Blogs

Barbara’s 7 Ingredients of Happiness

August 30, 2023

So, why are we talking about happiness? Three reasons; Number 1, my wife of 56 years Barbara (met in High School) and I had an extraordinary life together. I called her The Sunshine Girl because she was always happy and she taught me how to be happy, too. To our surprise, our unintended example seemed to have a powerful effect on those around us. Barbara died in 2019. This is her legacy.

Number 2, In 2021 A friend and I, after three years of work, in the middle of Covid 19 published a book about Decency and Civility, The Decency Code © 2021, McGraw Hill. It failed. In the process, we discovered that many successful people are happy. Decency is the critical ingredient in achieving happiness. And yet for so many more the accolades, gratitude, and recognition they expected would come with their success never happened. But it can. If you help it happen.

Number 3, Happiness comes to those who help others create it for themselves. It’s The Platinum Rule, “Help others achieve those things they feel are meaningful, helpful, and important to others, but who need help completing what they hope to accomplish.” Do good things for others, doing good things for others, and all will do good things for you.

Throughout much of our life together we deferred talking about how our happiness occurred. Frankly, we figured that if we talked about it, we’d probably mess it up. But toward the end of her life, and people knew about her illness, they pressed us to talk more about this topic. The result of our conversations is the list below. We share them here because they might help you, as they helped us.

  • Intentionally say nice things about and to each other in private and publicly every day, everywhere.
  • Avoid saying the two or three divisive, corrosive, “Get-even” things you might really want to mention every day. Let them go.
  • Always better to be positive or blah than negative or inflammatory.
  • Rid your lives of negative, irritating, and intentionally abrasive people. Walk away. Skip the goodbyes. Immediate happiness happens.
  • Make every day simple, sensible, and satisfying for yourself and for others.
  • Maintain a genuine respect for those you care about 24/7.
  • Place the responsibility for your success on those closest to you or who really care about you.

Do this every day and the payoff is immediate and pleasant. What are your happiness ingredients? Please send them to me and we’ll build a powerful running list of more happiness ingredients. Email me at jel@e911.com.

Jim Lukaszewski – Snap Wisdom #2

During the First 120 Minutes – Activate Your Crisis Response Checklist

  1. Stop the production of victims.
  2. Tend to the victim’s needs.
  3. Communicate frequently internally.
  4. Alert those outside your organization who are directly affected.
  5. Call your insurance company.
  6. Have an experienced crisis communication consultant nearby or on board.
  7. Hire an attorney competent to the situation.
  8. Call your Mom, do what she says, and things will get better by tomorrow afternoon.
  9. Deal with new media, old media, critics, bloviators, bellyachers, backbench complainers, and survivors.

Savvy #1 August 2023

Table of Contents

Concise Advice #17: Your Manifesto for Communications Success

YOUR MANIFESTO FOR COMMUNICATIONS SUCCESS

Every letter, talk, and communication we send to employees or to other places has to flow through a self-imposed emotional and vocabulary filter system that keeps us on an even keel that preempts, deters, and reduces the attacks, provocative, and negative comments that are likely to occur. Here are your preemption, and peace-driving filter elements:

1. Eliminate, remove, and eradicate all negative words, language, and phrases. Each of these is a flash and attack point, viewed as intimidation, pushback, and pressure. These responses are what stir up bad headlines and angry people. They energize and enrage.

2. Avoid the use of the word “I” as much as possible, especially at the beginning of paragraphs. Any piece of copy that begins with the word “I” is about the sender rather than the recipient. When messages are about the sender, they will be misunderstood, negatively reinterpreted, and tossed back at you in a headline.

3. Reflect on the impact of every sentence and thought expressed. Whether we are talking to our friends or those who are attempting to irritate or organize us, plain, declarative, positive language will reduce contention and make it harder to credibly attack or challenge our words and deeds.

4. Bosses and leaders set a positive, peaceful example. Protect the outcome we seek. Employees at all levels, including managers and supervisors, will reflect and behave the way the bosses walk, talk, and behave. Say less but be important and positive.

5. All of our communications and actions must be targeted toward reducing the production of victims, critics, and combatants. These individual circumstances, once created, last essentially forever. In every communications setting, you need to ask this question, “How many critics, victims, or combatants does this approach create?” If even one is possible, fix it.

6. A single victim carries unimaginable explosive power. You are the target.

7. A single public victim tear can destroy millions of data and provable facts.

8. Wage peace everywhere, every day at every opportunity. Victims and casualties live, suffer, and remember forever. Most want to get even. Can you go home and talk about your plans and strategies over the dinner table with your children or grandchildren present or your mother? And they won’t roll their eyes?

9. Be prepared to promptly correct, clarify, and constructively, and productively comment as needed. This approach can have an enormously calming effect on employees and employee concerns, the community and community concerns, and even the victims, survivors, their families, and their concerns.

Jim’s Wisdom #43 Seeking Forgiveness – Nine Steps to Rebuilding and Rehabilitating Trust

“Only the truth deserves forgiveness.”

Seeking Forgiveness is society’s requirement for relationships, trust, and credibility restoration. Adverse situations using this template are remediated faster, cost a lot less, are controversial for much shorter periods of time, suffer less litigation, and help the victims come to closure more quickly. Obtaining forgiveness involves completing the nine steps below. To achieve success in the shortest possible time, these steps should be completed as quickly as possible: like start them all today. Skip a step or be insincere and the process will be incomplete and fundamentally fail.

Step #1 Candor: Outward recognition, through promptly verbalized public
acknowledgment, that a problem exists; that people or groups of people, the environment, or the public trust are affected; and that something will be promptly done to remediate the situation.

Step #2 Extreme empathy/Apology: Verbalized or written statement of personal regret, remorse, and sorrow, acknowledging personal responsibility for having injured, insulted, failed, or wronged another, humbly asking for forgiveness in exchange for more appropriate future behavior and making amends in return.

Step #3 Explanation: (no matter how silly, stupid, or embarrassing the problem-causing error was): Promptly and briefly explain why the problem occurred and the known underlying reasons or behaviors that led to the situation (even if we have only partial early information).

Step #4 Affirmation: Talk about what you’ve learned from the situation and how it will influence your future behavior. Unconditionally commit to regularly report additional information until it is all out or until no public interest remains.

Step #5 Declaration: A public commitment and discussion of specific, positive steps to be taken to conclusively address the issues and resolve the situation.

Step #6 Contrition: The continuing verbalization of regret, empathy, sympathy, and even embarrassment. Take appropriate responsibility for having allowed the situation to occur in the first place, whether by omission, commission, accident, or negligence.

Step #7 Consultation: Promptly ask for help and counsel from “victims,” the government, the community of origin, independent observers, and even from your opponents. Directly involve and request the participation of those most directly affected to help develop more permanent solutions and more acceptable behaviors, and to design principles and approaches that will preclude similar problems from re-occurring.

Step #8 Commitment: Publicly set your goals at zero. Zero errors, zero defects, zero dumb decisions, and zero problems. Publicly promise that, to the best of your ability, situations like this will be permanently prevented.

Step #9 Restitution: Find a way to quickly pay the price. Make or require restitution. Go beyond community and victim expectations, and what would be required under normal circumstances to remediate the problem.

Liars may be forgiven but they always know and fear that they will be found out.

Concise Advice #16: The Tools and Playbooks of Decency’s Enemies

Unconscionable actions, decisions, and behaviors

that are intentional, premeditated, injurious, degrading…

unethical…and some tend to be evil.

Decency’s enemies are obvious, expansive, and culturally corrosive. as are the playbooks of bullies, misbehaved buggers, and bad people. These tools and plays are intended to hurt, harm, and harass. Evil targets the innocent.  

Your first response:

Start Naming and blaming the predators and perpetrators.

  1. Arrogance
  2. Beyond the Boundaries of Decency, Civility, and Integrity
  3. Bullying
  4. Defaming
  5. Demeaning
  6. Dismissiveness
  7. Disparaging
  8. Disrespectfulness
  9. Evil
  10. False Suspiciousness
  11. Humiliation
  12. Intentional Embarrassment
  13. Intentionally Injurious
  14. Intentionally Irritating
  15. Intentionally Painful
  16. Intentionally Victimizing
  17. Meanness
  18. Negative Surprise
  19. Overbearing
  20. Overzealousness
  21. Punishing
  22. Ridicule
  23. Sarcasm
  24. Tone Deafness
  25. Unfounded Accusations
  26. Vengeance
  27. Victimization
  28. Vilification

Your second response:

  • If the perpetrator is someone you know, find someone else to know.
  • If the source is from someone you buy something from, find another source.
  • If it’s from someone in public life, disavow and shout them out.
  • If it comes from your local pulpit, find another pulpit.
  • Spend your energy on building a better life, expectations, and circumstances for yourself and those you care about.
  • Stop trying to change or reform the perpetrators and predators. They are always toxic and worthless.
  • Perpetrators, predators, evil public figures, and leaders will never really change.
  • Your efforts are far better spent on new endeavors and new approaches where you can clearly make a difference and others will benefit more than you.
  • Predators and perpetrators are superb slimy liars and con artists.

Wednesday’s Smart Shibboleth #15: Insidious Unethical Behaviors

WARNING, The DOJ calls these “predicate behaviors.” Less apparent, more insidious kinds of unethical behaviors that lead to crime. These behaviors are patterns prosecutors look for. Find even one of these behaviors in your vicinity, trouble is ahead. Two, get an attorney. Act promptly to eradicate (and report?) these situations.

  • Lax control: Careless enforcement, education about, and monitoring of ethical standards.
  • Lack of tough, appropriate, centralized compliance.
  • No one assigned responsibility for teaching, enforcing, and disciplining breaches of ethics.
  • Leadership that allows supervisors to overlook bad behavior.
  • Leadership that allows employees to explore methods and tactics outside established guidelines.
  • Emphasis on “doing whatever it takes” to achieve appropriate business and financial goals.
  • Managers and supervisors who minimize the importance of oversight and compliance.
  • Structuring incentives that compromise ethical behavior, the quality of products and services delivered, and shortcuts for questionable reasons.
  • Failure to confront managers who chronically misbehave or chronically overlook misbehavior.
  • Operating “on the edge,” always pushing for more than is appropriate.
  • Ignoring the signs of or failing to question rogue behavior.
  • Management tolerateing inappropriate behavior by individuals who are “critical to the organization’s mission.” Folks like super salespeople, the high achievers who are allowed to break the rules to maintain the altitude of their performance.
  • Belittling or humiliating those who suggest or seek ethical standards.
  • Dismissing or destroying the careers of employees who report bad or outright wrong behavior.
  • Demeaning the internal or external credibility of whistleblowers, those who report lapses in ethics.

*Source The Federal Sentencing Guidelines of 1991

Jim Wisdom #42: The Boss’ Most Crucial Roles in Crisis

The Boss’ Most Crucial Roles in Crisis

Few problems are crises. But all crises are serious management problems. Preplanning executive actions can avoid career-defining moments. Include specific executive expectation instructions in all plans and response scenarios.


One of the more powerful weaknesses in crisis response is the lack of specific roles and assignments for top management. The result of this crucial gap in crisis management planning is the mismanagement, lack of management, or paralysis that afflicts crisis response efforts. This defect occurs all too frequently in plans I review, responses I analyze, and scenarios I explore
with client companies.


In the course of directing a client’s crisis response, analyzing past responses to crisis, or developing powerful response strategies, it’s clear to me that crisis response promptness and effectiveness depends on having five essential responsibilities spelled out carefully in your crisis plans for the CEO (or surviving leaders):

  1. Assert the moral authority expected of ethical leadership. No matter how devastating or catastrophic the crisis is, in most cultures’ forgiveness is possible provided the organization, through its early behaviors and leadership, takes appropriate and expected steps to learn from and deal with the issues. The behaviors, briefly and in order, are:
  • Candor and disclosure (acknowledgement that something adverse has happened or is happening) Share response strategy.
  • Explanation and revelation about the nature of the problem (some early analysis)
  • Commitment to communicate throughout the process (even if there are lots of
    critics)
  • Empathy (intentional acts of helpfulness, kindness, and compassion)
  • Oversight (inviting outsiders, even victims, to look over your shoulders)
  • Commitment to zero (finding ways to prevent similar events from occurring
    again)
  • Restitution or penance (paying the price – generally doing more than would be
    expected, asked for, or required)

Jim Lukaszewski – Snap Wisdom #1

Snap Wisdom #1: Truth

  • 15% Facts and Data
  • 50% Emotion
  • 35% Point of Reference (where you or the victim were when it
    happened).
  • Too many facts and too much data humiliate victims, makes
    them angry, deaf, and search for an attorney.
  • A single victim tear, especially in front of a jury or on television,
    can wipe out more data, and smart experts than you can possibly
    assemble.

Wednesday’s Smart Shibboleth #14: The Exception to the Loyalty Rule

If your leadership or management is asking you to make recommendations regarding something they are doing that you know is irregular, immoral, monumentally stupid, perhaps dangerous, and even a touch illegal, this is a signal for you to leave. Now.


Too many of our colleagues, perhaps you, have stuck around working for people they like but behave badly, hoping that you can have enough impact on them to move them to a more reasonable course. Almost never happens. In my experience, it never happens. Bad leaders and managers stay bad.


If you are one of those hanging around waiting to be effective again, just look around. Be honest with yourself. Actually look for the last time you made significant changes in their direction or their intentions. What likely comes to mind are lots of promises, stumbling starts, but never specific, concrete, permanent change. It’s just not there. It never will be. Head for the door.


Once you recognize that you’re involved, you have become complicit in everything they are doing. Your loyalty needs to stop. Leave that day. It will be one of the best decisions you ever make in your life, for those you care about and, those who care about you.