The Necessity of Civility in Politics

Eyes have been turned on politics since the last election with growing partisanship and lack of basic civil respect. No names, no side, no person will be mentioned because the blame lands on both parties equally. They created the environment were hate and anger are the mainstay of government business. As a value system we failed to contemplate the long-term disadvantage of brutality.

Some of you were raised with a religious background and some of you were not. You don't necessarily need it to have a religious participation to have a civil approach to treating others. We as human beings know that our society is based on the ability to work together as a group and this is deeply rooted in our psychological, biological, and historical existence.

Whether we are discussing a nation, or some savage band living in the woods, the principles are the same. It is our ability to work together and overcome our challenges that makes the difference in our survival. Once we decide to not work together the fabric of our "togetherness" begins to break down; society weakens and new paths are created.

Its unfortunate that some of the rudest and selfish people are seen as strong personalities to emulate. People are beginning to copy and act in the same way. A true sign that as Americans we need to question our values should consider where we want to end up in the future and in our lives. Our future is defined by the choices of our present and past.

Worse, we are encouraging bad behavior and even worse characters through financial and social rewards.

I have seen it in the workplace and I have seen it in politics where the profane move up the ranks and good people are left to the side. The selfish are hungry and don't care one way or another the consequences of their choices unless those consequences land directly on them. Yet..who cares...by the time people come to their senses the barbarism already took its course.

I guess this might depend on how you define Barbarians. Cruel, insensitive, not following societal norms and not part of civilized society seems to be a common definition.  Standing outside the norms reflects on the people who violate such social values while changing our American value system reflects on us as a nation.

Sure...they may fear breaking the law and getting in trouble but they don't care one way or another the social consequences of their behavior. As long as they get what they want, they eat from the trough, and move on. If they are ever held accountable for their actions they simply just deny, blame, and jump ship. Values and loyalty are in short supply.

Civility allows us to work toward a beneficial solution versus spending our time and energy fighting each other. As we spend our time in tit for tat arguments we waste our energies that could be used for finding real solutions to real problems. Without solutions we only gain more problems, more problems and even more problems. Perhaps so many problems we can't fix them all.

As the incessant barking at each other continues the nation is running into deep problems. Deficits, education, emerging economies, military power flexing, and declining standards of living. Few things can be based and solutions are not rooted in compromise but set in stubborn dogmatic lines. We are not only losing our moral fabric but also letting our futures slip through our hands. Present leaders are setting a precedence which may reverberate for a long time.

America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.- Abraham Lincoln

2018 International Conference on e-Commerce, e-Administration, e-Society, e-Education, and e-Technology (e-CASE & e-Tech 2018)

2018 International Conference on e-Commerce, e-Administration, e-Society, e-Education, and e-Technology (e-CASE & e-Tech 2018)
April 1-3, 2018, Osaka, Japan
http://tw-knowledge.org/ecase

We cordially invite you and your colleagues to participate and submit papers to 2018 International Conference on e-Commerce, e-Administration, e-Society, e-Education, and e-Technology (e-CASE & e-Tech 2018) which will be held in Osaka, Japan, April 1-3, 2018. We welcome submissions from all over the world and we encourage you to join us in Osaka, Japan to share your research and knowledge. To submit abstracts/papers for presentation or participate as an audience member, please visit the conference website for more details. All submissions will be subject to a double-blind review process. All accepted manuscripts will be published in the conference proceedings, under an ISSN reference, on CD-ROM support.

The objectives of the conference are:
1. Provide a platform for the researchers to seek further opinions, comments, and suggestions.
2. Contribute knowledge in the fields of e-Commerce, e-Administration, e-Society, e-Education, and e-Technology.
3. Provide wider opportunities for participants to interact and create networking.
4. Deliver your research findings to global audiences.
5. Participate in a truly international, interdisciplinary and intercultural event.

Osaka is known throughout Japan as an international and progressive business center and is the mover and the shaker of the Kansai region. The cherry blossoms (sakura) usually bloom in the last week of March and the first two weeks of April in Kyoto (roughly between 20 March and 14 April). In an average year, the blooms peak on April 1 in Osaka. Once they bloom, they are notoriously fickle: sometimes almost all the trees will come into full bloom (mankai) at the same time and stay in full bloom for a week or even longer. We believe that you will enjoy your stay in Kyoto. If you need any assistance, please feel free to contact us.

Conference Website: http://tw-knowledge.org/ecase
Online Submission: http://my-ecase.org/ecase
Enquiries: ecase.conf@gmail.com
Submission Deadline: November 30, 2017

Conference Chairs
Wachara Chantatub, Chulalongkorn University, Thailand
Norbert Jesse, TU Dortmund University, Germany
Yixuan Wang, Nagoya University, Japan

Employee Performance and the Hawthorne Effect

The Hawthorne studies helped us understand that a persons social network and environment has as much influence as their innate abilities. I recently read an article in the Economist that brought up a a lot of great ideas I learned in college. A person's potential is defined as much by the environment as it is by their actual abilities.

I know this is a little odd. While looking for a dog I went down to the animal shelter and was show a
mild Chihuahua that was afraid of everything. It was meek, mild, was frightful of its own shadow and barely took any treats you provided it.

I asked the volunteer what the story was with this lifeless dog? She stated with some sadness that the dog lived with other dogs in an old man's house and it was at the bottom of the dog pack. It ate last, got pet last, got its food last. It was simply socialized to be seen as "not worthy".

That got me thinking of corporate culture. We are so busy with trying to win the next promotion that we sometimes start treating others as though they are the bottom of the list. We don't see their potential because we have not actually created the right environment. In essence, we socialize others as thought they are not important so they act in unimportant ways.

It does seem as though the most selfish of us seem to get promoted. The complete lack of concern for others with the notion that one must achieve above all ethical considerations take precedence. This is the fault of our system and the fault of company administrators. But they are only responsible so far.

It is hard to blame leadership either as they are under pressure to produce results. People with a selfish disposition do get results. They simply don't care one way another. They seek to make strong performance metrics that enhance their position; even if there is cost to employee moral. The result is often strong performance by all team members.

Somewhere along the line it would seem that short-term results and long-term performance would clash against each other. The environment that might be created through narrow focus might also encourage less performance as employees are forced into specific responses that pleas their bosses. Creative think is discouraged.

I do believe it is possible to create a performance based environment where positive group interaction can lead to the best of both words of employee performance. Results are more inclusive and different contributions are encouraged because metrics can sometimes be limited if they are not capturing all of the required data.

This will require a level of civility and inclusiveness within the environment. People should not be sidelined because they haven't got the same social connections. Their performance should be encourage and they should be actively sought out to form their opinion. Those opinions lead to personal "buy in" and greater performance.

Open environments encourage the ability to act and interact in ways that encourage new ideas, norm formation of teams, and pushing of expectations in ways that have a wide draw in. Because much of this environment is created through social-psychological knowledge it can be difficult for people calculating the bottom cost to create. Someone would have to use multiple parts of their brain to grasp what specifically can be done and how it can be calculated in terms of dollars.

2018 International Symposium on Business and Management (ISBM 2018)

ISBM 2018 @ Osaka, Japan - CALL for PAPERS
2018 International Symposium on Business and Management (ISBM 2018)
April 1-3, 2018, Osaka, Japan
http://tw-knowledge.org/isbm

We cordially invite you and your colleagues to participate and submit papers to 2018 International Symposium on Business and Management (ISBM 2018) which will be held in Osaka, Japan, April 1-3, 2018. We welcome submissions from all over the world and we encourage you to join us in Osaka, Japan to share your research and knowledge. To submit abstracts/papers for presentation or participate as an audience member, please visit the conference website for more details. All submissions will be subject to a double-blind review process. All accepted manuscripts will be published in the conference proceedings, under an ISSN reference, on CD-ROM support.

The objectives of the conference are:
1. Provide a platform for the researchers to seek further opinions, comments, and suggestions.
2. Contribute knowledge in the field of business and management.
3. Provide wider opportunities for participants to interact and create networking.
4. Deliver your research findings to global audiences.
5. Participate in a truly international, interdisciplinary and intercultural event.

Osaka is known throughout Japan as an international and progressive business center and is the mover and the shaker of the Kansai region. The cherry blossoms (sakura) usually bloom in the last week of March and the first two weeks of April in Kyoto (roughly between 20 March and 14 April). In an average year, the blooms peak on April 1 in Osaka. Once they bloom, they are notoriously fickle: sometimes almost all the trees will come into full bloom (mankai) at the same time and stay in full bloom for a week or even longer. We believe that you will enjoy your stay in Kyoto. If you need any assistance, please feel free to contact us.

Conference Website: http://tw-knowledge.org/isbm
Online Submission: http://my-ecase.org/isbm
Enquiries: isbm.conf@gmail.com
Submission Deadline: November 30, 2017

Conference Chairs
David Ang, Auburn University at Montgomery, USA
Gyorgy Neszmelyi, Budapest Business School, Hungary
Tie Su, University of Miami, USA

Horse Riding as an Exploratory Sport of Commitment

There is something wonderful of horse with their powerful bodies and their unique temperaments. Some will love horses and others won't consider horse ownership. The riding of the horse is one of the smallest considerations while the bonding and grooming of the horse is likely one of the biggest commitments. Owning a horse becomes a serious time consuming effort that some feel is worth the effort.

Two considerations come immediately into play 1. Cost and 2. Enjoyment. If the cost is higher than the enjoyment then one should seriously consider not getting one. If the enjoyment is higher and they are willing to give up extra things like new clothing that might give them pleasure it might be a good idea. We have only enough resources to go around and it is important to use them wisely.

Lets also consider personality. People who like horses do so because they are exciting, feel alive, are consideration and show leadership traits (See Study). They are a people who find that the activity matches well with who they are as a person and they are likely to feel gratified by riding and taking care of a horse. If your personality seems to match with buying a horse then you have a solid reason.

Horses are certainly beautiful animals that take a lot of commitment and time. Like many other things they are also expensive and one will need to go out and see them at least 3X a week if they hope to maximize their enjoyment and truly support the health of the horses. The rewards can be enormous for personal and psychological purposes. Making wise decisions today help us achieve our financial and personal goals.

Gladstone City Commission Meeting: June 26th, 2017-Trucks,Cost and Landlords

The Gladstone City Commission Meeting held on June 26th, 2017 brought up a lot of great questions and showed an air of concern and collaboration on pressing problems. While I was not fortunate to attend the entire event I was able to see where an important spirit of collaboration was taking fold where logic seemed to win out over process.

Lets first discuss trucks. The cost of new dump trucks is a whopping $214,000 dollars!!! For a small town of Gladstone that is huge! There was much debate and discussion over how to reduce that amount such as retrofitting the back of the truck and selling the old truck. Considerations over where the money would come from was also important with the use of 100K in the fund and whether that should be used.

As long as all the options were thoroughly explored fiscal responsibilities were achieved.

City leaders don't often work together on issues but here they were willing to engage in productive conversation. Ideas were floated around about alternatives to buying a truck and options on how to save money. It seemed that all parties were interested in finding a frugal resolution. Some "digging" into alternatives is expected with a later report to commissioners.

The second large topic worth discussing was the issue of landlords being stuck with renters utility bills. Confusion over notifications and language within theses notices came forward with some landlords feeling that they were not being notified until their is a threat of it being put on their taxes. The end result was the willingness to look deeper into the issue and ensure website information and regulations are clear and concise.

Using theory, conversation analysis (CA), and critical discourse analysis (CDA) it is possible to determine the conversation style of the meeting and whether or not it is meeting public need (Farkas, 2013). Where some cities have designed processes that limit open conversation it doesn't seem that Gladstone has that problem. Attendance may be an issue but overall discussion and openness is not as the public seems to freely engage in the discussion.

Public comment is welcome but does need to be controlled to ensure it doesn't uselessly rattle on. New information in the meeting may arise in response to a question proposed by a member of the public. There should be an opportunity, when feasible, to continue to respond to the new information or propose another question. Time seems to make this difficult as conversations can't continue on for a hours as meetings need a prompt start and end on time. Offering opportunities to do this could help the public feel the issue has adequate input. A difficult balance to maintain.


http://www.gladstonemi.org/city-commission

Farkas, (2013). Power and access in the public hearings of city council meetings. Discourse & Society, 24 (4).

What is Biased Research?

We have a growing problem of bias in research. It often occurs when someone has a goal or objective in mind and then sets out to prove something is right. Their perspective is justification for an existing belief than actually asking an open question. At other times, the researcher leaves out pertinent information that would lead to a different conclusion. Bias skews the results and can lead to expensive consequences as decisions are derived from faulty findings.

Consider a scientist who wants to justify his decision for some personal or professional reason. Being involved in the conducting of a study on an existing decision may make the person prone to all types of bias because they have a personal stake in the results. Letting someone else do the research might be a more appropriate choice.

This is what I would call a bias by objective: The objectives of the research is not to answer an open question but to justify one's pre-existing beliefs.

There are also times when researchers leave out important information so they can skew the results. They may willing or unknowingly only look at certain data and ignore competing data. Sometimes this is not intentional because the person doesn't know what data is truly valid and what is not. Other times it is an intentional act of omission.

Bias by Omission: Not including competing information or pertinent data sets.

What is the cost of such bias?

That is hard to calculate. Sometimes that cost is very low and few people will see or use the research. It was used as an opportunity for the publisher to get something out there and the mistakes are minor while the entire research is beneficial. Other times, in the case of medical research and strategic research, the results can cost companies millions of dollars in poor decisions or in an attempt to replicate findings.