You Take My Breath Away...

These were flowers in a city park in Salo, Finland. Simply breath-taking!

Focus!!

My boyfriend washed his new (leased) car last weekend, so I took advantage of the situation. Those of you who know about cars will recognize that it's the new Ford Focus ST (it's bright orange in all the ads on TV). Quite a sporty number, moves nicely. 225 hp, if I'm not mistaken. My boyfriend won't let me drive it; for some reason he doesn't trust my skills in that area - I wonder why on earth not? ;-)

The Miracle of Birth

Being a city girl, I haven't witnessed animals giving birth, so it was a big deal for me that the cat on my boyfriend's parent's farm had kittens - although I did not actually see the cat in labour or anything. They got rid of most of the kittens in some unrevealed way (that I don't want to think about), but they kept this one. Awwwwwwww!

I saw her when she was really tiny for the first time, but did not get photos. She's probably around 3 months in this photo - probably the cutest age. It is my boyfriend's Mom holding her.

Yet another photo from Pink Lady's "What I Did Last Summer" album...

You Give Me Reason to Live

Here is something that Pink Lady lives for: Greek salad!!! In the background, you can just make out the label of the beer bottle: Mythos. Apparently very good beer. I wouldn't know, Pink Lady is way too ladylike to drink beer. Drinking wine, however, is considered very ladylike indeed. Note how Greek salad is served in Greece - there's a whole big piece of feta cheese on top; no cubes of feta or anything.

Pink Hotel

Greece is usually known for its blue-and-white architecture, so of course Pink Lady had to get a shot of this unidentified pink hotel, also taken in Naxos.

Summer Toes

On a much lighter note, here is a photo of Pink Lady's summery - and embarrassingly unmanicured - toes. As you can see, Pink Lady's pink foot is not very tiny! The previously posted photo of the cute little footprint is unfortunately not Pink Lady's footprint but that of an unidentified German child who was passing by. We took a one-week holiday to Greece a few weeks back. The footprint photo was taken on the island of Naxos. As was the balcony photo.

Lonely Planet Greek Islands writes something along the lines "Greece is ridiculously over-photographable" and it certainly is true. I took a gazillion photos - you'll probably grow tired of seeing them in this blog... ;-)

The shoe is the other half of Pink Lady's currently fave summer shoes. They are Spanish, but I bought them about 4 years ago in Dallas, Texas. They were 50% off, of course. I worked in Dallas for about 4 months in the summer and bought lots of sandals and other summery shoes while there - one couldn't possibly imagine wearing socks in Dallas in the summer! I still wear most of the shoes I bought there. I may have lots of clothes and accessories, but I wear them (and wear them out!) for years. The gravel in the photo is not Greek but Finnish - the photo was taken in Salo, Finland last week. The capris are my fave summer jeans; I got them in Greece a couple of years ago and I just wear them to death. But the more worn out they get, the better they look. Beautiful women and good wine improve with age - and so do good quality denims and good quality leather shoes!

Pink Toes

Our Most Valuable Resource?

Hey There Bloggers and Blogettes!!

Eventhough Pink Lady is a business woman, this blog has - up until now - strictly avoided business topics. The idea being that the blog is a weight on the side of "life" in the work-life-balance scales! ;-)

However, today I am inspired by Peter Drucker to write on the subject of business. Let's start with a quote:

"Peter Drucker has suggested that companies have to treat their employees like volunteers: every day they have to provide compelling reasons why their most talented employees should keep coming to work. This is not just about money; chiefly, it is about building socially valuable corporate communities in which individuals feel valued. Managers who create such communities and inspire their most creative employees are like gold dust: Finding community-building talent is the single most precious resource in the modern world (high-lighting mine)".

Now what say you to that!!??!!! I bolded the words "socially" and "community", because those are traditionally not words used by the top management of large corporations. However, ever since I first started working for a large corporation, I have strongly felt that they can, at best, be like "village communities". Now I am very much a city girl, so I've never had a sense of community with my neighbours. Mostly, I've moved around so much that I've practically never had the chance to even get to know my neighbours. (I calculated at one time that I've moved, on average, every two years! The average may now have gone up a bit). So when I started working for a large company, I strongly felt that it provided a community of sorts. I made heaps of friends there and many have remained my friends for the past ten years. My closest friends are former coworkers. I even met my boyfriend at work!

The sense of community was, however, much stronger in previous years than it is currently. The economic situation seems to have changed everything. Employees have gone from being the company's "most valuable resource" to being seemingly expendable pawns to be laid off at the drop of a hat.

Now don't get me wrong, I am very, very much a capitalist at heart!! But as I state in my profile, I am all for ethical capitalism. Many other bloggers list this as an area of interest, but it seems that when I try to find information on the subject, I find information either on how to make sure that the management does not break the law (!!!!) or on environmental issues. The former point should be so obvious as not to even merit discussion and actually so should the latter these days.

But when I talk about "ethical business" or "ethical capitalism", I mean neither of the aforementioned. What I mean is ethical in the HR policy, i.e. in the way that employees are treated. And I don't just mean not exploiting them!! Lack of exploitation does not equal good treatment. I mean the kind of leadership that allows employees to fully commit to the company with their hearts and souls. But here is the interesting point: many managers would see this as being "soft", as in not being able to make a profit. I completely disagree.

I believe that a totally committed employee, one committed at the feeling level, is about 20 times more valuable than one just going through the motions. I don't know how much research has been done to back this up, but I have read it somewhere (it may have been The Pursuit of Wow by Tom Peters?). To me this is just so obvious!!!! Why is it so hard for managers to understand? Strong, ethical leadership is not soft at all, it's simply good business sense!! I guess managers don't read enough Dilbert. ;-)

I do hope that this idea will catch on. It seems to be very slowly spreading in the literature. I have recently been reading John C. Maxwell and saw that he has also written a book called There's no Such Thing as Business Ethics. Judging from the title, it sounds like it might be a book on this very subject; will look into it. Stepher R. Covey also thinks along these same lines. And I seem to recall having read that the companies with the most satisfied employees are also the most profitable. Why does top management pay so little attention to such stories?

Here's another quote from Peter Drucker:

"Knowledge has become the central resource. But the productivity of knowledge workers is incredibly low. Does anybody here believe that the teacher of 1991 is more productive than the teacher of 1900? The productivity of service workers is even lower.... Over three-fourths of our workforce are service and knowledge workers. By the end of the century, 90 per cent of total workers will be knowledge and service workers. Productivity of knowledge work and dignity of service work are the two great priorities."

Firstly, aren't we all "service" workers these days? Don't we all serve someone? Secondly, if soon nearly all of us will be in fields where productivity is the main competitive advantage, doesn't it simply make good business sense to treat employees in such a way that they be as productive as possible? I do wonder why so few companies actually do this...

Pink Lady has spoken