frustration Friday

Frustration Friday: Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble

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Yes, I know.  There's a Social Media bubble.  I hear it discussed in the news lately, and now that Facebook is involved with Goldman Sachs and IPO talk is a fly-ing, we're going to hear even more hand-wringing discussions of The New Bubble.  Then there will be debate about A Social Media Bubble.  Then we will see endless articles on it.  Then I will go buy myself some sake and try to forget the articles clogging my newsfeeds.

OK, let me clear it up for our pundit friends who need to fuel a 24-hour news bubble.

Of course there's a Social Media bubble.  We're seeing ridiculous amounts of money thrown around for companies that may or may not be profitable – that is part of a Bubble.  We're also seeing crazy amounts of cash invested in companies whose profitability may not endure – that is part of a Bubble.  Potential valuations seem questionable and inflated for many companies – that is part of a Bubble.

Come on you don't need to discuss it, it's obvious and in-your face.

I mean, seriously, how much is Facebook or Twitter really worth?  How do you measure it?  Is Groupon's popularity and potential profitability going to last?  Can we trust any financial estimation after so many meltdowns – we probably have to worry about a Bubble just because people would love to see one to try and make some money.

OK fine so we have a Bubble.  Now the next thing . . .

. . . stop acting like this is some late-90's-all-over-again mess.

Look, reporters and pundits, I know you like your narratives, and I know the last Bubble where people poured money into flushmoneydownthetoilet.com is a great example of a Bubble.  But I think the doomsaying getting thrown around ridiculous and fueled by memories of the last time investors went insane and invested in things like lemursonline.net and touchmynose.com.

We are not in the 90's.

Yes, some social media is overvalued.  But this is not the late 90's with all its ridiculous projects and insane speculation in every niche.  This is an age of leander and meaner companies, of hard lessons learned from the meltdown, of a different group of entrepreneurs.  The Bubble is being called out in a limited area of economic activity.  The very fact that people are calling out a social media bubble is a sign that we can avoid the economic insanity of the past.

So please, call out the Bubble, but no Doomsaying.  I've been listening to the usual cycles of who's-going-to-die for years.  No panic, no return to the 90's BS.  Let's just report on what's going on and speculate appropriately.

I'd like to see what lessons we can learn from this Bubble unencumbered by as much B.S. as possible about the 90's.

Steven Savage

Frustration Friday: Horrible Holiday Hijinks and Lessened Loyalty

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I've been talking Christmas a lot this week for obvious reasons – the Holidays are over and now it's time to sort through the tinsel and rubble and see what we've learned in progeekery.  But I'd like to focus on one issue for this Frustration Friday that is not exactly Christmas-based, but was inspired by Christmas.

A friend of mine who got suspended from their job on Christmas.  Seriously.  It sucks enough to work on Christmas, but to actually get suspended?

Yeah, you know what I mean.

Even in this currently lousy economy, 84% of people intend to seek a new position in 2011. I know not all of them are dissatisfied, but that's a gain in 24% over last year – some people are obviously not happy with their situation.

That's with an unemployment rate of roughly 10%.  Imagine what change we'll see in the amount of people looking to change jobs if there's even a marginal improvement in employment. Imagine how people who, way, were Suspended on Christmas, are going to react when the economy improves?

We're going to find out the hard way – perhaps the very hard way – just who's been happy at what job and what companies have been taking care of their employees.  There's a reason I study up on management ideas and am glad I have that psych degree – building teams and camaraderie is important to success.  Loyalty has to be earned.

I know at least one person whose loyalty isn't going to be very strong in 2011, and I'll have one more friend looking to change jobs.

– Steven Savage

Frustration Friday: Fired Up About Firing

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There's been a discussion around the blogosphere about how people (especially the 3 p crowd – politician, pundits, and preachers) don't seem to get that our unemployment situation is not just about people being fired.  I'd like to chime in and add my own bile, in my own distinct idiom.

So, as I've noted before, a lot of people have contempt for the unemployed.  There are many reasons I've come up with: mean-spiritedness, ignorance, and a deep fear of some kind of unemployment cooties.  I'd like to further expand on the whole "ignorance" thing for a moment, cut with a slight examination of misplaced moralizing for flavor.

Several times I have asked myself "why would people choose to look down on the unemployed?"  What I myself noticed is that it often seems those who think ill of the unemployed are convinced the jobless have some kind of horrible moral flaw like drug abuse or laziness or some other kind of failing.  So as far as I can tell the unemployed-bashers figure that some horrible personal moral flaw has led to the unemployed being the unemployed.

Or in short, the tut-tutting moralizers figure the unemployed basically got fired or are unhireable due to their this personal or ethical weakness.  Note these moralizers usually have jobs, often saying stupid things about the unemployed.

What these moralistic morons miss is that people loose their jobs – and cannot find jobs – for many reasons that have nothing to do with laziness and other personal failings.

People loose their jobs for many reasons beyond those that get people fired.  They get laid off (which has affected many people in this economy).  Their position gets moved and they can't relocate for understandable reasons.  Their company goes belly-up because of managerial incompetence or bad luck.

For that matter some people graduate from college and have no work.  They didn't even get to work up to being fired.  They'd love the chance to get fired as it means they at least had a job.

People also can't find work for many other reasons that have nothing to do ethical problems.  There's no work in their area.  They have some outdated skills that were useful just a short time ago.  Their cyclical industry is in a serious down cycle.  They're not getting hired due to stupid reasons, from incompetent HR to weird requirements for age – and the favorite "don't hire anyone who doesn't have a job" rule we've heard of.  They're recent graduates and don't have enough experience.

All of the above is on top of the fact that, with the Great Recession, a lot of jobs are gone and aren't coming back.

These issues aren't due to moral failings, or laziness, or anything else on the part of the unemployed.  They're due to a troubled economy (screwed up by a lot of greedy goons who did have ethical problems) and a re-aligning world economy, on top of the rapid changes in business and technology.  It's a tough time for good people and bad.

I don't think a lot of people get that many good people don't have jobs for reasons unconnected to moral issues.  Perhaps they don't want to.  Perhaps they're ignorant.  Perhaps they're just a bunch of pretentious asses.

But either way they're wrong.

– Steven Savage