Pavillion of Women

We are reading this book for our book club at the office. It was written in 1938. I was thinking it was not going to be very good or very relevant to today. Amazingly it was not. Much of what Madame Wu struggles with is very relevant today. She's looking for purpose. She is weighted down by her responsibilities in the household of more than 60 people. She longs for something that will touch her soul. There were so many observations about her and her loneliness that I found parallel to my own life in a very odd way. With one great exception - she did not love her husband. I love mine very much. He is the sweetest, kindest man I have ever met.

She carries a heavy burden for many people as do I - at work, with my Dad, at home

She longs for purpose and meaning as do I. I want to be something more than just the job I have. I want to know my purpose. But I am often too busy to ponder the question. This was Madame Wu's problem as well. So many things she had to handle that she did not have time for herself. To find inside herself what her purpose and meaning were.

She longs to reach inside herself. To feel and know her soul. As do I.

Maybe I will get that chance very soon - to ponder these questions.

7 Deadly Sins of Peformance Measurement

I recently attended an executive management class at MIT. They provided a copy of the most recent MIT Management Review which had a really interesting and relevant article on performance measurement. http://sloanreview.mit.edu/smr/issue/2007/spring/02/pdf/48302W.pdf

The 7 Deadly Sins are Vanity, Provincialism, Narcissism, Laziness, Pettiness, Inanity and Frivolity. You are probably thinking what the heck does that mean? The article gives great examples from real world companies on how each of these can be a down fall.

Vanity - selecting only measurements that will inevitably make management and the company look good

Provincialism - allowing departments to measure narrowly within their own boudaries or silos which leads to suboptimization

Narcissism - measuring from one's own point of view rather than the customers

Laziness - assuming one knows what is important to measure without giving it adequate thougth or effort

Pettiness - measuring only a small component of what matters

Inanity - implementing metrics wihtout giving any thoguht to the consequences of thes metrics on human behavior and enterprise performance.

Frivolity - the sin of not being serious about measurement in the first place

There are great examples in the article about how each of these can adversely impact the business. It really made me rethink our approach to measurement and ask all the other business unit leaders to give it some thought for discussion at our next meeting.

The Language of God

I am currently reading the book "The Language of God" by Francis Collins, the head of the human genome project. He is a scientist and former athiest. Through his work on the human genome project he ultimately turned his view around to one of profound belief in God. Much of the reading that he did to inform his changed viewpoint was written by C.S.Lewis, starting with "Mere Christianity". I am just about half way throught he book so more commentary will come as I finish it up. Please read the comments - I am attaching some links to articles a friend sent that are related to the topic.

Down and Out

Stress has really had a hold on me for the past few weeks. My blood pressure has been quite high and I've just been feeling down and out. Not much is really different from how things usually are at work. So I wonder what it is that makes a person reach the breaking point. How is it that one day you just wake up and realize that you've had enough. You aren't happy. You don't enjoy your days and all the joy and positive energy is being sucked out of you for a purpose that is solely about money. What makes you break? What makes you stop caring about the money? Is it that you have enough or you realize that there will never be enough unless you let go? Well I reached that point this week. I can't really say what drove me there - it really wasn't any one specific thing. I just hit the wall. I don't know what this is going to mean for me. Its scary. But I know I can't go on the way I have been. It's a relief to come to the decision but it is also incredibly depressing. I think that was the big surprise. I just feel like crying. But the tears won't come out.