Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) is on every corporation’s and organization’s to do list. I figured since I have such a broad scope of readership, I better make sure I am trying to educate myself. 

One of the main proponents in corporate life is McKinsey, the management consultant firm. There is a senior partner, Bill Schananger, who is their talent expert on getting and keeping worthwhile employees but more on that later. Several of my definitions are taken from one of their articles. 

Diversity is relatively straight forward (no play on words) and consists of different types of people according to gender, age, ethnicity, color, and even what they think. With 7 billion plus on this big blue marble how do you incorporate what each and everyone of us think? But I digress. 

Equity gets a little dicier. If you consider the word equality that assumes we are all created equal. As imperfect as that sounds we have been dealing with this for several centuries but I daresay we have not gotten it down pat yet. Equity is more complex. Your upbringing or familial fortunes may make you automatically better off than a person of equal talent. All interns are equal but if you don’t have to worry about not getting paid then you have a leg up on the field. Interesting point. 

Inclusion means all voices are to be heard with some sort of validity as worthwhile. I guess that means no matter how off the wall you are, you are to be heard and appreciated. I think this is where we create safe spaces in school. I heard recently that a child in school thought they were a cow and therefore could pee and poop outside. Icarus thought he was a bird in Greek mythology and you know where that got him, flying too close to the sun.

This inclusion really gives me pause. If we keep parsing down our identities in absurdly minute detail don’t we really create disunity? There are no rules. There are no standards. There is to be no judgment of accomplishment or achievement. It is not only weird to me but really smacks of an impossible dilemma. Is this what we want? 

Going back to McKinsey if we get everyone involved and proposing ideas then we will create products that everyone will love and be ultra useful. Because it has been created by every color and ethnicity it should appeal to everyone’s morality. Because the workers have been heard, they are happy as clams and will produce more and better. The titans of industry have seen the light and now shower everyone with largesse from their private banks and  the world will live as one. Huh?

Mea culpa! I am taking this a tad too far but is this the new B School curriculum? In a perfect world sure, but as flawed as we are how does this come to be? Take the glass ceiling. In my career I can hearken back to Wall Street in the late 80’s and early 90’s. I worked with some very smart and hard working women. When I put in for a raise for one of them the response was,”She doesn’t have a wife and kids!” I kid you not. 

This wasn’t putting females in places for window dressing. They were fantastic.I will probably lose my male ID card for this but I have often wondered if we would have wars today if women were more in positions of authority. My point is that if we can’t get the corporate hierarchy straight with regard to gender discrimination, how the hell are we going to welcome someone in drag to a corporate meeting? 

I am not in a panic but rather fascinated that we have all of a sudden on every stage, striven to be open, welcoming and yes demanding inclusion. It is not adequate for a school, church or business to say let’s talk about it. If you don’t do it at this very minute we are going to blow your whole idea of heaven out of the water. Just ask Target, Budweiser or Disney. DEI is not a topic to be discussed it is an ultimatum. I have never liked having a gun to my head. 

Do I want a black, Hispanic or Asian or a gay person to have a fair shot at a job or tenure as a teacher? Of course I do, if you have read me for a period of time. Have many of them been screwed over the years? Yes, indeed. But you can’t do a 180 degree turn on two counts. First you are assuming everything we have done and put forth over the life of our country or even the world is flawed and has to be blown up. I appreciate your point of view but I believe you are wrong. 

Secondly, you are now saying to me that I have to accept your credos whether they are white supremacy or rights for every sub category of the human race. Do I want to hear you? Of course, but don’t try to intimidate me or shout me down without a hell a lot of pushback. Today’s negation of any conservative thought on campuses is a bad optic for any thinking American. Is this where we are to learn or just be indoctrinated? 

I abhor the big ass pickups in the Sunshine State carrying Trump and American flags all over town. 63% of Republicans believe the election was stolen. They just won’t listen to reason. When I see speaker shouted down or disinvited at a major university I feel the same way. We have lost our way. 

Be inclusive, equitable and diverse but don’t jam it down my throat. Maybe instead of thinking about how different we are, we could study how alike we are or could be? Maybe that is irrational on my part but it is the only clear path I can see. 

As always

Ted The Great 

Factoids;

Gender is the way someone identifies internally and how they choose to express themselves externally. People can use their appearance, clothing style, and behaviors to express the gender they identify with.

A person’s sex is often based on biological factors, such as their reproductive organs, genes, and hormones.

Cisgender: Someone who is cisgender identifies with the sex they were assigned at birth. 

Nonbinary: Someone who is nonbinary doesn’t experience gender within the gender binary. 

Omnigender: Someone who experiences and possesses all genders.

Transgender: An umbrella term encompassing everyone who experiences and identifies with a different gender than the one they were assigned at birth.

I print these because I myself wanted to understand the terms better and there are plenty more. If you read me you know I respect your ability to do whatever you want. I feel people are pushed into things at an inappropriate time. For kids who have feelings from 5-18 of different sexual identification, it  is part of growing up. Some continue and some change. To use hormones or surgical transformation at this age I find objectionable in every aspect. If a child is having a difficult time as a boy or girl they might envision themselves as better as an opposite. As crazy as it sounds it might be an easy way out. They then find out too late that they were wrong. To make this part of curricula presents options that cannot be suggested after a cursory exam or discussion. We find the need to enable every thought or fantasy no matter how young. We want to shield every pain or discomfort, I just feel it is part of growing up to deal with difficulty. Can we really micromanage adolescence and young adulthood?   TTG

If you are not a golfer or fan of golf or perhaps live in a cave you have no idea the upheaval that has been heaped upon the big world of the little white ball. More importantly it has shown just how vapid the titans of industry are when it comes to principle and loyalty. 

In short, the PGA and the LIV golf tour decided to put down the switchblades and see if they could make nice. LIV has been throwing around a lot of money on a few stars and a lot of has beens. They have been getting nowhere in attracting a following and more importantly media and corporate backers. 

On the other hand the PGA was looking forward to endless lawsuits from a bottomless money pit called the PIF or the Saudi Sovereign Fund. Who do you think will outlast the other? Between Greg Norman and the country of Saudi Arabia you have enough villains to really piss off a lot of people. Jay Monaghan of the PGA appealed to the loyalty of the players and the hearts and minds of the 9/11 victim’s families. He is now running for Slug of the Western World. Should be a shoo in. 

If you don’t give a crap about any of this please, bear with me. The long shot of it is that money can buy everything from jewels, to mansions to people’s souls. We have monetized everything in the wonderful world of sport. Trademark bearing uniforms in every sport and perhaps even down to jock straps. You can bet on every aspect of the game from whether the next pitch is a ball or a strike or how long it takes to sing the Star Spangled Banner. All good clean fun. Ha!

And now the beauty of streaming. Whether it is the Yankees or the Boise Bears you can watch your favorite team on a myriad of channels. All the years it has been for free and the honeypot got shared by big TV and owners of the teams. We pause this interlude to let you know that you will eventually pay for each specific game. ESPN, CBS et al are only going to give you access through streaming for a monthly fee of $60-90. What a deal ! In short those gazillion dollar salaries are going to be paid for good old Joe Six Pack or your local gin mill. 

Let’s get off sports for the moment. Prior to the golf menagerie, I have been deep diving into none other than hospice. I came across an article a few months back on the role of private equity in our industry.

 Now private equity is basically a large fund that buys up a bunch of businesses in a field and streamlines them. They cut staff and expenses and up revenue. They do all this by taking out huge loans to both buy and modernize. When things really get cooking a few years later they sell the businesses at a pretty healthy profit. The American way. Always saying they made the industry better and more profitable. Not exactly. 

Enter hospice. Prior to funding from Medicare, hospices were charitable organizations funded by donations. Several were religious or part of non profit hospitals.

They were small and struggling and they had this stupid notion of being a service to the community. Medicare was a welcome respite from sparse funding. As time went on, a few people caught on the notion this could be a gravy train and more and more started to get into the business.  

Whether inept or illegal, the industry does not have a lot of safeguards unless you are big and then they pay attention. Stay under the radar and you can do just fine. Yet watching all these people make money caught the eye of private equity and they started buying. 

Using their SOP they jumped in and decreased staff and increased claims to Medicare. Aggressive marketing put quotas on finding people who were dying and signing them up. They roamed the halls of hospitals and nursing homes. They went out in the backwoods of rural America. They get a per person fee everyday whether the patient is seen or not. They use a lot of inexpensive staff.  It was and is a license to steal.

Now some may say this is just capitalism at its best. Some say they are making the system better. I say BS. Our hospice is  a non profit. Our margins are small and we rely a lot on private donations. We take indigents and tough cases that require a lot of time effort and yes love. I say this not to brag about us but to say this is the way it should be done. I find it beyond distasteful that investors in private equity are making money off people dying. Maybe that is just me. Private equity is the largest owner of hospices nationwide and are scooping up more and more everyday. 

I say all this because big money is into everything from rehab clinics, to treatment centers to pharmaceutical distribution. Just like golf and every other sport. We have created the mega wealthy set. All the players reap absurd salaries and fringe benefits. Now that is fine if you start a business with your own money and nurture it. But at medicine and hospice I draw the line. People, we are the ones paying for all this through Medicare and Medicaid. It is our largess that is so often doled out without oversight. 

I was talking with an old friend who is by no means poor. We wondered who are all the people buying mega mansions, yachts, and works of art? It came down to a discussion about wealth and obscene wealth. We really have lost our way when it comes to ostentatious behavior. I am not at all jealous but saddened. If we can make megabucks from people dying or healing the sick then I think we really have lost our moral compass. Again, maybe that is just me. What do you think?

As always,

Ted The Great 

Factoids:

A major owner of for profit hospices was recently fined $200 million for lack of documentation and questionable claims. Paid as a cost of doing business. There are over 5,000 hospices in the United States. 66% are for profit. It is a $45 billion industry. 

The CEOs of approximately 300 health care companies collectively took home more than $4.5 billion in 2021, according to a STAT analysis of hundreds of financial filings. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals CEO Leonard Schleifer represented 10% of that total on his own, pulling in an astounding $453 million.

Lionel Messi, soccer star is being paid over $400 million a year to play for Miami. Tiger Woods was offered $800 million to play on the LIV golf tour and turned it down. And all they do is play a game.

We purchased almost $100 billion of lottery tickets in 2022. Interestingly almost two thirds of that was spent on instant scratch off games. In 2021, the market size of the casino and online gambling industry worldwide reached a total of $231 billion U.S. dollars.