On Guidance

Published on Apr 16, 2015, filed under management, misc. (Share this on Mastodon or Bluesky?)

Many a time have I cussed during my journey and accompanying studies. I have cussed about how little I really knew about life, whether practically or philosophically. Which in my view boiled down to the poor guidance I received when I grew up—essentially, it was just about how to drink and eat, walk, get good grades, and please people. (Yet this is no blame nor resentment.)

Few of us seem to get good guidance. We get taught what’s important on our parents’ and teachers’ minds and our institutions’ agendas. If that’s biased, superficial, unimportant, or plain wrong, then that’s what we get filled with.

We get similarly poor leadership. Political leadership is a disgrace. Economic leadership is an immense Scheiße show infested with cancerous conflicts of interest. And even for inner-business leadership, we may need to exert a lot of goodwill, and still expend only two or three fingers, to count benevolent, trustworthy, wise leaders. People with character and integrity.

We’re all learning and growing you rush to add. Nobody is perfect. Give people the benefit of the doubt. I agree. But that still doesn’t make up for the astonishingly and inexcusably poor guidance we receive, and the few leaders there are that do and deserve to lead.

Like you, I have some ideas about what we can do to change this, but nothing effective to present here. All I know is that we urgently need better guidance, need to give better guidance, and get out of the way if we ourselves, when in position of authority and leadership, can’t give good guidance. That requires a good amount of humility, sobriety, and courage. Perhaps good guidance starts with that.

Everett Dean Martin wrote in his 1920 work The Behavior of Crowds: “I fear the student of social psychology will find little to reassure him in the pitiable lack of intellectual leadership, the tendency to muddle through, the unteachableness and general want of statesmanlike vision displayed by our present [ruling parties].” And this he stated in the context of impending revolutions.

About Me

I’m Jens (long: Jens Oliver Meiert), and I’m a web developer, manager, and author. I’ve been working as a technical lead and engineering manager for companies you’ve never heard of and companies you use every day, I’m an occasional contributor to web standards (like HTML, CSS, WCAG), and I write and review books for O’Reilly and Frontend Dogma.

I love trying things, not only in web development and engineering management, but also in other areas like philosophy. Here on meiert.com I share some of my experiences and views. (I value you being critical, interpreting charitably, and giving feedback.)