"Strategy" = Placating Rich People

That's what a lot of modern white-collar work has become.

Dozens of ways I could start this one, and I debated a few, but I think in general people will understand the concept I’m going for. I don’t always love this Modern Wisdom podcast, but I listened a few days ago at The YMCA to some interview with a neuroscientist. It was pretty good, some basic shit in there, but he talked about how organizations ultimately take on the personality of their founder. Think the current Republican party and Trump — not a founder, but “the face.” Or think Zuck and Facebook, who is a founder. Think Tesla and Elon, or even Amazon and Bezos, or Widgets Inc. in Leavenworth, Kansas and its founder, KPI Kevin. Organizations become emotional and linguistic mirrors of the guy/gal who started the ball rolling, and often the guy/gal at the top now.

I worked at a joint called Virtuoso in Fort Worth in 2014–2015. The CEO was the son of the founder; his name (current CEO) was Matthew. Dude was a narcissistic sociopath on his best day, but he was revered by dozens to hundreds in the company. Most people, if they needed work out of you, would come to you and say “This is Matthew’s №1 priority,” as if the assertion of that lie would spring you into action. Obviously we all want to please upward and be seen as good, successful, and productive, but at some point it was so much bullshit. Thankfully I got fired from that job after 18 months. At the time, that was stressful; long-term it’s been pretty good, tho.