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.
Wayne Botha
How can I resist an invitation to share a 2008 hall of shame story? Here is mine.
In November I was at a local T-Mobile store, looking for phone with a full keyboard for my son.
I have had an account with T-Mobile since we came to the USA in 2001. The arrangement is great. I haven’t called customer service in at least three years. Ignorance is bliss.
After waiting in the store for a customer rep to finish up her phone call with her boyfriend, she shouted that we should cross the store and approach her desk.
At her desk, while chewing bubble-gum and listening to music she “served” us. Each bubble popping in my face increased my dissatisfaction. Finally, she understood what we were looking for and showed us three phones that could suit our needs. All three carry ridiculous price tags.
The customer rep could not provide the current status on my account or the charges if I were to upgrade, renew or cancel. Apparently the only way to find out your current account details in a T-Mobile store is to call “Accounts Department” from your T-Mobile phone which has no coverage in the mall.
From my car, I called T-Mobile to terminate my account. The “Account Specialist” said “I see that you have been a valued customer since since 2001, and we don’t want to lose you. The termination fee will be $200 per line”. “What? Are you telling me that it is $200 per line, for each of the phones, which both have various malfunctions and are now out of warranty?” “Yes”.
I drove 3/4 mile to the Verizon store where I was treated like a paying customer. Very much appreciated, thank you. The young lady helping us demonstrated her personal phone, with glowing recommendations of every feature that my son needs. Her charming service and third party endorsements sold me on the spot. The phone was $100 cheaper and customer service was delightful.
Before these incidents, I was considering switching all of my phones to Verizon. After being insulted in person and on the phone, it is good bye, and good riddance to T-Mobile in my household.
Laurent Duperval
WARNING: Unsavoury story follows
I have a stall story too. I was in a stall the other day, and I kheard a steady, regular noise. Turns out the guy next to me had fallen asleep doing his bizness.
And if that wasn’t enough…
A few seconds later, he sort of wakes up and I realize, he’s had too much to drink and his stomach is rebelling. On the floor…
I have never run out of a stall so fast. No way the barn doors could’ve hit me.
Alan Weiss
And you certainly couldn’t have called for help on your T-Mobile….
Laurent Duperval
No, T-Mobile doesn’t work in our area. 🙂
Instead I did the next best thing and notified a security guard.
L
Laurent Duperval
Two years ago, I was looking to buy a Marantz digital recorder. At the time, those things went for about $1100 apiece. There was only one place in Montreal where you could buy them.
I located the dealer and went onsite, since it was close to where I was working.
The receptionist asked me what I wanted, I explained and she paged one of the sales people to come to the front and meet me.
I waited patiently as she went about shuffling her papers, sighing heavily every time the phone rang, and basically ignoring my presence.
I waited to see if she would offer me water, or call the representative again. Nope, nada, zilch.
I walked out without saying another word. To this day I wonder if they ever noticed.
L
Cheri
I listened to this podcast this morning about the “hall of shame” and then went to my bank to meet my new personal banker. Perhaps your podcast was a warning… sent from the future?
The bank manager seemed confused as to why I was meeting with a business banker. When the banker did arrive, she shook my hand heartily moments before it became clear that she was quite ill and was losing her voice. (Note to self: roll in some Lysol)
We spent about 30 minutes together. Most of this time was spent with me sitting and watching her hack into a tissue while SHE was on hold with her corporate office, trying to figure out how to download a form off the computer for our discussion.
While she was on hold, she told me that the new computer system was broken, and she filled me in on how she didn’t want to be a manager at that bank because she didn’t believe in “shoving numbers down people’s throats” and so on.
Time to look for a new bank…..
Alan Weiss
Can’t make this stuff up, can you?!
Dan Weedin
Earlier this year, I bundled my internet and phone to a Comcast Business account. I already had a personal internet hookup so the rep said it would be “no problem” to change over to the business account. After a mishap in billing me for my new business account (sending it to my physical address instead of my post office box and listing it as Consulting, Toro – looks like junk mail right)I got that paid off and cancelled my personal account (supposed to be done by them).
The day after I received my refund check for cancelling my personal account, in mid-day my internet and phone suddenly ceased working. I called my wife on my cell phone and she informed me that she saw a Comcast van leaving our street.
I called Comcast. Turns out when I cancelled my personal Comcast, they immediately sent a guy to cut me off. The rep on the phone said they can’t cross-check to see if the person they are cutting off is also a business account. “But,” he says, “Since you are a business customer he will be back within 2 hours. If you were just a regular person, it would be two days.” Lucky me.
Those words from my original Comcast rep (who never called me back) still echo in my head…”no problem.”
Jeffrey Summers
I’m a consultant in the hospitality business so I’ll spare everyone my “Hall of Shame” moments and simply ask a question.
Is it bad people or is it bad systems?
Alan Weiss
Just who, do you suppose, creates the systems?
Dov Gordon
Roughly 35% of the trees the city planted on our street grow 2 – 3 inch long thorns along the branches.
Whose bright idea…#$%?
Thanks for the laughs.
Ash Waechter
I had to write this right after I heard the pastrami sandwich entry into the Hall of Shame.
I was in New York on my way to my measly advertising job on Madison Ave. when I saw a panhandler turned up his nose at a sandwich a woman gave to him on her way to her job.
It was her lunch that she brought from home for her lunch at work but decided, out of the kindness of her heart, to give it to the man at the foot of the subway stairs. The man took the sandwich out of the brown paper bag, folded open the bread, sniffed at it, and then tossed it aside.
That was her sandwich, I thought angrily. How ungrateful.