Close Encounters of the TSA Kind

How much my life has changed in mere weeks.


I have a great apartment on the quiet periphery of Chelsea; one subway stop or a short walk from work, three blocks from my gym and just at treetop level. Right now, I look out my window to see a fluttering wall of healthy, almost-lime green as the leaves begin to grow toward the dark green of their oncoming summer maturity.


Since taking the job at Amnesty International, this is my first actual weekend that I'll have had to myself. I stayed with Apple on weekends through the iPad launch, then was in New Orleans for the Annual Meeting, last weekend. So, this one is Mine.


Turns out a good friend of mine, in his own Portentous Life Moment, had decided to move-in with his partner; thus, needing to rent out his condo...offering both of us immediate solution to parallel opportunities. Thus, I moved into his furnished place, and will bring my own stuff up from Australia in several months; after the dust has settled from the past eight months and I've done other financial cleanup.


Meanwhile, I am daily more excited with and pleased to have this Amnesty work, before me. The job becomes appreciably more and more gargantuan with each day's revelations: I'm rather fully whelmed, though not overly so. 


The experience in New Orleans was regenerative and revelatory. I traveled there in order to meet and spend time with some of the members and board members who are part and share a great deal of the history of the organization. I was immediately distracted by and drawn into the powerful energy of the attending members; the students and younger people who filled the plenary sessions with an energy I have not witnessed nor felt for decades. Not since my own participation in Marches on/in Washington, DC, have I felt such burgeoning, intelligent passion.


I learned much, down there, and have returned with an even more clear focus on the what and how of my own responsibilities for seeing to it that the 50th Anniversary Year of this institution is resonant, compelling and yields a stronger, bigger organization through the programs, initiatives and events of 2011.


I can help that to happen.


Right now, I'm still in the Immersion Stage; though the pressure is on to put things in order to be ready for next year in time and in shape for results that fully meet potential. It can be done, albeit it will require a not-so-negligible cultural shift within the organization in order to gird and go. My sense is that the disparate sections and components are ready for and prepared to team up and face this inspirational challenge with professionalism, resolve and commitment.


One indisputable fact is that, in my experience, I have rarely come across a body of professionals as passionately committed to their Mission. Not since the early days of the AIDS epidemic have I encountered a body so committed to rescue and the preservation/restoration of dignity and quality of life for targeted populations and the individuals who make up those populations, one-by-one.


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I dropped-into The Apple Store to pick up a printer, this week, and it was like Dolly Levi returning to Harmonia Gardens. Big, welcoming smiles accompanied by laughter and exuberant hugging from all quarters. I will never lose sight of the value to me of having spent the time working there that I was lucky to have had. Those people and that experience will nurture and support me for a very long time to come...


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A part of me, deep within, continues to experience doubt that all this will last. Scott laughs, sympathetically, and tells me it's Pavlovian; after living in scarcity for so long, after having so much blow up in my face, it is not unreasonable that I would doubt this security with which I am now presented. I take none of this for granted...


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As I was departing New Orleans, last Sunday, finally approaching the front of the queue for the first security checkpoint, I noticed a big smile on the musically-voiced TSA Agent checking tickets and identification. As she was looking over my documentation, I mentioned how friendly people in New Orleans were seeming. She stopped what she was doing, looked me in the eye, put my documents on her lectern and said, "Honey, we LIKE people, down here...!" and gave me a BIG hug - one to rival my own.


I got hugged by a TSA Agent! 


My life has changed, so much...

iWork, myWork...

As of Friday, I've been at Amnesty International for two weeks. With each day my appreciation of the magnitude of my scope of work grows exponentially, and with it my engagement with, commitment to and exhilaration for the project broadens and deepens. The pressure of having this singular opportunity to direct and drive the articulation of the evolving and ongoing relevance of the AI legacy and of having this to do in so short a time-frame is beginning to fuel my creative inner fires.

I am taking things very slowly; despite my inclination to hit the ground, running. I'm spending this first 45 days or so immersing myself in the culture, context and history of the organization; learning the players and becoming familiar with the currents that massage the forces under the surface. When I do begin to direct activity, I want to be sure of my footing. My judgement is excellent, when it is informed. Though the pressure to get things moving is great; when I do begin to move things, I want to be especially confident of the direction. We only get one shot at this, and I've been entrusted with quite a legacy.

When it comes down to it, my value is in the tools that I bring, the processes and methodologies I've developed and can apply, and my dexterity in the creative expression of story, of legacy. The best way to realize my mandate at this iconic organization is to operate with complete transparency; to include virtually everyone - being sure that all have been heard through the process, be assiduous in paying attention to detail, being open and communicative and definite, making decisions at the right time...and remaining calm.

The experience of the past 220 days since returning to NYC will have proven to have been invaluable as these coming days, weeks and months unfold. Nearly eight months of moving from place to place, with the few belongings I had brought back to NYC with me spread all over town (I still can't find my favorite pair of brown slacks; they're in some closet, somewhere in the city...), have re-calibrated within me my own confidence- or self reliance-meter. 

Frankly, I think I am better prepared, now, to address the responsibilities of this new position than I might have been a year or two ago...thanks, in no small part, to my experience at Apple SoHo, which ends today.

Though I started at AI two weeks ago, I have remained a part of the Apple Team on weekends, as I didn't want to just quit, and wanted to remain to be a part of yesterday's launch of the iPad. It was too big a thing, coming too soon to miss by mere days...and, I'm glad I stayed on. The energy of yesterday's launch event was fantastic, and the environment at the store was like the first block of a parade, all day long. It was great to have been a part of such a huge milestone for this future-shaping company, and there were thousands of very happy people coming through the store, yesterday.

At Apple, I jumped into an environment in which I had no real previous experience. Though I've been a fan of the technology for a very long time; being in retail, being at the bottom of the ladder, the new guy on the team, learning new systems on the fly and applying them immediately... The pressure on me to perform and deliver the most basic of services was immense; the need to release any ego and simply get the job done was paramount and, in retrospect, excellent preparation for This Next Chapter.

The true value in the Apple Experience, my Apple Experience, though, has been the people. I've said it before, but the quality of these fantastic young men and women is virtually unsurpassed in my history. Vibrant, motivated, disparately talented, sincere, caring and YOUNG; having become accepted, embraced and made such a part of this team has honored me in unexpected ways.

I am going to miss being amidst and among these young men and women. Frankly, it is a Badge of Honor to have become so well regarded by such a group. As word of my departure has spread, scores of them have come to me and, one-by-one, looked me in the eye and expressed heartfelt disappointment at my going, wishing me sincere good luck. A part of me is astonished that, at an easy 30-year gap in our ages, our relationship and interaction can mean so much to them. Certainly, it has had powerful meaning for me; soaking-in the energy, sharing in the conversation, learning what entertains and what concerns this group of younger people. I consider myself the Lucky One in this.

I arrived at Apple in November, virtually broken and very unhappy; I considered myself a failure and considered myself to be on the extreme periphery of this "Bunch of Kids." In one fiscal quarter, I've risen to the top 5% in revenue, been told by the manager that the door is always open to me, and tonight, after closing, scores of them are descending on a local bar to send me off with a Farewell Party. What greater honor might such a group bestow on a man such as m'self?

This morning, in my new apartment, as I prepare to shower and go to work for my final day at the Apple Store, my heart is indeed full. This place and these kids (er, young men and women!) have prepared me to take on the world, again. I expect to keep this experience close to my heart, wherever I go -- and it will not surprise me were I to be able to hire some of them at some point in the not so distant future... 

Or, to be hired BY one of 'em! Who knows...?

I'm ready for This Next Chapter.