David Jackson

Contemplating Hell by Bertolt Brecht

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Contemplating Hell

Contemplating Hell, as I once heard it,
My brother Shelley found it to be a place
Much like the city of London. I,
Who do not live in London, but in Los Angeles,
Find, contemplating Hell, that it
Must be even more like Los Angeles.

Also in Hell,
I do not doubt it, there exist these opulent gardens
With flowers as large as trees, wilting, of course,
Very quickly, if they are not watered with very expensive water. And fruit markets
With great leaps of fruit, which nonetheless

Possess neither scent nor taste. And endless trains of autos,
Lighter than their own shadows, swifter than
Foolish thoughts, shimmering vehicles, in which
Rosy people, coming from nowhere, go nowhere.
And houses, designed for happiness, standing empty,
Even when inhabited.

Even the houses in Hell are not all ugly.
But concern about being thrown into the street
Consumes the inhabitants of the villas no less
Than the inhabitants of the barracks.

Bertolt Brecht

Phenomenal Woman Poem by Maya Angelou

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Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
‘Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

***

Musketeers of Illusion Poem by Dandelion De La Rue

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Always the coldness
creeping in
disturbing the warmth
of my illusions,
illusions of
d’Artagnan seeking
one for all and
all for one
true friends
warm love
risking all.

For them
the musketeers
there were no borders drawn
between them,
they knew that
borders don’t exist
imaginary lines
drawn in the mists
of paranoia.

But they
the musketeers
are only my
illusions,
now.

Like them
I drift into
invisibility
missing them
I have become
a nonexistent
border
separating love
and despair.

Daniel Pink on Motivation l The Effect on Product Cost.

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View the video

I am a retired product engineer for a major corporation with whom you are familiar. You have touched my product. I have patents. Woo hoo. As a young engineer I worked with engineers I called those old flat top guys, amazing engineers of the fifties and sixties era who calculated with a slide rule, drew their designs on paper and had no calculator or computer. They knew their stuff.
As a young engineer I worked for a chief engineer who knew my job. We worked with autonomy and very few meetings. Job appraisals were short and sweet. I saw the work force shift to the model used today. The chief engineer was replaced by three levels of managers none of whom had ever done my job.
The job turned into meetings with the Lead Engineers, Project Managers, and Directors. The individuals rewarded were often those who performed the rudimentary, non creative tasks well. Job appraisals turned into a nightmare of meetings and objectives and ratings. They called it the Performance Management System.
What was the difference in motivation?. For my Chief Engineer I would have walked over hot coals. He knew my job, had done it, could teach and keep me out of trouble, left it to me.
Now my product is built in China.
The product was sent to China because the overhead became too high and caused the product cost to be too high to compete. I was there when we costed the product and it is the product cost that sends the product overseas.
The products went to China, not because of politics, or labor costs, but in large part because the extra layers of American management ends up in the cost of the product. Our product cost $100 to manufacture. That included only $10 in labor. Mexican labor alone would not mean a move. The “burden” or overhead was $30 to build it here. Let’s add that up:

Material……………..$60
Manufacturing Labor……$10
Overhead……………..$30
Total…………………….$100

The cost of that overhead includes our pay for performance philosophy. It also includes healthcare folks. The American built product has healthcare in the cost. Products are outsourced because of the extra layers of management and because of healthcare and benefit costs that end up in the product cost.

Our cost was $100 and the Chinese placed a product on the shelf in the store for $80 retail….It costs us $100 to make it and they were selling it for $80….

We need to take the burden of healthcare and fat management out of the product cost and the products can come home. The old flat top guys had it right. Daniel Pink is correct and the our business model rewards waste in creativity and that waste ends up in the cost of the product and the product ends up being built elsewhere. The CEO bonus is in the cost of the product but, as Daniel points out, that bonus means lower performance when creative solutions are needed.

the ol’ engineer david michael jackson