Your Legacy is Now
Life is not a search for meaning from others, it’s about the creation of meaning for yourself.
For over 30 years Alan Weiss has consulted, coached, and advised everyone from Fortune 500 executives, state governors, non-profit directors, and entrepreneurs to athletes, entertainers, and beauty pageant contestants. That’s quite an assortment of people, and they run into the thousands. Most of them have had what we euphemistically call “means,” and some of them have had a lot more than that. Others have been aspiring and with more ends in sight than means on hand.
Alan Weiss states:
I’ve dealt with esteem (low), narcissism (high), family problems, leadership dysfunctions, insecurities, addictions, and ethical quandaries. And I’ve talked about them through the coronavirus crisis. But don’t get the wrong idea. About 95% of these people have been well-meaning, honest (to the best of their knowledge), and interested in becoming a better person and better professional. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be talking to me.
I found the equivalent of the “runner’s wall” in their journeys, where they must break through the pain and the obstacles and then can keep going with renewed energy and spirit. But runners know how far they must go after the breakthrough, be it another half lap or another five miles. There is a finish line.
I’ve found that people in all positions, even after the “breakthrough,” don’t know where they are in the race, let alone where the finish line is.
They do not know what meaning is for them. They may have money in the bank, good relationships, the admiration of others, and the love of their dogs. But they have no metrics for “What now?” They believe that at the end of life there is a tallying, some metaphysical accountant who totals up their contributions, deducts their bad acts, and creates the (hopefully positive) difference.
That difference, they believe, is their “legacy.”
But the thought that legacy arrives at the end of life is as ridiculous as someone who decides to sell a business and tries to increase its valuation the day prior. Legacy is now. Legacy is daily. Every day we create the next page in our lives, but the question becomes who is writing it and what’s being written. Is someone else creating our legacy? Or are we, ourselves, simply writing the same page repeatedly?
Or do we leave it blank?
Our organic, living legacy is marred and squeezed by huge normative pressures. There is a “threshold” point, at which one’s beliefs and values are overridden by immense peer pressure. Our metrics are forced to change.
In an age of social media, biased press, and bullying, we’ve come to a point where our legacy, ironically, is almost out of our hands.
Yet our “meaning”—our creation of meaning and not a search for some illusive alchemy—creates worth and impact for us and all those with whom we interact.
Alan Willett
I don’t see a specific section you are referring to, but I am betting it is from his very short section about hourly billing.
I first read this book about 20 years ago (it was originally published in 1985). The book was very helpful to me in dealing with many consulting situations. It was not helpful at all on the business side of consulting.
I still find this and other Weinberg books useful. However, as I did a quick page through before I responded to this, I am surprised what a narrow segment of consulting these books actually cover, especially compared to your body of work.
Alan Weiss
Thanks for clarifying, but I’m lost as to how anyone can make those comments.
Alan Willett
That made me laugh ruefully since If I hadn’t discovered you, I am sure I would have been Just as Lost in the hourly billing morass.
The more I understand value-based fees for improving performance, the more I understand how hourly rates are unethical.
Thanks for your guidance.
Alan Weiss
It’s astounding that anyone claiming to be an expert in consulting can think and talk this way, AND get published. It’s a public disservice.
Peter McLean
Alan, would love to check it out and I don’t know what I’m getting wrong, but I can’t view the scan of the consulting book excerpt in any browser – just a picture placeholder. I also seem to be blocked from my usual login to your site and when I request a password reset, the site says the captcha code is unreadable. Regards, Peter.
Alan Weiss
I’ve reload the text this morning and it seems to have copied correctly. I don’t know about the login. Contact [email protected] if you can’t get access, though how else would you read this?!
Peter McLean
It’s just the login that provides autocomplete of one’s personal details. No big deal. Still have access to everything.
Thanks Alan!
Craig Martin
What the heck!
I can’t believe someone would write that!
It stinks of arrogance, hubris and absolute disrespect.
I’d fire a guy who hired that guy!
I’m genuinely shocked
Jon Sullivan
Accepting a consulting engagement believing, at the onset, that you cannot add value seems like taking a shortcut to a bad reputation (and maybe to writing books filled with bad advice).
I’ve had clients that I was unable to help because of a variety of reasons (not being aligned with the decision-maker, my failure to hear what was really being said, underestimating the client’s constraints, etc.) but I cannot imagine wasting my limited time knowing I was working just to save a mythical, incompetent, middle-manager’s hide.
The author seems to have a poor view of his chosen profession. What does this view say about how the author views his own value to his clients?
Noah
Hilarious. I can only imagine what the other “laws” are. Apparently he hasn’t read the Bible!
Vince A
Gerald ‘Jerry’ Weinberg is a respected name in the IT / software industry. While I don’t find all of his writing useful, anything from him that sounds stupid is probably not, and deserves investigation.
So I opened up my copy of ‘The Secrets of Consulting’ from which this quote appears. Weinberg traces this law to a colleague of his who attributes it as one of ‘Sherby’s Laws of Consulting’
(There are 3 laws comprising ‘Sherby’s Laws’:
1. In spite of what the client tells you, there is always a problem.
2. No matter how it looks at first, it’s always a people problem.
3. Never forget they’re paying you by the hour, not by the solution.
)
Anyway, the laws were meant to be attention-grabbing, and irrational sounding (and require a lot of explanation).
Weinberg mentioned these laws in the context of recounting an incident where he presented these 3 laws to grab the attention of an audience that another consultant seems to have lost control of. It indeed grabbed their attention.
I believe the 3rd law was to remind greenhorns consultant that it has been known to happen that a quick solution will make your client look incompetent to their boss. Be aware of such situations. Don’t always be in a hurry to deliver a quick solution because sometimes they won’t be appreciated.
Rachel
Your comment was the first sensible one I came across. Having read his book very recently, I completely agree with your comments.
Alan Weiss
If he’s an “expert” in IT, then hourly billing is his mantra. I find that offering a solution immediately is irresponsible, but offering value immediately is a competitive advantage. Further, delaying solutions is entirely consistent with the hourly mentality one finds in IT.