Today’s Topics: Staff Favorites: Books | SFP-10G-SR Deal | 12 Days of Christmas Deals | What is Right? – Decision Filters | News to Start Your Day
Happy Tuesday!
December 8th is National “Pretend to be a Time Traveler Day”…anytime but 2020, right?!?!
Hey there, friends. We have been thinking through some gift guides that may be helpful to you all this time of year. I shared a CK Staff Favorites guide with you last week. This one is for the guys and gals in your life who are looking to expand their business knowledge. Here at CK we have several books that have been a source of wisdom or guidance for us. Out of hundreds of business books, these are the ones that we reference often, that speak to us most, and we think they could be helpful for the business leader in your life too.
(Fun fact: whenever Craig is recommended a book by a friend, colleague or acquaintance, he almost always logs into his Amazon account and orders it right away. When I say we’ve curated this list of hundreds of books, I’m not kidding!)
- Traction (Gino Wickman) – the model we use most for our structure and rhythms
- Rocket Fuel (Gino Wickman)
- Mastering the Rockefeller Habits (Verne Harnish)
- Scaling Up (Verne Harnish)
- Good to Great (Jim Collins)
- E-Myth (Michael Gerber)
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Stephen Covey)
- Simple Numbers, Straight Talk, Big Profits (Greg Crabtree)
- The BEST Question Ever (Andy Stanley)
- The Power of Habit (Charles Duhigg)
Hope this is helpful! Be sure to check out some of our product updates below.
Christin
Product Spotlights & Updates from Rebecca:
Happy Tuesday! We are kicking off our 12 Days of Christmas Deals sale with one of the absolute most popular transceiver modules we sell, the SFP-10G-SR!
The Cisco SFP-10G-SR module is a best seller for a reason! This module gives you a wide variety of 10 Gigabit Ethernet connectivity options for your data center, enterprise wiring closet, and service provider transport applications. This transceiver boasts a variety of features and benefits, including being the industry’s smallest form factor, which results in the greatest density per chassis. The SFP-10G-SR is hot-swappable and can be switched out with ease. Cisco 10GBase-SR SFP+ modules also feature Digital Optical Monitoring (DOM) functionality, which allows you to monitor the signal strength, the temperature of the SFP, and the transceiver voltage.
Cisco 10GBase-SR SFP+ modules support a link length of up to 300 meters on multi-mode fiber. The SFP-10G-SR requires a minimum of OM3 fiber. We offer this module in 3 different options and ALL are ON SALE NOW!!
Have you checked out our Premium Non-Contact Infrared Thermometer yet?! This handy device is on sale for only $20! Use this thermometer to safely and accurately get a temperature reading in 1 second or less! This easy to use thermometer takes a temperature reading with the pressing of one button! It also features an orange and blue backlight to make it easy to read your temperature regardless of environmental lighting!
What is Right? Part 1/4 (Decision Filters) – Gary, our Chief Administrative Steward
What is right? Three simple words; yet, deeply profound. The question may be resolved without conscious thought or produce soul-searching angst. The consensus may emerge quickly or provoke long and rancorous debate. The search for answers may build community or rend relationships. The question even sparks bloodshed. The answers may be inconsequential to the arc of my own life or affect millions.
We face repeated opportunities (and sometimes requirements) during the course of each day to choose among multiple courses of action (including doing nothing). How do we decide?
Absent compelling (internal) or constraining (external) forces, human beings will typically default to choices that:
- Serve our own needs and desires
- Seem easiest or make us comfortable
- Make us look good
How do we overcome those inherent tendencies? What filters or framework should guide our choices? This four-part series wrestles with “What is right?” and links to one of the CK core values (Do The Right Thing)
This first post identifies seven factors which can help us decide and act more rightly more often:
Authoritative In some situations there is a right and a wrong. Our society’s increasing focus on individual rights casts a relativistic pall, which marginalizes or even mocks this notion. Nonetheless, I contend there are certain universal truths that apply regardless of time, place, or circumstance. For example, abusing a less powerful person is never right.
Aligned (with core principles or natural laws). The right position or posture often requires that we balance competing forces. When we fall down physically, a relationship fractures, a business fails, or we struggle emotionally, we are most often out of alignment with certain core principles or natural laws. This principle led to the phrase, “right the ship.”
Attentive (to the needs of others). Our judgment on what is right may change when we consider the needs of others. Right choices for a couple’s weekend activities change when they add a baby to their family.
Acceptable (to the sensibilities of others). Sometimes we choose to act in certain ways purely out of deference to others. We may adapt our dress, actions, or speech to comport with the acceptable social norms of certain situations or cultures.
Appropriate (for the situation). Circumstances often influence the right course of action. Certain behaviors suitable at a football game are improper during a church service. Similarly, decision-making methods appropriate in a stable business environment may not work right for a business experiencing rapid growth or in crisis.
Available. At times rightness is a merely a matter of availability. If we cram events one after another into our daily lives, we have no margin of availability to respond to the inevitable opportunities or crises which intersect our lives without warning. Creating such margin involves purposeful choices. In support of this principle we also make ourselves available without reservation or restraint to those closest to us. We will cancel other plans politely and firmly yet without hesitation or regret when those people need us.
Aimed. Pursuing the right course requires that we determine first the proper destination or focus of our attention and energy and, secondly, the most effective and efficient path or process to reach that goal. Stephen Covey called this “Beginning with the End in Mind.” Absent an aim our choices can lead to wasteful wandering.
Interestingly, two themes undergird this list of factors which influence what is right — Respect for Truth and Respect for Others. Said another way, identifying what is right rarely starts with us. A purposeful pursuit of right behavior involves looking outside of ourselves; not focusing on what makes us most comfortable, satisfied, or happy. That’s not to imply that our ease, satisfaction, or happiness is of no import. Rather, I believe it means that we find these elements of personal fulfillment through exercising a servant’s heart.
You can apply these filters singly or in groups based on the situation. However, when you face potentially life-altering decisions, you need a more structured decision framework. Part 2 in this series describes a practical decision framework to decide What is Right when there is a lot on the line.
***Stay tuned for Part 2 next Tuesday.
Today’s News to Start Your Day:
- As of this morning, there are 19,349,600 active cases worldwide, with 1,553,570 deaths. In the US, there are 6,088,450 active cases, with 290,798 deaths
- Companies are considering compulsory Covid vaccination requirements as a condition of employment. “Under the law, an employer can force an employee to get vaccinated, and if they don’t, fire them,” said Rogge Dunn, a Dallas labor and employment attorney. Anti-discrimination laws would enable eligible employees to request an exemption from a company-wide coronavirus vaccine mandate.
- The FDA could authorize a coronavirus vaccine as early as the end of this week. The move would be a pivotal moment in the pandemic, as public health officials say the U.S. is likely to face its worst public health crisis in history this winter. An FDA advisory group is scheduled to convene on Thursday to review Pfizer’s vaccine.
- California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday said the state has partnered with Apple and Google on an app to let people use their phones to track potential exposure to COVID-19. The digital system uses Bluetooth signals from phones to alert people if they’ve been in contact with someone who’s tested positive for the novel coronavirus. The project takes advantage of two of the world’s most popular operating systems — Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android — to potentially reach billions of people.
- Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer continues to put pressure on President-elect Joe Biden to forgive up to $50,000 in student debt per borrower on the first day of his presidency. “We have come to the conclusion that President Biden can undo this debt, can forgive $50,000 of debt the first day he becomes president,” Schumer said on Monday outside his office in Midtown Manhattan. “You don’t need Congress; All you need is the flick of a pen.”
- The United States will not be able to buy more doses of coronavirus vaccine from Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, until late June or July, after other countries bought most of the supply. The US purchased 100 million does.
- The Trump administration is accusing Facebook in a lawsuit of discriminating against U.S. workers in favor of foreigners with special visas to fill more than 2,600 high-paying jobs. The Justice Department announced the suit Thursday, alleging that the tech giant refused to recruit, consider or hire qualified and available U.S. workers for the positions that the social medial giant reserved for temporary visa holders. Facebook sponsored the visa holders for “green cards” authorizing them to work permanently.