Displaying 361 To 390 Of 1,384 Comments Employment at Will…what does it mean? Abby – the sad reality is that companies are set up to monitor and reward/punish COGS issues. No one watches overhead or rewards/punish for inflated overhead. So, Project Managers, Dept. Managers, VP’s and anyone that can, hides mistakes and cost overruns in overhead whenever they can. I can fix that. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 1:23 pm Abby – it’s what I do! LOL » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 1:16 pm Abby – Ahhh! The hidden (buried) costs of mismanagement, which is why overhead in many companies is higher than it needs to be. I will, over and over in my series, repeat that TRUE costs have to be determined. For example, bad safety practices are EXPENSIVE. Higher WorkComp, higher liability insurance, legal fees, settled claims… all are in overhead. Why not set up a safety program that eliminates those expenses? That is also in overhead, but is MUCH less expensive than those other things over time. Just one example… » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 1:10 pm Abby – every time I have gotten a business to apply what I set up for them and follow through, it has resulted in more profits, fewer headaches, and a self-running business. A practical approach. who doesn’t want that? » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 1:02 pm Abby – I will, at some point, also address incentives in my series. It is actually a cornerstone of effective management, if done properly. And the way I suggest it be done, it costs the comapny nothing outside of what they establish as a reasonable profit margin in a careful and complete Business and Financial Plan. It’s actually what I’m pointing at. I’ll be interested to see what you have to say on the subject. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 12:55 pm Hi David. What about the fact that they have a signed contract? I mean, it is a NEGOTIATED contract. Both sides signed it. If it were so onerous or problemmatic, why didn’t the state just not sign it? Contracts work both ways. Are you saying that contracts are to be ignored? Seems a bad bit of business, if true. Besides, the workers’ union has tried repeatedly to speak with the governor, but he has refused. They are more than willing to talk about the money, but they are adamant about not giving up negotiating rights. Seems reasonble to me. How am I mistaken? » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 9:18 am Sarah Palin Watch: The Death of Death Panels The story about the child in the field brought back some memories… My Dad died of cancer back before there was formal paperwork that could be legally filed, a living will or whatever. It took a year for my Dad to die, chemotherapy kept him going. He and I and my brothers talked about it, my mom wasn’t too keen on talking about it, so we let her alone. My dad did not want heroic measures. Maybe a feeding tube if he couldn’t eat, but that was it. he had no interest in “living” on machines for a long time. So, when he got bad enough to be hospitalized near the end, my brothers and I had a long talk with his oncologist and made sure he understood we wanted a DNR on his chart. He said he understood, and we thought that was the end of it. I’ll never forget the day my dad died. I drove 130 miles up to my hometown that weekend, and dad was in the hospital, not in very good shape. The minute I walked into the room, I knew he was dying. I spent some time with him, but he wasn;t responsive, and I had to head back home to go to work the next day. I had one foot on the elevator across from the nurses station, and for some reason, I stepped back off, walked up to the nurse’s station and asked if my dad’s chart had a DNR on it. It did not. I was stunned! I insisted that the oncologist be called. He was unavailable. I went ballistic (without yelling, but got very intense) and demanded to see the head Resident to straighten it out (it was a Sunday, and not many doctors were around). The two nurses gave each other a look when I mentioned the name of the oncologist, and I got it. This had happened before with other patients. Apparently, he didn’t believe in DNRs and took his own path. It was all in a glance. The nurses told me they would handle it. I made sure they understood that any other option or issue would result in very dire consequences, since I had my dad on tape saying what he wanted. My dad died before I got home that night. I am SO grateful for that unexplicable feeling I had to check on his chart. My dad was able to die without prolonged machine assistance, which is really not living. He went in his time, with my mom there, and that was good. I consider it one of the best things I ever did for him. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 12:16 pm Writing Responsibly for Other Universes Ahhhhhhhhhh………. Science fiction and fantasy formed me. That’s as close as I can come to explaining why I am the way I am in my head. From Blish to Clarke to Asimov and Heinlein, Campbell, McCaffrey, Lackey, Jordan, even Rand(!) and all the rest. They have been my teachers and my friends, have allowed me to mentally explore ideas in social issues, technology, the human mind, and how they relate to each other in ways no other genre possibly could. By somehow making me read their propositions, I became a better person, more thoughtful, understanding, perceptive, and imaginative than I would have on my own. I sincerely believe that. Besides, they keep my belief alive that, somehow, there IS magic in the universe. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 12:44 pm jdm – Bears, deer, porcupine.. all can be real pests and actually dangerous in large numbers. What “citified” people sometimes don’t see is the tragic loss of whole populations because carrying capacity is exceeded. However, my cousin DJ took that bear in his back yard. I’m convinced of it. That pile of apples, carrots and potatoes might have been a clue, I don’t know. He’s not much of a gardener, and the “compost pile” sort of didn’t make sense! LOL » Posted By PocketWatch On February 20, 2011 @ 10:31 am jdm… no, haven’t heard that one, but it sounds right. My cousins are generally in logging for paper mills. LOL My first cousin DJ is an infamous poacher. He denies it, but when tries to tell us the bear he shot was trying to get into his kitchen window and he HAD to do it, we all crack up! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 7:55 am jdm & chill.. I have a ton of cousins up on the ‘Range! Yah hey! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 7:03 am BDM – When I moved from NYC to Texas, I resolved to drive the entire Sky Line Drive, which starts in Virginia and ends up in Georgia, or damned near. I had to detour around some of it because the tops of the mountains in NC were still snowed in (it was March, as I recall). A GREAT drive! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 21, 2011 @ 3:28 pm ADONAI – I’m not sayin’ a word… » Posted By PocketWatch On February 21, 2011 @ 3:24 pm For Pepe and Great Lardini — Canada’s OTHER game and its long love affair with baseball I come from a little town in Northern Wisconsin, and when I was growing up, the town hosted a major championship series of fastpitch softball. Teams from Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Northern Michigan all showed up for six or eight weekends in the summer to duke it out. It was an amazing time, and thousands of people showed up in busses and trucks and, as far as I know, hiking through the forests. You essay reminded me of that, for some reason…. good times! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 1:42 pm Doing Business – The Right Way (Part 7) Mornin’ d’girl! See what you did? Got ’em all riled up! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 7:59 am Truth… First, I know adey. She is a very good egg. And a real rabble rouser, someone good to have around. I have been following that thread a bit, waiting to see if there is a consensus on how to proceed. My suggestion is that SOMEONE start with a short “mission statement.” What, exactly, and in very few words, are the goals of the project? That will lead you to the steps necessary to complete the task. Just list them. THAT will lead to the functions required to get there. Next, a down-and-dirty org chart or plan… we have functions that need to be performed… who will do them? What resources are necessary? That’s what you need to get a project like this accomplished. All that planning might take all of a half hour… doesn’t need to be fancy. What it does is provide clarity of thought and a map to completion. I’m not sure what the goal is, yet, in clear detail. Until that happens, the rest is ephemeral. That is why there is ‘confusion.’ » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 7:50 am Truth…. I saw where you guys were trying to rope me into that one! LOL I’ll be glad to help once you decide what direction you want to go (the business plan) and how it is to be organized (functional org chart). See how that works? » Posted By PocketWatch On February 19, 2011 @ 7:10 am KQ… good point. Downstream costs are always very difficult to quantify. However, there are things that can be done, since most downstream costs ARE buried in overhead, many times intentionally, and many times through ignorance. Case in point … safety. If you look at the costs to a company down in overhead of increased Workman’s Compensation due to claims caused by accidents, and compare those costs to the costs of an effective safety program, you can see that one offsets the other. In the paper idustry, what are the insurance and legal costs associated with settled claims and increased insurances due to using dangerous chemicals versus safer ones? There is homework involved, and it has to do with thinking about what are the hidden costs of doing things this way versus that way. And we all know how everyne hates homework! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 6:06 pm My all ’round favorites are my fedoras… I have several in different colors. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 6:59 pm day, I always knew you were a rabble rouser! Look what you did! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 6:57 pm I love it, actually! I thought adey started it with some radio show from Canada she heard? » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 6:47 pm KB, just saw it… kewl hair, man! LOL I could never have worn a ‘hawk or anything like it. I started going bald at 16 (thanks mom!) and have always had fine hair. During my hippie days, it was way long. But the day I got out of the army, I started a beard, and have not had a shaved face since. Even against company policy a couple times. Skrew ’em! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 6:45 pm Since everyone’s sharing, I will reveal a little about my SN choice. The picture, of course, is me, taken in my office from the laptop’s camera. I love hats, since I’m bald (I think of it as my hair just sort of slid down to my face…) and I have many, but that panama is one of my summer favorites. Anyway, PocketWatch.. my real initials are PW, and my handle back when CB radios were popular (handy when you drive 100K a year for your job)was Pinball Wizard. So, when I started in AOL chatrooms eons ago, back just after the Earth’s crust cooled, I wanted a handle that kept the pattern. I’m also sort of old-fashioned in many ways, and own a pocket watch or two, mainly for when I go hunting, so, I became PocketWatchQQ. The QQ part was graphic. They look like two eyes looking down to the side in some typefaces, as in “I’m watching you!” I shortened it for HP {[spit!]}, and kept it for here. (I’m such a creature of habit with an amazing lack of imagination! I hang my head in shame….) » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 6:30 pm Fox – Yes you are! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 10:42 am Well, Kewl! Spoke with His L-ness… » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 10:33 am Brody… I’m the same way. Even though I’ve had personas over the years for role-playing, my “mundane” has always been “me.” I have no time or inclination to hide or fool people. Too much work! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 10:19 am I have had long experience with online persona, having spent literally years on AOL in the early days in role-playing chatrooms. You bring up an interesting point. I learned long ago never, ever to make assumptions. Gender, age, location, background, educational level… it is all invisible. Add to that the lack of facial expression and body language, and it becomes nearly impossible to really and for certain, ID a person online as to those things. There ARE clues, though, if you pay close attention. Word choice, POV, ways of expression, subject matter, sense of humor, sensibilities in general… all can be clues to some of those attributes, if one pays very close attention and uses a sort of gestalt applied to the person you chat with. Not anything like totally accurate, but many times it’s not hard to tell some of those things about a person after a while, even in a very short time, as you point out. This form and format of communicating is a very new thing in the world. People used to write letters. Days, weeks, and months would pass before replies got back. Now, we think 30 seconds is “slow.” It is also theoretically anonymous in many ways. That alone gives people the courage to open up more than they ever might face-to-face. There is safety in pixels! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 10:17 am Families can be – and often are – complicated, there is no doubt. There are no words to express the empathy I feel when reading of how families treat each other. The phrase “We only hurt the ones we love” comes to mind. Rather than attempt and abysmally fail at trying to understand your complicated and trying history, I rather started to think of two funerals in my family. My maternal grandmother was a tiny woman, barely 4’10” and thin. She was of French origin and therefore Catholic, and a quiet, nice lady. She loved a good joke and having family around. With six children and unnumerable grandchildren all scattered across the country, family get-togethers were rare, but fun. Her second husband (my grandfather died the day my older brother was born) was a staunch Lutheran, stern and conservative, quiet, and never said much. He was an ok guy, took some of us kids fishing a time or two, and was a very good provider. My grandmother died frst, in her eighties. I remember driving 6 hours through a snowstorm to get to her funeral, and was shocked to find she had specifically requested I be a pallbearer. To this day I don’t know why, considering there were literally dozens of cousins that lived closer and had seen her more often. On her side of the family, there is French from her, Irish from my blood grandfather. We are a boisterous bunch of wisecracking, storytelling people. My grandmother was beloved in the community, and the number of cars that followed the hearse to the cemetery was literally miles long. After, the family got together at someone’s house, and, as our habit, spent hours over food, funny stories, remembering my grandmother in so many ways. They say weddings and funerals… in my family that’s true. No joke, no amusing situation goes unturned. It’s our way, and somehow very comforting. When her husband died, it was so different. The funeral service was somber and dreary, the wake was about the most depressing thing I can ever imagine, and as soon as the service at the cemetery was done, everyone just left. It was the antithesis of what I was used to. I guess the reason I’m relating this is a way to think about how different families operate and behave. Many people are shocked at the way we behave when all of us get together to say goodbye to a family member. Scandalous! We should be sad, and somber, and cry a lot! What is going on? I see remembering someone as a celebration of their life, and noting the passing of someone we care for. They live in on our memories. And maybe that is what touched me so much about the story you related… the lack of memories. But, you are creating something that didn’t exist before, a memory, a reality that didn’t exist before you accepted this torch. And that’s something that is extraordinary. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 9:56 am e’cat… And the narrow necktie, white-shirts meeting in the basement for the Young Republicans. Those guys are now in Congress. » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 11:37 am coveark – Yesterday was trying for many… sunspots, aliens, spotty connections, server issues… all made it a trial yesterday. I am sure they are working it out. BTW, I lost almost 300 fans on Black Monday out of over 1,600.. It was then I knew SOMETHING was up! » Posted By PocketWatch On February 18, 2011 @ 10:40 amComments Posted By PocketWatch
«« Back To Stats Page
Home Stats