Force For Good Communications

Are the American economy's best days behind it? Don't accept the "new normal!"

The severity of the current economic downturn (aka, the "Worst Recession Since the Great Depression") has a lot of doomsayers declaring that things have changed forever and that we might as well get used to it.

ABC News has launched a news segment on coping with hard times, featured relentlessly on both the ABC Evening News and Good Morning America. It's called "The New Normal."  The premise is, you guessed it, lean times are here to stay.

Sounds to me a lot like the "malaise days" of the Jimmy Carter Administration. The stagflation of the late '70s seemed to many to mark the passing of American economic greatness. Then came Ronald Reagan and "Morning in America" and two solid decades of prosperity and double digit annual returns on just about anything you invested in.

So I'm not buying the "new normal." And I hope leaders in businesses large and small reject the notion, too. There will be an upside to the current down draft, mark my words, and those companies putting into place the elements for their recovery plans will far out-perform their competition when things start heating up.

Echoing this sentiment is friend of Force for Good and former Governor of Kansas Bill Graves. Governor Graves now serves as the president and CEO of the American Trucking Association.

"As difficult as our recent economic past has been, I’m one of the optimists who believes we’ll see some encouraging economic developments before year end," Governor Graves wrote to me in a recent email.

"While our situation in 2010 and 2011 won’t be a return to the heady days of 2003-2007, I’m just too much of a believer in the average US citizen’s fondness for the great quality of life that we’ve all come to expect, and therefore expect to see lots of freight being moved which supplies this country's consumer demand."

Commercial trucking activity should be one of the first harbingers of a rebounding economy. Other sectors will have their first green shoots as well. Make sure your company doesn't miss the opportunity that lies ahead for those who can see past the "current normal."

- Jon Harmon

Peace From the Bottom Up

I don’t know those people. They’re different from us. They act weird. I don’t trust them. They’re stand-offish. I’m sure they hate us.

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They’re violent people. They don’t know any better. They don’t want peace; they just want to take what we have. We need to build a wall around them to keep them away from us. They’re too dangerous.

 

What will it take to bring lasting peace to the Holy Land? In a land where conflict runs so deep, peace cannot be imposed on the people as some calculated outcome of diplomatic negotiation. But perhaps it can rise up from the people themselves. Distrust, suspicion, prejudice and even hatred melt away when we get to know each other as individuals.

 

I spent some time with one of them today. She was shy but eventually we really started talking. I don’t know if all her people are like her but she seemed okay. I like her.

 

We talked about our families today. We laughed together. She’s my friend.

 

What if there was a quiet, serene place right in the cultural fault line of Jerusalem, where Christian, Jewish and Muslim young people could get to know each other as people and eventually as friends – rather than distant stereotypes and enemies?

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That’s the profoundly simple vision of Beit Benedict Peace Academy to be built on a beautifully rugged slice of land on Mt.Sion near the old city. My wife, Mary, and I had the privilege to visit the Benedictine Dormition Abbey recently with a small group from our Catholic parish in Illinois.

It is breath-taking to stand on hallowed ground amidst ruins dating back to King Solomon, to think about the millennia of bloodshed and conflict that these hills have known, and to imagine an academy dedicated to peace and multi-cultural understanding.

Our location has served over the years as a neutral place for reconciliation, ecumenical meetings, inter religious encounters and peace negotiations. In a land so divided and torn by conflict, Beit Benedict Peace Academy provides a neutral space on holy ground that is found no where else in Jerusalem….Our community offers to people diverse in creed, culture and tradition an opportunity to be guided in the path of reconciliation. At the request those seeking peace we are building Beit Benedict Peace Academy.

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The Benedictine monks living here have acquired this the last piece of land on Mt.Sion that can be developed, secured building permits from the Israeli government and received approvals on architectural plans. Funds now must be raised to build and endow the academy.

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Click here to learn more about how you can support this wonderful project, truly a force for good in a troubled land.

 

- Jon Harmon

 

 

Friends of Force for Good: Jill Anderson on "Leading from Behind"

Jill Anderson is director – Development and Communications at the Return to Freedom Wild Horse Sanctuary. Her essay addresses leadership from a unique perspective. As a professional communicator and a tireless advocate for a cause she passionately believes in (saving wild mustangs from being exterminated), she is a true Friend of Force for Good. Previously, she worked for Congressman John Dingell (D-MI).

There is a moment in everyone’s life where he or she feels compelled to make a difference in the world, to offer some substantive contribution during our time on the planet. Perhaps this is especially true for those in the communications field. We believe, after all, that we have something worth saying.

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In today’s modern world, where we are besieged with stimulus on every front, it seems a daunting task to distinguish oneself from the masses, and emerge as a leader. For many, it is not the challenge of climbing to the top that gives us pause, but the chance that our integrity will not be found in tact when we get there. The upwardly mobile know very well that opportunities to propel ourselves, to gain ground against our peers, will be offered . . . as long as we leave our better angels by the wayside. Can we resist these opportunities? Can we ever really reach the top if we do? Is there not a path where honest ability, hard work and a sound moral compass are the best tools to help us reach the proverbial top?

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I work as a communications professional for a wild horse sanctuary. A fast track to the limelight it is not, but it affords me a unique and rare opportunity to learn from some very powerful constituents.

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At our sanctuary, wild horses roam the hills in their natural herd groups. It has been a profound and invaluable education for me to observe these natural communities; to watch them interact; to learn how they resolve conflict; and to realize by whom their path is chosen.

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In a wild horse herd the lead mare serves as the sort of figurehead, out in front of the rest. She has the attentive focus of her herd and they follow her with unwavering faith and loyalty. As integral and high profile as her role is within the herd, it is not the lead mare that chooses the path and sets the pace.

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Behind the herd, driving with purposeful intent and hard won assuredness is the stallion. In a seemingly effortless and almost instinctual manner, he assesses the environment, decides if it is time to move – and how quickly and in what direction, or whether it would be more prudent to preserve their energy and remain a little longer in their current space. He navigates through unexpected obstacles, and meets challenge with an honest and direct response, expending no more or no less energy than is necessary to resolve the conflict. The stallion does not achieve his position through privilege or favor, nor can he rise to lead stallion without truly possessing the qualities needed to effectively guide and protect the herd. He will be challenged continuously by other stallions seeking to claim his status, and could easily lose his herd if he is not the leader that nature requires him to be.

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I would suggest that through these incredible animals nature has provided us with a model of true and honest leadership. As communications professionals we would do well to follow the example set by the stallion. Like him, ours is the task of assessing our world and guiding the movement of our herd.

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Our world is rapidly changing. People are feeling increasingly disconnected from their families and community, from the earth and maybe even from themselves. Climate change and the steady depletion of natural resources gives many cause for great concern with the path that we have been on – a path which seems to be heading for a downward spiral. None of this can be resolved without a willingness to make changes, to leave behind old ways of thinking and set out on a new path. The world is desperately in need of true and honest leadership to help us find this path and successfully navigate it. We are the opinion leaders, the architects of perception and the builders of conscious awareness. In this incredible journey that we are all on together it is our calling to find those greener pastures, and to guide our herds safely to them by leading from behind. 

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-  Jill Anderson

Lessons From Wild Horses: Healthy Relationships Begin With Trust

I met Karen Sussman two years ago when I was leading a project for Ford called Save the Mustangs. We shared a desire to preserve wild horses that might otherwise be slaughtered for meat to be exported for human consumption. For so many people, the wild mustang embodies the essence of the American West – freedom, strength, vitality and a beautiful ruggedness. For Ford, the Mustang was our most powerful car brand and it seemed fitting to pay back in some small way the inspiration the wild horse has provided the company for more than 40 years. For me, it was one small but incredibly fulfilling part of my job. For Karen, it was her life’s work, consuming nearly every moment of her every day for more than two decades.

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I found Karen to be an incredibly knowledgeable, passionate advocate for the wild horse, and a warm and generous, compassionate person. When I created Force for Good I envisioned including a host of additional voices, Friends of Force for Good, for fresh perspective and insight. I asked Karen to author the first Friends guest post.

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Karen Sussman and Destiny, one of the wild horses she has befriended.

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For the past 25 years, I have devoted my life to understanding the basis of relationships among wild horses and how these relationships apply to people. In the wild horse world, life is about survival. Each herd animal has a particular task in making sure that the entire herd survives. In addition to safety, there are other wonderful benefits achieved when the entire herd functions as a unit such as pleasure, freedom and the expanding sphere of knowledge known as herd wisdom.

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Although the herd functions as a unit, one can observe subcategories such as natal bands, harem bands and bachelor bands. Each band has its own social order. Within those band structures we can look at each individual horse’s role and how it affects the whole.

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Trust is the first building block in creating a relationship with a wild horse. It is the matrix of all relationships. We create trusting relationships when we are honest, compassionate, respectful, responsible and accountable. These attributes must apply to all decisions and actions we take. It must also apply to our entire living eco-system as a whole – our Earth, even our universe.

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Horses have evolved on the North American continent for 60 millions years, disappearing for only 8,000 to 10,000 years. With advances in molecular biology, we now know that the horses re-introduced by the Spaniards in the 1500s are the same species as those that disappeared in that relatively short geological time period. 

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What lessons do we have to learn from our wild equine friends? Just viewing their highly adaptive skills in out-surviving many other species in an ever-changing environment can give us great insight into how we should manage our own relationships within the world, including the corporate world.

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The ancient horse makes no secret about survival. It is all out in the open for everyone’s understanding to apply to our daily lives. It is the readiness to change, with every thought and action based on trust – honesty, compassion, respect, responsibility and accountability to each other. When we violate any of those values for individual benefit, we fail as a whole.

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- Karen Sussman

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Karen was born in Pennsylvania but has spent most of her life in the West. She has been riding horses since the age of four and has spent the last 25 years of her life studying and caring for wild horses. She is president of the International Society for the Protection of Mustangs and Burros and currently resides on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation in South Dakota where she and ISPMB manage three wild herds of horses. 

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