edrocha1961

Stay home ordered? Call mom. Talk about the old times.

I did that several times and we went down memory lane to some interesting places. It felt good.

Recently we talked about the day my mom and I went with dad in a day trip to a customer he had to visit about one hour and a half from home (Caçapava, for the Brazilian friends’ reference).

I was about six years old and while my father was in his meeting, mom and I stayed by the car in the parking lot (the picture of that moment is still in my mind).

My mother sat in our VW Beetle with the door open and I played with some little cars on the sidewalk. Time went fast. When dad came back we quickly collected our stuff and started the trip back home.

Well, we “collected our stuff” too quickly and the little Volvo from the picture above was left behind.

How can it be in the picture then? Is it the same one? You still have it, you pack rat?

Yep. When little Ed found the Volvo was missing, dad turned around and went back for it. That’s love!

Yep. I still have it… together with each other Matchbox car I would collect over the years.  Mom and I would take the bus to go downtown Sao Paulo (Lojas Americanas – again from my Brazilian friends reference) to buy the little cars with the money I saved from my allowance, or polishing my grandpa’s shoes and selling old newspapers – an adventure. Those cars are all together in a glass jar in my “Man Cave” with their battle scars from years of abuse.

Talking about these and other stories with my mom brings very good memories.

Time won’t come back and we are very distant, but those conversations are creating new memorable moments to cherish.

Love you, mom.

I have been dealing with customers for many years (more than I can count using all my fingers and toes), and at some point I observed a phenomena that repeats all the time, and I called it: “The Flipping Point”.

Let me explain it. In our relationship with our customers there are always some issues: the disruption caused by a defective part or a late delivery, the report that is not submitted on time or an unanswered phone call (or text message), the incomplete document submission, etc.

To a certain degree all that is understood and tolerated on a daily basis. To a “certain degree”.

Then, suddenly, either caused by a more significant event or an accumulation of smaller ones, we cross an imaginary line in our relationship with the customer and he or she explodes.

That is the Flipping Point.

Part of the phenomena is that when it happens, even the things that were recently tolerated are now unacceptable. The minor crimes are now punished with the equivalent of a professional death penalty.

The emails become harsh, the meetings become rude, the topics are easily escalated to the highest level of the organization, and so on.

Sounds familiar?

The next part of that process is the difficulty to bring the relationship back to the level it was before: below the Flipping Point.

It typically takes significantly more energy to cross the invisible line in the other direction. A significant time factor is always involved. We now have to re-gain the customer’s confidence, which brings me to the obvious conclusion: it is better to invest the effort to never pass the Flipping Point than it is to recover from that nuclear explosion.

The fact that makes the line invisible is that we are talking about human relations, and everyone has a different pain tolerance level, so you will not find here my formula for how many minor issues or how many significant ones it would take to cross the line. It depends on your customer.

Now that you are getting tired of nodding in agreement to what you are reading, let me make a fair extrapolation: the Flipping Point is not a phenomena that manifests itself in the professional world only.

Can you see this applying between you and your spouse, or you and your kids?

In those relationships as well, there are only so many little annoying things you can do or any major ones (one?) before you cross the Flipping Point.

So, the conclusions of this extrapolation are:

• If you are below the Flipping Point, do your best to stay there
• If you find yourself past that point, take a deep breath, and prepare to work hard to bring that relationship back to the good side of our mysterious Flipping Point

It is worth it.

It was bad!

Growing up in Brazil in the 60’s & 70’s I used to see rusted cars all the time. Three or four year old cars would start to show the bubbles under the paint in the expected areas.

That only got better in the 80’s when automotive steel started to be galvanized.

I remember a friend of mine unsuccessfully trying to blame the car wash when his Karmann Ghia emerged from the booth very clean, but with a big hole on the rocker panel where the high pressure water hit it.

But… no worries… there was Bondo!

If you would react to the first signs of rust you could fix it in your garage: sand it until most of the rust would disappear, apply Bondo, sand again, prime and paint.

Bingo! You could now go for another year or two without any visible rust (or sell the car quickly).

It was so bad that used car shoppers would carry a magnet to check if the critical areas had been repaired.

Now, the sad thing is when you see people trying to do the same with themselves.

I am not talking about make-up covering skin imperfections, I am talking about character issues being hypocritically covered up.

A nice smile on that selfie on Facebook won’t cover for too long the issues someone may be dealing with: lies, gossip, addictions, slandering, lust, selfishness…

A “do it yourself” Bondo application won’t solve the deeper issue with the rust.

The metal has to be restored.

The same is the case for the spiritual version of rust: sin.

You can cover it, but it will come back. You can fight it (and you should) but you will not win it alone.

You don’t need the sin to be hidden: it has to be removed.

The painful grinding, cutting and welding can only be done by the One who can remove sins.

Not with Bondo, but with His Blood.