We will hear a lot of ABBA‘s Happy New Year this week. But “the Winner Takes It All” speaks directly to our zeo-sum society.
You lose, I win.
There are only limited “chips” on the table. Scarcity causes rising values. Hot air also rises. Like New Year’s champagne bubbles.
It’s time for a 2012 wrap up. To tabulate and look at the bottom line while drinking bottom-up. Swallow the strong drink and let go of the past.
Time flows only one way.
And the winner takes all. It’s the name of the game.
People and companies are urged to give and give to anyone, any cause, except to Uncle Sam.
Budget short fall.
Remember that one year when the IRS actually refunded the extra tax?
Fair game.
It’s only numbers. And it’s pure math.
As if numbers exist in thin air, unrelated to society and people (who are hurting).
There have been a lot of discussions in academic circle to “humanize” the business schools (courses on ethics, communication and inter-cultural communication) after what happened four years ago. Even Medical schools realise their future doctors need some human skills when interacting with patients in the real world.
In short, those who earn the most feel the least for their clients.
By now, even the least sensitive of them should realise that when people are hurting, they don’t make for good clients, if they still show up at all to use their services.
Politicians ironically are aware of their shrinking tax base, at least every four years.
That leaves the job (of drawing our attention to society’s weakest link) to priests and pastors, who, couldn’t tell one acronym from the other. The cultural divide. Work and Life, faith and science.
It’s another bookend, year-end. We have survived a couple of perfect storms that knocked down the house of cards. The winner did take all. That leaves us, losers.
Be not sore. Lick not those wounds, and give them not the satisfaction. Instead, look forward to a future where all are winners. It’s possible. As long as we take turn, or else, it’s another version of Utopia. Yesterday’s winners might very well be tomorrow’s losers (the Innovator’s Dilemma). That’s why VC‘s keep hunting for new and upcoming talent.
That’s why we expect the next big thing around the bend. Keep our blood pumping. “If we don’t, we might as well lay down and die”. Champagne anyone?
Thang Nguyen 555 