​I read an excellent article by Randall Resch recently about whether or not towers have a responsibility, legal or otherwise, to try to influence a driver who is under the influence.  Mr. Resch offers some excellent suggestions for how to approach this moral dilemma when placed in the difficult spot of suspecting impairment.  In one example, he asks what you would do if called out to change a tire, only to find that the vehicle driver appears to be impaired. ​

I started trying to imagine what I would do when I suddenly remembered that I have been faced with this situation – not the exact same situation, but something similar.  On a warm summer evening, the Railroad Police called me down to help a vehicle owner, who had somehow wandered into a section of their railroad yard and had high-centered his Pontiac on a track changer.  This was no small feat.  The track changer was at least a foot high, and the vehicle was way up on there.  It was a major feat for me to back my truck across multiple sets of railroad tracks and then lift the car straight up off of the track changer.  The lower engine has sustained significant damage, so I hooked up the car and began to offer options to the vehicle owner. 
 
This guy was barely conscious.  He had no idea where he was, no idea what had happened, and no understanding of what he could do at that point.  The Railroad Police are a private security division of whatever Railroad company they work for, so they were not positioned to arrest the man.  They chose not to call the actual Police, possibly because the guy clearly wasn’t going anywhere.  Instead, they passed him off to me, trusting that I would handle it correctly, or at least content that he and his vehicle were now on the right track, so to speak.
 
One problem was that he had no cash and no credit cards.  He wanted me to tow his car home.  He lived 80 miles away.  Without guaranteed payment, I wasn’t about to do that.  I told him I would have to impound his vehicle, which was probably better anyway, because he would have sober times ahead to decide what to do with it.  I could have towed it to a dealership or shop where we had an account that I could bill to, but he was from out-of-town, and I thought his insurance might have to be involved, so our storage lot seemed like the best place for the car.
 
Now what about the owner?  He wanted me to drive him to the airport.  Not to catch a flight to nowhere, but to rent a car.  Yes, he intended to secure a vehicle that still had a working oil pan and drive it 80 miles down I-5.  I pointed out that he didn’t have any credit cards, so no one was likely to rent him a car, and that no rental car agency was likely to allow him behind the wheel.  Although I don’t know for sure what procedures rental car companies have in place to prevent sending Foster Brooks down the road in a new SUV.  Without money, he couldn’t even get a motel room and sleep it off.  I could have simply drove him to the airport and let him figure it out.  I could have even pushed him out the front door of the storage lot and left him alone, broke, and drunk in a questionable part of town.  Finally, what I did was drive him home.  My shift was over, and I felt sorry for the guy, so I drove him home.  I asked for his driver’s license, so that I could map it out before he lost consciousness, which he did almost right away.  I silently prayed that he wouldn’t throw up in the truck, and he didn’t, so I guess that prayer got answered.
 
I’ve dealt with many inebriated vehicle owners.  One young man who had wrecked his car could seemingly speak only gibberish, so I took his car to our storage lot, where he refused to get out of the truck.  Violently.  After an hour or so of attempted alien communication, I got him to write down a phone number, and I called his roommate to come get him.  Even that guy had a hard time getting him out of the tow truck.  I guess he just like the comfort of the seat.
 
His wreck was a single-car wreck, and I remember another case of a single-car wreck in which the Police piled the driver into my truck and went on their way.  These incidents were pre-2000, so perhaps it was a different era, but on both of these occasions, law enforcement sent criminally intoxicated citizens back into circulation after they totaled their vehicles, probably because the accidents did not involve other motorists, and probably because they didn’t want anyone to throw up in their patrol car.  In the other case, the gentleman told me to tow his car to his home, and then he passed out before I could finish hooking up his car, and I couldn’t wake him up to ask where he lived.  I had to push him onto his side and pry his wallet out of his pocket to get his driver’s license.  Fortunately, he had credit cards, so I knew it was a safe move to tow him home, rather than to impound the vehicle.  When we got there, his wife (I am guessing) came out and removed him from the truck and agreed to pay for the tow.  I told her the Police had turned a blind eye to his state, and she looked a little disappointed to hear the news.
 
I agree with Mr. Resch that we have a responsibility to help, as well as to prevent further harm.  We aren’t police officers, and we don’t have breathalyzers, and we aren’t social workers, but we can be helpful and creative.  Using our helpfulness and creativity to make the roadways safer is its own reward.

​The advent and promotion of Slow Down Move Over laws has garnered a lot of publicity in the Towing industry.  With the problem of distracted driving, it seems like roadside work has become more dangerous in recent years.  The evidence is there – you read new reports of traffic fatalities or injuries almost daily that involve a first responder, often a tow truck driver.

 We would all like to think that the new laws are having a beneficial effect.  I notice, as I drive local highways in our area, that motorists are more aware of the need to slow down and move over as they pass a police, fire, or medical vehicle, or a tow truck on the side of the road.  Even a disabled vehicle on its own, with no first responder, is a signal to approaching motorists to switch lanes.  So the evidence is also there that the law is improving motorist awareness and changing their behavior.
 
Of course, it’s not the observant motorist that we really need to worry about, is it?  It’s the motorist who is looking at their phone, or who is otherwise distracted, who poses the big threat. 
 
I believe in the power of positive thinking.  I believe that we can influence others with the energy we project.  Some believe in the power of prayer.  I have to admit, however, that as far as I can see, the evidence is NOT there that a first responder can influence the behavior of motorists by how passionately they feel about Slow Down Move Over laws in those moments that they are working an accident or helping a motorist.  So, while our work to spread the word about Slow Down Move Over is necessary, what is also necessary is effective training for first responders, especially for tow truck drivers, who must undertake tasks requiring both mental and physical focus while at the same time trying to preserve their life and health in a dangerous work setting.
 
One concern I have is that all of the attention given to Slow Down Move Over might actually give workers a false sense of security.  Picture yourself hooking up to a vehicle on a highway, with no police or DOT vehicle to assist with blocking traffic.  The motorist has limped their vehicle mostly out of the lane of traffic.  The rear driver-side corner of the vehicle is just barely hanging over the white line.  You’re driving a carrier, so you can angle the truck a little to keep it farther away from the traffic lane, but as some point, you’re probably going to be walking perilously close to the lane of traffic during the loading process.
 
One nice thing about carrier design is that there are controls on both sides of the bed.  Also, since you’re approaching the attachment points from the front of the towed vehicle, you don’t have to stand to the side of the vehicle and attach a wheellift strap.  A vehicle on a carrier bed doesn’t require tow lights.  So, if you really want to be careful, you can avoid stepping into the traffic lane, or even walking close to it.  You could use passenger-side tiedowns only, get off the highway, and then complete the tiedown process. 
 
Also, as you prepare to attach a bridle to the vehicle suspension to pull it onto the bed, you can look over the vehicle at approaching traffic and select a gap in the traffic as a good time to bend down and attach the bridle.  If, God forbid, some distracted or impaired driver wandered over the line and was headed for the vehicle you’re attempting to tow, you might have enough time to vacate that space between the vehicle and your lowered truck bed. 
 
Now, instead of being vigilant, let’s imagine that you pull up to the scene, and you expect Slow Down Move Over to make you safe, so you park at a different angle, with the front left corner of your truck a few inches into the traffic lane.  You get out and lower your bed, using the driver-side controls.  You stroll with carefree indifference up and down the traffic side of your truck and the vehicle you are towing.  When you are facing oncoming traffic, you don’t look ahead to time your action with traffic gaps, and when you’re not facing oncoming traffic, you don’t turn to look or walk backward so that you can keep an eye on it.  Hey, they’re suppose to slow down and move over, right?  That traffic lane is your workspace, and they have to respect it, even if they don’t respect any fellow motorist enough to save their texting for home, work, or at least a parking lot. 
 
I understand that the extreme example I’ve given is rare, and that any towing professional who regularly engaged in that sort of carelessness wouldn’t make a habit of it – not for long, anyway.  But I still worry, because a false sense of security is no security at all. 
 
The best thing for each of us to focus on is what we control.  Unfortunately, we don’t control anyone else behind the wheel.

https://whatswhatforsale.com/products/slow-down-move-over-tshirt

My daughter is dealing with some workplace politics in her job in the software application industry, and she’s learning how to manage her anxiety in situations of contentious disagreement.  It’s a little too easy for me to look back over my 35 years of work and dismiss her fears.  I’ve had my share of run-ins with co-workers, including bosses and people I bossed, and in retrospect these things always seem less important than they were in the moment.  The interaction with my daughter stirred my memory, however, to a particularly intense conflict with a co-worker when I was a lowly impound driver.

I got to have my car towed this week.  It overheated.  We’re in the middle of 3 days of 90-degree heat, which is a little odd for Oregon, and I thought my A/C was acting up, until I noticed the temperature gauge looked a little off.  I shut it down and checked the coolant, which was full, but cloudy.  Not good.

I pulled off 99E, on the south end of Oregon City and called my friends at Speed’s Supertow, one of our sister companies.  They gave me an ETA of 60-90 minutes, which I didn’t so much mind, because it gave me time to find a local refreshment.  As it happened, there was a pub only a couple blocks away.  Closed on Mondays...  Bummer.

I headed the other direction and saw some beautiful old homes that I’d never seen before.  Oregon City is an old city, Oregon’s original capital.  It overlooks the Willamette River.  Right there on that end of town there is an abandoned paper mill that would make a great site for real-life Halo location.  It’s big, with lots of structures in a state of disrepair, of varying sizes and shapes, connected by catwalks and enormous tubes and latticework.  There is for sure a basement of some sort, and it’s right on the water, so my player can still mistakenly jump off the wrong balcony to his death, just like in some of the real Halo locations (well, real in a virtual sense).

Fortunately, I found a pub that was open, and I had just enough time to drink a Black-and-Tan and eat some happy hour fries and read a book that I’ve been needing to finish to get it back to the library only a day or two overdue (I finished it the next day while stuck in traffic – some guy’s boat fell off his trailer and got hit by multiple vehicles on I-5).

 I usually held out for most of my work shift, but I laid down across the bench seat many nights to catch a few Zs.  When business got slow, I brought a pillow to work with me – it was more ergonomic.
​
My daughter asked me recently if I ever almost fell asleep while driving, and my instinctive answer was, “Every day.”  I have a long commute – about 45 miles – and I tend to burn the candle at both ends, so I have to manage my fatigue.  There’s something soothing about being behind the wheel.  For me, it’s kind of like reading.  If I open even the most interesting book ever written at bedtime and start reading, I’m good for about 2 pages.  My wife can read for 3 hours in bed. 

We all hear about these cultures where taking a nap in the middle of the workday is routine.  I’ll believe it when I see it.  Supposedly this happens in Spain, or Italy, or one of those European countries where the economy has collapsed.  I have a cot in my office, which I used to open up once in awhile to rest my eyes.  Now even that is onerous – I’ll just sink down in my chair and “meditate.”  I know, from my own experience, that if I do this once or twice a day, for just 10-15 minutes at a time, I do better work all day long.  About the only thing you can do effectively when tired is sleep. 

I don’t think we have to pay people to sleep, although really that is preferable to paying them to make mistakes when they’re tired.  We also don’t have to encourage or recommend it, although, again, that would probably be a good idea.  Why don’t we just condone it?  Let employees know that they can take an unpaid sleep break during their work shift, and maybe convert an old office into a nap room.  Go to the army surplus store and pick up some fold-up army cots. 
Excuse me for a few minutes.  I’ll be back.

Ah, that’s better.  My train of thought was derailing.  Thinking about sleep was making me drowsy.  This seems like a no-brainer to me.  I’m sure there is research indicating that people who get the proper amount of sleep are more effective, efficient, and creative.  We know that the body/mind energy cycle is not a 24-hour cycle.  It’s more like a 3-hour cycle, meaning that we could all benefit from resting for a few minutes several times a day.  Especially after a meal. 

I’m a big fan of results-based performance evaluation.  Yes, there are processes that we want employees to follow, provided that they are proven and tested (we also want to periodically re-evaluate processes, to make sure they stay optimal).  I’ve found that giving people the space to engineer their own work often leads to something better than I expected.  Some people need more guidance than others.  I’m reminded of a Dilbert cartoon when the Boss finds Wally carting off office equipment and supplies to his car and asks him what he is doing.  Wally answers, “You told us to ‘act like we own the company,’ so I am.”  If you’re going to trust in the results-based system, you can’t forget to check the results.  An employee who takes advantage of granted freedoms won’t be able to hide their results for very long.  Maybe accounting personnel should be exempted from this program.

Embrace the nap.  And remember to dream.
Nick Kemper
www.TowPartsNow.com
https://www.facebook.com/towpartsnow?ref=hl

www.hub911.com

No other vehicles were involved, and my daughter had the presence of mind to pull off the next exit, at the end of the bridge, but the semi truck kept going.  It never stopped.  The police informed us later that several motorists called to report the truck, and some of them recorded the license plate number, so hopefully the driver will pay the price for his transgression (I am extremely thankful to all of those people who called).  Unreal.  Hit-and-runs happen, but rarely with a commercial vehicle.  I have to wonder if he even realized what he had done.
 
Last month I was on my way to work, and I passed a semi truck and trailer, and then later on he passed me, and I noticed that he was following the car in front of him VERY closely.  We were on 99E, a state highway with many signals that goes through towns every few miles.  I followed the truck for about 15 miles, and he drove aggressively the whole time.  At one point, I dialed the number on the back of the trailer to report him, and the way it was answered made me think that the number went to the driver’s cell phone, so I hung up.  I wish now that I had followed through.  Even if it was the actual driver who answered, I wish now that I had pointed out to him how dangerous his behavior was.  There is no excuse for aggressive driving, from anyone.  I’ve driven aggressively, and I’ve done it in a tow truck, and I can honestly say I didn’t gain from the practice.  Aggressive driving in a commercial vehicle is particularly egregious, and in a large commercial vehicle, it’s criminal.  Really.  My daughter’s life was at stake.  There’s NOTHING worth that.
 
The truck that I followed that day pulled off at set of scales, and I couldn’t help but think that it was comical that I had been leisurely following him at a distance while he tailgated some poor motorist, and here we were, at the same place, at the same time.  It wasn’t really comical, though.  The motorist he was following probably had experienced actual fear.  What gave that driver the right to do that?  Anyone who exhibits that type of behavior should simply have their driving privileges revoked. 
 
The really scary part is we don’t know why he drove that way, just like we don’t know why the driver who hit my daughter kept going.  Was it blatant disregard for the safety of others?  Was it gross incompetence?  Was it an altered state?  That type of judgment certainly seems to indicate impairment.
 
If you are a surgeon, or even an anesthesiologist, the life of your patient is in your hands.  That’s one reason why you train for so long, and work under the supervision of others with more experience for so long.  Mistakes are very costly.  You also know that you bear personal responsibility for your actions.  Would we tolerate a surgeon aggressively rushing through a procedure to make more money, or because he or she had something else to do, or simply because he or she is a jerk, or because he or she was impaired?  No, we would not.  If you are in a motor vehicle, the lives of others are in your hands.  We should drive as if we were cradling an easily-detonated explosive in our hands, with extreme focus, humility, and great care.  We should not tolerate dangerous behavior from other motorists.  What can we do?  We can report them.  We can snap a photo of their license plate number (at the next traffic stop), and post it on Facebook with a description of the car and the driver.  If it’s a commercial vehicle, we can report them to their employer and start a social media campaign against the company pending their action on the issue.  Be creative.
 
Have a safe and profitable week.
 
Nick Kemper
www.TowPartsNow.com
  
www.hub911.com
www.essentialnow.com
​

members that I towed personally for free or discounted significantly.  It almost seems like it’s common knowledge, assumed.  Your brother drives tow truck – ergo, you get free towing.  Have we cultivated that, as an industry?  Is it because our industry is more family-oriented, or informal? 
 
I think part of it is that the public has an awareness that towing has a multi-tiered pricing structure.  At the top, there’s the insurance company gouging level, where tow companies get back at the insurance industry for overcharging for premiums and non-renewing companies for 3-1/2 claims in a 12-month period.  Then there’s the full-blown commercial level, for BMW owners and individuals who may have a concussion from their accident and are too foggy to argue about the tow charges.  Then there’s the 20% discount for shops, who then invoice the insurance company for the full tow bill (a scam that we enable because we need their business), and for people who don’t have insurance that will cover their towing.  Then there’s the 50% discount for friends, favors between businesses, come-back tows for shops, and hardship cases.  And finally, there’s the free tow for family and very close friends.  Somehow, the public has awareness of this system, so they are able to take advantage of it, if they so choose.
 
Let’s picture this type of system in another industry.  Say my brother is a surgeon.  Let’s say I need some minor work done.  Why don’t I just call him up and ask for the family discount – say, 50% off retail?  Or better yet, free?  What about the guy who owns the local food market?  What does he say when some old buddy of his calls and says, “Hey, listen, I ran out of money unexpectedly.  How ‘bout you give me a break on this weeks’ groceries?”  He doesn’t have to say anything, because it doesn’t get asked (I’m guessing).
 
All of these cars I towed for free over the years – it wasn’t even my tow truck.  I’ve never owned a tow company or a tow truck.  So my employer knowingly (or sometimes, unknowingly) loaned the use of their commercial vehicle, which is not only a sacrifice of revenue, but a sacrifice of potential revenue that the truck could be earning if it weren’t in use.  Where I worked, we were supposed to collect a few bucks to pay for the fuel being burnt during the free tow, but most of the time we didn’t do even that, and it wasn’t enforced.  And, of all the times I towed a car for free, do you know how many times the vehicle owner handed me a $5 or a $10 and said, “Hey, use this to put some gas back in the truck.”  Never.  Maybe I told them up front not to worry about it, but I wouldn’t say it was an arm-twisting experience.
 
I think it works like this because we let it happen.  And you know what?  If we’re all good with it, then so be it.  It has to be okay, however, if a business owner opts out.  If you call your buddy who works at a towing company, and ask him for a favor, and he says, “Sorry, my boss won’t let me do it,” that has to be okay.  I really think that our compliance feeds into the Entitlement Culture.  This friend of mine who called me last weekend – from our conversation, I gathered that he talked his way out of a ticket, or worse.  Single-car accident, county sheriff let him go ticketless and unarrested, let him leave his SUV teetering on the edge of a ditch for a couple of days – what message does that send?  Sure, we all want to be cut some slack when it’s us on the wrong end of the stick.  Let’s at least agree to not expect it, and maybe even to not push it when we’ve been graced by someone’s kindness.  Or pay it forward it some other way. 
 
Have a safe and profitable week.
Nick Kemper
www.TowPartsNow.com
​

I visited my previous workplace last night, to drop off some dollie tires, and it reminded me of how happy I was to stop working there, by the time I left.  There is something about managing a tow company that can just beat you down like a bent nail over time.  It wasn’t anything specific to that company or those drivers or the layer of brake dust from the nearby freeway that coated everything in that facility.  My time there had simply expired.  I needed to move on.
 
Moving into the world of products and order fulfillment presented new challenges, and I learned many things about supply-chain economics that I did not know.  Today’s customer service environment has influenced companies to change their standard practices, mostly for the good.  For instance – our customers expect to know what is going on with their order.  So when we receive the order, we send out an order confirmation, telling them where the order is shipping from and when they should expect it.  After it ships, we send them a tracking number.  I like this practice, as labor-intensive as it is, because it is proactive, and it also forces us to gather data, so that when the customer calls because they didn’t read the email we sent them with the tracking number, we have the tracking number available.  This is much better than not having the tracking number, in which case you look like you don’t have a clue what you’re doing.
 
So here is the part of the process that most customers don’t know about:  most manufacturers and wholesale suppliers have not entered this world of proactive customer service.  They are lingering in reactionary practices, and they are resisting the lure of current customer service best practices.  Some of them are resisting aggressively.  Some of them are actually data black holes, sucking in information from nearby businesses where it will never be seen again.  Maybe that’s why they are selling via wholesale, rather than retail.  Let me give you an idea of what I’m talking about.
 
We have a procedure we follow here when we place an order, whether it is a large stock order, or a small drop-ship order.  I constructed this procedure after placing orders with suppliers many times and not doing the steps I’m about to describe, and then having it bite me in the ass too many times.  First, we send a Purchase Order with all of the necessary information – item numbers, costs, quantities, destination.  On the PO are 2 sentences:
Please confirm receipt of PO with tracking number or estimated ship date.
Please forward tracking number after order ships.
 
Why would you have to include these 2 sentences, you ask?  Wouldn’t they just proactively provide this information, as we do to our customers?  Well, I’m not going to say it doesn’t happen.  We have a few suppliers who follow these instructions consistently, and may they be blessed with eternal happiness and perfect health.  I love them.  Without them, I would be utterly hopeless that it could happen at all.  Most suppliers will confirm receipt of a PO, usually within a few hours of receiving it.  If we do not receive a confirmation within 24 hours, we send the PO a second time asking if it was received, and we continue to do that, although at a certain point we start calling until we get an answer or consider getting on a plane to visit the warehouse in-person to verify that our order has been received.
 
Once we have a confirmation, we start asking for a projected ship date.  Some suppliers will include this in the confirmation, as requested, and many have learned to do so, because they got tired of me asking after they confirmed with no projected ship date.  If the ship dates comes and goes, and we have not received a tracking number, we start asking for that.  And again, we continue to hound until we have the prey in our grasp. 
 
So you can see this is an arduous process sometimes.  I call it “babysitting the vendor.”  It’s a reality of our business.  You can’t afford to relax, because the customer deserves the best service you can provide and accurate information.  I’ve said this before:  accurate and timely information is one of the most important commodities we provide.  If you walk into a store and buy something, you know what you paid, and you have it with you when you leave.  If you order something over the phone or via the web, you need to know what you’re paying, and when you’ll get it.  Similarly, we need to know the same thing from our supplier.  Unfortunately, there are limited sources for items (and these sources apparently know that), so if we don’t get it, we’re stuck.  If you order something from us, and we fall short in our customer service, you might be able to buy the same thing somewhere else.  We don’t always have that luxury, so we are hostage to the level of service provided by the supplier.  It used to frustrate me that I had to go through so many steps to get information that a supplier should have been offering to me before I asked for it, but after multiple therapy sessions and a few brushes with death, I’ve accepted it for what it is.  I’ve kind of taken it upon myself to help to draw these operations into the 21st century by relentlessly hounding them for the information I require to be competitive in our market, and I have everlasting hope that I will groom individuals at these various companies to learn how to provide quality customer service proactively before they leave for greener pastures and I have to train their replacements. 
 
It keeps me busy, and I like being busy.
 
Have a safe and profitable week.
 
Sincerely,
Nick Kemper
www.TowPartsNow.com
 

www.hub911.com

I got some spam the other day from a training materials firm that I once bought something from, and I glanced at the email without reading it closely.  The subject read, “5 Dumb Ways to Kill Employee Morale – and 5 Great Ways to Improve it.”  I read only the first part, and I thought it read, “5 Ways to Kill Dumb Employees.”  Maybe my brain read it that way because I’m dysfunctional – who knows?  My first thought was:  Only 5?  Just kidding.  I love employees.  If I had any, they’d back me up on that.  I really enjoy other people’s employees.  It really is so much fun to hang around the periphery of a deteriorating supervisor-employee relationship, doling out unsolicited advice to both parties.  Mostly, I try to wait till the advice is solicited.  It is so much easier to have a positive perspective on employee issues when you are not immersed directly in the issue, when it’s someone else’s issue.  This is why we need peer relationships with coworkers or friends with a corporate stature similar to our own.  Let’s not confine it to professional relationships, either.  Husbands talk to other husbands, and wives talk to other wives, about the challenges of marriage.  Parents to other parents, and kids talk to other kids, about the challenges of intergenerational relationships.  We’re wired to sometimes see things more clearly at a distance.
​
I like being a grown up.  I don’t always act like one, but I like being one.  I like the privileges, the freedoms, the responsibilities, the challenges.  One of my brothers is going through a divorce, and the circumstances of the separation and his activities immediately following required some painfully honest discourse between members of the family.  One of the feelings he expressed to me was that he didn’t want to be judged.  I heard the same thing from one of my other siblings – we shouldn’t judge others.  People who are religious sometimes suggest that only a higher power can judge humans.

This got me to thinking.  I’m very fond of pragmatic activity.  What if we really tried to not judge others?  How could this possibly be a good idea?  Think about it.  You start teaching your kids at an early age to be wary of strangers, a stark and subjective judgment that has no basis in fact.  Why?  For their protection.  It’s not about the person being judged.  It’s about your kid being safe.  Volumes have been written about how important it is to make a good first impression.  Malcolm Gladwell wrote a whole book about how right we usually are when we form that first impression.  News flash:  first impression = snap judgment.  In the business world, when we interview a job applicant without any more information than the resume, references, a look at their Facebook page, and the content of the interview, we are judging based on very limited information, something many of us later rue when the dysfunctions start multiplying.  Judging others is pragmatic, and necessary. 

And think about a courtroom judge.  Should they go a little easier on the guilty?  Maybe we should change their title to “Advisor.” 
I think most of us would qualify my brother’s statement to say that we don’t want to be unfairly judged.  But what most of us really mean by that is that we don’t want to hear the unfair judgments of others.  The reality is, we all judge others constantly, and often unfairly.  I say, let’s bring the judgments out into the open, where they can be judged themselves.  We were just discussing in a staff meeting the other day how it wasn’t really fair for a recently-hired employee to be surprised about being let go before his or her training period was up.  I agree.  I see it in business all the time, treating everything as if it is a pop quiz.  Listen, if you are testing your employees, you want it to be an open-book test.  You want them to have all of the necessary information at their disposal all the time.  You want training to be an ongoing process, and you want it to be an endless loop:  demonstrate, drill, provide feedback, rinse, repeat (the lather-rinse-repeat instruction, by the way, has got to be one of the most brilliant marketing ploys ever devised).  That’s teamwork, that’s leadership.  If an employee sits through a performance review and is legitimately shocked about how poorly you assess their performance, you haven’t done your job as a supervisor.  You should scrub clean the record and start over with that employee.

It really is an egocentric fault to demand that others not judge you.  That sentence reminds me of another reason why people don’t want to be judged – the inability to separate self from actions.  Anyone who has read good parenting guidelines knows that you criticize and correct a child’s actions, not the child himself.  You affirm your love for the child, then explain why you disapprove of his actions, and give an example of what action you would have preferred.  Life is messy, and linguistics are doubly messy, so when we hear someone tell us that they are unhappy with us, we need to hear it as, “I love/like you, but not what you did.”  Why interpret a judgment in the most personally threatening way?  And remember, also, that the Judge, in this case, is another person just like you, trying to get through the day with limited data, subject to the same misconceptions and insecurities.  Like Crash tells Nuke in “Bull Durham,” when Nuke is nervous because his father is at the game:  “He’s just your dad, he’s as full of crap as the next guy.”  Guess what?  We’re all as full of crap as the next guy.  If I make a judgment about your tobacco addiction, or your taste in “music,” or your inane ramblings, I don’t expect you to engrave it in gold and make it your mantra. 

And, finally, let’s not forget the nature of judgments:  they don’t have to be bad.  What about the good judgments?  What about when I tell you you’re smart, pretty, funny, trustworthy, inspirational, and you smell good?  What about when I tell you that I like you, that I love you?  We want to get rid of that?  Hell, no, we don’t.  We all have the power to tip the scales, to make 60%, 70%, 80% of our judgments positive judgments, to look for the good in others and celebrate it.  So let’s tip.
I love you guys.  Thanks for reading.
Sincerely,
Nick Kemper
www.TowPartsNow.com