Black In Business

I am so glad it is football season. The Bears are in first place, the Bills have brought excitement to Western New York and the hopes of many are still alive. At a college level, there are many teams vying to be number 1.High school football is coming to an end with state championships and traditional Thanksgiving Day games.
I love the combat of football but also the life and business lessons we can learn from it.
For instance; learning how the set goals, work hard, be accountable, monitor progress, become a team player, be coached and how to win and lose, are all valuables takes a ways from the competition of sports.
If you notice, the athletes make competition fun. They have a tremendous desire to win but there seems to be little fear of showing emotion.
A pre game ritual is for the head coach to give a speech, or it could be the team captain. The speech is meant to fire up the team for the goal of winning. I saw Tony Dungy do this with his team and at the end he simply said, “Let’s do what we do!” At that point grown men went crazy with excitement. They were yelling, jumping and bumping helmets as they ran out of the locker room. The screams included the proverbial, Let’s Go!!!!
Keep in mind there are life and business lessons at work here. What the Colts do, is score a lot of points and win football games, Kentucky fried chicken, fries chicken, the heavyweight champion, knocks people out.
This brings us to us. What is that you do? Is your mission clear? Are you fired upped about it? Do you desperately want to achieve it? Is it fun for you?
Obviously, you want your answers to be yes. If there are no’s, chances are you will not care if you are successful or not.
In closing, as you watch games this week, ask your self, what do you need to do, to be that fired upped come Monday morning? How can you use emotion to make your job seem more important to you? Enjoy your holiday, and Go Bears!

What a great opportunity our President elect has to gain and keep the trust of a vast majority of the American public. What an opportunity for our nation to reclaim our place at the top of the world community.
Think about it, 65 million voters voted for Barack Obama and over 130 million American voted in total! Never in modern times as there been so much interest in our nations politics. This is becoming bigger than the Super Bowl. The entire world is watching this defining moment in history.
So far so good for President elect Obama, a great and humble acceptance speech, what appears to be an excellent transition team, a potentially great economic advisory team. The man is looking and acting like a President.
The vision for the campaign was change, one word that has incredible possibilities and Barack has already gained the respect and admiration of many conservatives. Now the difficult part, what does change mean and how do you manage it? Even more important is how do you make the change positive and with the support of our nation?
Many business leader face the same challenge. Here is my free and unsolicited advice.
I offer a few simple steps for managing change.

1) Establish a strategic intent statement. Barack is visionary and this is a difficult one because of the vast nature of the republic. John Kennedy once said, “we will send a man to the moon and return him home safely before the end of the decade!” The goal was clear,{send a man to the moon} there was a time frame, {10 years} and it was a stretch goal. We need some sort of goal that all people can be aware of.
2) State the reason for change. This one is more obvious.
3) Express the benefit our nation will realize from this change.
4) Express the benefit we the people will realize from this change.
5) Express the role we the people must play to make this change possible.
6) Communicate the positive steps of the change, the YouTube radio address is one way, how about a federal blog that we the people can comment on ?celebrate the small steps to victory.
7) Have champions for change across the nation helping to gain support for your change initiative
If somebody has a better idea, use it, make modifications as necessary.

That is it, a 8 step plan for change. We can do this. What are your thoughts? How do you manage change? Lets talk!

You have to read this story and understand the Obama family has the same history of all of us living black in America. It Started on a slave ship! My friends at Blackpoliticsontheweb, hipped me to this article on Michele Obama that came from the UK. I urge you to visit this site and find one place for great black political insights.
I am sitting here think about all the times I felt weighted down by race. Thinking about how it is a white boys world. I hope it become a world for us all and opportunity that we all can reach. This mandate of a landslide election gives us an opportunity to learn from past mistakes. The angry white males of the 90’s lead by Newt Gingrich, and the George W. Bush political capital and I am going to spend it, is not the style of Obama.Notice the positive effect he has had on John McCain, whom seemed like a statesman in his gracious concession speech. How about George W Bush, showing emotion and offering to welcome the Obama’s to the White House, a side of our President we had not seen in 8 years. Even Secretary of State Rice, was proud to be black again. Oprah although surrounded by white people she did not know, crying on the shoulder of a unknown whiteman while her man stood in the background, found something in Black America she could be proud of!
Myself, I will try not to be so defensive around white people, I will try to be more open and less fearing. I am no racist, some of my best friends are white. Man it felt good to say that. How will Obama’s election win change you? What did you learn about our suddenly great nation? BTW, I told you so, here

Oh what a night! There are so many emotions involved in witnessing the most significant event in a lifetime. I have been witness to some memorable and news worthy happenings. Here is a short list.
Assassination of JFK
Assassination of Robert Kennedy
Assassination of Martin Luther King
Neil Armstrong’s small step for man and giant leap for mankind
Richard Nixon being removed from office
Muhammad Ali, enough said
Fall of the Iron Curtain
OJ trial
“I did not have sex with that woman!”
9-11
Preemptive strike leading to a dumb war
Reelection of George Bush, huh
The excitement the entire campaign season for President caused the past 21 months.

All of those event pales in comparison to the unlikely and meteoric rise of Senator and President elect Obama. As an African American, I am very proud of Barack. For the first time in my adult life I feel like an American and am proud of my country. I plan on getting a flag lapel pin.

I decided not to go to grant park or to the exclusive party I was invited to at the Hilton Towers Hotel. I hung out in the hood, there were people all over the streets and the bars were filled with people watching election returns. This was on the notorious south west side of Chicago, where the streets are considered mean. There was calm in the air and the crap games stopped for cheering and dancing in the streets. As I returned to my car, several black away, I felt no worry of being accosted in a unfriendly manner. Hope was alive and the black community was unified in pride and support of Barack. the first 2 texts I received were from Porto Rican friends, whom were part of a larger Hispanic community that supported Obama to the tune of 66%. The Black community had not been on the same joyful page since OJ was found not guilty. The verdict had nothing to do with our love for OJ but rather a Black man beating the system. Our pride in Barack has set our bar for hope and expectations higher. We can now understand all things are possible.

Here are some thoughts I have on key players in this year election;
Bill Clinton, first black President, no way baby.
Hillary, missed the window of opportunity.
The Obama’s, sensational execution.
John McCain, good candidate but not the maverick of 2000.
Palin, embarrassing, and a big cause for the loss
Republican Party, reduced to Joe the plumber and Sarah Palin. They both make me want to regurgitate.
Small percentage of Blacks that voted for Palin and McCain, Fools, how could you not be a part of this moment in time?
Those are my thoughts, let me hear yours! BTW, I told you so in FEB!