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Business Lessons; Life Lessons

I’ve always been a big reader. Besides fiction and sustainability-related books, one of the other categories of books I read most is business books. (A low-footprint lifestyle helps me protect my time so I never have to say I don’t have time for reading! So if you want more time for reading, that’s just one more incentive for you to minimize your footprint, and I hope this blog and my book will help you.)

One of my favorite business reads over the past few months was The Rainforest: The Secret to Building the Next Silicon Valley. This book by Victor W. Hwang explores the “secret ingredients” that turn a place into a hotbed of innovation and investment. I also greatly enjoyed The Lohman Way: Entrepreneur Lowell Lohman’s Story and Strategies for Building Multimillion-Dollar Family Businesses, by E.L. Wilks.

But yesterday I picked up a business book that ended up being possibly my all-time favorite so far: The Five Temptations of a CEO, by Patrick Lencioni. (The photo above shows the book in the Little Free Library I set up in front of my house.)

I devoured the book in a couple of hours. The author identifies five “temptations” that CEOs fall into, that end up harming their companies. These five temptations are 1) choosing status over results; 2) choosing popularity over accountability; 3) choosing harmony over conflict; 4) choosing certainty over clarity; 5) choosing invulnerability over trust.

Mr. Lencioni wrote his book for CEOs of companies. But, as a self-employed person, I’ve always considered myself to be a CEO too, albeit CEO of a company with just one employee. Today, looking through the lens of “The Five Temptations,” I’ve gained a deeper understanding of a catastrophic business failure I experienced a few years back, and how to avoid repeating those mistakes.

Here’s what happened. A few years back, I got involved in a venture with other self-employed people. We were working together, but keeping our finances separate. Things were going fine, til one year I absolutely tanked financially. Ended up not only with zero money to my name, but actually in the red. Truth be told, I’d been struggling for quite some time, but I had just kept throwing money at my problems rather than look into the root causes.

From a “Five Temptations” standpoint, here are the mistakes I made:

1) Choosing status over results: After achieving a certain measure of success, I became preoccupied with where I stood in relation to my teammates. I got into comparing myself with them and envying them the recognition they were getting, and seeking such recognition for myself rather than staying focused on our actual work, which was to help people make desired changes in their lives.

2) Choosing popularity over accountability: In working with clients, I was out to be “liked,” be the “good guy,” rather than be the “tough guy” who pushes people to fully attain their desired results. A no-win game.

3) Choosing harmony over conflict: By not being willing to ask hard questions, I squandered time and energy engaging with people who weren’t good candidates for our products and services (and in the process, probably overlooked people who were seeking what we were offering).

4) Choosing certainty over clarity: Rather than make decisions based on the information available to me and move forward, I became a procrastinator, always waiting for that last bit of essential information so I could be 100% certain of success before making a move. Never happened!

5) Choosing invulnerability over trust: When I started getting into trouble, rather than confide in my teammates I kept things to myself and struggled alone, focused on “keeping up appearances.” If I’d been willing to be vulnerable, I’d have gotten some solid advice and moral support (which did in fact happen later, once I was willing to confide in them).

What’s nice about the “temptations” framework is that it offers a simple (though not necessarily easy) path to self-correction. Although I’d never heard of the Five Temptations until yesterday, much of what I did to recover from my business collapse was in keeping with what I read in Mr. Lencioni’s book.

I am very fortunate to have what I consider a calling in life, and quitting it is not an option. Therefore I always need to be willing to look at myself and make corrections when things aren’t going well.

My favorite business books are applicable not just to business, but to life in general. In an upcoming post I’ll talk about a time in my life when I fell into the “Five Temptations” to the detriment of some of my most valued personal relationships. And how I got out of that!

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Living-space Experiments

I’ve found that I take great joy in experimenting with different ways to store and organize clothing and other household stuff. At the moment, I have relatively few clothes, and most of them fit into two milk crates. I use four red hooks to hang four categories of my most constantly-used clothing items: bras, underpants, tank tops, bottoms (including swim-skirt). And sometimes my drying-rack ends up getting used as a hanger.

At times of my life I have had a lot more clothes than this. At this time of my life, I find it more liberating to have not as many items. I am one of those people who found herself wearing 20 percent of her clothes 80 percent of the time. Particularly after moving to ultra-humid Florida. And so I adjusted accordingly by getting rid of clothes I wasn’t wearing.

Note, you do not have to be a “clothing minimalist” to live a low-footprint life. This just happens to be my version, at least in recent years. During one era of my life, I had tons of clothes, many of which really were more COSTUMES than clothes, and about 30 pairs of platform shoes! And this was while living in a 19-foot travel trailer in South Austin. (I built little shelves to showcase the shoes. The inside of my trailer, lined as it was with Indian silk scarves and such, looked like some sort of Bohemian genie bottle.)

The milk crates sit in a piece of furniture which I scrounged at curbside and dubbed my “clothing hutch”. My bedroom is a lot bigger and has much more clothing storage than I need. The closet is empty, as are the wicker chests. Once I find likeminded housemates to share this home with me in the long term, one of them will get this bedroom and I’ll probably sleep in my micro studio. For now, I’m enjoying my experiments with the large bedroom space.

The rose mesh curtains (fabric bought from a vintage thrift shop), plus the kimono which I use as a substitute for the missing door, add a touch of pretty that keeps the room from being too spartan for my tastes.

I first used the “clothing hutch” when I was renting a one-bedroom apartment and sharing it with a roommate. The roommate got the back bedroom, and I had a partitioned area in the living room. The hutch helped create the partition, and it was a real boon for space! Experimenting with the hutch has been fun. I loved my little “roomette” (see photos below). Note, you can’t see the hutch in these pics; it’s outside the photo. I just wanted to show you my cozy sleeping, working, and reading space. Very RV, or very NYC!

When I experiment with various living-space arrangements, sometimes I feel like a kid building a fort out of blankets and pillows. It’s a joyful, creative experience. I encourage you to try it! Tip: Using curb-scrounged or thrifted stuff takes the pressure off to be “designer perfect.” This pressure takes a lot of the fun out of having a home. Let’s get rid of the pressure! Have fun experimenting. And if you have kids, bring them into it! Kids have such creative ideas, and it’s a fun way to spend quality time together as a family.

I keep my room as tidy as possible because it helps me feel relaxed and peaceful in the room. I think of it as a nice subdued backdrop to the wild, jangly-colored notes of my art, writing, and life.

Further Reading: Check out this neat post I just found on makespace.com: 11 ways to divide a studio apartment into multiple rooms. I particularly like the “movie projector screen wall” — great for video nights! And another post to stir your creative juices, this one from Life Storage Blog: 10 clothes storage ideas when you have no closet.

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Unexpected Flower

This morning. Hauling water out to the plants that need it most (at this point, endless days of no rain, it is a triage game). Feeling annoyed to no end as the water I’ve painstakingly carried runs off my sloped yard and onto the sidewalk. (I dig little trenches uphill of each plant but they fill in quickly so I have to stay on top of it.)

And just as I’m feeling sort of defeated, my eye catches on a spot of purple. A morning glory! A beautiful purple morning glory I did not plant! A pretty treat for my morning. And a reminder that even when my current efforts don’t seem to be accomplishing much, a sudden flower can pop up seemingly out of nowhere. Probably from someone else’s past effort. I take it as a reminder to have faith, to keep contributing my efforts to the general pool, and just enjoy that process and not get too stuck on outcomes.

Coincidentally, via Facebook’s “memory” feature, this morning on my Facebook feed I encountered “Bicycle Morning Glory,” a painting I did about five years ago and had forgotten about. I don’t remember who bought the original painting but presumably it is “blooming” in someone’s home or office. And I was pleasantly surprised to see this old forgotten creation “bloom” in my e-universe this morning.

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Trash Revisited!

The average household in USAmerica throws away 4.5 pounds of garbage PER PERSON, per day! The Riot for Austerity target is 10% of that, or 0.45 pounds per person. The main things that add unnecessary weight to the trash are 1) food scraps and other organic matter; and 2) things that could be recycled.

Here’s a couple weeks worth of my trash. Since I compost and recycle, the trash is very lightweight, not to mention relatively odor-free and not drippy or gunky. I always say composting is a great way to avoid “gross” trash, smelly slimy trash can, etc., so it’s well worth doing even if you don’t garden. Since my trash isn’t slimy or gunky, I need no trash-can liners — but I do line the bottom of my can with used cardboard or newspaper just in case. The cardboard or paper liner itself gets composted once it becomes soggy (from the occasional stray drop of liquid) or starts to absorb odors.

The trash filled most of a 5-gallon can (top photo), but it was mostly bags and thin plastic wrap, so I was able to condense it all into this one bag, which originally served as packaging for frozen chicken nuggets (a freegan acquisition from a friend who purchased the product and ended up not wanting it).

Revisiting the other contents of the trash (middle photo), I realized that a couple of the plastic containers would be good trays for beading projects. And the potato-chip bag, turned inside-out, serves as a waterproof, solar-reflective container for a spare bicycle-tire tube which I keep in my bicycle basket (bottom photo). All in all, hardly any trash! In all, the trash I ended up putting out into the actual garbage collection this time weighed about a pound. For two weeks!

Trash is one of the categories where I typically find it very easy to have a low footprint. I don’t buy a lot of new stuff or packaged foods. Also, a lot of my “trash” is stuff I scrounged in the first place, as opposed to purchasing; for example, furniture or pots found at curbside, or clothing inherited from friends who were purging their closets. But there have been times in my life when I’ve generated higher volumes of trash, such as when moving to a new place, or doing a major decluttering project.

There are seven Riot for Austerity categories, and most folks find it easier to meet the targets, or make progress, in some categories than in others. And most of us find ourselves in temporary circumstances where our footprint goes higher than we wish. No worries; that’s one of the major benefits of having multiple categories!

The Riot categories are Gasoline; Electricity; Home Oil/Gas; Garbage; Water; Consumer Goods; and Food. You’ll be hearing more about these in future posts.

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DEEP GREEN Book Featured in “Permaculture Women” Blog

I am deeply honored to be included in this post of “Best Permaculture Books Written by Women”.

In this post by Heather Jo Flores on permaculturewomen.com, I find myself in great company with some of my favorites, including the classic No Work Garden Book by Ruth Stout. Another book mentioned is Beyond the War on Invasive Species by Tao Orion, which “contains a broader view by taking into account that we need to understand why invasive species are existing in an ecosystem to make more ecological decisions that address the root of the problem.” I haven’t read this book yet but plan to because the prevailing approach, even within the permaculture community, to “invasive species” has always felt off-base to me.

The author of the post, Heather Jo Flores, also herself happens to be the author of one of the best permaculture books around. That book is Food Not Lawns: How To Turn Your Yard Into a Garden and Your Neighborhood Into a Community.

Heather, an artist, activist, and permaculture educator, has developed an extensive base of resources including permaculturewomen.com and the Permaculture Women’s Guild (which offers an online permaculture design certificate course taught by 40 women). She also offers her own series of online classes in the areas of emotional permaculture and practices for women authors.

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Someone Is Listening

Don’t worry, someone is listening to you. Even when it seems like no one hears or cares, someone is listening. It could just be one person, but that person really needs to hear what you have to say, and you never know what great things may come of it.

So go ahead. Write that post; upload that video; post that photo; make that comment. Someone is listening.

Speaking as someone who’s many times been the reader, hearer, viewer of that post or comment or video that almost didn’t get made. And felt saved by it, and taken it and run with it.

Speak! Share your unique voice. Someone is listening.

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Nursing Transplants Through the Hot Season

In my recent post of food-gardening tips, I advised beginners against “fighting nature,” by which I meant don’t try to grow food in the hardest season when you’re just starting out.

The same applies to the part of your garden that you’re cultivating for purposes other than food (such as wildlife habitat; flowers for pollinators; shrubs for privacy and blocking out streetlights).

With my ever-alert scrounger’s eye, I’ve been finding various shrubs and plants that people have left at curbside. Also, friends have been giving me surplus plants they don’t want. Lots of free plants — great! But I shouldn’t have tried to plant them in the yard during the hottest driest time. If I had it to do over again, the curb-scrounged podocarpus shrubs pictured in the top photo would have spent a few weeks being babied in pots on my shaded patio. Instead, I made the mistake of planting them in the harsh cruel world of the yard during what has turned out to be a very hot dry spell. Carrying water to those shrubs and to my other yard transplants each day has turned out to be a major hassle! Also it uses an awful lot of water, 20 or 30 gallons a day. (By the way, although the podocarpus look dead, one of my super-horticulture-savvy friends tells me they’ll be fine.)

Now I’m learning from my mistake. The second pic shows some plants that a friend invited me to dig up from her yard today. I’m babying them on the patio til the weather gets a bit less harsh. Snuggled up together in pots, they won’t need as much water.

Can you spot a subtle-but-significant difference between the second photo and the third?

Answer: In photo #3, I have removed the label sticker from the plastic tub! Yes, I’m that fussy, at least in certain ways — I really notice the difference! I’m very much a practitioner of the KonMari aesthetic, long before I had heard of Marie Kondo and read her books on decluttering. I remove the labels from dish liquid and other bottled household products (the few I use), and was amazed to find that someone else did that too.