BETTER WATCH OUT
Ah, life in, around and near the corporate world is what many embrace and some disdain.
It’s got some positives, assuredly, and especially for those willing to sacrifice or consciously stifle that unique human quality of creativity, living on the edge or, put yet another way, “thinking outside of the box.”
Mostly, it’s a culture of fear that quashes the latter, ultimately leading one to speak or do what he thinks the boss wants to hear or believes the boss wishes to do – thus caught in a self-constructed crossfire of confusion that causes one to hold a tongue or, even, refrain from even seeking a boss’ opinion, rote’s mediocrity then reigns.
Oddly, such generally results in the promotion of an ideology diametric to that which the boss desires, “the boss” having gotten where he is through innovation, quick responses to given situations and not going where today’s non-entrepreneurial corporate guy would even think to go.
And what has prompted such rant from Ol’ DC, perhaps making proud one Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum, (assuming she was still alive)?
"Kentucky Speedway regrets the traffic conditions . . ."
Such statement being issued late Sunday evening after an undetermined but evidently substantial number of fans failed to even gain entrance to Kentucky Speedway’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race before being ordered to return to from whence they came.
(What was that old adage: “Go where you want to go; do what you want to do?” Conditionally speaking, that is.)
IN A WORD
Kentucky Speedway general manager Mark Simendinger on Sunday evening issued that statement, sent through email and posted on the track’s website, in which used was the aforementioned “regret,” most likely in an attempt through nuance to appear as though he was apologizing without directly apologizing. Likely feared was that an actual “apology” most likely would’ve opened a “liability door” through which the corporate guys are loathe to pass.
Like an attempt to stand rigid on the beach against an approaching tsunami, the lack of a clear mea culpa was akin to an attempt to quell a fire with petrol.
On Monday, with flames higher than an elephant’s eye, Kentucky Speedway officials, joined by counterparts from “corporate,” Speedway Motorsports, Inc., issued actual apologies along with compensation offers.
THE RIGHT WAY
Early in the summer of 1969 a group of race car drivers gathered, among them Cale Yarbrough, Bobby Allison, David Pearson and Richard Petty, to form the Professional Drivers Association (PDA).
A “line in the sand” was to be later drawn on Sept. 14, 1969, at Alabama International Motor Speedway, known today as “Talladega.”
Seizing upon supposed tire issues on the day before a race for which 60,000 tickets had been sold and after squabbling with NASCAR head Big Bill France, a drivers-only meeting went late into the night, afterward resulting in Petty and a race-field’s worth of teams loading up their trailers, making like tires and rolling on down the road.
At the ready, William Henry Getty France instituted Plan B and the crowd had its 30-some-odd-car race, albeit empty of the drivers it expected, save one PDA member who crossed the line: eventual winner Richard Brickhouse.
Aware the fans on hand were probably disappointed, prior to the race Big Bill rolled up in a loudspeaker-equipped truck, grabbed a microphone and, standing before the crowd, acknowledged their disappointment, additionally telling them their tickets would also be honored at the following Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway, as well as the next Talladega race.
“It was a gutsy thing for him to do,” the founder of IMSA, John Bishop, said to this journalist.
“It was one of the gutsiest things I’ve ever seen. Mr. France was kissing his profits goodbye. Just like Daytona (International Speedway), he’d been running on a shoestring at Talladega. He literally was depending on that money to keep the company (then “Daytona Speedway Corporation”) alive. But Mr. France was a man of immense integrity and he knew that the most important thing was the fan. I learned a lot that day.”
Bishop also learned a few days later the result of Big Bill “making good” would end direct France-family funding, if not other help, for his young International Motor Sports Association. But that’s another story for another day.
Also running deep was Big Bill’s appreciation for the drivers and teams who nevertheless participated in that 1969 Talladega race, as Richard Childress, who finished 23rd that day, will surely attest today.
Evidently also running deep were the fans’ appreciation of how Big Bill handled the matter: quickly and using the most correct corporate speak of all: “fan first.”
Big Bill showed he really meant it, not mouthed it.
Thus coming to conclusion is today’s lesson.
Later,
DC
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