Showing posts with label wikipedia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wikipedia. Show all posts

June 20, 2010

Father’s Day

Father's Day is a celebration inaugurated in the early twentieth century to compliment Mother's Day in celebrating fatherhood and male parenting. It is also celebrated to honor and commemorate our forefathers.

The first observance of Father's Day is believed to have been held on June 19, 1910.

After listening to a church sermon at Spokane Washington's Central Methodist Episcopal Church in 1909 about the newly recognized Mother's Day, Sonora Smart Dodd felt strongly that fatherhood needed recognition, as well.

She wanted a celebration that honored fathers like her own father, William Smart, a Civil War veteran who was left to raise his family alone when his wife died giving birth to their sixth child when Sonora was 16 years old. From Wikipedia

It is not flesh and blood but the heart which makes us fathers and sons.
Johann Schiller

When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years. Mark Twain

By the time a man realizes that maybe his father was right, he usually has a son who thinks he's wrong. Charles Wadsworth

Life was a lot simpler when what we honored was father and mother rather than all major credit cards. Robert Orben

My dad still encourages me to follow my passions and my dreams. His words still ring in my mind that relationships are not 50-50 but 100-100. At 73, he edits videos of his vacations, rewrites the rules for his online baseball league and adores his wife more than life itself.

Thanks for everything, Dad. You rock dude!

Happy Father's Day to every dad.


Bookmark and Share

photo credit: schlissellaw

February 7, 2010

Is That Charity or Service?

According to Wikipedia:
Charitable is the act of giving money, goods or time to the unfortunate, either directly or by means of a charitable trust or worthy cause.

The name stems from the most obvious expression of the virtue of charity is giving the objects of it the means they need to survive.


What's The Difference?

A few weeks ago a colleague asked if I thought there was a difference between charity and service. I said it is up to the individual.

Often we give both.



We all do stuff for others without financial compensation, that’s what makes us human. Look at the outpouring of support for Haiti right now. Sadly there are people looking to profit from this tragedy as well.

There are many types of service.

Civil service | Career employees of government.
Community service | Volunteer service for the benefit of a community.
Customer service | Provision of assistance to customers or clients.
Domestic service | Employment in a residence.
Public service | Carried out with the aim of providing a public good.
Selfless service | Performed without any expectation of result or award.

My colleague pressed further and asked if I thought there were parameters for charity and service and again same response - it depends.

Then she went for the big one.

If you willingly giving your time or resources and the other party begins to ask for more than you are able to give - is that charity or service? Neither. It's time to examine the relationship a lot closer.

Companies toss around phrases like customer service but they are empty without meaning. Do you mean it? Does your company mean it?

Why? Why? Why?

Do you give to the less fortunate for the tax receipt or for how it makes you feel to help another? Do you smile so the customer thinks you are giving them service but you are simply trying to get to their wallet?

Companies need to make a profit, we all need a hand at some point but the question may not be as simple as it may seem.

What is the difference between charity and service?

@knealemann
strategy. marketing. social media.

photo credit: i.ehow

Bookmark and Share

Add to Google Reader or Homepage
 
© Kneale Mann knealemann@gmail.com people + priority = profit
knealemann.com linkedin.com/in/knealemann twitter.com/knealemann
leadership development business culture talent development human capital