Category: Claims vs. Behaviors
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5 Tips About Realigning Organizations I Learned by Falling Off A Horse
(No, it was not “Get right back on.” Everybody knows that.) Sustaining organizational authenticity requires continually realigning organizational identity, purpose and action. But realigning can be harder to do than you’d think. I learned recently, after falling off a horse, that getting back into action was only the start of a longer, harder realignment process.…
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Target: Why Organizations Should Boycott Target but Individuals Shouldn’t Bother
I’m a supporter of LGBTQx rights and of organizational diversity. As an individual, I’m not likely to do much to boycott Target in response to Target’s $150,00 contribution to an anti-gay, pro-bigotry gubernatorial candidate. But, if I were Target’s business customer, business supplier, stakeholder, or other important large stakeholder, I would make a bit deal…
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Target Misses the Mark on Diversity: Corporate Donation equals Corporate Homophobia
How do you know whether an organization is racist, or sexist, or homophobic? You can use my 6 Degrees test, or you can use an even simpler method: You can watch where they put their money. Target has put its money behind the campaign of a homophobe who’s against same-sex marriage. This single action casts…
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Is The Daily Show Sexist? Use the 6 Degrees of Sexism Test to judge for yourself
The media storm surrounding Jezebel’s claim that The Daily Show is sexist has tangled up our common assumptions about what does or does not make an organization sexist. Whether or not an organization is “sexist”–or for that matter racist, classist, sustainable, Mormon, Black, etc. – matters to the organization’s members and to its audience. Our…
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Implicit Complicity and “Negative Spillover”: Reputation Damage from BP’s Oil Spill Crisis
What do birds, beaches, and Chevron have in common? They have been “tarred by the same gush” of “negative spillover” from BP’s Deepwater Horizon catastrophe. In one of the weirder cases of a collision between literal and figurative language, the “negative spillover” of BPs Deepwater Horizon crisis is soiling not only birds and beaches, but…
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BP’s Beyond Petroleum: Hypocrisy, or caught in the act of learning?
Some people actually believe(d) that BP was making an authentic effort to move “Beyond Petroleum”. I was quite surprised to discover this early in June, in conversation with an organizational change consultant who specializes is sustainability change. This consultant explained that, in contrast to other energy companies that he had worked with, BP was making…
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Sexism in FairyLand: Disney’s Pixie Hollow Won’t Let Girls Wear Pants
Mom, Disney is a sexist company, isn’t it. Out of the mouths of babes, and 9 year olds, come important truths. But I like to wait it out, rather than presume, so I reply with: Why do you say that, honey? On Pixie Hollow I want to buy pants for my fairies. I have the…