Do you think you are mentally balanced?

The world is upside down right now as Biden and EU seize some yachts to stop a brutal tyrant. But don’t tell the Tik Tok and Instagram crowd. Many still think the most critical issues right now are the posts by their idols and influencers. So, when LinkedIn suggested I write on the topic of?Mental Health, I jumped on the idea. LinkedIn elaborated on the topic by saying: write about work-life balance, etc. Well, no. There are more important things.

LinkedIn asked me to write about work-life balance, etc. Well, no. There are more important things.

Apparently, Taylor Swift released an extended version of the 2012 song All Too Well when she performed it recently on an SNL show. The song is rumored to be about her breakup with the talented and impossible-to-remember-how-to-spell-his-last-name Jake Gyllenhaal. She also alludes to leaving a red scarf in his sister’s apartment. Following the release, Mr. Gyllenhaal (I am practicing) had to block comments on his Instagram account because of an overwhelming attack by crazed Swift’s fans. One Dionne Warwick, a singer, even twitted that she’ll pay for the stamps for him to return the scarf (apparently, she is not aware of how problematic using the USPS has become.)

So far, a normal occurrence in our society where a cowering administration, rising US taxes, flourishing crime, declining real wages, and a looming DEEP recession are considered secondary to pop diva’s suffering. The nuts are going nuts. Sorry, the mentally challenged being challenged by a scarf.?

Mental balance from unexpected source

Do you want to know a (mental) healthy response to Swift’s fans nonsense? Go on Fox News reporting this Swift’s anecdote and read the comments. They are way more interesting than the fans’ insanity or Swift’s music.

Maddoogg says, “I am on my third bourbon and feeling great.” (146 likes)

Shannonscott125: “I used to love dill pickles. I still love them but I used to too.” (103 likes).

You get the drift. There is a dozen more such deliberately non sequitur comments. As far as I am concerned, these Fox News readers saved America. You might think Fox News is the devil’s channel, albeit more successful than all the "angels'" ones combined, but these commentators are saner than 51% of America and 100% of Swift’s fans.

Solution to our energy problem?

I remember watching a docuseries about the Beatles and the famous mob scenes when they came to America with thousands of hysterical fans screaming their heads off (of course you couldn’t hear the music). I could only think that as a source of alternative energy finding a way to tap the sound waves would have been way superior to the Greenies’ delusion of wind turbines and solar panels.

The sad part is if we could turn that fanatical passion and devotion of these fans to fighting for say, free choice, small government, and personal responsibility, we might never have had to deal with mentally challenged politicians.

That would have been a true mental health balance. ?

Can strategies be insane?

Not really. But how about decisions that can be predicted – by a reasonable observer- to fail? That’s the legal standard applied to defendants in negligence cases to ascertain their liability. Perhaps we can apply it to evaluating strategy?

The "reasonable person" legal doctrine applied to evaluation of strategies?

It is easy to see such impending failure in politics, and if we could sue the snake oil sellers, I believe we would be underway to a much better society. A policy of defunding the police, for one small example, is reasonably expected to increase crime, not reduce it, unless you believe in “progressive” magical thinking (which like helium, expands to fill all spaces around it including inflation, borders, educating pre-K kids, energy, and wars.) But in business strategy, things are more subtle.

When a giant company like Amazon, known for creating and then dominating the eCommerce field turns 180 degrees and starts building brick-and-mortar grocery stores, it reminds me of Continental Airlines creating Continental Lite, a discount airline, that failed miserably. It was just not in management DNA to run both full service and no service businesses. It’s this “mysterious” ingredient called “limits on management control.”

Economies of Scale is a huge factor in competitiveness, but it’s not everything. Amazon’s scale is cosmic, but it is not winning everywhere- not in pharmaceutical distribution (pharmacies win), not in videos (Prime is way behind competitors), not in handmade goods (Etsy is killing it) and not in grocery. Amazon.com and Whole Foods accounted for a combined 2.4% of the grocery market over the past 12 months and as one investor said, "It's almost like the grocery business is an expensive hobby."

Alternative perspective: Maybe strategy can’t be insane, but it can surely reflect blindspots. People pay with their jobs, sometimes with their lives (Ukraine) when leaders’ blinders are obvious to everyone but the leaders and their crazy fans. Sorry, mentally imbalanced fans.

Feel free to follow me on medium.com for your mentally balanced life. Or take my course Competitive Blindspots in June. Or don't if you are a Swift's fan.