The quest for fame (and fortune)

Apropos my post the other day about anonymity and those who spend their lives in a quest for fame and fortune--here is a rather apt cartoon from one of my favorite comic strips, Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller.

The Undisputed Truth - Smiling Faces Sometimes (1971)

An oldie but goodie. The video is so-so, but the song is so good--and relevant for the times we live in. A warning, a message, good advice. The songwriters knew the truth--smiling faces are not always what they seem to be. Here are the lyrics: 

Smiling faces sometimes pretend to be your friend.

Smiling faces show no traces of the evil that lurks within.

Smiling faces, Smiling Faces, Sometimes they don't tell the truth.

Smiling faces, smiling faces tell lies and I got proof.

The truth is in the eye 'cause the eyes don't lie, amen.

Remember, a smile is just a frown turned upside down my friend.

So, hear me when I'm saying

Smiling faces, Smiling Faces, Sometimes they don't tell the truth.

Smiling faces, smiling faces tell lies and I got proof.

Beware. Beware of the handshake that hides the snake,

I'm tellin' you beware of the pat on the back it just might hold you back.

Jealousy, (Jealousy) misery, (misery) envy.

I tell you you can't see behind

Smiling faces, Smiling Faces, Sometimes they don't tell the truth.

Smiling faces, smiling faces tell lies and I got proof.

Your enemy won't do you no harm, 'cause you'll know where he's comin' from;

don't let the handshake and the smile fool ya.

Take my advice I'm only tryin' to school ya.

Smiling faces, Smiling Faces, Sometimes they don't tell the truth.

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Barrett Strong / Norman Whitfield

Smiling Faces Sometimes lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, DistroKid

Reflections on anonymity

Most of us will never become famous for what we do or for who we are, and most of us are satisfied with that, because we did not set out to become famous. We did not set out to become world conquerors, famous for what we do, or filthy rich because of what we do. Most of us did the best job we could do in our chosen field, achieved a modicum of success, enjoyed decent incomes, and made sure that those who follow us were ready to take over for us when it was our turn to leave that field behind. Anonymity is not something we chose, it simply is the backdrop of our lives while we live them. We are not anonymous to those we love and who love us. We choose to give up anonymity in order to love another person. But we remain otherwise anonymous to the world at large. 

Most people don't seek widespread attention willingly, because the idea of being center stage is not appealing. That is true for me as well. It has happened that we found ourselves center stage at several points in life, but those were not aimed-for experiences, rather stressful ones, especially for introverts or ambiverts with introvert tendencies. When I was in grade school and high school, I was deemed the smartest student in my class each year based on grades, and that meant accepting several honors at the end of each school year. While it was nice to be recognized, it also meant accepting awards in public and feeling pressure to accept a position as student council president in high school, a position for which I was unsuited and which I disliked immensely. Being the top student also meant holding a valedictorian speech at the end of high school for a huge auditorium of people that made me nervous for weeks prior to graduation. That has been the case for every single speech or lecture I have given since then. I've agonized for weeks about them--what to say, how to say it, will it be well-received, will I make a fool of myself, will I be so nervous that I couldn't enunciate correctly, and so on. I have never enjoyed public speaking nor being on stage. I remember performing in dance recitals, and how nervous I was before each recital. But I loved dancing and dancing classes, and recitals were a part of the entire experience. For me they were just something to get through. 

As I've gotten older, I've realized that preparation is key; if you practiced your speech enough times, or memorized your lines, or your dance moves, you would be fine. Something automatic takes over when you finally step onto the stage and it's your turn to be in the spotlight. With one exception, I've never made a bad speech, given a poor lecture, or performed a suboptimal dance. But my nervousness has not abated with the years. If being recognized and remaining anonymous were possible, that would be preferable. Writing comes closest to that combination; it is possible to write, to receive responses from readers, and to remain anonymous, at least in a general sense. I remember when my book about passive-aggressive leadership began to garner some attention; I was pleased but at the same time nervous when I read the reviews of the book. Putting yourself out there as a writer is an iffy proposition; will you be able to write and still retain a sense of anonymity? If one writes under a pseudonym, it is possible. The author who writes under the pseudonym Elena Ferrante has retained her anonymity while being a best-selling author, one example of this being possible. Her publisher protects her anonymity. 

Some people I know have never had a problem being in the limelight. They enjoy giving speeches, enjoy being the center of attention, and enjoy an audience, both socially and professionally. Most of them are extroverts. I admire them, at the same time knowing full well that I could never be like them, nor would I want to be. I am perfectly happy remaining out of the limelight, as long as I am recognized for the work I actually do and am rewarded for that when it comes time. That is very important, especially in a world that rewards extroverts for nearly everything. If you are comfortable in the limelight, if you don't mind selling yourself, if you like giving speeches or leading meetings, more power to you. But that shouldn't mean that those who don't like these things should not be rewarded. Unfortunately, if you are not an extrovert, you are often overseen in a work context. I have gone out of my way during my career to 'see' those employees who don't make a big deal about themselves, who prefer being in the background. I've always found them to be as smart and knowledgeable as the extroverts who have also been smart people, just more verbal about it. 

Some of you may be thinking that I am equating introversion and anonymity. I am not. But I have often found that introverts prefer remaining anonymous in the general sense of the word--unidentified, incognito, or unnamed. They are not attention-seekers. That is the connection I've seen and experienced. One can be an extrovert and choose anonymity as well, for good reasons. But mostly those who prefer or choose anonymity tend to have introvert tendencies. 

There is also a group of people who spend most of life desperately trying to escape their anonymity. This group of people are of average intelligence and abilities, but they believe that they were made for greater things and that one day they will be finally noticed for their great talents. They waste quite a bit of time trying to be noticed, trying to be famous, trying to be successful, ad nauseam. Their definition of successful is being rich. They are not happy with who they are, and they refuse to accept that they are just average ordinary people who are destined for average ordinary lives. They just know that they are destined for fame and fortune. It's just right around the corner. If you try to tell them that there is nothing wrong with having an average ordinary life, they will berate you for being negative or unambitious. They blame others for their lack of success (money), and they buy into all sorts of scams promising them success if only they do this or that thing or change this or that mindset. They'd be better off writing a book about how to become successful, rather than buying the books telling them how to become successful. They don't see that there is no magic formula for success/becoming wealthy. What they want is to be famous and successful, but they don't understand that success and being famous are not necessarily connected (Elena Ferrante is a good example of a successful writer, but no one knows who she really is). You can be famous without being successful (rich), and successful without being famous. These people don't change or begin to accept their lives as they are until they have been through some hard-knock experiences. But getting to that point can often take a good portion of a lifetime. 

Deception and the end justifies the means

Last night I watched the Netflix film The Woman in the Window with Amy Adams as a pill-popping, wine-drinking agoraphobic female psychologist who lives alone in a big house in Manhattan, except for a tenant who rents the basement apartment from her. The story revolves around her trying to get the police, her tenant, and a few others to believe that she has witnessed a murder in the apartment building across the way from hers. It's based on the book of the same name by A.J. Finn (pseudonym for Daniel Mallory). I haven't read the book, so I cannot comment on whether the film remained completely true to the book, or whether the film is better than the book, or vice versa. 

As I usually do once I finish a book or a movie (or both), I googled them to read more about them and the author. One thing led to another, and I came upon an excellent article in The New Yorker (A Suspense Novelist’s Trail of Deceptions | The New Yorker) about the author (book editor turned novelist) and his climb to the top of the publishing world. His debut novel, which was published in 2018, is The Woman in the Window, and it made him a millionaire. So far, so good, I thought. Kudos to those debut novelists whose books become best-sellers. It's the hope and dream of most novelists, however, most of them never realize the dream. Very few novelists write best-sellers. That's a statistical fact. 

But as I read further, I realized that for this author, the end justified the means. He used every means possible to get to the top, to become famous, to become a best-selling author. He essentially lied his way to the top and used the people he needed to use to get there. He lied about being sick, about family members being sick/dead, about his education/degrees, and his work experience. He made himself out to be much more important than he was. Some of you may be shrugging your shoulders saying, so what, many people do that. If you read the article, you'll realize that most people don't do what he did, and if they did, we'd be living in a very difficult world where you wouldn't be able to trust anyone, essentially. I don't know why he did what he did, or if he even understands that what he did hurt people, but if he does, he knows that what he did was morally questionable and wrong. When confronted, he ended up blaming some of his behavior on being bipolar. I don't know enough about bipolar disorder to comment on it one way or another, so I leave that to the experts. I do know something about narcissistic personality disorder, and this type of behavior is not uncommon in those who have that disorder. So I don't know. What I do know is that it struck me while reading the article how little the publishing world polices or punishes their own. And when their mistakes catch up with them, they go the 'no comment' route in order to avoid the bad publicity and embarrassment. 

It also struck me that the publishing world rewards their own. Editors know other editors and suggest books for perusal and publication. They take care of their own. It's who you know that moves you ahead. A.J. Finn the editor turned novelist may have gotten ahead just fine without all the lying; there were plenty of people willing to move mountains for him. The publishing world is another elitist profession that protects its elitism by keeping the common people--average ordinary authors--at bay. Traditional publishers do not accept manuscripts directly from authors; most go through literary agents who wield a lot of power in terms of acceptance/rejection of manuscripts. They work together with publishers to keep out the 'riff-raff'. It is strange to realize that most authors will never enjoy what A.J. Finn enjoyed--editors willing to promote his book. Most authors who behave honestly and who follow the traditional rules of publishing will never see their book published by a traditional publisher. 

This is why I am all for the rise of independent publishers and self-publishing, at the expense of traditional publishers. Yes, the market is now flooded with sub-optimal books by first-time self-published authors who think they are great authors, but eventually they find out that they are not, because no matter what they do, their books don't sell. It's hard to be a little fish in a huge ocean. Absolutely no one will notice you. And that is the current state of affairs for most self-published authors. But there is also a lot of poor writing published by traditional publishers; many books promoted by traditional publishers are just garbage. The same holds true for vanity publishers, who promise first-time authors the moon--a best-selling novel and a film script based on their books. Vanity publishers have no qualms about taking 20,000 dollars from authors to 'help them publish their books, to distribute them globally, and to initially promote them on social media'. These are all activities that the author can do himself or herself for less than 50 dollars on Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP); one need only use KDP to self-publish a book, arrange for global distribution, and sell the book on Amazon. I wrote a post about self-publishing already in 2010 (A New Yorker in Oslo: Publish Your Book using CreateSpace (paulamdeangelis.blogspot.com); just as an update, CreateSpace eventually became KDP for those who are interested. Once the book is out for sale on Amazon, it's easy to tweet about it or share the link on social media. So what are vanity publishers using the 20,000 dollars for? They're getting rich from taking advantage of first-time authors who don't know any better. They're also criminals for lying to authors. 

One sad thing about getting older is finding out how many people lie, or are willing to lie to get ahead, to make money, or to be successful. There are people willing to sell out their relationships and family in order to make money. There are people who were perhaps willing to cheat or be dishonest when they were young, who became cheaters and dishonest people as adults. It's disconcerting to read about them, and even more disconcerting to know them personally. I find it sad that most professions are built on the backs of honest hard-working people who never really found out how or even that they were taken advantage of until they were older, and by then the only feelings they can feel are disappointment and sadness. It's too late to do anything about it. It's hard not to feel sad when you realize that in many professions--academia, publishing, business, journalism, medicine--there are those who don't mind shamming others, who don't mind lying and cheating their way to the top, who don't mind stepping on others or holding them back, and who don't care what others think of them. Perhaps that is the way of the world, and perhaps that has always been the way of the world. Nevertheless, it is still quite jarring.  

Foo Fighters - Chasing Birds (Official Video)

I haven't really followed the Foo Fighters much since they started making music, but this song and video caught my eye. Definitely a throwback to the psychedelic songs from the 1960s and 70s, from the likes of The Beatles (think of the album cover for Magical Mystery Tour), Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix, and other bands/singers from that time. I hope they continue in this vein--it's a very good song. 

Working from home and the least engaged employees

I read an article today in the New York Times about the CEO of WeWork who meant that employees who enjoyed working from home were those who were 'least engaged' in their jobs (WeWork’s CEO: ‘Least Engaged’ Employees Work From Home - The New York Times (nytimes.com) I had to laugh. I thought to myself--another dinosaur. Another entitled leader without social antenna or emotional intelligence. My advice to him is to join the 21st century before it leaves him behind. 

The pandemic has shown us all how it is possible to keep on working productively and effectively while working from home full-time (or mostly full-time). Those of us who have administrative jobs have not experienced major changes in how we do our work. The greatest challenge I've faced during the past year has been getting my hospital's VPN to work at home; my company had to work that one out. It took some time, but they did. I need to have access to work emails from home and it has to happen via a private network. Does it always work? No. But 90% of the time it does. So I won't complain. When it doesn't work, I find another task to occupy me. The days go by, and work gets done. 

I'm an older worker without children to care for. Many of the younger couples in my neighborhood who are new parents have enjoyed working from home this past year, for good reasons. They have been able to spend each waking day with their infant/toddler, and I've watched them take turns caring for their children. The fathers are outdoors pushing the baby carriages while the mothers are at home working. Or vice versa. They are relaxed and their babies are relaxed. Of course, we are talking about parents with one child each. Families with several children each may not experience the same amount of relaxation, especially if the children are of school age and were stuck at home during the last year. I've read articles about the parents who have used a lot of time on home schooling and the challenges involved in trying to work from home and home-school children. It can't be easy. As always, I would guess that much of the work falls to the women in the family, who do all of the above plus clean and run the house. So the WeWork CEO is most likely referring to mothers when he says that those who enjoy working from home are the least engaged. As I said, he lacks social antenna, because if he had them, he'd understand that maybe these women appreciate the extra time gained not spent commuting to and from work. Perhaps they appreciate being able to use that extra time on their actual jobs when they are at home, despite all of the other things they are asked to do. As always, it's a man commenting on these issues. I'm really so tired of hearing what men have to think. Why not ask women CEOs? Oh, I forgot. Men still outnumber women when it comes to occupying those coveted CEO positions (Women Business Leaders: Global Statistics (catalyst.org). Why doesn't that surprise me?

I've worked in academia my entire career (dominated for the most part by men at the higher levels). All I've seen are men who have prioritized their careers at the expense of family and friends, at the expense of hobbies and other interests. Many of them (now old) are divorced and alone. They face old age and sickness alone. Many of them were unfaithful to their wives along the way. Many of them were never there to help raise their children. It seems strange to me that society would expect men and women to behave this way and then expect them to have a decent family life. My brother hit that wall when he had children; suddenly sitting in his office until late hours did not appeal to him, and it caused him trouble with his bosses who thought he should not be leaving at 5 pm every day. But he wanted to be with his children, and it cost him one job. But if you get your work done within regular work hours, why shouldn't you be allowed to leave at 5 pm without that being a negative thing? It's because we Americans were raised to think that 60-hour work weeks somehow make you important, invaluable to your company. And for some decades, it probably was that way. But no longer. Companies are no longer loyal to employees who dedicate every waking hour of their lives to their companies. Younger people want a life, and thank God for that. They enjoy their work, but they also enjoy their family lives and friends. And most younger women would not tolerate being married to a man who worked the way men in my father's generation worked, or even men in my former boss's generation (close to 80 years old now). They gave their all to their jobs, but for the life of me I cannot see what they got back that was so much more important than their families and friends. 

So working from home gets two thumbs up from me. Being able to be flexible about when one needs to focus on work, or on family, or on home life and friends, is worth gold. If the WeWork CEO has a problem with that, it's his problem. Society is changing rapidly, and it has passed him by. Good riddance to these types of men. 

The demise of workplace loyalty

Modern leadership courses emphasize many things, but loyalty to one’s workplace is not one of them. Loyalty (my definition of it) is considered to be old-fashioned; what’s important is being able to navigate the many and continual changes that come your way as an employee. Don't become too attached to anything because it could all change tomorrow. Don't become too attached or loyal to a project, a job, or a good leader. Be ready to let go of all of it immediately, because you may very well be asked to do that. Be ready for change at all times. That is the modern workplace mantra.  

As long as employees do not resist the many changes that are foisted upon them, they are considered 'loyal' in the way that management likes. That is the modern definition of workplace loyalty. If management decides that an employee should move to a new location and start anew, it is expected that the employee do that without questioning the wisdom of their decision. Modern workplace loyalty is doing and saying what workplace leadership wants you to do and say; it is not doing and saying what is often the truth and what is often best for oneself and one’s workplace, because the truth is generally not appreciated, or rather, management does not often wish to be reminded of it, especially when it comes into conflict with the plans and strategies that management wishes to implement. Most managers are not interested in hearing your thoughts/opinions about their decisions, whether they are about your job or the workplace at large. If management decides that a merger is the best course of action for a workplace, they effectuate it even if most employees are opposed to it. That has been my experience in huge public sector workplaces. Employees must simply find a way to deal with the outcome, even if it is an obvious failure on many levels. If management decides that personnel budget cuts are the way to reduce operating costs, they effectuate them, despite the protests and complaints by the employees affected directly by them. If management decides that the remaining employees are to do the work of the employees who have been let go, they will put a spin on that decision and foist it upon the remaining employees. If productivity decreases as a result of this decision, management will not allow employees to remind them that this is a direct result of the budget cuts. Management refuses to face the truth--that it is not possible for two people to do the work of five. Modern workplaces are all about saving money ad nauseam but making sure that top leaders get the generous salaries they feel they deserve. And so on. 

Leaders would rather not have to deal with such a tiresome virtue as loyalty, with employees who want what's best for their workplace, who like their workplace, their colleagues, the camaraderie, the shared history, and the interesting projects. It's difficult for most employees to live up to the version of modern worker that most modern workplaces want. The same idea applies when discussions of open office landscapes come up; management will push through that idea despite protests from employees who know from the start how the noise and chaos of open landscapes will affect their productivity. They are not listened to. They are expected to be sheep; just follow management's lead and accept the consequences. If the decision proves to be a huge mistake, they'll find a way to gloss over it so that it is never defined as a mistake. Ergo, it will not be possible to learn from mistakes because there aren't any. 

I don’t understand workplaces that refuse to listen to the good advice and ideas of their employees who have worked there for many years, who know the history of their workplaces and the risks involved in going down a particular path. It’s almost as though the longer you work in one place, the more risk you pose to the implementation of the plans and strategies of management, because they know that long-term employees perhaps cannot adapt or might not want to adapt as readily as short-term employees. They are too loyal to the old way of doing things. I can understand this from management’s point of view, but it’s disconcerting to realize that history, experience, and general knowledge are not valued in the same way as they once were. It’s disconcerting to watch a workplace under new management make the same mistakes as were made ten years ago under an older management. It’s disconcerting to know that they did this because they did not want to listen to the long-term employees. It's disconcerting to watch how long-term employees are pushed aside or frozen out in favor of the younger ones who are more malleable. Eventually, the longer you stay in one workplace out of a misguided sense of loyalty, the less valuable you are to that workplace. That is the definition of a modern workplace. It is no wonder that younger people are less ‘loyal’ in the old-fashioned sense of the word. Why hang around when your ideas and advice are not valued? Many of them shift jobs without compunction after five or seven years. I’ve come to see that as a good thing. I started my career with that attitude, because I felt that at the seven-year mark, one perhaps needed a change of venue. It was important to move on in order to grow and develop. But that was a different era when loyalty between employer and employee was a two-way street. Employers may not have wanted you to leave, and they did their utmost to keep you. That is no longer true. But then I moved to a small country with considerably less career opportunities, and suddenly I had to face the reality that it wouldn’t be easy to shift jobs the way I might have been able to do had I stayed in my own country. So I stayed in one place, in one department, at one hospital. I pursued a doctoral degree, did a postdoc, and became a scientist, all at the same workplace. Many of my colleagues have been the same people for the past thirty years. I grew to like that for the most part—the sense of familiarity and shared history. Thirty years went by. But during the past ten to fifteen years, much has changed, perhaps not unexpectedly. The sense of familiarity and shared history are gone. They have been replaced by a feeling that the sands are constantly shifting under one’s feet. Employees come and go. Decisions are made, work groups established to implement them, and then they are abandoned for reasons that are unclear. Few people seem to complain about the waste of time and effort involved in this type of decision-making, not to mention the huge costs involved. Everything has become very fluid and relative. It often feels like the foundations are no longer strong, or that they are now being built upon shifting sands rather than on solid ground. Many long-term employees have adapted to multiple and continuous changes, but it took time, probably much longer than management preferred. The result however is that long-term employees stand alone. They feel alone and perhaps abandoned. They feel devalued and useless to some extent. The sense of shared history is gone. The sense of pulling together for a real and important goal is gone. It’s a strange feeling. I haven’t decided yet whether I like it, but that’s not what’s important. What’s important is that management likes this way of doing things.

Another way of looking at it

 Makes you think......

Quotes about moving forward and the courage to do so

• Life moves on and so should we.   Spencer Johnson
• Accept yourself, love yourself, and keep moving forward. If you want to fly, you have to give up what weighs you down.   Roy T. Bennett
• Let go of something old that no longer serves you to make room for something new.  Roy T. Bennett
• One of the happiest moments in life is when you find the courage to let go of what you can’t change.   Unknown
• God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.   Reinhold Niebuhr
• You can spend minutes, hours, days, weeks, or even months over-analyzing a situation; trying to put the pieces together, justifying what could’ve, would’ve happened… or you can just leave the pieces on the floor and move on.  Tupac Shakur
• Inhale the future, exhale the past.   Unknown
• Nothing in the universe can stop you from letting go and starting over.    Guy Finley
• Close some doors. Not because of pride, incapacity or arrogance, but simply because they no longer lead somewhere.   Unknown
• The only thing a person can ever really do is keep moving forward. Take that big leap forward without hesitation, without once looking back. Simply forget the past and forge toward the future.  Alyson Noel
• When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need.   Tao Te Ching
• You will evolve past certain people. Let yourself.   Mandy Hale
• Let go of certainty. The opposite isn’t uncertainty. It’s openness, curiosity and a willingness to embrace paradox, rather than choose up sides. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow.   Tony Schwartz
• When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.   Alexander Graham Bell
• Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.   Erich Fromm
• It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.   Theodore Roosevelt
• Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.   Raymond Lindquist
• You don’t need strength to let go of something. What you really need is understanding.   Guy Finley