What do American Idol and Starbucks have in common?

I have new faith in the American people. They have voted Kris Allen to be the new American Idol! Sorry Adam – you are a talented man, but something happened.

Adam Lambert – talented, confident, polished, practiced, exceptional, dramatic, impressive. He spent the better part of his life perfecting his talent. The judges didn’t even give him any advice on areas for him to improve. He studied leaders in the entertainment industry – he took singing and acting lessons. He wore makeup to cover his acne and give his face a defined and polished look, dyed his hair to look edgy – even painted his finger nails black to give off that “bad ass” vibe. He has the “glam rocker” persona down. He wears tight leather pants. And, he’s a nice guy.

Kris Allen – average, cute, personable, pretty good at singing and playing guitar, genuine, real, guy next door, modest. Kris looked genuinely surprised when his performances were so well received – he even said “Adam deserves this” when they announced him the winner. Kris sings with passion, sincerity, and even misses a note here and there. The judges criticized his performances and he took their advice to heart. He is charming, average looking, and likeable. He dresses like a typical college kid. He could be anyone you and I know.

The judges favored Adam from the beginning – announcing him the person to beat. They didn’t like Allen until the American public started voting for him. And even yet, they still continued to tell the voters that Adam should win. All the hype surrounding this season on American Idol pointed the voters to chose Adam as the winner.

So what happened? The voters – although everyone could admit how very talented and polished Adam was – picked Allen. They chose sincerity over performance – genuine over polished.

Starbucks – you either love it or hate it. There is no in between. Although most people can admit that Starbucks has their act together – great products, great service, great atmosphere – there is something about many local coffee shops that people prefer. Is it the same thing that led people to vote for Kris over Adam?

Can someone or something actually be “too good to be true”? What don’t we trust about the perfect, exceptional, the polished? What leads us to say “how can it be that good? There must be something wrong with it (or him, or her)?”

When things are “too good”, “too perfect”, or come off as “too practiced” – we tend to lose trust in them. We start looking for flaws – trying to figure out what is “fake” about the item or person – start to believe that we are being fooled in some way. It’s human instinct.

In business – it’s best to be genuine, sincere, and modest. Customers will question a product or service that seems too practiced, too polished, too exceptional – it will appear insincere. At some point – too good becomes questioned. We can’t help but wonder – what are they trying to sell me? Are they trying to persuade me to do or buy something that I may not otherwise want? Am I being fooled? Is this just an act?

Be honest – Be sincere – Be genuine – or be careful, your intentions may be questioned.

Fire Manny!

Just for a moment, let’s put the Manny Ramirez steroid baseball suspension fiasco into “real” business terminology.

Manny Ramirez is an employee of the Los Angeles Dodgers. Mr. Ramirez is paid a salary of over $25 million. As an employee of the Lost Angeles Dodgers, Mr. Ramirez is expected to fulfill his contract to the company, which includes adherence to a drug policy that includes the ability for his company to penalize him for the use of banned substances. Mr. Ramirez used a banned substance on the job.

The Los Angeles Dodgers suspended Mr. Ramirez for 50 games and he faces about $7 million dollars in penalties. After that, he can come back to his job and his salary, business as usual.

“Suzie Smith” is a hairstylist and works at a salon. One day, she comes to work intoxicated. After cutting a couple of clients, her manager notices that she is not acting like herself. Taking her into the back room, the manager discovers she has alcohol in her system and sends her home. Suzie is immediately terminated from her job for gross misconduct and not adhering to the “no tolerance” policy of the company. Suzie was making $30,000 per year and had health insurance benefits. Suzie loses it all, despite the fact that up until that day, she was the best performing stylist in the salon.

What’s the difference between these two employees? Suzie is held accountable for her actions. Suzie’s employer believes in strict adherence to policy and in addition, believes that by performing her duty under the influence, she was not giving the best to her clients and could potentially injure a client. In addition, the salon reserved the right to report Suzie’s actions to the Department of Cosmetology, thereby putting the status of her hairstyling license and ability to continue with her career into the State’s hands.

Manny is not held accountable for his actions. The Los Angeles Dodgers and Major League Baseball do not worry about the safety of their other employees or their customers (the ticket holders – oh yes, they are customers). They simply give Manny a “slap on the wrist” and he’s back to making an obscene amount of money. Focus is then put on “the win” and not “the rules”. Customers keep coming back to the Dodgers – paying more and more each year for the product and patronizing the company regardless.

I have decided that the incident with Manny Ramirez is a perfect example of what is going on in The U.S. today. Accountability has fallen to the side of handouts, entitlement, rogue behavior, and the loss of morals and work ethic.

What Manny (and other baseball players) has done is NOT forgivable! You would think that the more a person is paid – the more they should be held accountable for their job performance – not the other way around. Yet, the $10 per hour employee is held more accountable for their actions than the $25 million dollar a year “superstar”.

Backwards thinking?

Whatever happened to the R.S.V.P.?

I am very troubled today about the R.S.V.P.

Does anyone know where it went? I can't seem to find it! Over the past year, I have coordinated many business events - and many of the attendees it seems, could not locate that R.S.V.P. either!

I was told at one of these events (that had primarily 21-40 year olds in attendance) - that "we just don't R.S.V.P. anymore....it's not really necessary.....people just don't do it." But they do seem to show up!

Now I'm not sure if the people that don't know how to R.S.V.P. have never planned an event before - so they don't realize how important it is in the planning of events to know about how many people are attending - or if it's that people today just have way too much on their plates and not enough time to even R.S.V.P. at all - or if the name of responding to an invitation has just changed and I'm so out of the loop that people don't even know what I'm asking for when I put R.S.V.P. on an invitation!

Maybe there is new "R.S.V.P." lingo. Is there a "tweet" version for use on twitter? Or perhaps an "e-R.S.V.P" for using evite or another similar on line invitation tool?

Has the R.S.V.P. simply just gone away? Maybe people today don't need to let each other know if they are attending an event or not. It must just be socially "cool" to show up at something when you feel like it, and not show up when you don't.

I think I will show up at the next event I'm invited to - without giving them an R.S.V.P. so that I can be cool, too!