In This Issue
- Captain Asoh, by Bob Sevier
- Extended Delay, by Bob Sevier
- Top Five – Bottom Five Graduate Programs, by Bob Sevier
- Five Reasons Why You Can't Afford to Miss SimTech2010
Captain Asoh
By Bob Sevier, Senior Vice President, Strategy
Peter Drucker once said that today's leaders love power and authority, but they hate being held accountable for how they use that power and authority. Everyone, it seems, needs to have someone to blame.
Everyone, it appears, except Captain Asoh.
Jerry Harvey, writing in The Abilene Paradox, tells the amazing story of Captain Asoh. It seems that Captain Kohel Asoh was the Japan Airlines pilot who landed his DC-8 with 96 passengers and 11 crew members aboard two and a half miles out in San Francisco Bay.
Captain Asoh landed the plane so gently that many of the passengers were unaware that they were in the water. No one was injured and no got their feet wet as the passengers were rowed in inflatable life rafts to the nearest land.
Regardless of how competently he did it, though, the fact that Captain Asoh, a veteran pilot with approximately 10,000 hours of flying time, landed his plane two and a half miles out in the bay irritated a large number of people. Shortly afterward, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) held a preliminary hearing to determine who was to blame for the debacle.
Captain Asoh was the first witness. With the eyes and ears of the world focused upon him—including those of private citizens, angry passengers, representatives of pilots' associations, lawyers, newspaper reporters, and representatives of a variety of governments—he took the stand. The investigator in charge opened the hearing with the penetrating question: "Captain Asoh, in your own words, can you tell us how you managed to land that DC-8 Stretch Jet two and a half miles out in San Francisco Bay in perfect compass line with the runway?" Asoh's reply was, "As you Americans say, Asoh messed up!"1
Harvey writes, "… the words attributed to Captain Asoh clearly touch, in a very powerful way, the nerve endings of a lot of people who live in a wide variety of organizations. Asoh told the truth and we are starved for it. Captain Asoh expressed, in unequivocal, unambiguous terms, the truth as he knew it. Faced with circumstances in which many of us find that deception is the norm, he didn't make a statement with the express purpose of misleading another person or persons. How refreshing!"
I recently participated in a strategic planning retreat with a very imperial president and his team. As problem after problem was outlined, I asked the president how he viewed his role as leader. His answer shocked the room: "I don't view myself as the leader," the president said. "We made decisions as part of a team."
His words absolutely stunned the room.
This was a president who had ruled as a virtual dictator. He micromanaged. He gossiped. He made decisions based on personalities and not principles. But when push came to shove, he would not accept responsibility for the decisions he had made.
He could have learned a lesson or two from Captain Asoh.
1Actually, the phrase he used was a little more poignant.
Extended Delay
By Bob Sevier, Senior Vice President, Strategy
Recently, while flying out of Chicago, I happened to glance into the overhead bin and noticed a cardboard box with a bright yellow sticker. The sticker stated in bold words, "Extended Delay Kit" and contained two columns of instructions.
Because I routinely have my delays extended, I snapped a photo of the box so I could better read the fine print. For example, before using the kit the crew had to:
- Check with the captain
- Make sure meals were not scheduled for later in the flight (of course, meals are seldom offered on flights)
- Make sure meals had not recently been offered (see # 2, above)
- Determine that the flight has no terminal access (in other words, it is stuck on the tarmac without possibility of being paroled to a gate)
There were also six "bullets" worth of copy on how to create the proper paper trail, replenish the box, and generally make sure all the Ts were crossed and the Is were dotted.
I felt an odd sense of comfort knowing that the box was available should my cabinmates and I meet those very special circumstances.
My sense of comfort evaporated when I noticed the two stickers on the bottom. The first said the contents had a "best used by" date of 2/13. I took the photo in May.
The second described the contents of the box: 144 oat and honey granola bars.
Granola bars!
I was devastated.
All that hoopla for a one-ounce bar of compressed sawdust.
What is wrong with these people?
Do they honestly think a cabin of stressed out, claustrophobic, exhausted people are going to be mollified with faux granola bars?
OK, so where am I going with this?
In some respects, I think a lot of colleges and universities can use their own version of an extended delay kit because things just seem to take so long.
I am aware of a recent article—"What Really Motivates Workers"—in the January-February 2010 issue of the Harvard Business Review. According to the authors, the number one motivational factor for knowledge workers was making clear progress toward goals. In other words, your best workers are tired of extended delays.
According to the authors, "On days when workers have the sense they're making headway in their jobs, or when they receive support that helps them overcome obstacles, their emotions are most positive and their drive to succeed is at its peak. On days when they feel they are spinning their wheels or encountering roadblocks to meaningful accomplishment, their moods and motivation are lowest."
It's time to put away the granola bars.
Top Five – Bottom Five Graduate Programs
By Bob Sevier, Senior Vice President, Strategy
The June 7, 2010 issue of Forbes magazine had a nice article on the top five and the bottom five (out of 30) graduate programs based on projected job growth and midcareer median pay.
| Rank |
Degree |
Projected Job
Growth* |
Midcareer
Median Pay |
| BEST |
| 1 |
Physician Assistant Studies |
39% |
$98,900 |
| 2 |
Computer Science |
27% |
$111,000 |
| 3 |
Civil Engineering |
24% |
$98,700 |
| 4 |
Mathematics |
22% |
$96,900 |
| 5 |
Physics |
16% |
$110,000 |
| WORST |
| 26 |
Fine Arts |
12% |
$63,900 |
| 27 |
Counseling |
17% |
$53,500 |
| 28 |
Education |
14% |
$59,600 |
| 29 |
English |
9% |
$61,700 |
| 30 |
Divinity |
13% |
$54,200 |
*Master's degrees ranked based on median pay, projected job growth and replacement needs for common jobs of graduates with that degree. Ten-year projected increase in common jobs of graduates with that degree.
Sources: Payscale, Bureau of Labor Statistics.
SIM TECH 2010
5 REASONS WHY YOU CAN'T AFFORD TO MISS SIM TECH 2010
October 20-22, 2010, Las Vegas, NV
Register by August 31, 2010 to receive the early bird rate of $499!
- Our Keynote Speaker: Google evangelist and internationally recognized analytics guru Avanish Kaushik, best-selling author of Web Analytics 2.0 and Web Analytics: an Hour a Day…no other higher ed web conference this year has a keynote at this level.
- Our outstanding lineup also includes Susan Weinschenk, author of Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?, Chief of UX Strategy, Americas at Human Factors International and Karine Joly one of the leading social media and content gurus in higher education, the Web editor behind www.collegewebeditor.com, the founder of www.higheredexperts.com, a social networking and professional development community with more than 2,000 registered members working in higher ed institutions around the world.
- This is the marketing and web conference in higher education—no other conference balances both technology with marketing and speaks so directly to recruiters and marketers. It regularly attracts higher ed web and new media experts from institutions across the country, like Tim Nekritz from SUNY Oswego, Jessica Kryowsa from Suffolk, and Dave Olsen from West Virginia University, all of whom will be speaking this year.
- Did we mention it's in Las Vegas? You'll have a room at the Paris, access to some of the best restaurants in the world (try The Joël Robuchon at the Mansion), shows like Cirque du Soleil and Jersey Boys, golf, the Hoover Dam and so much more.
- The conference is about what's important to higher education marketers and web developers now: up to the minute thinking on analytics, content strategy, social media, and mROI.
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