents of a teenage girl who was murdered in a road rage shooting last year demanded maximum prison time for the man who ended her life.

David Desper will serve at least 20 years in a Pennsylvania prison for the murder of 18-year-old Bianca Roberson. Common Pleas Judge Anne Marie Wheatcraft sentenced the 28-year-old to a maximum of 40 years, but he will be eligible for parole in 2038. 

Desper, of Trainer, Pennsylvania, pleaded guilty in September to shooting the college-bound teen in the head as they jockeyed for position along Route 100 in June 2017. Roberson was killed instantly with her car running off the highway and into the woods. Desper fled to a friend's house in Delaware where he hid out for several days before turning himself in.

At first, Roberson's family thought she died in a tragic accident, but days later learned it was a bullet that claimed her life. 

Her parents, Rodney and Michelle Roberson, delivered heartbreaking statements to Miller and the court Thursday morning saying dreams for their daughter were ripped apart the day she was killed.

"I hate you," Michelle Roberson said to Desper. The judge and courtroom staff wiped away tears as the mother spoke, recounting happy moments with Bianca that she'll never experience again.

"All I have left of Bianca is my memories," Rodney Roberson said in a separate statement.

"My questions for the defendant are simple. Why in God’s name did you shoot my daughter? Because she was young? Because she was black? Because she was a girl? Because you wanted to go first on the road? Because you had a bad day?"

Desper looked down and also cried as the parents spoke.

Bianca's grandmother, family friends and a school administrator also delivered statements. Emotions ran so high in the courtroom at one point that the judge called a short recess.

After a recess, Desper addressed the courtroom, his hands shackled as he choked back tears. He sobbed while attempting to apologize to the Roberson family, who shook their heads during his statement. Roberson’s mother abruptly left while he spoke.

"I am so sorry," Desper said. "I would do anything to take it back."

Earlier, family and friends described the convicted murderer as a "gentle giant" who was kind and willing to help. His mother, Wendy Desper, said that she wanted to speak with Roberson’s mother "mom to mom."

"She’s not a mom today because of what my son did," Wendy Desper said.

But the judge, who also cried during her statement, said that Desper could never take back what he did.

"I don’t believe you were afraid," Judge Wheatcraft said. "I believe it was anger."

  Here's Rodney Roberson's full victim impact statement:

Dear Judge Wheatcraft,

My name is Rodney Roberson. I am, and forever will be, the father of Bianca Roberson.

Everybody thinks I am a tough guy. I was raised in West Philadelphia. I enlisted in the United States Army, served honorably, then enlisted in the United States Marine Corps, and served honorably again. When I finished my service with the Marines, I returned to West Philly, but I quickly saw that there was nothing but trouble there. I then joined the United States Merchant Marines, where I have worked for the last 28 years. We move big ships around the country and world. My work is hard, but it is honest work. So maybe I am a tough guy.

But not when it came to Bianca. She was my youngest child, my baby. She always could make me smile and make life a little brighter. 

Let me tell you about my little girl. Bianca was a child who was always happy, and she brought that joy to everyone around her. With adults, she was shy and respectful. With her friends, she was kind, gentle, and funny. To me, she was the smartest and most beautiful young woman in the world. 

When you are a father, you laugh at your sons, but you worry about your daughters. Who will be there to protect them when you are not around? Will they always be safe? What can you do to make sure they don’t get hurt? Nothing hurts a dad more than his daughter’s tears. 

Bianca was hard-working and generous. She got a job at the McDonald’s on Gay Street in West Chester. I would go there to eat just to see her working, proud that she had a job. She would whisper to me, “Dad, you have to go home!” But I would just sit and watch her working, smiling at my little girl. Then, when she got her first paycheck, she insisted on taking me out to dinner, just to say thank you for being her father. I told her that I would pay, but she refused, her quiet way of telling me she loved me and that she was growing up. 

My wife and I decided to raise Bianca in Chester County because it was safe. We didn’t want to risk the violence of West Philadelphia. We wanted her to grow up around nice people in a nice place. 

We wanted everything for Bianca. I wanted her to go to college, something I never got to do. She was going to Jacksonville University on a scholarship, ready to study crime scene forensics. I wanted her to graduate and get a good job, working in an office and getting paid good money without breaking her back working on the docks. I wanted her to fall in love, get married, and then have kids. She always told me that she was going to have six kids -- three boys and three girls. I wanted to live long enough to spoil my grandchildren.

All my dreams for Bianca were coming true. Until the day that the defendant murdered by daughter.

My questions for the defendant are simple. Why in God’s name did you shoot my daughter? Because she was young? Because she was black? Because she was a girl? Because you wanted to go first on the road? Because you had a bad day?

How do you think your family would feel if somebody had murdered you like you murdered my daughter?

All I have left of Bianca is my memories. She had a special song that she said was her song just for me – “Dancing With My Father” by Luther Vandross. It is a song about a child whose father died, and about how that child is praying for one more dance with her father. I always teased her that it was such a sad song and I planned on living forever anyway. Here is a little bit of the song: 

Back when I was a child Before life removed all the innocence My father would lift me high And dance with my mother and me And then Spin me around ‘till I fell asleep Then up the stairs he would carry me And I knew for sure I was loved

If I could get another chance Another walk Another dance with him I’d play a song that would never ever end How I’d love love love To dance with my father again 

Your Honor, I would love to dance with my daughter again. But I never will.

Respectfully, Rodney Roberson

This story uses functionality that may not work in our app. Click here to open the story in your web browser. 20 Years in Prison for Pa. Teen Killer After Tear-Filled Hearing published first on Miami News

[jeroldlockettus]

What Does a C.E.O. Actually Do?

Mark Zuckerberg, C.E.O. of Facebook, did not intend to build a $74 billion company. He started Facebook to connect college students. (Mark Zuckerberg/Wikimedia Commons)

Our latest Freakonomics Radio episode is called “What Does a C.E.O. Actually Do?” (You can subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts or elsewhere, get the RSS feed, or listen via the media player above.)

They’re paid a fortune — but for what, exactly? What makes a good C.E.O. — and how can you even tell? Is “leadership science” a real thing — or just airport-bookstore mumbo jumbo? We put these questions to Mark Zuckerberg, Richard Branson, Indra Nooyi, Satya Nadella, Jack Welch, Ray Dalio, Carol Bartz, David Rubenstein, and Ellen Pao. (Part 1 of a special series, “The Secret Life of C.E.O.’s.”)

Below is a transcript of the episode, modified for your reading pleasure. For more information on the people and ideas in the episode, see the links at the bottom of this post.

*      *      *

Stephen DUBNER: I have one gripe about chip bags, especially for the single-serve. It seems to me very suboptimal to have the only opening at the top, where you have to jam your hand in there, and you can’t really see what you’re getting. Wouldn’t it be better to have a bag that just laid out all the chips on the package, like a nice picnic blanket or something? Have you ever thought about that?

Indra NOOYI: Well, imagine that you’re walking around, eating your bag of chips, which a lot of people do. How would that work? If you open out the Lay’s too much and a gust of wind comes by, you’re going to see a lot of chips flying.. We have to worry about all these little practical things.

That’s Indra Nooyi …

Indra NOOYI: Good morning.

Nooyi is the C.E.O. of PepsiCo. So when it comes to “little practical things to worry about,” she has a lot of them. PepsiCo has more than 260,000 global employees and over 100 brands and trademarks, including 22 that each do at least a billion dollars a year in sales. Those include Pepsi and Gatorade and Tropicana and Quaker Foods. There are also seven separate billion-dollar chip brands: Lay’s, Ruffles, Doritos, Tostitos, Cheetos, Fritos, and Walkers.

NOOYI: So I’m out in the marketplace almost every week. Looking to see how our products look on the shelf. Not from a C.E.O. lens, more from a consumer lens, because at the end of the day, I’m not just a C.E.O. I’m also a consumer, I am a shopkeeper, I’m a gatekeeper of my family. So I look at our business through a different lens, and then I come back and I talk to my people about what I saw was good, and what wasn’t really good.

Do you find it surprising that the C.E.O. of a $170 billion company micromanages her potato chips? What about the C.E.O. of an even bigger company, one built on silicon chips? I’m talking about Microsoft C.E.O. Satya Nadella.

Satya NADELLA: These hard decisions around what to pick and focus on is something that I believe a C.E.O. uniquely has to do. That’s not something that you can delegate.÷

And what if you’re the C.E.O. of a social-networking company with 2 billion global users? How micro do you think Facebook C.E.O. Mark Zuckerberg gets?

Mark ZUCKERBERG: So when I was in Ohio, I sat down with a group of heroin addicts, and one of the things that was really interesting is when you’re going through recovery, the first thing you have to do is detox. But then after that, the next thing you have to do is basically get new friends. And it turns out if you remain friends with anyone who you were using with before, then you are very likely to end up back using heroin and endangering your life.

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say “C.E.O.”? For many people, the image is a caricature: either supervillain or superhero. At the very least, you probably envision a luxe life with 100 rounds of golf a year.

SONNENFELD:  C.E.O.s work harder today than ever before.

That’s Jeff Sonnenfeld from the Yale School of Management. He’s spent more than 30 years scrutinizing C.E.O.s.

SONNENFELD: These aren’t people that are hanging out and golfing and running around country clubs and sipping on their sherries at late afternoon. These are people that are working nonstop, 40-hour days, eight days a week.

Today on Freakonomics Radio, we’re launching “The Secret Life of C.E.O.’s,” a special series that’ll get inside the minds of these rare and rarified creatures. Some of the questions we’ll be asking: What do C.E.O.’s actually do? What makes a good C.E.O. — and how can you even tell? Why do C.E.O.’s make so much money — and are they worth it? How did they get to be where they are? And: is it lonely at the top? You’ll hear from lots of big-time C.E.O.’s as well as the academics who know them best. And, if you find yourself thinking – hey, I’d like to do that too …

Nicholas BLOOM: It’s frankly a horrible job. I wouldn’t want it.

*      *      *

Let’s begin with this guy …

BLOOM: I’m Nicholas Bloom. I’m a professor of economics at Stanford University.

DUBNER: And if I were to just ask you, what’s your general specialty?

BLOOM: I work on trying to understand management practices, so, why some firms are better-managed than others, and how that helps improve their performance.

DUBNER: We are doing a multi-part series on C.E.O.’s So let me ask you an incredibly rudimentary question. What does a C.E.O. actually do? Because, everybody knows what a C.E.O. is, but I would argue that most of us really have almost no idea what a C.E.O. actually does, both on a day-to-day and on a year-to-year basis.

BLOOM: Their mandate is they’re part-public figure. If anything goes wrong or right with the company, they’re the man or woman standing up in the press taking the flak or the praise. spend about a day a week talking to Wall Street and other big investors. They also spend a huge amount of time on personnel management, human resources. Generally they’ll have 5 to 10 direct reports, people they’ll see once a week that work — the chief of finance, the chief of H.R., the chief of information It’s much more the coach — if you think of a football team, it’s very much like that with C.E.O.’s. In some ways, they’re the masterminds behind the scene. But they don’t actually throw the ball or actually have their hands directly involved in the business.

DUBNER: Most people, when they hear the term C.E.O., probably think of big firms such as PepsiCo and Microsoft and Facebook, and so on, but just to be clear the median C.E.O. in America, at least, has probably – what, four or five employees?

BLOOM: It’s an amazing fact when people mention C.E.O. they think of an older white man in charge of a company of 10,000 people. In fact there are 6 million companies in America. The median company, so the 50th percentile, has three employees and the most common company size has one. Actually, almost every C.E.O. out there that you’re going to meet is going to be in charge of 5 or 10 people.

Raffaella SADUN: I deal with people who are going to be C.E.O.’s one day.

That is Raffaella Sadun. She’s an economist who teaches at Harvard Business School.

SADUN: I’m very interested in understanding how management and managers affect firm performance.

So how much time does a C.E.O. spend on their own, thinking blue-sky thoughts?

SADUN: There is very little time that goes into thinking alone or being in their solitary office and looking outside the window. We tend to think about the C.E.O. sitting in an ivory tower, deciding what the organization will do,, and then, boom! They make a decision and the decision just happens, and everybody’s happy. But there is so much variation in how well firms adopt even the very basics of management that you can’t ignore it. That’s not below the pay grade of the C.E.O. It’s very important that the C.E.O. keeps in mind both the strategic and the operational aspects of their jobs.

And yet, Sadun says, that view is not shared by her M.B.A. students — her future C.E.O’s. They see strategy as paramount. How a firm responds to rivals, or a shift in the market, or consumer preferences. Operations, meanwhile — how goods or services actually get made, and delivered; how the quality is controlled; how you monitor and track employee performance. That is not what they’re thinking about.

SADUN: When we were teaching cases that had a lot of these operational aspects in it, my students were telling me, that that’s the easy stuff, right? “That’s not strategy, that’s easy, everybody can do it. Or you can pay somebody to do it.” And when you look at what happens inside firms, you just know that that’s not true.

Raffaella Sadun, along with Nicholas Bloom and the M.I.T. economist John Van Reenen, analyzed data from more than 12,000 companies to try to learn what makes some better than others. “Management practices,” they wrote, “can account for a large fraction of performance differences.” And yet, they argued: “achieving operational excellence is still a massive challenge for many organizations.”

BLOOM: The hygiene of management, for example, do you collect data? Do you use it to analyze what’s going on? Do you have thorough performance reviews? And, in fact, many of the most successful companies in the world – companies such as G.E., McDonald’s, and Walmart — are excessively focused on managerial competence. They’re unbelievably detail-orientated. And that’s one of the big ingredients of their success. My sense of teaching students is often they get overexcited about the big-picture, sexy stuff of long-term strategy and skip over the small details, which turn out to be critically important.

DUBNER: So how difficult is basic managerial competence and what keeps people from achieving it?

BLOOM: You’d think the basic managerial competence is actually easy to do. I mean, in some senses it’s been around for over 100 years. Frederick Winslow Taylor came out with something called scientific management in 1913, which was about using stopwatches, and monitoring, and data, and roll us forward a hundred years and it’s been called in many ways “big data.” On the other hand, we just see tremendous variations. And it’s because it’s important, but it’s boring and tedious and takes effort. And it’s hard for people to get it right. And certainly in our data, we see tremendous variation in managerial competence. And I should say not just in the private sector. You see the same in schools. Every parent’s had experiences with good and bad teachers — in hospitals, in health-care clinics, really just across the entire economy.

Okay, basic managerial competence may be unsexy. Still: if it’s so important, why don’t C.E.O.’s pay it more attention? Here’s one explanation:

SONNENFELD: A good C.E.O. has to play to five or six different constituencies.

That, again, is Jeff Sonnenfeld of the Yale School of Management. He’s also president of the Chief Executive Leadership Institute at Yale.

SONNENFELD: There is the shareholder, as the actual financial owners of the business and we have others with a stake in the business: the bondholders, debt holders. There are concerns as an employer, that they’re seen as an employer of choice, and that employees have an opportunity, that they are investing in training, And is there metrics that are created to take a look at their community impact both environmentally, and as a good corporate citizen to their immediate communities. But a fifth constituency, is consumers. Are they getting healthy, safe product? Is there a sense of accountability? Is there a warranty that the products work as they should, and that companies are responsive?

Okay, those are a lot of constituencies to balance. Being C.E.O. is starting to sound like a fairly impossible job. And I’d assume a fairly important one as well. I’d assume that who the C.E.O. is at a given moment matters a great deal to whether that company will thrive. But let’s not assume.

DUBNER: Let me ask you this question, not about yourself as C.E.O. but about C.E.O.’s of other firms. How much does the C.E.O. really matter to the firm, and how can you tell?

RUBENSTEIN: I believe a C.E.O. matters a lot more than I probably thought before.

That’s David Rubenstein, co-founder and, until recently, co-C.E.O. of the Carlyle Group, one of the biggest private-equity firms in the world.

RUBENSTEIN: Private equity is a phrase that is used to explain the investing of money, typically in a company that is privately owned – i.e., it’s not public. And you spend three to five years improving the company, incenting the managers to work harder, do more efficient things, and ultimately, after three or five years, you sell or otherwise liquefy the investment.

Since its founding in 1987, Carlyle has purchased or invested in nearly 600 companies and sold off more than 300. Today, it has 271 companies under its control. Besides serving as a C.E.O. of Carlyle, Rubenstein was also involved in making sure Carlyle-acquired companies have the right C.E.O. – and, if not, bring in a new one.

RUBENSTEIN: In all the companies Carlyle’s invested in, the C.E.O. has made the most amount of difference. The price we paid is probably the second most, and the quality of the company we invested in was probably the third most. If you told me you had a reasonably good company, a terrible C.E.O., I wouldn’t invest in it. If you told me you had a reasonably good company and a great C.E.O., I certainly would invest in it.

Rubenstein plainly has massive experience in shopping for, and observing C.E.O.’s. Who are we to challenge his opinion that the C.E.O. is the single-most important component of a firm’s success? But here’s the thing: it is largely his opinion. It isn’t empirical evidence. That’s what researchers like Nicholas Bloom try to come up with.

BLOOM: I’ve been working for 20 years trying to understand what makes some firms perform better than others.

To that end, Bloom has some good news and some bad news. The good news is that researchers have found, as David Rubenstein argues, that the leader of a company matters a great deal. The bad news?

BLOOM: No one could really give us a straight answer on what defined a good or bad leader.

In other words, no one can really say what indicates, or predicts, or produces a good leader.

BLOOM: And I must have pitched this question, dozens and dozens of times. You look at the data, and there’s 10 different recipes for success. Maybe they each work for a particular case study, but I’ve still, 20 years later, struggle to find anything that’s the secret recipe beyond saying Sure, there are some people better than others but it’s damn hard to tell what it is.

DUBNER: On the one hand I could say I admire your humility and I admire your candor. On the other hand, I could say, well, what good are you people then, if you can’t figure it out

BLOOM: Well, why don’t I give you a great anecdote from sport. Imagine this. Imagine I took a thousand men, and I ask you to pick which one of them would be best at tennis. Now, some of that’s pretty easy. Professional tennis players tend to be taller than average. They’re pretty athletic-looking and lean. I take the thousand; I whittle it down to the 50 taller- than-average, late-20s, lean-looking individuals. But beyond that, it’s almost impossible to know unless you’ve seen how they’ve played before.

Think about it practically. Roger Federer, Nadal, Andy Murray — they look identical to just about every other professional tennis player. And so it is with leadership. By the time you get to people with basically great education, charming individuals, some prior experience — they’re all in the frame for leadership. And sure, we can rule out people that typically dropped out of school at 15. But by the time you get to the subset of educated, experienced, right background, at that point it becomes incredibly hard to tell who is going to succeed.

DUBNER: One big problem with your kind of research is that you can’t randomly assign C.E.O.’s to control groups and treatment groups, But if you could, if you somehow had the permission and resources to set up the perfect randomized experiment to learn whatever you want to learn about C.E.O.’s — or maybe it’s several things: how to build the perfect C.E.O., or how to pre-emptively tell a great one from a terrible one — what would those experiments look like?

BLOOM: This is the researcher’s dream, is to go out there and randomly move C.E.O.’s around companies and, it doesn’t happen in America. It probably happens in North Korea but they’re not sharing their data with us. Ideally, you take a bunch of firms and a bunch of C.E.O.’s and every five years you’d flip coins and you’d rotate them around. Pretty soon, you’d find what makes a good leader and what doesn’t. The problem is right now that just never happens.

SADUN: We have a lot of anecdotal evidence about C.E.O.’s, about what they actually do.

That, again, is Raffaella Sadun.

SADUN: But very little large-scale representative evidence.

*      *      *

The most controversial fact about C.E.O.’s, at least in the mind of the public, is that they are just paid too much. In 2016, the C.E.O.’s of the top 350 U.S. firms earned an average of $15.6 million. Adjusted for inflation, that’s a more-than-900 percent increase, since 1978. During that same period, the typical employee’s compensation rose just over 10 percent. We’ve been hearing that good leadership is essential to good business performance. Maybe C.E.O.’s deserve that huge compensation. Why would a board pay it if they weren’t getting their money’s worth? And what’s the “right” amount to pay a C.E.O.?

BLOOM: It’s actually impossible to say what’s the right amount a C.E.O. should get paid.

That, again, is the Stanford economist Nicholas Bloom.

BLOOM: The numbers they get paid now seem astronomical. There are C.E.O.’s getting paid hundreds of millions, I find it hard to defend those amounts. But I also am aware that there is no one that can definitively say that’s too much or too little. The second point is — you do definitely want to pay these individuals a lot. Why? One is — you want to select people into the job. It’s frankly a horrible job. I wouldn’t want it. Being a C.E.O. of a big company is a hundred-hour-a-week job. It consumes your life. It consumes your weekend. It’s super-stressful. Sure, there’s enormous perks, but it’s also, all-encompassing, and particularly for people with kids, you really want to make sure that they’re motivated and also rewarded. And since these individuals are running massive companies, their actions affect all of us every day. It’s not just big, pub-listed companies. You got to think of C.E.O.’s of hospitals, school districts, and the government. Everything we do is affected by their actions.

SONNENFELD: All that said and done … they’re still way overpaid.

That’s Jeff Sonnenfeld, the leadership expert from Yale.

SONNENFELD And more than being overpaid, there’s very little correspondence between performance and pay. There are some very strong companies, historically, say, United Parcel Service, which rank at the bottom, in terms of compensation. But Philippe Dauman, who ran Viacom ‘til recently, was being paid more than the very high-performing C.E.O.’s of Disney and Time Warner combined! And Viacom was a disaster. People like to talk about, what’s the ratio against the average employee? No, even worse is the lack of correspondence between pay and performance.

There’s a lot of data to back up Sonnenfeld’s claim. A huge study in the Journal of Management in 2000 found that the size of a firm accounts for more than 40 percent of the variance between C.E.O. salaries, while firm’s performance accounts for less than 5 percent. A more recent study of over 400 large-cap U.S. firms found that higher C.E.O. pay was correlated with worse-than-median stock-market returns. Let’s say you’re trying to do better. Let’s say you are trying to link compensation to performance. There are the standard metrics of share price, profits, and so on. But how can you tell that a different C.E.O. wouldn’t have accomplished the same? Or maybe even better? Which traits of a C.E.O. could you measure to tell how good they are? And: are there real, empirical and statistical indicators of what makes a great C.E.O. – or is it mostly just “leadership” mumbo jumbo?

SONNENFELD: There’s been over three-quarters of a century of research on leadership traits. The bad news there is the sum total of it is very little of it matters in terms of static human traits that predict leadership greatness.

A 2012 study found that American firms spend about $14 billion a year on leadership training. Every year, publishers put out approximately 1 gazillion leadership books, which are primarily used to wallpaper the bookshops in airports. Divulging the secrets of great leadership is a long-standing tradition. Among its most enduring practitioners: Sun Tzu, Plato, and Machiavelli. These days, leadership courses and institutes are pretty much everywhere. How good is the evidence to back up what they teach? As Jeff Sonnenfeld was telling us, the search for such evidence has been problematic for a while.

SONNENFELD: In the aftermath of the Second World War, a flight of scholars who escaped the Holocaust came to the U.S. to help create something between sociology and psychology, called social psychology, that really had no history before that. Its academic definition was really trying to understand the psychology of energized groups. But because of the experience so many had with charismatic leaders out-of-control, it became the vogue to focus on groups to the detriment of looking at leadership. We were afraid to look at charismatic leadership and often had some very simplistic notions out there in popular media. But in university worlds, we actually weren’t teaching leadership — even at the Harvard Business School, the supposed “West Point of Capitalism.” It was very hard to actually take a look at individual leaders. And that became the norm throughout business school.

SADUN: One of the first people to look at what goes into the activities of a manager is Henry Mintzberg …

Raffaella Sadun again.

SADUN: … who did some pioneering work in the 70s by measuring the activity of five C.E.O.’s. And that’s what he based his Ph.D. thesis on.

Henry Mintzberg’s thesis was called “The Manager at Work — Determining His Activities, Roles, and Programs By Structured Observation.” Mintzberg got his Ph.D. at M.I.T., and all the C.E.O.’s he studied ran firms in the Boston area except for one — the Bulova Watch Company, in New York. The rest were Massachusetts General Hospital; the Newton School System, Arthur D. Little Consulting; and a technology firm called EG&G – which, for what it’s worth, was bought decades later by the Carlyle Group. Mintzberg shadowed each of the five C.E.O.’s, full-time, for a week. He recorded every activity they did during that time. Every meeting, every phone call, and so on. Also: what they said, and wrote, and to whom; and what was said, and written to them – and the action it elicited in the C.E.O.

SADUN: And there is a ton of knowledge that has been generated by his research.

Mintzberg argued, for instance, that a C.E.O. had ten primary roles that fell into three categories: interpersonal, informational, and decisional. For instance: among the decisional roles were “negotiator” and “resource allocator” but also “disturbance handler.” Now, granted, it wasn’t a large study — only five C.E.O.’s, remember — but at least Mintzberg started to bring some scientific method to the supposed science of management. But, as Raffaella Sadun tells us, it didn’t really catch on.

SADUN: after this initial push, there was very little large-scale representative research.

And with very little large-scale representative research, a lot of the modern leadership gospel was based on observing high-profile individual C.E.O.’s.

SADUN: What we know about C.E.O.’s was pretty much based on either exemplary people, people that were somehow famous. It’s hard to really think: is that is representative or not? Probably not.

And you can imagine all kinds of faulty conclusions based on such unrepresentative observation.

BLOOM: There’s a long-held view that C.E.O.’s may be selected for being risk-takers. Imagine there are two types of C.E.O.’s. There’s the boring ones and the ones that take huge gambles. At the beginning of their career, the boring ones plod along but they never make it to the top. Of the huge gamblers, some of them win early on. They get promoted. They gamble again, some of those win again, and they get promoted, and they gamble again. At the end of it, you can see of the big gamblers very few make it, but those that do get to the top. Being a C.E.O. is horribly selected on having taken a lot of big bets in the past and then successively paying off. Risk-taking is an attribute we end up selecting in our successful C.E.O.’s, but I’m not sure it’s actually one that you’d want if you pick someone at the outset.

Steve Jobs famously had his reality-distortion field and ignored all of his advice and pushed ahead and did well anyway. But I could mention Elizabeth Holmes at Theranos who was also apparently had a reality-distortion field. And the company crashed and burned. And I’m sure there are 50 other examples of Theranos out there. I’m very nervous about taking these anecdotes and looking only at winners. If you want to do well, you want to look at winners and losers — basically take everyone that starts and see who tracks, and then you’ll find the risk-taking C.E.O.’s, many of them crash and burn. We just never notice them because they drop out of the press.

That’s the problem. What’s the solution? Enter the World Management Survey.

BLOOM: The World Management Survey was a project started up back in the early 2000’s to try and rigorously measure management practices and large samples of firms from around the world. By now, 15 years later, we have about 40,000 companies from around 40 countries – we have the U.S., the U.K., but also Vietnam, Brazil, Australia, China, India. And it was just to try and be more scientific about what defines good overall management. We wanted to randomly pick companies, so you have losers and winners.

The idea being that if you had enough data, and the data were truly representational, you could identify the specific qualities that contribute to good leadership.

BLOOM: And we just really struggled to come up with anything. We didn’t find we could identify the secret sauce

But Bloom points to current research by Raffaella Sadun as potentially groundbreaking. She’s been doing a bunch of studies…

BLOOM: … been doing a bunch of studies, not looking at who C.E.O.’s are but what they do. So she’s managed to persuade C.E.O.’s — incredibly — to release their time diaries under confidentiality, what they do every half-an-hour for a week.

That’s right: Raffaella Sadun decided to pull a Henry Mintzberg …

SADUN: But we could also put Mintzberg on steroids.

While the Mintzberg study relied on his shadowing five C.E.O.’s, Sadun and her colleagues have been studying more than 1,000 C.E.O.’s of manufacturing firms across six countries. Doing all this in-person, as Mintzberg did, would have been impossible.

SADUN: Instead what we did is we decided to create a project called the Executive Time Use Project, which essentially allows us to shadow not the C.E.O. personally, but the agenda of the C.E.O. We get information on every activity that happens in the life of the C.E.O.

The researchers created from scratch a call center and hired 45 people to call the C.E.O.’s or their personal assistants every day …

SADUN: … in the morning and night, to get a sense of what was planned in their agenda and what they actually did. We decided to also keep track of is it a meeting? Not only the type of meeting or type of activity, but also who was involved, the number of participants, who the participants were, whether the meeting was planned or not planned. Is the maybe C.E.O. on the golf course? Is it a personal activity? Believe me, we have a lot of personal activities that are coded into our data. We don’t use it for research but it’s kind of fun and validates the data a little bit.

Validating the data is important — after all, they’re mostly self-reported data. And we all know that self-reported data have a habit of making ourselves look slightly better than we are. But Sadun did have something to offer the C.E.O.’s in exchange for honest data.

SADUN: we told them: “Look, if you allow us to shadow what you do and to measure what you do, we will give you a report back that tells you what goes into your day. How long do you work, what do you spend your time on? And also we’ll give you a sense of what your peers do.” And that was the key, because there is a tremendous appetite to know: What am I doing? Am I doing it right? What are my colleagues doing?

Another potential limitation of the study: these were only manufacturing firms, so the findings wouldn’t necessarily be universal. Also, the C.E.O.’s who chose to participate were slightly more likely to run smaller firms. Still, this time-use data has led to some significant insights.

SADUN: What we find in the data is essentially two very different ways of allocating time. And in the paper we label this “leaders” and “managers.” Let me start with managers. This manager is a C.E.O. that spends a lot of time basically doing a lot of operational activities, and often in meetings that involve one person at a time. The other type, which we call the leader, is a completely different way of allocating time. Instead of focusing on just one function, the meetings typically involve many functions at the same time, more people.

Okay, “manager” C.E.O.’s and “leader” C.E.O.’s operate quite differently. What are the consequences of those differences? Sadun and her colleagues found that the firms run by a “leader”-type C.E.O. were more productive and more profitable. But wait a minute: earlier, Sadun and Bloom told us that C.E.O.’s who focus on good, solid management — on operations, for instance — that they’re more successful. Now Sadun’s telling us that a “leader”-type C.E.O. is more likely to be correlated with success than a “manager”-type. How can that be?

SADUN: We don’t think that this correlation reflects the fact that leaders are always better for firms.

What’s that mean? If the firms run by the “leader”-type C.E.O.’s are more profitable and more productive, doesn’t that mean that leader-type C.E.O.’s are more effective?

SADUN: We think that what’s happening in the background is something a little bit different, which is that leaders might be good in certain situations but not be good in others. But that some firms that really need a leader, actually end up with a manager. It’s more of an assignment problem of who gets hired to do what, relative to a difference in the intrinsic quality of managers.

In other words, the right C.E.O. for a given company is — well, it’s hard to say. It might be a manager type. It might be a leader type. It might be a big, brassy, back-slapping rally-the-troops type of C.E.O. Or it might be a quiet, studious, lead-by-example kind of C.E.O.

BLOOM: They’re different, from outgoing to quiet, to internal- to external-focus, just a whole range of practices.

Nicholas Bloom’s obsession to identify the secrets to good leadership has stretched on for years.

BLOOM: But we just couldn’t pick up any characteristic. Maybe it just doesn’t exist. Maybe there’s just many different ways to be a great leader.

Case in point: remember when Bloom told us the one thing that excluded someone from becoming a big-time C.E.O.?

BLOOM: And sure, we can rule out people that typically dropped out of school at 15.

How can you explain … this guy?

BRANSON: I’ve never had to report to anybody since I was — well, since I left school at 15.

And that is …?

BRANSON: My name is Richard Branson, and what do I do? I do everything Virgin.

Over the next several episodes, we’ll be trying to learn as much as we can about who C.E.O.’s actually are and what they actually do. As we’ve been hearing today, academic research on the subject indicates there’s no template, no set of neat identifiable characteristics that predict who’ll succeed and who will fail. We accept that fact. Indeed, we’ll revel in it. We’ll talk to a bunch of C.E.O.’s and try to understand their lives, their decisions, their successes and failures. We’ll talk about whether the kind of person who’s capable of starting a successful firm is also the kind of person who’s good at running it.We’ll find out how C.E.O.’s get picked in the first place; and we’ll take a look at the pipeline, and try to figure out why barely 6 percent of the Fortune 500 C.E.O.’s are women. We’ll look at how C.E.O.’s deal with crises and make hard decisions. And, mostly, we’ll hear their stories.

ZUCKERBERG: Yeah, well, I never started this to build a company.

Mark Zuckerberg tells us what he did have in mind for Facebook.

ZUCKERBERG:Ten years ago, I was just trying to help connect people at colleges and a few schools.

NOOYI: People talk about a honeymoon period, but there really isn’t a honeymoon period, because from day one you are the C.E.O.

PepsiCo’s Indra Nooyi, and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, talk about trying to be a C.E.O. and a human being at the same time.

NADELLA: It took me multiple years to even understand what had happened because in some sense I was more about — Why did this happen to us? What happened to me?

BARTZ: Well, I would say the first thing — and people don’t talk about this a lot — but it is a very lonely job.

You’ll hear from Carol Bartz, former C.E.O. of Yahoo! And Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Associates, one of the biggest hedge funds in the world.

DALIO: The senior partners said that “you’re making people uncomfortable, you’re demoralizing them with your straightforwardness.”

The Carlyle Group’s David Rubenstein on making mistakes.

RUBENSTEIN: Anybody that tells you they haven’t made a mistake probably really isn’t in the business or isn’t being honest.

Richard Branson will talk to us about founding versus managing:

BRANSON: too many young entrepreneurs want to cling on to everything. And they’re not good delegators.

Ellen Pao, former interim C.E.O. of Reddit, talks about tradition versus modernity:

PAO: Are we actually going to find that people are starting to hire people with different views, and different backgrounds, and different experiences, who we really believe are going to change the system and not just perpetuate it with different players?

And we’ll hear from at least one C.E.O. who seems to personify that status quo:

WELCH: …treating everybody the same is ludicrous. And I don’t buy it. It’s not cruel and Darwinian and things like that, that people like to call it.

That’s Jack Welch, former long-time C.E.O. of General Electric. Some people consider him one of the best C.E.O.’s in modern history.

WELCH: A baseball team publishes every day the batting averages. And you don’t see the.180 hitter getting all the money, or all the raises. You don’t win with a gang of mediocre players in business or in baseball.

Freakonomics Radio is produced by WNYC Studios and Dubner Productions. This episode was produced by Max Miller. Our staff also includes Alison Hockenberry, Merritt Jacob, Greg Rosalsky, Stephanie Tam, Vera Carothers, Harry Huggins and Brian Gutierrez; the music throughout the episode was composed by Luis Guerra. You can subscribe to Freakonomics Radio on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, or via email at [email protected].

Here’s where you can learn more about the people and ideas in this episode:

SOURCES

Carol Bartz, former C.E.O. of Yahoo!

Nicholas Bloom, professor of economics at Stanford

Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group

Ray Dalio, founder of Bridgewater Associates

Henry Mintzberg, professor of management studies at McGill

Satya Nadella, C.E.O. of Microsoft

Indra Nooyi, C.E.O. of PepsiCo

Ellen Pao, former interim C.E.O. of Reddit

David Rubenstein, co-founder of the Carlyle Group

Raffaella Sadun, economist and professor at Harvard Business School

Jeff Sonnenfeld, Senior Associate Dean at the Yale School of Management

Jack Welch, former C.E.O. of General Electric

Mark Zuckerberg, C.E.O. of Facebook

RESOURCES

Executive Time Use Project

“Why Do We Undervalue Competent Management?” Sadun, Raffaella, Nicholas Bloom, and John Van Reenen, Harvard Business Review (September 1, 2017).

“CEO Behavior and Firm Performance,” Sadun, Raffaella, Oriana Bandiera, Stephen Hansen, and Andrea Prat (2017).

“CEO Pay Remains High Relative to the Pay of Typical Workers and High-Wage Earners,” Lawrence Mishel and Jessica Schieder (2017).

“Are CEOs Paid for Performance?” Ric Marshall, and Linda-Eling Lee (2016).

“The Manager at Work — Determining His Activities, Roles, and Programs by Structured Observation,” Henry Mintzberg (1968).

EXTRA

Henry Mintzberg

“What Is Leadership, Anyway?” Joshua Rothman, The New Yorker, (February 22, 2016).

World Management Survey

Executive Time Use Survey

The post What Does a C.E.O. Actually Do? appeared first on Freakonomics.

from Dental Care Tips http://freakonomics.com/podcast/c-e-o-actually/

[deniscollins]

Why Women Aren’t C.E.O.s, According to Women Who Almost Were

The percentage of chief executives of Fortune 500 companies who are women just passed 6 percent, and data predicts that half or more of the women who earn an M.B.A. this year will drop out of the full-time work force within a decade, with reasons ranging from family conflicts to placing less inherent value on position or money, yet even those women who stay and reach the C-suite are more likely than men to be overlooked. If you were a board member, what would you do, if anything, to address this gender equity issue?

A year ago, dressed in suffragette white and addressing a cheering, weeping convention, Hillary Clinton stood for possibility. Now she is a reminder of the limits women continue to confront — in politics and beyond.

More than 40 years after women began pouring into the workplace, only a handful have made it all the way to the top of corporate America. The percentage of chief executives of Fortune 500 companies who are women just passed 6 percent, creeping up (and occasionally dropping back) at a glacial pace.

Why don’t more women get that No. 1 job?

Consider the experiences of the people who know best: Women who were in the running to become No. 1, but didn’t quite make it. The women who had to stop at No. 2.

What their stories show is that in business, as in politics, women who aspire to power evoke far more resistance, both overt and subtle, than they expected would be the case by now.

The impact of gender is hard to pin down decisively. But after years of biting their tongues, believing their ranks would swell if they simply worked hard, many senior women in business are concluding that the barriers are more deeply rooted and persistent than they wanted to believe, according to interviews with nearly two dozen chief executives, would-be chief executives, headhunters, business school deans and human resources professionals.

What they say: Women are often seen as dependable, less often as visionary. Women tend to be less comfortable with self-promotion — and more likely to be criticized when they do grab the spotlight. Men remain threatened by assertive women. Most women are not socialized to be unapologetically competitive. Some women get discouraged and drop out along the way. And many are disproportionately penalized for stumbles.

“For years I thought it was a pipeline question,” said Julie Daum, who has led efforts to recruit women for corporate boards at Spencer Stuart. “But it’s not — I’ve been watching the pipeline for 25 years. There is real bias, and without the ability to shine a light on it and really measure it, I don’t think anything’s going to change. Ultimately at the top of an organization there are fewer and fewer spots, and if you can eliminate an entire class of people, it makes it easier.”

Jan Fields worked her way from crew member at a McDonald’s restaurant to become president of McDonald’s USA, the No. 2 position at the company. She was fired in 2012, blamed for the first monthly drop in profits since 2003 during a strategic push for higher prices. From her perspective, she was making bold changes necessary for the company’s survival; McDonald’s has struggled in recent years amid increasing consumer consciousness about health.

She’s blunt about the life of a woman near the top.

“You’re the only woman,” she said. “It’s very lonely. I was at a high level playing in a golf foursome with all high-level men. One said, ‘I didn’t know you knew how to play.’ I said, ‘You never asked me.’ I never drank with them. I never tried to be one of the guys. I spent more energy on performance.”

In the end, she said, she won over many of the men. “The men along the way, they were extremely jealous and competitive,” she said. “It didn’t really last that long because they saw my production, and when they did start to work for me, they realized, ‘She was not that bad.’ ”

Like many women who became senior executives, she said she rose fastest and most smoothly when she was measured by the straightforward metric of profits. “It’s really all about money,” she said. “I always had to do better than anybody else to be considered equal. I ran great restaurants, had great profits and had the most successful people working for me.”

One handicap to becoming the chief executive, she said, was her own choice not to work overseas. “I thought so many of the countries we were going into were so against women,” she said. “I thought, I don’t need that.”

But after three years in the No. 2 spot, she and her boss disagreed about strategy. She pushed hard for changes, as she said many women in her place have done. “That’s how come I’m gone,” she said.

When women act forcefully, research suggests, men are more likely to react badly. A Lean In/McKinsey & Company survey in 2016 of 132 companies and 34,000 employees found that women who negotiated for promotions were 30 percent more likely than men to be labeled intimidating, bossy or aggressive.

Another executive spent 30 years in Fortune 500 companies, rising to the C-suite, the pool from which the next chief executive may be chosen. She described her experience in detail but insisted on anonymity because she has a settlement agreement with the company and remains friendly with her former boss. She gained a reputation for finding growth where others had not, often doubling the revenue of her divisions.

She was seen as a possible successor to the chief executive, but she said she was unprepared for corporate politics at the very top. “Before heading to the C-suite, I didn’t feel I was handicapped at all,” she said, echoing conversations with many other women. But the next rungs of the ladder depend not only on results but also on prevailing in an environment where everyone is competing for a chance at the top job.

“I got a guy his C-suite job,” she recalled. “I’m sitting there at the C-suite table and he takes a massive swipe at me on my business: ‘She’s not doing this right.’ I go down the hall, and I go to my friend and say, ‘What the hell just happened?’ And she said, ‘Did you forget the boys play a 24/7 game of dodge ball? You just walked into the gym. You whip the ball, and if it happens to knock somebody on the head, so what?’ And my husband said, ‘Why the hell did you help him get his job two years ago?’ ”

Her turning point came when she was outmaneuvered by male colleagues during a corporate reorganization. Believing she was not going to rise further, she asked for an exit package.

Looking back, she is convinced that being a woman hurt her. “I rewrote the entire strategy for the company, doubled its share price,” she said. “We had a little bit of a dip. All of the guys had missed their numbers more. There’s a guy positioning himself as the successor. He hasn’t made his number in seven years. He’s tall and good looking and hangs around the right circles.”

She drew an unwelcome conclusion. “Women are prey,” she said. “They can smell it in the water, that women are not going to play the same game. Those men think, ‘If I kick her, she’s not going to kick back, but the men will. So I’ll go after her.’ It’s keeping women in their place. I truly believe that.”

Such experiences resonate even with women who did rise to the top job. “We are never taught to fight for ourselves,” said Ellen Kullman, the former chief executive of DuPont. “I think we tend to be brought up thinking that life’s fair, that you thrive and deliver, and the rest will take care of itself. It actually does work for most of your career. It doesn’t work for that last couple of steps.”

Ms. Kullman withstood a challenge from an activist investor but then decided to resign in 2015, telling Fortune that she concluded she had become a target and “was getting in the way of the future of the company.”

Sally Blount, dean of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern and the only woman to lead a top 10 business school, noted that data predicts that half or more of the women who earn an M.B.A. this year will drop out of the full-time work force within a decade. The reasons range from family conflicts to placing less inherent value on position or money. That accounts in part for the low number of women who do reach the very top job, because fewer remain in the pipeline. Yet even those women who stay and reach the C-suite are more likely than men to be overlooked, Ms. Blount said.

“Getting looked over is incredibly painful, particularly when you’re not sure why after all these years,” she said. “I used to love the word ‘gravitas.’ I now think it’s male code for ‘not like us’ at the highest levels.”

The parallels with politics are striking. Research in both fields, including some conducted after Mrs. Clinton’s loss, has shown it’s harder for assertive, ambitious women to be seen as likable, and easier to conclude they lack some intangible, ill-defined quality of leadership.

In a Korn Ferry survey in April of 786 male and female senior executives, 43 percent said they thought that continued bias against women as chief executives was the primary reason more women did not make it to the top in their own companies — and 33 percent thought women in their firms were not given sufficient opportunities to become leaders.

At DuPont, Ms. Kullman said, she found that men were being promoted within two years, women in three. “It wasn’t as overt as, ‘She’s too aggressive,’ ” she said. “It came down more to, ‘We’re not sure she’s ready for that job.’ ”

As Wendy Cai-Lee, a banker now running her own investment firm, put it, if she wrote a book about women in business, the title would be “Dependable Back-Up.”

The Lean In survey shows a pervasive sense among women that they face structural disadvantages: They are less likely than men to believe they will be able to participate in meetings, receive challenging assignments or find their contributions valued. The bleakest perceptions are from minority women; only 29 percent of black women think the best opportunities at their companies go to the most deserving employees, compared with 47 percent of white women.

Some men see the competition in zero-sum terms. One corporate recruiter described a conversation with a male client seeking an additional board post. “He said, ‘I know all the seats are going to women, and I don’t stand a chance,’ ” the recruiter recalled. “I said, ‘70 percent of the seats go to white men.’ ”

Yet many women work in companies with public commitments to diversity and clear policies against discrimination, with many men who sincerely believe they want women to advance.

That makes many of the subtler ways women encounter bias more pernicious than blatant discrimination, a Harvard Business Review meta-analysis found.

Many women, accomplished as they are, don’t feel the same sense of innate confidence as their male peers. Gerri Elliott, a former senior executive at Juniper Networks (who said she did not personally encounter bias), recounts a story related by a colleague: A presenter asked a group of men and women whether anyone had expertise in breast-feeding. A man raised his hand. He had watched his wife for three months. The women in the crowd, mothers among them, didn’t come forward as experts.

Shelley Diamond rose to chief client officer at Young & Rubicam after running its New York office and leading several key worldwide accounts. Early in her career, she said, “My biggest Achilles’ heel was my own confidence in myself and my ability to accomplish a task that seemed giant and daunting and scary.”

But she and other women describe a culture in which men sometimes feel hesitant to give women honest but harsh feedback, which can be necessary for them to ascend, because they fear women may react emotionally.

Dina Dublon, who retired in 2004 as chief financial officer of JPMorgan Chase, said male colleagues sometimes told her they were reluctant to have dinner or drinks with female subordinates — important bonding activities in the corporate world — because it might be seen as flirtatious.

The challenge for women is how to enter into the intangible but crucial circle of male camaraderie. “Once you get to the top of the company, in most cases, you are dealing with a male kingdom,” she said. “For as long as we are the minority group, it is much more about our capacity to adjust to them than their capacity to open up to us. I don’t think it’s about fairness. It is narrow-minded and ineffective, but human.”

The widespread concern in business circles about the slow progress of women to the top has spawned a virtual cottage industry of recent initiatives, from Paradigm for Parity, of which Ms. Kullman is a co-chairwoman, to 100x25, a Rockefeller Foundation initiative aiming for 100 female chief executives in the Fortune 500 by 2025. That number now stands at 32 — an all-time high and spurt from last year, when there were 21.

Pledges may be welcome, but consequences must follow, said Deborah Gillis, president and chief executive of Catalyst, which pushes for women’s advancement in business. She suggests withholding bonuses if leaders do not promote enough women or minorities and increasing bonuses if they do.

In recounting their experiences, some women were philosophical; several swung between barely suppressed fury and bouts of self-blame. Our interviews were long and sometimes wrenching. As a former senior executive myself, I found that some of what they described resonated.

Tracing what role gender played in any decision is often elusive. These women were high achievers, accustomed to knocking down barriers, not running up against them. There’s seldom one reason someone else wins out, making the dissection of any outcome all the more painful and perplexing.

Yes, there are men who truly want women to succeed. Yes, businesses understand that a changing customer base means they fail to diversify at their peril. No one wants to give in to defeatism. But the long path to the top, and the loneliness at the summit, are forcing a reckoning.

For her part, Mrs. Clinton is writing a book and speaking out more acidly than she allowed herself on the campaign trail. “Certainly, misogyny played a role” in her defeat, she told a rapt, partisan crowd at the Women in the World summit meeting in April. She described what she saw as the thought bubble among some voters for President Trump: “He looks like somebody who’s been president before.”

The fury and revulsion aimed at Mrs. Clinton — as well as the more open misogyny in some quarters in the wake of the election — has led many women to question whether they’ve underestimated a visceral recoil against women taking power in any arena.

Many fear they already know the answer.

#Gender

[hollywoodjuliorivas]

HomeSKIP TO CONTENTSKIP TO NAVIGATIONVIEW MOBILE VERSION The New York Times SUNDAY REVIEW Share 140 Cover PhotoCredit Kiersten Essenpreis Why Women Aren’t C.E.O.s, According to Women Who Almost Were It’s not a pipeline problem. It’s about loneliness, competition and deeply rooted barriers. By SUSAN CHIRA JULY 21, 2017 Continue reading the main storyShare This Page Share Tweet Email More Save A year ago, dressed in suffragette white and addressing a cheering, weeping convention, Hillary Clinton stood for possibility. Now she is a reminder of the limits women continue to confront — in politics and beyond. More than 40 years after women began pouring into the workplace, only a handful have made it all the way to the top of corporate America. The percentage of chief executives of Fortune 500 companies who are women just passed 6 percent, creeping up (and occasionally dropping back) at a glacial pace. Why don’t more women get that No. 1 job? Consider the experiences of the people who know best: Women who were in the running to become No. 1, but didn’t quite make it. The women who had to stop at No. 2. What their stories show is that in business, as in politics, women who aspire to power evoke far more resistance, both overt and subtle, than they expected would be the case by now. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story The impact of gender is hard to pin down decisively. But after years of biting their tongues, believing their ranks would swell if they simply worked hard, many senior women in business are concluding that the barriers are more deeply rooted and persistent than they wanted to believe, according to interviews with nearly two dozen chief executives, would-be chief executives, headhunters, business school deans and human resources professionals. What they say: Women are often seen as dependable, less often as visionary. Women tend to be less comfortable with self-promotion — and more likely to be criticized when they do grab the spotlight. Men remain threatened by assertive women. Most women are not socialized to be unapologetically competitive. Some women get discouraged and drop out along the way. And many are disproportionately penalized for stumbles. “For years I thought it was a pipeline question,” said Julie Daum, who has led efforts to recruit women for corporate boards at Spencer Stuart. “But it’s not — I’ve been watching the pipeline for 25 years. There is real bias, and without the ability to shine a light on it and really measure it, I don’t think anything’s going to change. Ultimately at the top of an organization there are fewer and fewer spots, and if you can eliminate an entire class of people, it makes it easier.” Newsletter Sign UpContinue reading the main story Sign Up for the Opinion Today Newsletter Every weekday, get thought-provoking commentary from Op-Ed columnists, the Times editorial board and contributing writers from around the world. Sign Up You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. SEE SAMPLE MANAGE EMAIL PREFERENCES PRIVACY POLICY OPT OUT OR CONTACT US ANYTIME Jan Fields worked her way from crew member at a McDonald’s restaurant to become president of McDonald’s USA, the No. 2 position at the company. She was fired in 2012, blamed for the first monthly drop in profits since 2003 during a strategic push for higher prices. From her perspective, she was making bold changes necessary for the company’s survival; McDonald’s has struggled in recent years amid increasing consumer consciousness about health. She’s blunt about the life of a woman near the top. “You’re the only woman,” she said. “It’s very lonely. I was at a high level playing in a golf foursome with all high-level men. One said, ‘I didn’t know you knew how to play.’ I said, ‘You never asked me.’ I never drank with them. I never tried to be one of the guys. I spent more energy on performance.” In the end, she said, she won over many of the men. “The men along the way, they were extremely jealous and competitive,” she said. “It didn’t really last that long because they saw my production, and when they did start to work for me, they realized, ‘She was not that bad.’ ” Like many women who became senior executives, she said she rose fastest and most smoothly when she was measured by the straightforward metric of profits. “It’s really all about money,” she said. “I always had to do better than anybody else to be considered equal. I ran great restaurants, had great profits and had the most successful people working for me.” One handicap to becoming the chief executive, she said, was her own choice not to work overseas. “I thought so many of the countries we were going into were so against women,” she said. “I thought, I don’t need that.” But after three years in the No. 2 spot, she and her boss disagreed about strategy. She pushed hard for changes, as she said many women in her place have done. “That’s how come I’m gone,” she said. When women act forcefully, research suggests, men are more likely to react badly. A Lean In/McKinsey & Company survey in 2016 of 132 companies and 34,000 employees found that women who negotiated for promotions were 30 percent more likely than men to be labeled intimidating, bossy or aggressive. Another executive spent 30 years in Fortune 500 companies, rising to the C-suite, the pool from which the next chief executive may be chosen. She described her experience in detail but insisted on anonymity because she has a settlement agreement with the company and remains friendly with her former boss. She gained a reputation for finding growth where others had not, often doubling the revenue of her divisions. She was seen as a possible successor to the chief executive, but she said she was unprepared for corporate politics at the very top. “Before heading to the C-suite, I didn’t feel I was handicapped at all,” she said, echoing conversations with many other women. But the next rungs of the ladder depend not only on results but also on prevailing in an environment where everyone is competing for a chance at the top job. “I got a guy his C-suite job,” she recalled. “I’m sitting there at the C-suite table and he takes a massive swipe at me on my business: ‘She’s not doing this right.’ I go down the hall, and I go to my friend and say, ‘What the hell just happened?’ And she said, ‘Did you forget the boys play a 24/7 game of dodge ball? You just walked into the gym. You whip the ball, and if it happens to knock somebody on the head, so what?’ And my husband said, ‘Why the hell did you help him get his job two years ago?’ ” ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story Her turning point came when she was outmaneuvered by male colleagues during a corporate reorganization. Believing she was not going to rise further, she asked for an exit package. Looking back, she is convinced that being a woman hurt her. “I rewrote the entire strategy for the company, doubled its share price,” she said. “We had a little bit of a dip. All of the guys had missed their numbers more. There’s a guy positioning himself as the successor. He hasn’t made his number in seven years. He’s tall and good looking and hangs around the right circles.” She drew an unwelcome conclusion. “Women are prey,” she said. “They can smell it in the water, that women are not going to play the same game. Those men think, ‘If I kick her, she’s not going to kick back, but the men will. So I’ll go after her.’ It’s keeping women in their place. I truly believe that.” Such experiences resonate even with women who did rise to the top job. “We are never taught to fight for ourselves,” said Ellen Kullman, the former chief executive of DuPont. “I think we tend to be brought up thinking that life’s fair, that you thrive and deliver, and the rest will take care of itself. It actually does work for most of your career. It doesn’t work for that last couple of steps.” Ms. Kullman withstood a challenge from an activist investor but then decided to resign in 2015, telling Fortune that she concluded she had become a target and “was getting in the way of the future of the company.” Sally Blount, dean of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern and the only woman to lead a top 10 business school, noted that data predicts that half or more of the women who earn an M.B.A. this year will drop out of the full-time work force within a decade. The reasons range from family conflicts to placing less inherent value on position or money. That accounts in part for the low number of women who do reach the very top job, because fewer remain in the pipeline. Yet even those women who stay and reach the C-suite are more likely than men to be overlooked, Ms. Blount said. “Getting looked over is incredibly painful, particularly when you’re not sure why after all these years,” she said. “I used to love the word ‘gravitas.’ I now think it’s male code for ‘not like us’ at the highest levels.” The parallels with politics are striking. Research in both fields, including some conducted after Mrs. Clinton’s loss, has shown it’s harder for assertive, ambitious women to be seen as likable, and easier to conclude they lack some intangible, ill-defined quality of leadership. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story In a Korn Ferry survey in April of 786 male and female senior executives, 43 percent said they thought that continued bias against women as chief executives was the primary reason more women did not make it to the top in their own companies — and 33 percent thought women in their firms were not given sufficient opportunities to become leaders. At DuPont, Ms. Kullman said, she found that men were being promoted within two years, women in three. “It wasn’t as overt as, ‘She’s too aggressive,’ ” she said. “It came down more to, ‘We’re not sure she’s ready for that job.’ ” As Wendy Cai-Lee, a banker now running her own investment firm, put it, if she wrote a book about women in business, the title would be “Dependable Back-Up.” The Lean In survey shows a pervasive sense among women that they face structural disadvantages: They are less likely than men to believe they will be able to participate in meetings, receive challenging assignments or find their contributions valued. The bleakest perceptions are from minority women; only 29 percent of black women think the best opportunities at their companies go to the most deserving employees, compared with 47 percent of white women. Some men see the competition in zero-sum terms. One corporate recruiter described a conversation with a male client seeking an additional board post. “He said, ‘I know all the seats are going to women, and I don’t stand a chance,’ ” the recruiter recalled. “I said, ‘70 percent of the seats go to white men.’ ” Yet many women work in companies with public commitments to diversity and clear policies against discrimination, with many men who sincerely believe they want women to advance. That makes many of the subtler ways women encounter bias more pernicious than blatant discrimination, a Harvard Business Review meta-analysis found. Many women, accomplished as they are, don’t feel the same sense of innate confidence as their male peers. Gerri Elliott, a former senior executive at Juniper Networks (who said she did not personally encounter bias), recounts a story related by a colleague: A presenter asked a group of men and women whether anyone had expertise in breast-feeding. A man raised his hand. He had watched his wife for three months. The women in the crowd, mothers among them, didn’t come forward as experts. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story Shelley Diamond rose to chief client officer at Young & Rubicam after running its New York office and leading several key worldwide accounts. Early in her career, she said, “My biggest Achilles’ heel was my own confidence in myself and my ability to accomplish a task that seemed giant and daunting and scary.” But she and other women describe a culture in which men sometimes feel hesitant to give women honest but harsh feedback, which can be necessary for them to ascend, because they fear women may react emotionally. Dina Dublon, who retired in 2004 as chief financial officer of JPMorgan Chase, said male colleagues sometimes told her they were reluctant to have dinner or drinks with female subordinates — important bonding activities in the corporate world — because it might be seen as flirtatious. The challenge for women is how to enter into the intangible but crucial circle of male camaraderie. “Once you get to the top of the company, in most cases, you are dealing with a male kingdom,” she said. “For as long as we are the minority group, it is much more about our capacity to adjust to them than their capacity to open up to us. I don’t think it’s about fairness. It is narrow-minded and ineffective, but human.” The widespread concern in business circles about the slow progress of women to the top has spawned a virtual cottage industry of recent initiatives, from Paradigm for Parity, of which Ms. Kullman is a co-chairwoman, to 100x25, a Rockefeller Foundation initiative aiming for 100 female chief executives in the Fortune 500 by 2025. That number now stands at 32 — an all-time high and spurt from last year, when there were 21. Pledges may be welcome, but consequences must follow, said Deborah Gillis, president and chief executive of Catalyst, which pushes for women’s advancement in business. She suggests withholding bonuses if leaders do not promote enough women or minorities and increasing bonuses if they do. In recounting their experiences, some women were philosophical; several swung between barely suppressed fury and bouts of self-blame. Our interviews were long and sometimes wrenching. As a former senior executive myself, I found that some of what they described resonated. Tracing what role gender played in any decision is often elusive. These women were high achievers, accustomed to knocking down barriers, not running up against them. There’s seldom one reason someone else wins out, making the dissection of any outcome all the more painful and perplexing. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story Yes, there are men who truly want women to succeed. Yes, businesses understand that a changing customer base means they fail to diversify at their peril. No one wants to give in to defeatism. But the long path to the top, and the loneliness at the summit, are forcing a reckoning. For her part, Mrs. Clinton is writing a book and speaking out more acidly than she allowed herself on the campaign trail. “Certainly, misogyny played a role” in her defeat, she told a rapt, partisan crowd at the Women in the World summit meeting in April. She described what she saw as the thought bubble among some voters for President Trump: “He looks like somebody who’s been president before.” 140 COMMENTS The fury and revulsion aimed at Mrs. Clinton — as well as the more open misogyny in some quarters in the wake of the election — has led many women to question whether they’ve underestimated a visceral recoil against women taking power in any arena. Many fear they already know the answer. Correction: July 21, 2017 An earlier version of this story incorrectly described the 100x25 project. It is a Rockefeller Foundation initiative, not a partnership between the foundation and Korn Ferry. Susan Chira (@susanchira) is a senior correspondent and editor on gender issues for The New York Times. Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook and Twitter (@NYTopinion), and sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter. Continue reading the main story TRENDING These Americans Hated the Health Law. Until the Idea of Repeal Sank In. Trump Aides, Seeking Leverage, Investigate Mueller’s Investigators News Analysis: Why Women Aren’t C.E.O.s, According to Women Who Almost Were Chester Bennington, Linkin Park Singer, Is Dead at 41 Trump’s Fury Erodes His Relationship With Sessions, an Early Ally Excerpts From The Times’s Interview With Trump Modern Love: The 12-Hour Goodbye That Started Everything Editorial: President Trump’s Contempt for the Rule of Law Op-Ed Columnist: Republicans Can’t Pass Bills Op-Ed Columnist: Health Care in a Time of Sabotage View More Trending Stories » Recommended for You OP-ED | JENNIFER WEINER The Men Who Never Have to Grow Up OP-ED | STEVEN RATTNER The Fading Trump Bump Go to Home Page » SITE INDEX THE NEW YORK TIMES Site Index Navigation NEWS World U.S. Politics N.Y. Business Tech Science Health Sports Education Obituaries Today's Paper Corrections OPINION Today's Opinion Op-Ed Columnists Editorials Contributing Writers Op-Ed Contributors Opinionator Letters Sunday Review Taking Note Room for Debate Public Editor Video: Opinion ARTS Today's Arts Art & Design Books Dance Movies Music N.Y.C. Events Guide Television Theater Video: Arts LIVING Automobiles Crossword Food Education Fashion & Style Health Jobs Magazine N.Y.C. Events Guide Real Estate T Magazine Travel Weddings & Celebrations LISTINGS & MORE Classifieds Tools & Services Times Topics Public Editor N.Y.C. Events Guide Blogs Multimedia Photography Video NYT Store Times Journeys Subscribe Manage My Account SUBSCRIBE Home Delivery Gift Subscriptions Crossword Email Newsletters Alerts Corporate Subscriptions Education Rate Mobile Applications Replica Edition Site Information Navigation © 2017 The New York Times Company HomeSearchAccessibility concerns? Email us at [email protected]. We would love to hear from you.Contact UsWork With UsAdvertiseYour Ad ChoicesPrivacyTerms of ServiceTerms of Sale Site Information Navigation Site MapHelpSite FeedbackSubscriptions

[annielaskorp]

Gotta Ticket to Anywhere

TW: Injury, Depression

annie didn't knock on the door. she didn't fucking need to. at this point, owen's house was practically her house. which was fine because his house was big enough to house all the residents of little hope. seriously, the place was huge. but that wasn't important. the important thing was that she got her hands on owen and gave him a nice slap. for scaring her. for acting like it was no big deal. for having to find out from her dad, who apparently was the one to take him to the fucking hospital after he had the accident. when she should've found out from owen. you know? owen? her best friend? pretty much her big fucking brother? and she wasn't even allowed to fucking see him? what kind of shit was that, anyway? and, yeah, her pop was nice enough to drop her off at owen's place, but that didn't mean he was off the hook for keeping her from the hospital. especially not for leaving to go help owen without telling her before leaving that that was what he was doing. fuck them both. assholes. "hey, dipshit! where you at?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

she didn't want to fucking hear it. no excuses. no bullshit. all straight-forward angry confrontational madness. she strolled into that house ready to duke it out between bros, and that was exactly what she was prepared to do. now looking at her douchebag friend's face, she tried to dish out her nastiest snarl. of course, she'd never been one host a lot of facial expressions, so it wasn't really intimidating. just kinda looked like her usual resting-bitch-face. "don't you fuckin patronize me, cocksucker," she huffed, though she didn't really stop him from wheeling her into the living room. asshole. "and don't smile at me like that, fuckwad-- i'm mad at you. you're an asshat and a cock-hole-shitting-fuckin-fuck-fucker." she didn't really have the words. well, she had some words, but they weren't really helpful. annie tried to push him away, but instead simply put her hands on his chest. buff fucking motherfucking ass. "get less buff so i can fucking push you around, brazilian wax mother fucker."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"my pop can go suck a dick." he wasn't off the hook, either. there was no reason that he couldn't have told her before this. before knowing that he was okay. she might've been able to do something for owen while he was out after the accident. pinched him in the fce until he woke up. you know, helpful things. she could be helpful. albeit violent. "what the fuck. no. you don't just get to apologize. even if you should apologize. becuse you were in the wrong, and you're an asshole. i'm gonna fuckin' punch you for this. you know that," he hugged her, and she rested her head against his shoulder, half-heartedly started to hit a fiist at his chest, "'cos you should've told me. i shouldn't have heard it from my fuckin' dad. fuck you, man." it was upsetting that he didn't think it was a big deal. he should've known it was a big deal. he should've... then again, she couldn't remember a time when she ever told him how she was put in the chair. had she never..? "you're not allowed to go and get yourself killed in a car accident, fuckface. don't ever fucking do that again." if she hadn't been allowed to die in her car accident, then neither could he.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

annie didn't like being patronized. she definitely didn't like being patronized while being picked up. she actually didn't fucking like being picked up to begin with, anyway? so the whole thing had her squirming, huffing, and giving owen a death glare fit for the fiery pits of satan's ass-crack. she pushed on his face as he spoke, didn't even care that he was giving another apology. which, again, he should be giving because he fucking needed to apologize? like, forever. she sighed, audibly. it was an incredibly audible sigh, and that was because she wanted it to be very well heard. because she was upset. and if her expression didn't say it (lol, because it didn't), then she would have to prove it in other ways. "yeah, you'd fucking better cuddle me, you rat bastard." she nosed against his chest, relaxed just the tiniest bit at the hair petting. it wasn't much, but it was better than nothing, she supposed. even if she was still pissed. even if she would probably hold this grudge for a while. "well, fuck you for thinking i shouldn't be in the fucking loop. i don't care what chicks you're fucking or whose ass hole you're licking, i am your loop. your whole loop. i should be the fucking first number on your phone if something happens." what would happen if he'd died? and she never got a chance to see him first? what the hell was she supposed to do if something like that happened, huh? she closed her eyes, wrapped an arm around his chest and snuggled close.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

she almost hated the fact that it was so much easier talking to owen about the difficult shit. probably because owen was just as much of a dick as she was. that is to say, it was both a reason why it was easier to talk to him and a reason why she hated to. what worried her was how resigned to it he seemed to be now. there was no backlash, no dumb fucking jokes. like, yeah, annie really wanted to think that it was just because he deserved it. but she also just kinda wondered if it was because he was upset about it, too. granted, the fucker had been in accidents before. faced mortality. hell, his leg was made out of metal, after all. there had to be some kind of story there, right? "yes. you fuckin' will," it wasn't as angry as her other remarks, but more a matter of fact. at least owen could learn from his fucking mistakes, right? at least he was able to get out of that hospital bed fully intact. or. as intact as he could be, considering he didn't go in fully intact to begin with. at least he was still mobile. that was good. at least he wasn't dead. "you're gonna order us food, right?" because she wasn't gonna let him drive them anywhere. even if he'd probably already bought fifteen fucking cars to replace the one. though, if he wanted to make a call, he'd have to do it from where he was. because annie wasn't moving.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

she'd asked him (more like told him, but in a kind of polite way? whatever. fuck being polite) for food, but she really hadn't put any thought into what she might want to eat. granted, she always wanted mcdonalds, but she doubted that mcdonalds delivered. not to mention, the fucker would probably turn up his nose at every fuckin' bite of double cheeseburger. "what? like i'm gonna fuckin' go anywhere, are you nuts. i'm comfortable. i'm not fuckin' moving anywhere," of course she also didn't answer the question. to be fair, she was a little too resigned to her spot and position to care about what they were gonna eat. as long as owen was there. and not dead in a fucking ditch somewhere. as long as she knew he was going to be okay. and he was still walking upright. and not. well. you know. worse off than he was. "fuck, man. i dunno. shitty chinese food sounds good. as long as it's cheap and shitty. it can't be super fuckin' fancy, you know? that ruins chinese take-out." or delivery. whatever you were supposed to call it. she was quiet for a moment, then finally asked the question, "so what the fuck happened?"

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

and it was like laying on a mass that could disappear at any moment, at least that's what it felt like to annie. right then and there. right now. as if one stupid decision could make him gone forever, which is could, actually. "what's wrong with healthy? other than it being fuckin' disgusting, i don't know. and i don't care. i just don't want it." and maybe one day she'd die from something that a long line of bad choices and stupid decisions had caused. but, seriously, annie wasn't made for looking too far into the future. she cared about the here and now, and recently, owen had done something fucked up. and god, he was being so passive about it. it made her so fucking angry. her dad had been passive about it, too. as if he didn't think one stupid car accident could kill somebody. or worse, as if it couldn't maim somebody to the point that they'd have been better off dead. and maybe that was a fucked up thought, but fuck you, and fuck anyone that tried to tell her how to feel. "that's it? you got fucked up and got in the car? and just decided to drive the fuck off? you're such a fuckin' douche, you know that?"

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Other character mentioned belongs to Neva of RP: Abandon Hope

[itsfinancethings]

(Miss this week’s The Leadership Brief? The piece below was delivered to the inbox of Leadership Brief subscribers on Sunday morning, Aug. 30; to receive weekly emails of conversations with the world’s top CEOs and business decisionmakers, click here.)

“I like to sleep late and then take a short nap during the day to recharge,” said no CEO, ever. Whether it’s the demands of the job or self-selection, the typical rising time of chief executives appears to be 5 a.m. And they’re not waking up early to finish binge-watching Season 6 of Alone. They’re hitting the gym for some sort of intense cardio workout.

One fiscal quarter into TIME’s weekly Leadership Brief series, we are hitting pause to offer some lessons learned from our first 13 installments. Even though our sample size is relatively small, our interview subjects own outsize influence: they’re running some of the world’s most important companies, like Delta and Microsoft and Pfizer, and offering real-time insight into navigating unprecedented challenges. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Their decisions are likely to be studied for decades to come.

So it’s important to take stock. We launched the series in May, on the premise that the twin crises facing the country—health care and economic—acutely demonstrated the need for strong leadership. And now, in the wake of national protests sparked by the murder of George Floyd, the very notion of leadership, and the system that produces who gets to be in charge, is subject to vigorous debate.

In the words of Kevin Washington, the first African-American CEO of the YMCA, “it’s a very tricky time” to be in charge. Younger workers today, says Washington, “expect and demand a different kind of leadership. They’re not as patient with the status quo or the hierarchy of an organization or a company.” Leaders already coping with issues that seemed unimaginable just months ago—like figuring out how to protect essential frontline workers, establish millions of home offices and cope with rolling supply-chain disruptions—are now facing pressure to implement truly equitable recruiting, hiring and promotional practices.

So let’s pivot to our lessons. The year’s barely three-quarters done, but I’m making an early call on the business word of the year: pivot. Whatever plans a company had in January were abruptly revised in March. Closing call centers and equipping thousands of employees to work from home were not included in any 2020 strategic goals. Everyone is pivoting. Maybe that’s why we are all so dizzy and disoriented: the mass pivoting.

Here’s another observation, though our small sample size may make data-driven CEOs cringe: growing up in a large family seems to help one muddle through chaos. I was struck by the number of leaders who hail from crowded houses. Brian Moynihan, the CEO of Bank of America and one of eight kids, takes pains to note that my observation is not “mathematically correlated.” But he offered the following theory: “You learn how to get along and manage many different personalities and many different viewpoints,” he says. “When you’re in the younger side of that large family, you get a lot of feedback.” Beth Ford, CEO of Land O’Lakes, also had seven siblings. Margaret Keene, CEO of Synchrony, was one of six kids, as was Progressive CEO Tricia Griffith.

Equally striking is the number of CEOs who grew up in households where money was scarce. A number worked their way through college. Growing up in Iowa, Ford shared a bed with a sister and was allotted one drawer. “Had to put those hand-me-downs somewhere,” she wrote me after our interview. Keene of Synchrony grew up in Queens, the daughter of a police officer, and she worked her way through college making $5.50 an hour as a debt collector. Griffith of Progressive recalls, “My dad sold life insurance door-to-door so we were really broke. I had a very small house with a lot of people.”

Running a modern multinational during an economic catastrophe is not a job for control freaks. These are big-time delegators. John Foley, CEO of Peloton, says, “Our CFO does 99% of finance. I engage because I want to know how we’re doing. But to say I don’t add value to her operation is an understatement. You can also say the same with technology. Our CTO doesn’t get any help from me. I’ll go sometimes months without talking to our CTO, which as a CEO of a technology company, that’s kind of rare.”

Chris Kempczinski, CEO of McDonald’s, says, “I’m usually not involved until there’s a problem, and then I get heavily involved.” David Taylor, CEO of Procter & Gamble, also doesn’t believe in micromanaging. “My job is not to manage,” Taylor says. “It’s to lead.”

I was struck by the CEOs who said they didn’t read conventional business-leadership books but instead were leaning on history. They’re learning from past eras, when world affairs also seemed grim and America appeared stretched to the point of breaking. Enough mentioned Ron Chernow’s Grant that I began reading the book. It’s indeed compelling, and also a grim reminder that the country has been trying to address systemic racism since the end of the Civil War.

Finally, the animated responses to my favorite question—What behavior do you not tolerate?—spawned a list of seven deadly workplace sins: nastiness, passive-aggressive behavior, pocket vetoes, PowerPoint presentations, lack of preparation for meetings, lobbying the CEO privately after a decision was made in a group meeting, and my favorite, from Midwestern-born Beth Ford, who says, “I’m not somebody’s mom, so don’t come to me with ‘I am not getting along with Joe or Sally.’ Absolutely not. I am uninterested. And if you do that, God help you. No, no, no. Be an adult for goodness’ sake.”

Thank you for your readership. We are taking next week off and will be back Sept. 13, with a strong lineup of interviews for the fall. I welcome your feedback and suggestions. What should we be asking the world’s business leaders? I’m eager to hear from you at [email protected]

Subscribe to The Leadership Brief by clicking here.

#IFTTT #Blogger