It’s Saturday morning, so the ritual of before-anyone-else-rises reading, writing and coffee is, as no one ever really says to anyone else, “on like Donkey Kong”.
After closing out a couple of chapters and heading to the laptop to write, I happen to see a piece in the news about a local who is heading off to the Montana State timeout facility in Deer Lodge.
I make a comment on Facebook about the story, the essence of which is “Good riddance, don’t come back”, and then move on to writing. So of course the first response to my “don’t come back” comment is politically charged (because that’s the only way some people see the world these days) and a little snarky.
Public comments of a political nature are rare from me because political conversation usually degrades into one of two things: political arguments or political rants. I have absolutely no use for either one because I find them a waste of time.
So why did I say anything about this story? Why this time?
It isn’t just news
Because this isn’t just news, and it’s only political to those who see the world only through their party’s political lens, regardless of their politics.
What struck me about this story is that the criminal in question is a convicted felon on parole who owned a business and is married – yet no one noticed a thing. Yes, despite the comings and going of employees, customers and a spouse, no one saw or did anything and when asked – the convicted criminal’s spouse said “Oh, I just thought those people were coming over to use (the convicted criminal’s) computer.”
Really?
Is that your contribution to the community? I’ll bet you can tell us what happened on the last two episodes of Real Housewives (or similar), but all that stuff in the basement (nothing out of the ordinary, just the guns, drugs and other stuff) somehow escaped your attention.
Again, why did I say anything about this story? Why this time?
Beyond the headline
Let’s go beyond the headline and it’ll become clear.
We have a business owner with employees. Now that the business owner is going to Deer Lodge, the business is likely to go under, because the owner is probably the “technician” (read “The E-Myth”). But there are other reasons that the business is likely to lose.
The community now knows that the owner is a convicted felon – in this case, a repeat felon with meth and weapons charges. That isn’t likely to attract more business.
What does the community lose if this business fails?
- Employees lose jobs.
- Employee families experience decreased financial stability, if not serious trouble. It’s not uncommon for these things to roll downhill to what might be called “social issues” such as domestic violence or changes in the behavior of kids. It just depends.
- Whatever benefits the community might gain from the tax revenues collected from that business.
- The rollover of money use from those employees’ pay in their community.
- Some level of stability of the community, which drops when the stability of the communities’ employee families drops.
Those are just the obvious ones.
Had someone said something, maybe this could have been averted. In the case of a repeat situation like this, maybe not. We’ll never know. The choice made to say or do nothing reminds me of a conversation I had recently with a group about their obligation to sell harder.
Why sell harder?
Selling harder benefits your community in ways that are similar to those mentioned in the above business failure discussion.
I have to repeat this because people tend to take it out of context thanks to an experience with a less-than-reputable salesperson in their past: Selling harder does not mean “hard sell” or unethical sales. It means selling better and testing the “fringes” of your market for new opportunities.
Selling better should result in a stronger business, thus more stable (perhaps increased) employment, thus more stable families, thus a more stable community.
It’s your obligation to sell more and better, just like it is to be observant and open mouth when something’s wrong.
Both reflect your leadership as well as your stake in your local community.
Want to learn more about Mark or ask him to write about a strategic, operations or marketing problem? See Mark’s site, contact him on Twitter, or email him at [email protected].