Category Archives: Alas Babylon

If you’re excellent at choosing horses, why don’t you just bet on them instead of selling tips at the racetrack?

Among all the SEO spam from India and inheritance fraud from Nigeria, here is a mailing which I can’t seem to escape, there’s no unsubscribe, and it’s all free! (Names and sites removed to avoid humiliation.) Note that it’s a group “devised of.” And there are “hidden and well guarded secrets.” (I wonder where “Million Dollar” came from? That would never work.) “Dons” brain apparently requires no possessive, but it may be referring to Spanish nobility. This illiterate mess apparently doesn’t matter to those who allow their names to be used. They called me a “jackass” when I asked not to receive any more. Perhaps they can sell me the secret and hidden jackass techniques, for free!

I recently wrote a Monday Morning Memo® on what I believe to be failures in the way we educate our youth, and why schools in the US are failing. I received the following from Australia this morning:

“Hi Alan

“After much thought and reflection I am unsubscribing from your Monday Memo because I’m dismayed at you recent attacks on education.  Education is not a commodity to be bought and sold, it is not a business, it is a life skill.  Attending school goes beyond learning how to read and write it teaches teamwork, social skills, interacting with a group and so on.

“I can only comment on my experience with the Australian education system and here we value education.  The Federal Government is overhauling the funding model to ensure that all children receive a quality education and have the ability to undertake Tertiary education if that is what they wish.  In addition to overhauling the funding model they are introducing a National Curriculum from Kindergarten to Year 12.

“Your recent assertions that a people should only have to do the relevant professional entrance exam is laughable.  University equips the student with skills far beyond the scope of their Degree pattern, the ability to learn, research and problem solve.  This is a fundamental cornerstone of producing quality graduates.  I am very proud to display my education qualifications and professional associations as a post nominal on my email signature and on my business card.  It shows that I am qualified in my chosen field and am committed to continual improvement.

“In closing I have enjoyed receiving your Monday Memos over the last few years and have shared them with many friends.  Many of them in the education sector.  Sadly this will no longer occur.

“Kindest Regards

(I’ve Withheld His Name) BSc ME Dip Man Dip SIS CEnvP MEIANZ MIECA ARLF”

Aside from the fact that 36 initials after one’s name reflects either a practical joke or someone so insecure that they present you with their fourth grade report card when they meet you (sort of what they do on Facebook), can you imagine anyone so “involved” in education and learning that their reaction is to unsubscribe from a free newsletter they’ve admittedly enjoyed for years over one, single disagreement in philosophy? Geeze, I thought that was how educated people learned—they discussed and debated.

But my friend, here, has his hands over his ears and is screaming like a child (probably reciting all those initials from memory) so that he doesn’t have to tolerate any ideas that aren’t consistent with his agenda (like those trolls on Twitter who insist on debating your Tweets because they can find one exception in ten thousand to your point).

Folks, don’t worry about the competition, because if you focus on new ideas, innovation, and provocation, you’ll be hired and pass these frightened people by. Although it may take a slight detour to get around all the initials.

© Alan Weiss 2013

My new Alan Weiss’s Common Sense® World View is a partner program to my existing, very popular Alan Weiss’s Common Sense Consulting® Weekly Video.

A woman registered for the former yesterday, but informed me she wanted the $50 discount for ordering prior to August credited to her card, since my site didn’t accept the discount. I explained to her that was because the discount was for prior to August 2012 when the series began. That’s why the site had only one fee, which was only $250.

She proceeded to inform me, “one marketer to another,” that I was engaged in misrepresentation, and violation of truth in advertising. I told her of a thousand people involved in one or both of the offerings, and she was the only one to make such a statement or claim.

I then told her to take a hike. I don’t want the money of someone so self-absorbed and mean-spirited that common sense wouldn’t make a dent in that smug armor in any case. But, she said, two trusted colleagues had told her how much they received from my coaching, workshops, and materials.

That, of course, is because they have common sense and don’t attribute malice to every slight misreading, ambiguity, or even error that occurs. Some people can’t be helped. Don’t try. There are too many who truly want to be helped.

© Alan Weiss 2013

When you’re a public figure frequently appearing in varying media, you receive some bizarre emails. Here’s one from today:

I’m just asking which of you donors, alumni, and contributors to the Rutgers Foundation want to start giving your money now, the first million of which will make up for the obscene amount of severance CNN is reporting that the fired, disgraced former athletic director, Tim Pernetti, is to receive.

Does Rutgers have a board of trustees, or are they just assorted “names” who take the title but never bother to actually try to govern the university?

So, who’s first in line to pay Mr. Pernetti for being grossly incompetent? Perhaps those of you who also support keeping the clueless president of the university in his job? (“I never bothered to actually watch the video.”)

— Embarrassed grad, Alan Weiss

© Alan Weiss 2013

All right, Mike Rice is gone, and now Tim Pernetti is hitting the bricks (despite some sorrowful souls who want to retain him among the alumni). Now let’s get the president out of there who knew about this since last year, and anyone on the trustees who knew about it.

Hey, governor Christie. You listening to me? Clean house, then press charges and reclaim some money due to moral turpitude. Pernetti was making close to half a million with bonuses and perks! You could fund some libraries with that….

Fire the athletic director and the president, and anyone else in the hierarchy and board of trustees who knew about this and failed to act. Rehire the assistant who was fired for exposing this, or provide him with compensation.

Investigate criminal charges for abuse and hate crimes, and then sue to get the money back from the coach under a moral turpitude clause.

Yo, Governor Christie, what, you’re above all this? You need a special prosecutor? You understand? I’m talking to you.

When I went to Rutgers, we were concerned about learning not covering up, and prided ourselves on our diversity, not our homophobia.

When do you throw out Tim Pernetti? Are you kidding? Where does the buck stop? The athletic director KNEW of Mike Rice’s completely aberrant, unethical behavior. He chose to do nothing until a video exposed it to the public.

What’s wrong with my alma mater? Why would anyone contribute to the Rutgers Foundation if this is the way the university is being run?

Did the president know? Where are the board of trustees? Asleep?

First, I swear that all that follows is true. I have not made it up.

I offer both paid and free subscription services, in text, audio, and/or video. Invariably, the people who pay are less demanding, more polite, and more flexible in their expectations. However, overall, 99 percent of all subscribers are either highly positive or not heard from at all.

But, brother, that other 1 percent! Again, I am NOT making this up.

• A woman scolds me that she did not get her free audio download within 48 hours or ordering. I told her it was within 48 hours of the actual teleconference, still a month away, and that I could hardly send her a download of something that hasn’t yet taken place.

• “I wanted to tell you that the end of your video has you in a pose as if you’re grabbing something, and Steve Jobs would not have approved of it if you’re trying to tell us you’re a million dollar consultant.”

• “I’m writing to tell you I disagree with you.” (He never said about what.)

• In response to my suggestion that the critical nature of his email revealed great defensiveness: “I am NOT DEFENSIVE!”

• “I’ve found nine typos in your books. Why don’t you correct them instead of selling them this way?” (These were published by Wiley and McGraw-Hill.)

• “My system can’t open your mailing. Would you send separate mailings to me each week using this address?”

• A free subscriber: “You owe it to your customers to listen to our feedback and use it. If you don’t do this, I’ll have to unsubscribe.”

• Him: “Why did you unsubscribe from my mailings?”

Me: “Because I have tens of thousands of subscribers and if I accepted all of their mailings and newsletters I’d be swamped, so I accept none.”

Him: “Well, mine is better than everyone else’s so if that’s your attitude unsubscribe me!”

• “There is no link as promised in your mailing.”

Me: “The link is in the first line, and it’s in the very document you’re returning to me here.”

• Him: “You neglected to send this week’s edition of Common Sense Consulting® Weekly Video. I scrolled to the bottom, and it’s not there.”

Me: “That’s because it’s on top.”

• “When will the hour teleconference starting at noon end?”

• “You telling me that the email address I used to register is the one I need to access the publication each week, but I don’t know my email address.”

• Her: “I’m putting in my email address and unsubscribing but I keep getting your newsletter.”

Me: “You’re not in my system. Someone else is forwarding their copy to you.”

Her: “Well, tell them to stop.”

© Alan Weiss 2013