Military Precision Put into Corporate Cliche’s

I love cliche’s.  As I’ve said countless times here on Kung-Foolery, they are super effective at hammering home any point you are trying to make and really ramming it down your throat….SEE!  They provide the proverbial proof that is in the pudding.

I work in a corporate culture that was previously a startup culture and the two are fighting a ground war of epic proportions.  Just like cliche’s, I love a good culture war as much as the next guy (perhaps not as much as Glenn Beck, but significantly more than Sarah Palin).

All this war talk has gotten me thinking about how we communicate and more importantly, how we ram our ideas down people’s throats.  What I’m finding, is that the most effective way to ram your idea down someone’s throat is to cloak that idea with the military jargon.  I am taking the military euphemism to an extreme and I am here to say… I love it and it’s really working!

Always remember to stay well cafeinated when “in the trenches” of corporate culture warfare.

Here are some jingoistic military cliches that are of the utmost importance in communicating your business strategy:

1) Build a beach head.  The only way to create the “network effect” is to build a beach head. Whether it occurs in Normandy or on the internet, you must build a concentration of something, somewhere, and penetrate it.

2) Follow the rules of engagement.  The process only works if there are clearly defined ROE and all relevant parties do not OVERSTEP THEIR BOUNDS (I’M TALKING TO YOU JACK!), let the chips fall where they may, yes, but follow the ROE or risk being a victim of collateral damage.

3) Establish an extraction point.  This is the point where all parties meet to confer and decide whether or not Johnny and his term sheet are worth saving, or perhaps we’re all better suited just not responding to that email.

This post is the jumping off point for this lesson as we have not yet hit the drop zone, so stay tuned for at least 87 million more examples that will help you succeed in communicating your strategies in an effective way through military cliches.

At ease.

 

 

Cost Benefit Analysis of Ruining my Child’s Childhood

Andie seems to do some really funny things when bathing, and I’m frequently trying (and missing) to capture a gem.  Well, this past weekend I caught what could be considered the holy grail of hilarious and exploitative material – a snippet that has the potential to go more viral than a cat falling curiously off the side of a couch while reaching for something.  As my iPhone began to roll, a humongous, water-displacing fart rumbled out of my 27 pound darling.  A fart that you’d think to be generally reserved for a 300 pound man, exploded out of the kiddo and she immediately started riffing on it.

“It’s poopy daddy!”

“Big Poopy!”

“Poop-tastic.”  (or some derivation)

Thankfully there was no poop.

Now, like you, I’ve spent probably 1,000′s of hours of watching dad’s get hit in the nuts by ill-set-up tee ball equipment on America’s Funniest Home Videos (AFV to those of us in the know), and if there’s one thing I’ve learned from all of that time spent – fart jokes are 3rd only to crazy animal behavior or the aforementioned nut-shot-to-dad-while-playing-tee-ball (NSTDWPTB for short) in terms of both laughability and likelihood of prize money.

You know how all communication nowadays is structured around a pun - well - this was the pioneer. "Thar she blows" might have been a nice one if this video were to get on TV in 1989.

I watched some AFV this weekend to verify my suspicion that this video could actually be a gold mine and my suspicions of grandeur were confirmed.  This has the potential to make Andie’s daddy a very rich man for a couple of months.  If you win one show it’s like $10,000 and if you win the whole season it’s $1,000,000 (although this is the same as it was in 1989 – so how about a little consideration to inflation!).  Like you, I immediately thought of all the fly cars and clothes that that mil will buy me and I even put a down payment (or was it a retainer?) on a helicopter time-share I’ve had my eye on.

It’s going to be amazing how rich I’ll be!

Then the funniest thing happened, I started to think about how getting massive attention for a video of yourself in a bathtub farting might affect Andie as she grows up.  Would that negatively affect her?  Or… could it possibly give her that springboard to the even more lucrative Disney/Nick Kids/Spike TV world that we’ve both always dreamed of?

A small part of me thinks there could be some fallout as she grows up, but then, we’ll be so rich that I can simply pay to have it removed from the internet later right?  Or at the very least I’ll be able to afford some very fancy therapy for myself to help me cope with those negative feelings associated with ruining your child’s life.

Check out this video of a cat falling off the side of a couch and tell me it’s not hilarious?  TELL ME!  That’s what I thought.  So… I should go for it right?

Please help me make my decision by filling out this one question poll.

Why do kids characters have speech impediments? Are they wetarted or somefin?

Not trying to get all Seinfeldian on you, but, what’s up with kids characters having speech impediments?  Andie and I have been spending a lot of time indoors the past two days and as such I’ve resorted to a little TV babysitting.  She doesn’t watch TV yet, but I do have a couple of Sesame Street DVDs that are pretty great, except for the Baby Bear character.  Everyone always says that the Elmo character is the most annoying – high pitched and so enthusiastic – but Baby Bear is infinitesimally more annoying.  He does baby tawk with a super speech impediment.  I have never wanted to turn my own TV upside down more than I do when he’s tawking.  

“What’s a wectangle?”  Agh!

Also, I downloaded Peekaboo Barn for my iPad based on how much my cousin’s kid loves it.  It has a really great and simple functionality that any kid gets right away.  Tap the barn and the doors open to reveal a new animal.  Andie loves it and will tap the thing for 10 straight minutes (which is a lifetime in terms of her current attention span).  The voiceover is a little kid that tells you what the animal is.  That’s great, except for the impediment the kid has.   

“Wooster!”  Dah!  

This doesn’t add authenticity, it’s just annoying.  Now, I wouldn’t say that these impediments are contributing to my kid having a speech problem as Andie has perfect pronunciation (elocution school really paid off), but I do think it’s confusing to teach kids the name of things the wrong way.  

Andie, The Mayor of Everywhere

I love the one and half-year old mind, it’s fertile, it’s nimble, and most importantly, it’s completely unencumbered with social norms.  I’m not talking about social norms like, it’s generally inappropriate to poo in your pants in public, or even more innocuous ones like, it’s inconsiderate to scream at Daddy at the grocery store because he won’t let you knock all of the vitamin pill bottles over.  One recent example of this that has come to light and it involves popularity…

It’s amazing being out with Andie, she is more popular than I have ever been.  She knows so many people that we are constantly stopping to say Hi when we are out and about…  Hi to everyone actually.  It’s a little like being in Teen Wolf, when the Mike Fox character has his first day at school as the wolf.  Andie is Teen Wolf and I’m Styles….just kidding, I’m not even in the movie

Just like the rest of the candidates, she is working every crowd, waving, kissing babies, and getting votes.

“The candidate” (as I will now refer to her) acts like she is the mayor of every place we go, stopping to say hi, waving furiously at anyone too far away to do a full frontal assault; She’s even stopping to kiss babies.  *Side bar – the kissing babies is much nice than the alternative, which is biting babies – she was doing this for a while.

Also, you better hope you don’t encounter “the candidate” if you’re out on a run.  She’ll insist on at least a short conversation and she will not hesitate to run in front of you or block your path.  We were out a Discovery Park a couple of weekends ago and she did this to at least 4 or 5 different runners.  A better father probably would have stopped this, but really, they should be ashamed of themselves for getting that much exercise.

The more I’m thinking about the correlation between baby behavior and political candidacies, the more I think I’m putting her on a plane to Iowa.  Not only is she smarter than Rick Perry, she is more qualified to be president, plus President makes over $400,000 per year which is more than she’s going to make in the first 4 years of her life (when I plan on getting her into the pageant circuit and regular auditions).

2-2-2 is going to be her new tax plan, a) because it’s so low everyone will vote for it!, and b) that’s the only number she can currently say.

Breaking News! Giants Sign Aging Veterans Too

In honor of the recent deal the Anaheim Angels gave the aging Albert Pujols (10 years and $254 million); I’ve decided to rehash an oldie I wrote for our site, Ovahere.com, to satirize big bucks to guys that might soon be washed up.

The Giants went through a faze at the end of the Barry Bonds era * that epitomized desperate ploys for aging stars (hello, and welcome to: Galarraga, Santiago, Alou, Grissom, Dunston, that guy with the weird stance who played for the Cardinals, etc….), and while I actually loved those old stars and the little production they actually had, there were not going to be bringing the Giants a World Series Championship.  Neither will this Pujols deal.

*************

NEWS FLASH! BREAKING NEWS! GIANTS SIGN…
Article by OvaHere Staff

December 8, 2006 -

Monday, December 11, 2006:

The Associated Press is reporting that the San Francisco Giants have just reached an agreement with Bobby Bonilla and Andy Van Slyke to play 3^rd base and Centerfield respectively for the Giants in 2007.  Brian Sabean announced that the Giants were, “…so very excited to bringing “the big 3,’” from, “those great teams (of the early 90’s).” Van Slyke (45) and Bonds (42) (who re-signed with the Giants Friday for 1 year and $16 million), have been known for many feuds over the years including one recently in which Van Slyke accused Bonds of taking banned substances and lying about it.  According to Van Slyke, “Barry was a great ball player, but he knows what he did was wrong, and you know what, I could have been as good as him, that’s right, I’m better than he is.”  He went on to add, “The Pirates made the right decision in 1993 when they decided the team need to go in the Van Slyke direction, not the Bonds direction.” Bonds was, according to sources (that would prefer to be unnamed for fear of alienating Barry), “going to kill that mother fucker if he ever saw him again.”   However, Sabean is confident that they will be able to put their past differences, “in the past.”  “We’re all grown men here, and I know they’d had some problems in the past, but all they want to do now is win; and with the components that we are going to be able to put on the field, we’re going to compete.  I mean, these guys can hit, and the nucleus of talented arms we’ve got… I’d be really disappointed if we didn’t make the playoff’s this year, or if not this year, then the next.”  Bonilla (43) too, has had issues with Bonds and many, if not all of his past teammates, but as Sabean has remarked, “he can still field a grounder like a pro, and has some arm left.”  Bonilla was excited to be back in baseball after a 5 year hiatus that many in the baseball community have remarked was forced.  “You know, I’m just glad the A’s are going to give Bobby an opportunity, an opportunity to show that I can still play this game.”  Some have questioned Sabean’s recent moves after periods in the early 00’s when he seemed to have the golden touch, and the Giants were perennial winners.  Lately he’s been pursuing players at what appears to be the tail-end of their illustrious careers. Terms of the deal were undisclosed, but the deals were reportedly multi-year deals (Bonilla was reportedly offered 4 years and $32 million, and Van Slyke was offered 5 years and $19 million).  And according to Sabean, “I’m just glad we locked these guys down before anyone else could, and I think by making these moves our front office and ownership has shown the fanbase that we want to win it all NOW!”

- AP – 12/11/2006

Thoughtlessness isn’t cool anymore… or is it?

Idiocracy is my favorite movie, it’s both hilarious and prescient.  The fact that society has devolved into an “idiocracy” in the movie is not that far away from where we almost went in the mid-oughts… see our intense infatuation and love at the time for MMA, “supersize” fast food, Hummers, Boob Jobs, Ed Hardy, Shitty Tribal Tattoos,  Garish Nightclubs, Blingy Watches, fake tans, et al.  The economic downturn shed light on some of the lunacy – like everyone shouldn’t strive for a 4 car garage – but that hasn’t halted the overall idiot-trending completely.  We are still inherently idiots and our society, while it values intellectual virtue that results in making a lot of money (see Facebook, Apple, etc…), still doesn’t really want to be thought of as nerdy.  We want to kick that nerds ass, but in a more aloof and not as obvious way as perhaps 2005.

In Seattle, being thoughtful is valued, and I really like that, but as I’ve been traveling pretty extensively for work to parts of the country that I will affectionately call “the armpits” – and I’ve been exposed to a broader spectrum of humanity.

I was in my least favorite place on earth recently, a “city” that embodies both the worst parts of the South and Midwest without any of the associated charms.  And I met a shitload of idiots while I was there.  People who were both aloof and somehow took pride in the fact that they weren’t that smart.  Juxtapose that with a city like Pittsburgh, which has had a reputation as a depressed steel-town full of Steeler-obsessed and morbidly obese sausage-eaters, and you have quite a contrast.   Pittsburgh is a great city.

Yes, they are absolutely crazy about the Steelers (I bought a terrible towel while I was there to wear as a gang accoutrement, and it saved me a couple of times from both physical violence and awkward conversation gaps), but they are thoughtful people with a great dining scene, burgeoning arts scene, and a tech sector that’s starting to take off – and people aren’t afraid to seem smart.  There is hope for America and the idea that we won’t fully devolve into an “idiocracy” – but more of our cities need to embody the Pittsburgh and Seattle ethos – that thinking about shit has value.

Inkling of overprotective dad syndrome (OPDS)…

I guess what I’m about to hypothesize is pretty obvious to anyone who lives or spends a lot of time in “these places.”  I live where it rains and everyone wears fleece year-round, even to bed, but I’ve been spending some time in Phoenix and and other hot, landlocked places for work and there is a plethora of surgically enhanced breasts. I’ve also spent some time in the landlocked south, Atlanta specifically, and it’s pretty ubiquitous. Yet, my time in Honolulu and Rhode Island has seemingly not exhibited the same thing to me – and I thought, why?  Why god?

Los Angeles is obviously a place that is not-land-locked (near the ocean) and has a lot of cosmetic surgery, but LA is the 2nd biggest city in the US and as a per capita, I’m going to go ahead and make a leap and say that it’s not as high a % of fake breasts as Charleston SC, or Birmingham AL, wait Charleston isn’t landlocked, hmmmmmm….

I have a theory as to why women in these places do this, and it’s not just because it’s hot and they wear less clothes.  It’s because the men they are trying to impress are very stupid (their daddy’s), and these women’s dads are basically assholes.  Why else would they be living somewhere that doesn’t have an ocean by it?  I’m willing to admit that this theory has not been fully “fleshed” out yet, but I think I might be on to something.

Considering the advancements in modern medicine, and frankly both the financial and mental resources dedicated to this — the average breast augmentation surgery “node” will last 20+ years, which is much safer than the previous iterations which lasted on average about 3 months* (that became untenable considering it took about 2 months to heal – ouch!).

Then again, if you were going to live somewhere that is in close proximity to an ocean, bouyancy might be pretty important to you?  Regardless, what was my point?  I don’t know there are just so many beautiful women here in Arizona I lost my train of thought.

Regardless, as someone with a daughter, I’m pretty happy that I live where it’s cold and people stay covered up and there isn’t as much pressure to “enhance.”   That’s a pretty great thing.

I don’t think I’ll be an overbearing or overprotective father, but if she thinks she’s wearing that out, she’s crazy!  I most certainly will not buy her enhanced breasts for her 16th birthday no matter how much she begs me, unlike those horrible parents in the UK (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1313286/Girl-16-to-be-given-breast-implants-as-birthday-present.html).

Yes, I’ve been blathering nonsensical – which I think is the first sign of Overprotective Dad Syndrome (OPDS).

Because it’s close to Halloween, and I sat next to a young woman on a plane recently who told me, “I don’t really ever have a costume, I just throw on lingerie!” I felt like all this giberish needed to be said, and I can confidently say Andie will be going as a “naughty” _____ until she is about 6 years old, and only because she really is pretty naughty, not because her costume has an exposed midriff.  She will never have an exposed midriff.

*based on my rough “guestimate”

FYI - this woman has a father, a real sh*tty one.