Thursday, July 29, 2010

What the Biz Rep Has Learned (#3)

In the human realm, everything is arbitrary ….

Think about it. Laws are arbitrary. Promotions and firings are arbitrary (Yeah, some you can see coming a mile away, but still …)

Success and failure don’t happen according to some immutable law of the universe. (John Lasseter would probably have been far less successful if he hadn't been let go from Disney.) ...

Definitions of beauty, good manners and personal hygiene morph from century to century and continent to continent. (Dukes and Earls in Louis XIV's court didn't take a lot of baths. We probably wouldn't like hanging out with them.)

And as for “fair” and “unfair”, those labels change with the public whim.

… And everything is temporary.

Nothing lasts forever. Not civilizations, not nations, certainly not you and me.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'd say axiom #2 is about the best case scenario example possible of getting laid off being a blessing in disguise. Not a bad one to keep in mind these days!

Anonymous said...

The problem is, not all of us are John Lasseter. If he wasn't laid off he still would have been a successful Disney feature film director, which most of us would consider an enormous unattainable achievement.

Unfortunately, for many of us, the consequences of losing a job at the wrong time or in the wrong way are catastrophic, beyond the remedy of exceptional inspirational examples.

Anonymous said...

I hear that, Anonymous #2. Timing is often everything, and unfortunately we're no more in control of that than we are the weather or ever-changing audience tastes.

Anonymous said...

Promotions and firings are arbitrary. So hard work and commitment means nothing? Oh yeah, we're talking animation so it is arbitrary. Thanks for clearing that up.

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