Were you ever in a meeting with someone who was asking you to do something, and by the end of the meeting you realize you have absolutely no idea what he or she is asking you to do? And the explanation was so long and so circuitous that you’re too embarrassed to say: “So, what are you actually asking me to do?”

I hate those meetings

I hate them because they’re worse than not having a meeting at all. They’re confusing. They’re usually conflicting. And worse of all, they’re paralyzing. Because you really don’t know what was asked, you spend the next few hours, days or meetings trying to figure out the meaning of the original meeting.

What happens?

You pick a course of action and pray for the best. You know you have to do something, I mean; you can’t ignore the request (even though you have no idea what the request was asking). You chart a course and off you go. You have a 50/50 chance of being correct.

Ah, but that’s the fallacy. You actually have a .000001% chance of being correct.

Odds are, you’ve now wasted time, energy, resources and passion on the wrong thing. And there’s a very painless and easy way to avoid all of this: the meeting recap.

It’s a lost art. But saves thousands of hours doing the wrong thing.

At the end of the meeting, instead of thinking “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” you say these magic words: “OK, to recap, next steps are…”

If you’ve guessed correctly, everything is fine. If you’re wrong, then the meeting organizer will say “No, let’s me be tell you exactly what I’m looking for.” And while for about 30 seconds you may feel like you’ve failed – you’ve actually helped everyone in the room. You’ve won. 30 seconds of pain is nothing in comparison to all the wasted hours with the wrong or bad direction.

There’s also another benefit. Everyone else in the room will love you. Trust me, you’re not the only person in the room who had no idea what was being asked. Most times, the entire room in clueless. Nobody wants to admit it.

So there you have it. Move forward. Fear not. You now have a secret weapon against bad direction. The upside: you have better meetings. The downside: everyone starts recapping all of my meetings.

1.8.12

I went to college.

I know because I recently had to get a copy of my college transcripts so I could teach an advertising portfolio class at a local college. But here’s the strange part. When I looked at my transcripts, I didn’t remember taking half of the classes on the list.

Now, I can understand not remembering some of the content. But I don’t remember anything about the class. Don’t remember choosing it. Don’t remember attending any of the classes. Don’t remember having any discussion with any professors.

Now this scares me.

Did I attend these classes? I must have, I got good grades in all of them. Did I just not care about the subject matter, so I did enough to get through the class, but never really absorbed the material? What was the deal?

Here are the classes I don’t remember:

1) Anthropology 301: At some point in my junior year I had to take an anthropology class. Now, I work in advertising – this should have been very interesting to me. It’s described as ‘what defines human life and origins.” Now that sounds fascinating. I would like to take that class now. I have no memory of it. My grade: A
2) Introduction to Media 100: I had to take a media planning and buying class. What? Somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind I know how to figure out TRPs and GRPs. I know the basics of ratings points and impressions. But I took a class in this? Zip. Nothing. Don’t remember even sitting in the class. My Grade B+
3) Tennis and Scuba Diving: OK – I remember taking these classes. Two physical education classes were a requirement. Can you image? Now, during the “Mad Men” era of advertising, knowing how to play tennis or scuba dive (I’m sure) was very important. But unless I’m entertaining client while on a shoot in The Cayman Islands, I don’t see how this was much use. Each was worth 2 credits. My grades: A & B
4) Photography: I guess this explains the stack of 35mm negatives I recently found. I don’t remember ever being in a classroom talking about the theories of photography. Studying the great photographic masters of the past. Looking at great shots from great shooter. Nope. I do remember owning a Konica AutoFlex T manual camera that was stolen. I remember I loved that camera. Don’t remember the class. My grade A

Here’s the other strange thing. While I have photographs from my college graduation, I have no memory of the actual ceremony. Bill Cosby was the keynote speaker. His topic to inspire us: I have no idea. I can’t remember a single word he said. I do remember working with him years later on two TV projects and he always referred to himself in the third person. “I’m sorry, Bill Cosby wouldn’t say that.” (I wanted to say, ‘aren’t you Bill Cosby?)

I guess this means that college gave me the degree I needed to begin my career, but I really learned my career by working in advertising. Now, I will admit, the curriculum at my college is VERY different today than it was when I was there. I’m sure they are preparing people much better today than in my day.

But than again, I recently interviewed someone from my college, and his portfolio was awful. So perhaps things haven’t changed at all.

Recently I heard something terrible. A story that had a very sad ending.

Someone I know just had a terrible experience, where something really awful happened on a flight. When the person telling me the story was finished with the awful ending, I started chuckling. In fact, everyone in the room started chuckling.

And that’s because the person who had this terrible experience was one of the meanest, nastiest, lack of compassion person we all had ever met. And the general feeling in the room was ‘well, what goes around.”

OK, I will admit it. I feel bad about it. But I will also admit that I’ve re-told the story 3-4 times and have laughed every time.

It’s like how you cheer when the water in the Wizard of Oz melts the Wicked Witch of the West. She got what she deserved.

But that led me to a bigger thought. Is there such thing as karma?

Do good things happen to good people, and bad things eventually happen to bad people?

We’ve all witnessed both sides of this argument. Nasty, backstabbing people, who get ahead on the back of the nice, well meaning people. But I’ve also heard opposite side of that story. When someone who worked hard their entire life, is recognized as a hero in their community for making a huge different although they never made a dime.

I want to believe in karma. I want to believe that I’ve done far more good in my life than bad, and that I project an aura of good karma. I know when I do something nice for someone, I feel better. I have a spring in my step. It helps me get through my day.

Here’s the strangest thing – in the middle of writing this entry, my daughter called me about an issue she was having at work. She was at a crossroad and wanted my advice. She asked, “Should I do what’s best for me, or what’s the right thing to do?” She was leaning to doing the right thing, even though it would mean losing money. I told her about karma. And that doing this good deed would come back to her later.

She’s calling her boss as I type.

So, I guess I have to stop laughing at poor person who had this terrible experience. Because even if she is the meanest person on the planet, that doesn’t excuse my behavior. I don’t want any bad karma.

Perhaps I’ll send her a card. Or not.

I hate people who talk on their mobile phone LOUDLY in public places.

This week I had to deal with a phone while I was eating dinner, taking the train and standing on line to check out of a store. Now, I could understand if the conversations were important. Emergencies. You know, the type of phone call that couldn’t wait 10 minutes. But nope, these were the conversations I had to endure:

Restaurant:

Woman in her 20s: No really, I swear I’m telling the truth. OK, so here’s what happened, Taylor and I went to see Ryan and then all hell broke lose. Ryan was there with Katie and Ryan and Katie ‘broke up’ two weeks ago, so Taylor hooked up with Ryan. But then Taylor was supposed to go with him to Jason’s New Year’s Eve party, but he didn’t call, so we just decided to go to Jason’s anyway, and that when we see Ryan and Katie acting as if they had never broken up. I thought Taylor was going to go nuts on him. But then Taylor ….

Train:

Guy in his 30s: It was outrageous. No. No. No. Yes. I can’t tell you here, but it was incredibly outrageous. I thought I would pee my pants. Yea, Yea. Yea. Um-Huh. Seriously. She was, you know, right there.   (I was hoping that this guy wasn’t Ryan, and he wasn’t talking about Taylor, but I had no way of knowing.)

Store:

Woman in her 40s: I was going to f@#king kill him. It was the worst Christmas in my life. I should have just told him what the f@#k to buy me. Can you imagine. Can you f@#king imagine buying someone that for Christmas. I can imagine him going into the store and the f@#king woman behind the counter is thinking ‘this guy is a f@#king idiot.’ I don’t know what the f@#k he was thinking. Do  you have any idea what the f@#k he was thinking? ‘Cause I know I don’t.  Now, I’m have to be the f@#king idiot and return it to the f@#king store. And the people in the store are going to know that I’m the person married to the f@#king idiot who bought it.  (Of course, I was thinking — everyone in this store knows you’re the idiot married to another idiot.)

And here’s what made matters worse. The woman in the store, had a 7 or 8 year old with her while she was on the phone. A cute little kid who was hearing it all. She kept tugging at her mother’s sleeve trying to get her attention, but the woman was too into her conversation to notice.

All three time I wished I was Larry David. I wanted to bust in to all three conversations and tell them that they were bothering everyone.  But I decided I was — in a way — enjoying listening to their stupidity. So while I was bothered by it – I was also somewhat entertained at the same time.

I guess it was kind of like watching ‘The Jersey Shore’ – you hate everything about it, but somehow it makes you laugh that there are actually people that stupid. It makes  you feel all superior.

But at the end of the day, I decided that yes, I hate these people. Because they don’t care about anyone. Not their child, not the people sitting around them, not Taylor, Ryan or Katie. They just care that they’re heard.

So in case you’re wondering, yes, we can hear you now. Everyone can hear you. And we hate you for it.

1/2/12

I will be the first to admit. I don’t believe in a lot of stuff. I like proof. I like to listen to all sides of an arguement before I make a decision.

With that said, I don’t think the world is really going to end this year. As I’m sure you all know, the Mayan Long Date Calendar ends on December 21, 2012. And some people are predicting the end of the world.

I just don’t think it’s that easy. I think if the world was really going to end there would be SOME warning signs. Somebody somewhere would be doing something. Or maybe there ARE people doing something but they’re just not telling us. Hmmm, you know secret government installations being built inside a mountain somewhere. There will be some national lottery and only brilliant poets and scientists will be invited. But you know the government would screw it up some way. They’d forget to bring electrictians or plumbers or carpenters. So the mountain would be filled with all these brilliant people who can’t make or fix anything in the real world.

But let’s assume for a minute that the world was ending in 355 days what would you do? And let’s assume that you could only choose 5 things. And that everyone in the world was given time and money to do any five things they wanted to do. What would those 5 things be?

Here are my top 5 in no particular order:

1. Have a family reunion. My family used to go on these family reunion cruises before all the kids got older and had their own families. They were a pain in the neck to organize and someone was always complaining. But you know what, they were a ton of fun and brought my family closer than it has ever been before or since.
2. Visit the pyramids. I’ve been all over the world, but somehow the Great Pyramids have escaped me. I’ve always wanted to go. I would make a point to go there this year.
3. Buy a really fun car and take a lot of car trips. I’ve spent a lot of time in the car as a kid. Car trips to California, Yellowstone, Florida. The time in the car with my sisters and my parents was really a lot of fun. Now I fly places. I think I would slow down and take my family on a car trip.  I have no idea what kind of car I would buy for this trip. Perhaps a 1970’s station wagon.
4. Watch all the DVDs I’ve purchased over the years. Someone once said, the best way never to watch a movie again is to buy the DVD. I have a lot of DVDs. I’d make sure I watch at least on per night.
5. Save on thing for later in the year. I don’t know everything at this moment. Perhaps later in the year I’ll discover I love painting or kniting or biking or something new.  I didn’t know last year how much I’d love to play the guitar. So, I’d leave on for a surprise, even if I never get to it.

What would you do.  In the comment section below (not on FACEBOOK but here) list what you would do. Even if it’s one thing. I’m curious to see what others would do. After all, I saved one for later. Perhaps you can influence my decision.

Because I don’t really think 2012 is the end of time. But as they say in the NY lottery commercials, ‘hey, you never know…

Happy 2012.

Tomorroow night is New Year’s Eve. If you’re thinking about spending midnight in Times Square in NYC, I have one bit of advice for you.

Don’t do it.

I have, and let me tell you, it’s not as much fun as it looks on TV.  First of all,  remember, it’s December in New York.  It can be really really cold. Second, there are a lot of really drunk people in a very small area. Which means there’s a high probabilty on at least one of these things happening to you:

1) Someone vomits so close to you that you can smell it all night. 2) Someone vomits on you and you have to smell it all night. 3) Someone warns you they’re going to kick your ass for no reason other than their drunk and cold and you’re the closest person to them.

I actually had someone hit me in the head with an empty beer bottle. Yes, in their excitement, they tossed an empty beer bottle in the air, not thinking that the law of physics will come into play, and that this bottle will eventually come down.

Oh, and there are so many people in Times Square, that my friend and I were afraid that we were going to get separated by all the people pushing and shoving. So we ties are arms together with a scarf. Of course, this made perfect sense to us at the time. But have you ever been in a three legged race? You know how much stability you have? Well, it’s about the same when you tied yourself together with a scarf. Which means, we were an inch away from falling and getting trampled at any given moment. We untied quickly.

Then there’s the fun part. Getting out of Times Square. Yes, when a million people try to leave somewhere at the exact same time it’s a little difficult to get anywhere. Plan on at least an hour to go 2 – 3 blocks. And remember, one of your friends will be drunk, or has just puked or just got in a fight. So moving around NYC isn’t going to be easy.

So my advice to anyone considering going to Times Square. Don’t. Watch it on TV. Walk around anywhere in NYC that isn’t Times Square. Go skating in Central Park. Have a drink at the outside bar on top of the Pennisula Hotel (if you want to be outside). Do anything. But don’t go see the big ball drop in person.

You’ll thank me later.