I opened my newspaper this morning to find some snarky opinions about the election. If only the media, McCain and the voters had dug into the unsavory truth about Obama, ran one, things would have turned out differently. Another laid the failure to elect McCain at the feet of Republican incompetence and malfeasance, saying “now, it’s Democrats’ turn to foul out.”
There’s an old story about a man in the 19th century who encountered two immigrants in steerage heading for America. “What kinds of people do you expect to find there?” he asks one. “People there are unfriendly and unscrupulous,” said one. “They’ll be out to cheat me.”
“Yes, that’s who you’ll find in America,” said the man. He walked further down the deck and asked another traveler, “What kinds of people do you expect to find in America?” The second immigrant got a faraway look in his eye and said, “I expect to find new friends, a boss I can work for, perhaps even a wife.” “Yes, that’s who you’ll find in America,” repeated the man to the second immigrant.
Barack Obama freely admitted that he was not the perfect candidate, and that he’ll make mistakes as president. More importantly, he’s asked voters repeatedly for their help to create lasting change. “We are the change we’ve been waiting for,” he said in one speech. I was thinking about that invitation when my cousin called this morning. He’d voted for Obama, but now he was wrestling with his own instincts. He wanted to believe that the country could change, but his experiences have made him cynical. He asked me how he could be more positive.
I told my cousin I was searching for a small, concrete way in which I could contribute to the changes that we all want. I hold no position of power; I’m just a consultant who works on business plans and performance management systems for large companies. But I told him about a talk I’d had with a colleague, who directed me to a European software company that sells software for monitoring corporate responsibility initiatives. If American companies are going to make progress reducing their carbon footprint or being more energy efficient, they’ll need to define performance metrics throughout their organizations that align with those objectives and their compensation and incentive systems. So, I’m investigating whether there will be a market for this kind of software in the U.S. If I’m successful, I hope it will be a tiny contribution to the effort President Obama will lead to free our country from dependence on foreign oil and to address our response to managing climate change. I’d like to think there are millions of people out there now quietly asking themselves, “What can I do to help?”
