04/19/2017
Just got back from a terrific training trip in Alabama and Tennessee. Worked with great leaders in the intensely competitive world of automotive. Saw lots of spirit, humour and teamwork. The good ol' US of A still has a lot to offer the world culturally. And one of the things I keep noticing about the south is how dramatically race relations have changed.
Let me go out on a bit of a limb here. The majority of professional media types don't tell you this. They won't say what I will say here. But I don't work in the media, and I'm not in the business of scaring people for a living.
So what am I talking about when I say the relative importance of race has diminished is quite simple. It's based on observation, and yes, I may be a little biased, but I'll explain what I'm thinking.
There really are two competing narratives on this issue. The first one says race relations have never been worse, and people will point to specific events to substantiate this. God knows if you want to see that, the 24-hr news cycle will ensure you get more than enough of it.
That sells. Always has. But is it the whole story?
The other narrative says something a little different. This second narrative is a bit more optimistic.
Only two generations have passed since the American south was legally integrated, but de facto segregated. Two generations later, almost no time really, in the grand scheme of things, I see male and female, black, white, asian and hispanic employees all working together towards a common goal every time I run training courses in automotive, or any production industry for that matter, down south.
What's the unavoidable lesson for me every time I'm in Alabama, Oklahoma, Texas, Georgia or South Carolina? Culture can change for the better. It can change quickly. Humans have great capacity for growth. When there's work to do, I truly believe your average person doesn't care what colour his or her co-worker may be. They only care about how well they can work together to get something done. In the crazy world of automotive, you are frequently judged, and sometimes judged quite harshly.
But when you are judged it has nothing to do with appearance. It has everything to do with your impact on your team and its success.
Big picture, what's my take away lesson? Simple.
Keep people busy, keep them employed, and things can change for the better. Every man and woman, regardless of colour, wants to earn a decent living, feel respected and go home at the end of the day to a family who loves them. This central core of the American experience remains a powerful, motivating force.
Here is where we find one of the more positive aspects of American capitalism. The profit motive, backed by good HR policies, the possibility of promotion, the sense of shared struggle, bonus, incentives - all these things make shared success rewarding. As a result, it becomes quite obvious that you put whatever prejudices you may have behind you, because that's the only way to survive in a competitive industry when you have to supply the right amount of parts to the right customer with the right quality metrics at the right time.
There's no time to do anything differently! As a result, success comes, and teamwork is naturally rewarded. Friction between demographic groups gets in the way of that, ergo, it doesn't happen.
On the other hand, what's my takeaway lesson regarding what not to do? Simple as well:
Stir the pot, convince people they're victims, continuously teach children to look for differences between demographic groups, convince people they're oppressed and you'll get a very different outcome. Anger, division, friction and conflict. And a never-ending litany of professional victims, lawsuits, protests and strikes.
The question is - which of those two narratives helps you more? Which helps the country more? Which one is sustainable?
What am I really talking about? Culture, of course.
Culture is a so very, very important. It impacts how we view the world and what we believe normal behaviour to be.
The colour of your skin in 2017, less so.
That's my two cents. Call me an optimist. I don't care. Things are better in the American south than they were when my parents were my age. And I'm sure they'll be better still when my kids reach my age.
I feel this imperfect world slowly but surely gets better each year. Culture here in the West quite predictably improves, evolves and gets a bit better with each generation. Sometimes slowly, sometimes at breakneck speed. This particular aspect of American culture seems to be evolving quite well, in spite of what the news reports would have you believe. Don't think I'm right? Go work in a busy, competitive industry like automotive. Look around at what happens when you put people under pressure, give them tight deadlines, and ask them to produce. They'll surprise you every time with what's possible.
And the south keeps surprising me too.
And that's enough to keep me optimistic.
