A Better Way Of Doing Business

Image by Great Beyond via Flickr

In the build-up to the holiday season, I was fortunate enough to be following a sneak peek preview of a most intriguing novel, Steve McAllister's The McAllister Code. I'll try to describe the book here, but that won't do it too much justice. Simply saying "It's about two wise-cracking aliens who visit Steve and convince him to write a book that will turn his hometown of Sarasota, FL into a marketing mecca" seems like it wouldn't achieve too much, but that's exactly what the book is about.

Or rather, that's what the book isn't about. There are several other recurrent themes throughout it, some striking, some novel, and some that will strike a chord with many readers. (There's my plug: go buy the book as I intend to, and tell @inkensoul I sent you). One theme Steve reiterates is something that I have believed for a long time. Businesses can be successful without being evil. For a long time it has been held that the "greed is good" images perpetuated in the Nineties were the model of how businesses should compete; win-lose, zero-sum games, triumph or die. One of Stephen Covey's seven habits is often quoted as "strive for win-win" yet only recently have companies appeared that can actually thrive on that model. It takes a huge amount of nerve to be the first adopter of that kind of policy and exchange short-term gains for long-term successes for all. It seems to be the sort of strategy that is only successful, once everyone accepts it. Although I was intrigued, I must admit, I had my doubts that such businesses could be successful. Yet, even as I read the daily excerpts from Steve's book, I ran into the following three quite remarkable examples.

Firstly, I'd like to mention Qualatek, right here in Hollister, California. My change in circumstances recently meant that C and I ended up sharing a laptop for a little while. This was quite an enlightening experience for C, as, suddenly she discovered that sharing a computer with a code monkey is quite a proposition as the poor machine begins to grunt and groan under the strain. I believe it lasted somewhere around a week before the monitor gave up the ghost. A quick peek inside seemed to confirm that it was a worn-out cable; it also confirmed what I believed about the interior of laptops. Nobody in their right mind should try to get inside one. It takes a can opener, and the number of bits and pieces is simply mind-boggling. Hence I started on my search for a repair professional, which is relatively easy, provided you don't mind being treated like dirt. Typically, computer repair folks will charge you the earth for an initial 'diagnosis', after which they'll then tell you what you might expect to pay should you decide to repair it or not. You're out of pocket immediately. Both C and I have had bad experiences this way that have left a terrible aftertaste. Enter Nick from Qualatek, who quite happily accepted my initial diagnosis, sat on an eBay auction for the missing part over the Christmas break, ordered it without even setting eyes on the machine, took the machine to fit it, and let me know that didn't cure the problem, then ordered a new display - all without any strong-arm or hard sales tactics. The whole experience has built such a level of trust that I know he is going to fix the problem, competently and economically, and I won't hesitate to recommend him to everyone. A wonderful way of doing business.

That "change in circumstances" I mentioned above was finding myself unemployed just before Christmas. Of course, everybody makes a comment that it's a terrible time to find yourself out of work, as if there was ever a good time, as if your sudden lack of a paycheck would overshadow the festivities and that would be the only thing on your mind. Of course, it's true it isn't a good time to be looking for work - but for many other reasons. So many corporate HR departments and recruiters are taking time off for the holidays that getting a response from anyone is difficult in itself. In December, I made something like sixty submissions to many and varied companies in the area, using the big-name job search sites that everyone has heard of. In the midst of all this I discovered Jobfox, and can certainly testify to its effectiveness. Like the other sites, there are benefits for premium membership, offers for resume writing services, and so on - of course, the companies have to make their money - but I was most surprised at the level of questions required during my initial sign-up for an account. As a result, the opportunities I was offered, which from the other sides were simply the same old stale postings that I'd seen throughout Christmas, were new, fresh, and more importantly, precisely targeted to my skills. The other sites had been fruitless for a month. It seemed within a week of Jobfox, I was well on my way to securing my current post. (Another mention here of course goes to my new employer, who distinguished themselves by acting surprisingly quickly over the Christmas and New Year break while other companies and recruiters let the holiday slip by).

Finally, one more mention of how human ways of doing business really make all the difference. We ate at Flames in San Jose after one of my job interviews, and were amazed at the friendly atmosphere, quality (and quantity!) of food on offer. We had a good conversation with the table server about where I had been that day, and wishing me good luck in my search. Of course, a recommendation for a restaurant always comes with a risk. You wonder whether or not your experience was a one-off; whether next time you go there it will not meet expectations, or worse, you take someone else there and things are terrible. C and I decided we were going to take two of her sisters there for their dinner after arriving in San Francisco airport last week. Fortunately, the food quality met - no, exceeded - our previous expectations, everyone enjoyed the food and the atmosphere. The biggest surprise though was most unexpected, the table server from our previous visit recognized us, asked me very directly and specifically about whether I had had any luck in the job search, and remembered so much from our previous visit. He surely had served hundreds of people in the interim, yet remembered everything, treated us well, and of course earned his tip. That's service, and that's a better way of doing business for everyone.

The coconut pie was wonderful, too.

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Standing up for what I believe in - I Am The Walrus

J, a dear musician friend of mine, wrote to me a couple of days ago with his ambition for the week. "I am going to do a remake of I Am The Walrus," he bragged. "It'll be quite a challenge, I'm going to be using all sorts of sound effects, I'll see how it goes." I wished him luck, told him he was exceptionally brave, and wondered what would become of it.

Last night, he mailed me an MP3 file attachment, and I was so intrigued I had to go over immediately to the computer and see what he had done. Admittedly, it was a bit rough around the edges. An amateur musician, with basic home studio equipment and a keyboard... but nevertheless J had done exactly what he had set out to do. And, more than that, he had created something that had never been created before. He had entitled his e-mail "You have never heard it like this" - and he was absolutely right. His sound effects included other Beatles songs, a sample of Rod Serling giving one of his Twilight Zone introductions, and even the great Don Knotts as Barney Fife saying "you've gotta nip it in the bud". It was indeed something I had never heard before. Something old and familiar, but delivered with a fresh spin so that it became something new.

For countless centuries, that has been the way culture has been done. Every generation takes the existing culture, and builds on it, modifies it, refreshes it, and gives us an increasing return on investment. Culture is a wonderful thing. Like intelligence, sharing it doesn't deplete it; it all comes from a commons. The more we have of it, the more it enriches us all. With the technology and capabilities that we now have, things that were radical and only accessible to producers like George Martin in studios like Abbey Road are now available to more of us than ever. Most of us have easy access to sufficient technology just by using our computers. Yet, somehow, our abilities to do so are being stunted. J can never perform his recording. He can only share it privately with friends in an e-mail. He can, of course, never afford to deal with copyright law.

The irony of it all is that copyright law calls what J has done stealing. There's some implied philosophy there that because the song of another was used as part of his work, because he "took" something, that there's less of it remaining for the original author. J had only done this as a tribute, paying homage to his heroes, as a labor of love. There was never anything remotely vindictive about what he did. Any concept of theft could not be further from the truth. Yet, that's not the way the law works. It's not just music, and it's not just the Beatles, of course. Once upon a time, the Walt Disney company took the works of the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen. Things that were old, and turned them into something fresh, something different, something new, and something that suited the times. Of course, were any of us ever to do the same to Disney as Disney had previously done to the Grimms or Andersen, the outcome would be very different.

Josie over at Sleep is for the Weak posed, as one of her prompts for this week's Writing Workshop, to write about a time when I stood up for something I believe in, and what were the consequences. (I must admit, this is my second attempt at a post; I tried the "taking stock" prompt first and wasn't pleased with the results). I guess like most kids of my generation, I was falling foul of copyright law as soon as I had any appreciation of music at all. I can remember every Sunday evening, listening to the Charts countdown (during that rare spell where Radio 1 would get a hold of the FM waveband from Radio 2 for the evening - I find it humorous now that I'm definitely in the 'Radio 2" demographic now), perched on a chair in the corner of the room, hovering expectantly over the stereo with three buttons pressed in on the cassette player; play, record, and pause, waiting, just waiting, for a favorite song to come up and release the pause button with a flourish; then hoping at the other end the DJ wouldn't punch in too early before a chance to get a clean pause at the other end. (Simon Bates was terrible for that sort of thing). It occurred to me back then that yes, what I was doing was technically breaking the law; it also occurred to me that why on earth did they sell blank cassettes, then. Now all you kids these days with your digital copies and your MP3's are missing how difficult it was to 'rip' music thirty years ago. You had to plan ahead with blank cassettes and all sorts. It actually took a great deal of work, and, quite frankly, the resulting quality was awful. Perhaps that was why nobody cared too much about it; the copyright police knocking on the door seemed about as far-fetched as the other bogeyman of The UK in the 70's - the TV detector van.

It takes quite a bit more than trying to badly record a few things off the radio to really make this much of a tale about standing up for what I believed in; let's go forward quite a few years later, to my last year at college. The college alternated between lavish May Balls and somewhat more subdued June Events; and, as luck would have it, I was in one of the years that would have a June event in their first and last years there. The committee for the 1992 Event had chosen an Olympic theme; and was looking for volunteers to assist, entertain. I'm a passable keyboard player. What that means, in actuality, is I can't play to save my life, but I can program a sequencer. There was an entertainment slot available; a "chill-out room" where movies would be projected up on the wall with some accompanying music. This sounded like just the thing, and I set to work composing the music. On the night, I'd sit behind the screen with the projectionist, and as the images appeared in front of me, I'd mouse-click and punch-in and out different music and sound effects. It had the potential of being an unmitigated disaster.

Indeed, for the first pass, it was. The music was bland and generic; the odds of actually being able to synchronize anything with the experimental art-school movies and claymation reels we had seemed hopeless. By the time I made the second pass, however, things started to look considerably better. This may, perhaps have been related to the consumption of alcohol; you know, just the right amount to loosen things up a bit. The more relaxed and laid-back things became, the more smoothly everything fit together. As the evening progressed, things seemed better and better - both the performer and the crowd evidently were getting drunker and drunker. After a while, things got to the point where I thought, why not, I can play live if I want to, maybe I can spice things up a little. What I did was unquestionably a violation of copyright law. All those keyboard riffs that I'd practised over and over again in my room, in an effort to learn how to play, ended up appearing in the performance. That unmistakable horn from Pure by the Lightning Seeds; Stevie Wonder's Superstition; those artsy-fartsy pseudo-Mozart riffs that the scruffy guy with the beard from Abba would do in S.O.S and Gimme Gimme Gimme. The crowd loved it. There were howls of recognition, and a room full of people who had a WTF expression (long before the Internet had seen that expression take off) turned into a rather raucous bunch who were quite happy to make more return trips to the bar to buy more beer. The copyright police didn't show up that day, either; I'm quite sure if I hadn't have decided to do something that was technically illegal, that night would not have been a success. A few people came up that night and wanted recordings of the music; I can remember giving one of the cassettes to Crazy Alice, who caught up with me a couple of days later. "It's not the same," she bleated. "Where's all the cool bits of stuff I know?"

Tonight, I wish I could share J's creativity and expression with you; I really do. I know however that copyright law won't allow that, and that's something I will have to begrudgingly agree to. But I do worry about the state of the law, about how it stifles creativity and expression, and I'm sure art will suffer as a result. What I worry most about the law is it does not change the behavior of those who believe, in their heart of hearts, that the restrictions are wrong. Law doesn't make people behave; it makes outlaws out of common, good folks. I am going to enjoy a performance of I am the Walrus now, and one thing is certain.

You have never heard it like this. And perhaps you never will.

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The Insanely Connected World

It takes a lot to be insanely connected in the blogging world. Not just to experience it, to be entertained by it, but to interact with it, to be absorbed by it, and, yes, to be fully immersed in it. It's more of a complex addiction cycle than anything else - intermittent positive reinforcement is what we seek. Something as simple as a comment, or a page view count, takes on enormous significance. We go to extraordinary lengths to secure that exposure; striving for retweets, building up a follower count, striking up "you scratch my back, I scratch yours" deals with fellow bloggers... Sometimes, a comment we'll receive will feel golden. That's why we blog. That's why we tweet. We build our networks, we look forward to those comments, those once-in-a-while elements of feedback that astonish us, that we treasure as validation that someone out there is taking notice of what we do.

Scheduling, remoting, control by email, from mobile devices... so many components out there, to build into some Rube Goldberg publishing contraption, attempting to get those posts out there, to be read. It's a thoroughly daunting proposition. There seems an infinity of tools to do so. With all the technology, all the features, all the capabilities that the Internet gives us; with all the stress placed on measures of our success; with all our own, psychological prejudices when it comes to measuring our own worth, it's easy to forget what our efforts should be all about. Surrounded by tools, it's all too easy to forget that we're here to write. It doesn't matter what we write about; what genre, what style. We're putting ourselves into it, and to simply reduce this to a mechanical publishing exercise is doing ourselves a grave injustice. It's about still being human. Let's not forget that. To be here for any other reason, that's insane.