‘NOT MY PRESIDENT’ – IS NOT ONE OF MY CORE VALUES

By Geoff De Weaver, CEO + Founder of Geoff De Weaver Inc. www.geoffdeweaver.com, Touchpoint Entertainment Inc. www.touchpoint.best , or connect with me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/geoff_deweaver

I truly believe ‘core values’ are critical for every Board, CEO or POTUS to have. In fact, I recently wrote an article entitled: “10 Core values your Board, CEO & Management must have today!” https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/10-core-values-your-board-ceo-management-must-have-today-de-weaver

For the past week plus, I am getting so sick of ‘celebrities’ like: Lady Gaga, Cher, Madonna, Miley Cyrus, Jay-Z, Beyonce, Bruce Springsteen, Robert DeNiro, George Clooney, RuPaul, Meryl Streep, Demi Lovato, Pharrell, Kim Kardashian, Magic Johnson, Barack Obama and a raft of other ‘spoiled’, cry-babies joining and protesting against the election results; so people across the country from NYC to San Francisco to Seattle and Austin, Texas and other major Urban areas.

Picture: Katy Perry rallied supporters of Hillary Clinton at a rally in Des Moines, Iowa, on Oct. 24.

All promoting mass damage, blocking roads and highways, rioting, fighting, looting and chanting: ‘Not My President’.  I think it is totally unacceptable to have people like: Lady Gaga, Cher, Amy Schumer, Katy Perry, Lindsay Lohan, Jamie Lee Curtis to name a few, joined protests against President - Elect Donald Trump in NYC.

Donald Trump is President Elect.

These high profile American’ simply don’t understand or get the importance that President-Elect, Donald Trust is outlining in his Transit Plan and Team. Obviously, they just don’t understand core values and their importance across organizations in different industries and countries.

As I have written before: core values enhance your team and your company (or country) to help create greater impact, build a superior customer experience and get better financial returns. That’s exactly what President Trump needs to do immediately and implement inside the first 100 days in office.

That’s exactly what President Elect Trump is doing now. And, I applaud him for his absolute professionalism. His decades of business expertise is exactly what the USA needs after the last two terms of Obama’s mismanagement.

Trump is taking a holistic approach including financially, strategically improve the USA’s ability to grow business, improve jobs, tightening security, becoming more transparent, building integrity, accountability AND, to help all American’s financially and improve their quality of life! 

Core values toward the common good can restore a sense of unity!

MOVING FORWARD – WEEK 2

While we have survived one of the most hostile and divisive presidential campaigns, which has resulted in one of the most divided outcomes of all times (even bigger with more drama than Watergate in June 1972). So where do we go from here?

Despite the political polarization the election results suggest, the sociologist Wayne Baker of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, believes there is a path forward to greater unity. His conclusion: ‘Americans are surprisingly united in the values and beliefs they hold dear’

Every day angry Democratic voices decry something in America’s changing culture and political movements. They claim America has lost its way, and its not working with a global agenda. Collectively, this daily friction erodes our belief that America rests on common ground.

I’d like share an article in which Mr. Wayne Baker, shares his 10 “core values” all of which the majority of Americans can agree on. (including me) They are respect for others; equal opportunity; freedom; security; self-reliance and individualism; getting ahead; pursuit of happiness; justice and fairness; symbolic patriotism and critical patriotism.

Mr. Baker’s research was conducted before the rise of President-elect Donald J. Trump and the lead-up to the presidential election. But he says he believes the core values that emerged still hold true because the original surveys included a broad swath of the American electorate and were conducted over a period of years. Out of a total of about two dozen values, which were cited by survey participants, 10 consistently emerged as being strongly held.

Here is a more detailed rundown of some of the key values Baker, identified in American 2016 – The American Catholic Review, November 14 2016. (https://www.americamagazine.org/content/dispatches/uniting-these-states )

1. Respect for Others – A high percentage of Americans place a premium on respect and also kindness, which they identify as a leading character strength. There was an interesting experiment conducted recently where a woman wearing a Trump T-shirt showed up at a Clinton rally with a dog she claimed had been separated from its owner. She did the same wearing a Clinton T-shirt at a Trump rally. People quickly jumped in to help the woman reunite the dog with its owner, despite knowing she was from their opponent’s political camp. It seemed all could agree that kindness toward dogs and dog lovers superseded political differences.
2. Equal Opportunity – Ninety percent of Americans told Baker this was an important value to them, though the United States has had a sketchy history in this area. Just ask African-Americans, Native Americans, women before they had the right to vote and today’s undocumented workers. Still, a majority told Mr. Baker they believe everyone deserves access to jobs, education, the voting booth and an equal shot at success regardless of race, religion or gender. Most Americans said they recognize, however, that equal opportunity does not always result in equal outcomes.
3. Freedom – Baker found it is not an abstraction for most Americans but a value learned early in life and manifests itself in the right to work, to protest, to worship as one chooses.
4. Security – Americans want security but in a post-Sept. 11 world are struggling with how to balance that value with freedom and respect for others, as was so evident in the 2016 campaign’s talk of a Muslim travel ban to the United States and a moratorium on accepting Syrian refugees.
5. Self-Reliance and Individualism – This value dates back to the country’s founding and its national identity. Most Americans recognize that it has to be considered in relation to the building of community.
6. Symbolic Patriotism – Love of country is both emotional and tangible. Most Americans unite around certain symbols including the flag and the national anthem—witness the uproar when athletes refuse to stand for the singing of the “Star-Spangled Banner” or someone turns his or her back to the flag during the Pledge of Allegiance.
7. Getting Ahead – Americans place a premium on success and believe it should not be tied to age, race, gender or other factors. They experience getting ahead as a major motivator in life and see this value as relating to self-reliance and equal opportunity.
8. The Pursuit of Happiness – An ingrained value as old as the Declaration of Independence. There is a streak in this value of materialism as well and the sense that the pursuit of pleasure and self-gratification is a “proper goal in life.” Still, Baker found an awareness among Americans that there is a sometimes a false happiness associated with material comforts.

Despite Americans’ insistence on pursuing happiness, he found Americans ranked 16th among 97 nationalities that were asked in one survey to rank their happiness level. Danes ranked themselves the happiest people on earth. Baker says democratization and increasing social tolerance are among the key contributors to societal happiness.

9. Justice and Fairness – The phrase “justice for all” is engrained in the Pledge of Allegiance. Although the nation has not always lived up to this ideal in its history, Baker found that Americans do hold those twin values in high esteem. Americans want a justice system that is fair, and blind to social and economic differences. They say they want the rule of law to apply equally to everyone. Americans see these twin values as the foundation for creating harmony within society.

10. Critical Patriotism – This value is likely to become more prominent in the wake of the recent presidential election. While they love their patriotic symbols, Americans also want to safeguard the right to criticize their government, its policies and their leaders. Baker says critical patriotism is a kind of “tough love” Americans exercise on the country. They see this value as the best hope of keeping America true to its ideals.

I think President Elect Donald Trump is trying to build common ground. But, our challenge as American citizens is to live up to these core values and to put into practice what we hold most dear.

If you want to make America great again too, I would love your feedback or comments on my article.

Let’s look to the future and have an authentic Democracy in 2017 and beyond.

God Bless you and win the day. You’re all Patriots and its time to jump on board.

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