BY RICHARD PACHTER Originally published on Monday, October 27, 2003 in The Miami Herald. In other words, emotion beats logic, and a product or service's true ''Unique Selling Proposition'' is often counter to what the company thinks it is. The smart solution is not always the obvious one (and it's sometimes the dumbest one imaginable). |
Pound for Pound, Goleman's Book is the Best Around.
Business: The Ultimate Resource. Daniel Goleman et al. Perseus Publishing. 2,200 pages.
BY RICHARD PACHTER
rpachter@wordsonwords.com
Chances are, you're never going to read this book, but that's all right, I haven't read it either - at least not the whole thing. But if you buy this giant compendium of business wisdom, you'll probably refer to it on a daily basis.
Created by an international team of writers, editors and authorities on a variety of aspects of business and management, this authoritative and comprehensive volume is encyclopedic in scope. Old business, new economy - it's all here, with contributions from Warren Bennis, Peter L. Bernstein, John Seely Brown, Jim Collins, Charles Handy, Thomas Petzinger Jr., David Weinberger and many others.
Goleman, the putative frontman for this ambitious endeavor, which is a collaboration between American publisher Perseus and the United Kingdom's Bloomsbury, offers a thoughtful explanation of the rationale - and practical value - behind this huge undertaking. He writes "business literacy [is] a working familiarity with the key thinking and writing that business people need to keep up with. Given the thousands of books and articles published each year for business people, it's virtually impossible to keep current with the explosion of new ideas and concepts - not to mention weeding out the quickly fading fads of the moment. The majority of that unwieldy mass of ideas and insights offered up each year will fall away like leaves in autumn. But year after year there are thinkers whose insights prove worthwhile, because they make a practical difference — they add to business intelligence, and prove their worth by ways they matter at work. Business advantage is gained by harnessing smart ideas — not just amorphous data, the latest technology, or a larger-than-life CEO. As each of us goes through the ups and downs, crises and triumphs, of a life in business, the brain automatically extracts lessons for confronting similar situations in the future. Over the years we each build up a set of tacitly learned decision rules - life's lessons - which constitute the sum total of our wisdom on the matter. But each of us has only a specific, limited set of life experiences - and so a restricted set of lessons — informing our business wisdom. We can each benefit from expanding the pool of lessons learned, given the unpredictable nature of challenges we will face tomorrow."
This 2,200-page extravaganza is loaded with all kinds of interesting and useful sections, including a world almanac covering 26 industry-sector surveys, profiles of the United States and 150 other countries and every U.S. state; dozens of best-practice essays; biographies of business leaders like Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Peter Drucker, Adam Smith, Henry Ford, Estée Lauder and others; digests of what the editors consider to be the 70 most influential business books; a lexicon of business terms; an anthology of quotations; and backgrounders on dozens of topics like accounting, intellectual property, mission statements, team building, venture capital and (as they say) much, much more
.
All in all, it's an extremely well done effort. Pound for pound, in fact, it may be the best purchase one could make for a business library.
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Why would that be offensive?
When someone came to the OP’s defense, they got a similar — and ruder — response from the self-aggrieved person. The rude comment and subsequent thread were deleted after a few hours, presumably by an admin (but maybe the original commenter sobered up).
But if anyone watches TV, you'll see commercials for at least one national pizza chain touting its “NY-style” product. Yet saying pizza (or Chinese-American fare) is “NY-style” seems to offend some non-New Yorkers.
I’ve seen pizza called NY-style touted in California, for example, and I don’t know if Angelenos are as upset as some Floridians are by that reference. It’s really a selling point, a shorthand for the style of food.
I've seen "Boston-style Chinese food" and it evoked curiosity, not offense. Same with "Montreal-style bagels."
But there's clearly an anti-NY vibe in South Florida, probably because New Yorkers are rarely bashful. And the obnoxious ones are often really obnoxious. But that doesn't mean they all are or that anything "NY-style" isn't good — or better.
If any eatery thinks they’ll get extra customers by saying they sell “Lake Worth-style pizza,” “Tamarac-style Chinese food,” “Boca-Raton-style bagels,” etc., so be it. Not holding my breath, though.
by Richard Pachter
Boring persisted, "Fired? What do you mean? All you've got to do is stop sending me scripts!"
Weisinger then said, "Do you need a kick in the stomach to know you're not wanted?"
Weisinger said he'd call Stan Lee and try to find something for Boring at Marvel. Wayne said he liked what he called Marvel's "punchy style," but after doing some sample work for the company, didn't get any work just yet.
The day after he was sacked by Weisinger, he contacted Hal Foster, and went to work for him as his assistant (and ghost) on Prince Valiant. Wayne later worked with Sam Leff on Davy Jones, another newspaper strip, and with John Prentice on Rip Kirby.
But it must have been a shock to be fired from Superman. Wayne recalls, "I was kind of down after 30 years."
As for Weisinger, "I was afraid I'd die and go to hell and he'd be in charge! That would have been the capper!" he laughed. Wayne eventually did do some work for Marvel Comics, including some Captain Marvel art, with a Roy Thomas-scripted issue of Thor a few years back.
Now 66 and working as a part-time security guard, Boring draws a bit and started painting several years ago. He says, "Painting has improved my drawing 1000 percent. Now I'm cussing myself that I didn't start years ago. By God! I've still got some punch yet!"
He frequently hears from fans and loves to talk about his work on Superman. The fans, of course, love to talk to him. Ultimate fan Fred Hembeck, in fact, met Wayne at a comic convention a few years back in Orlando and the two artists swapped sketches.
Sitting on his patio, I told him that Carmine Infantino and Gil Kane returned to DC, once again drawing and entertaining a new generation of fans, and also about the company's new enlightened and benevolent management which seems to be far more considerate towards it artists than its predecessors. I wondered if Wayne would want to draw Superman comics again.
He paused for a few seconds and said, "You know, I'm pretty well situated now. This is a mild job I've got, as a day security man. They're the nicest people I've ever met. They pay me well." He paused again and looked me in the eye and said softly, "Of course. Yeah, I'd like to get back to drawing, now that you mention it."
Will the man who drew the classic "Superman's Return to Krypton" himself return to DC Comics and the Man of Steel? Stay tuned ...
(P.S. He did, but that's another story ... )
It may no longer be necessary to tolerate really bad behavior in the workplace, according to this new book, which also discusses how to modify the behavior of habitual offenders.
BY RICHARD PACHTER
Originally published in The Miami Herald on 4/2/07
Are you an asshole?
Of course not.
But if you were, you probably would not admit it. After all, bad guys rarely consider themselves villains, and even the most misguided or murderous dictator usually claims a higher purpose. The people that author Robert Sutton writes about in this bracing new book are often oblivious to the unacceptability of their behavior.
Yet, almost every workplace seems to have several jerks who regularly run roughshod over others' rights and feelings. Most of us have toiled with weasels who blamed us for their own incompetence, laziness or malfeasance. Some may have even messed with us for the own amusement — or just because they could. I sure could tell you a few delightful stories, in fact, but as Don Corleone wisely declared, "This is business, not personal.''
SAY IT LIKE IT IS
In recent years, a new term for this stuff has gained popularity, both in the workplace and in academic settings: bullying. That's what it is. Employees who abuse their authority are craven bullies. Just as principals and teachers have come to recognize the corrosive and dehumanizing effects of such behavior, so too, have a growing number of employers.
It's not just bosses abusing subordinates; hostile words and/or actions directed at co-workers are also counterproductive and a waste of time and money. Sutton tells of a company in the UK that itemized the costs of the aberrant and abhorrent behavior of one such scoundrel and presented him with a bill for the expenses the company incurred as a result of his antics. Though commendable, the author points out that it's still a half-measure and that the firm really should have just fired the bad bloke.
Sutton provides a very solid and honest examination of the phenomenon but is not above recounting his own behavior when it veered near the precipice of iniquity. And there's a large dose of good-natured humor throughout the text, as any genuine discussion of human behavior must include, but he's also pragmatic. Despite his solid academic credentials, he is well acquainted with the world beyond the ivy-covered walls.
HUMOR AND SOLUTIONS
While the diverse examples and knowing asides Sutton invokes are interesting and reveal the ubiquity and universality of purposefully intemperate conduct, he also discusses a number of possible reactions and remedies. There is a lot of humor in his anecdote about the put-upon office worker whose boss always ate the food on her desk. The disgruntled employee left some chocolate laxatives for the transgressor -- with the expected results -- but the ideal approach to handling such situations varies, Sutton explains. Too often, however, management can't or won't take matters seriously until a subpoena or lawsuit serves as a wake-up call.
Even more interesting to me is Sutton's informal survey of organizations that actually implement the dictum of this book's title. It's tough, for example, to toss out a top performer who is otherwise a total SOB, but companies that are truly serious about creating and maintaining a positive and non-threatening workplace are well worth exploring.
Don't you wonder if any of 'em are hiring?
This was originally written in 2007 for Moli.com, a hybrid business-social site, now defunct, that published a substantial amount of original content. I was business editor. This was the first part of an abortive series on comics creators, never completed due to the site's demise.
The makers of comic books are all powerful. With a flick of their wrists, they create and destroy universes, cheat death, shatter the time barrier, and imbue mere mortals with powers far beyond those of mortal men. But despite their heroic demeanor and soaring imaginations, many of these omnipotent, omniscient Masters of Reality have been broke, exploited, and demoralized victims of corporate oppression. Occasionally, some rise up to fight this injustice and subjugation.
Our story begins many years ago ...
As content, comics are now a primary source of material for blockbuster movies. But the business of comics is just that: a business, albeit a rapidly changing one. Once upon a time, there were many companies producing comics. But for the last 40 years or so, the best-known characters like Spider-Man, Superman, the Fantastic Four, Batman, the Hulk, and others, have come from two companies: Marvel and DC. Sales of traditional pamphlet-sized, individual "comic books" have dropped sharply over the last decade, while the sales — and mainstream cultural acceptance — of hard- and soft-cover compilations, as well as original "graphic novels," are ascendant.
If you grew up reading comics in the '60s or '70s, you were regaled with tales of the Merry Marvel Bullpen, a wondrous place where all the artists drew their comics while laughing and kibitzing with writer/editor Smilin' Stan Lee. They had a grand time.
Turns out the bullpen was essentially a myth. Few, if any, artists hung around the office, except to pick up a check and a new assignment. They toiled from home, or from their own rented studios. That's the way it's still done. Most of the creative work in comics is performed by freelance writers and artists on a work-for-hire basis, with the companies retaining ownership of the story, the characters (old and new), and any derivative works, like movies, TV shows, cartoons, lunch boxes, ring-tones — whatever. Creators are sometimes offered a slender sliver of the pie, but paying actual royalties to actual creators is a relatively recent innovation.
Years after signing away his rights to the iconic character, Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel couldn't even get a writing assignment from DC or any publisher. His partner, Joe Shuster, was legally blind and couldn't draw, so he toiled as a messenger in Manhattan and lived in semi-poverty. Marvel comics artist Jack "King" Kirby, at minimum responsible for the original design (if not the actual creation) of the Fantastic Four and nearly every other Marvel character, was forced into pleading, threatening, and finally shaming Marvel into returning a fraction of his original drawings — those that hadn't already been lost, stolen, or destroyed.
"All I know is that I own my drawings, but they've got them, and they know that I own them," he told The Comics Journal back in 1986. "They know, and they're holding them arbitrarily. They'll grab a copyright, they'll grab a drawing, they'll grab a script. They're grabbers — that's their policy. They can be as dignified as they like. They can talk in lofty language, although they don't usually ... not to me [laughter]. They can act like businessmen. But to me, they're acting like thugs."
And this was Kirby, the King of the Comics! Mere mortals, and just plain journeyman artists and writers, have been treated far worse.
While it's legal and practical for publishers to exploit (in the positive sense of the word) their intellectual property, until quite recently these companies have also exploited their freelance writers and artists, paying on a per-page basis with none of the benefits typically accorded salaried employees, such as health insurance, paid vacations, holidays, etc. When a group of veteran writers organized in the mid-1960s and asked for basic health insurance, DC's reaction was to abruptly cut off their work — in effect, firing them. That was the end of that little uprising.
Modest improvements were made over time, including the advent of creator-owned properties and shared trademarks, royalties, and payment for reprints. Most of the advances were incremental and isolated until 1992.
Before that important year, the hegemony of Marvel and DC had been challenged by a handful of smaller publishers: Dark Horse, First, Pacific, Eclipse, Malibu, Comico, Valiant, and others (all of which are now out of business except Dark Horse, whose close ties with film properties like The Mask, Time Cop, and other Hollywood productions augment and support their print ventures). Some of the indies produced books with production values equal to or better than the majors, though the quality of the stories and art varied greatly. Distribution was inconsistent, at best. They were less a threat to the Big Two and more of a farm system for new talent.
But in 1992, seven of Marvel's hottest artists (Erik Larsen, Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, Todd McFarlane, Whilce Portacio, Mark Silvestri, and Jim Valentino) met with the company's management and announced the formation of their own publishing entity, Image.
Jim Lee told author George Khoury in Image Comics: The Road to Independence, "There was a wide, wide rift between how we perceived ourselves and our value to the company as creators, and [how] they valued us as creators, and I think they felt that they would survive without us. And they did, ultimately. They took a hit for ... several years because I think they underestimated what Image would become."
Image began to publish books written and drawn by the rebel alliance. At first Malibu distributed the comics. After learning they were paying Malibu for services that they could handle themselves, like dealing with printers and other vendors, Image distributed the books themselves.
But Image wasn't even a publisher in the traditional sense. It didn't own the copyrights, trademarks, or characters. It was (and is) more of a collective, with each of the then-six (Portacio dropped out) shareholders owning their own creative properties and calling the shots. The effect of Image's entry into the marketplace was immediate; initial sales of their books were quite high, even surpassing DC's volume, albeit briefly. Comics featuring their creations — Spawn, The Savage Dragon, Wildcats, and others — sold in the millions (!), and the Image founders became quite wealthy, especially for comic artists.
It's worth pointing out that these Image founders were all artists, and not writers; none wrote their own tales, though some had already begun either scripting or "plotting" the stories they drew at Marvel in collaboration with an editor or a "scripter," who penned dialogue to match the action depicted in the drawings.
In the wake of Image's success, several groups of writers and writer-artists also tried forming similar publishing collectives, but none gained traction and all were abandoned.
Image itself didn't stay together. Jim Lee's Wildstorm imprint was wholly acquired by DC in 1998. Lee is still ostensibly in charge of the creative side, but DC manages the business, which frequently involves creative decisions, too.
Marc Silvestri's Top Cow Productions left Image in 1996 but returned shortly after Image founder Rob Liefeld was voted out by the other partners over a variety of complaints and conflicts. Top Cow regularly works with Marvel. Lee and Liefeld have also drawn books for their old company, though since the DC acquisition, Lee's work has mostly appeared under that company's banner.
The comics industry is subject to the same competitive forces faced by most businesses, including consolidation. Image, though originally formed as a means to empower and enrich its creators, found that they still had bills to pay, payrolls to make, and profits to turn. Business is business; it's revealing that nearly all of Image's current books are written and drawn by non-partners.
But creators still seek to create businesses to serve their needs — and not the other way around.
The latest, artist Steve Rude, is a journeyman "artist's artist." In an upcoming post, we'll explore the secret origins of his new company, Rude Dude Productions, which one skeptical veteran editor termed "a suicide mission." We'll see.
© 2007, 2008 The Pachter Family Trust. Originally appeared on www.Moli.com.
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