caught up with my friends kacy and jack who are swinging through sydney. picked them up at their hotel and took them down to bondi for dinner by the beach.
refreshing to see them, reminders from home. conversation so easy. like minded views of the world and approach to living. interesting to hear how they are seeing things in america. positive views but realistic of obama and what he has been able to do in the first 100 days. jack offered that the 100 day marker was set with fdr and hard to replicate circumstances of that time and that man.
they have travelled extensively and confirmed that americans are more direct than most cultures. direct and open can be quite intimidating for other cultures. i am finding australians especially in business to be hard workers, pleasant, fun, jovial but more passive and less questioning. not a bad thing, but can sometimes bring complaining about a situation rather than doing something to solve it. kacy discussed running a business in the philippines, where people respect authority and in her experience has found that people work hard, wish to please and do not want to be confrontational. sometimes these intentions in business lead to lack of innovation or accurate reporting of status of a task/project.
respecting chain of command can lead a little to preservation of class and hierarchy in lieu of efficiency and innovation.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
banana peeling methods
both boing boing and wiki how give great options, including my favorite monkey method. however, awards for ingenuity go to this creative soul.
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