How we lose can define us

How important is it to be a good loser?

The year I was a senior in college, the band Steely Dan released its song “Deacon Blues.” A lyric from it has always stuck with me: “They got a name for the winners in the world. I want a name when I lose.” Walter Becker and Donald Fagen followed those lines with: “They call Alabama the Crimson Tide,” to make their point about how winners (in this case, the University of Alabama’s powerhouse football team) got a name. But then in an effort to provide a name to the loser narrating the song: “Call me Deacon Blues.”

It may not be a happy message, but the song gave a name to the losers of the world if we wanted to use it: Deacon Blues.

Losing, however, is not always a dire experience. Sure, approaching challenges with a desire to win can be a good practice. But even DJ Khaled, who sang, “All I do is win,” has had his occasional high-profile run-ins with losing. (You can look it up.)

From an early age, how we behave when we lose can help define our character. We learn it’s not OK to walk off the field of a baseball game if the opposing team is beating us by a dozen runs. We learn that it’s not OK to quit a competitive board game when it becomes clear we are going to be decimated. We learn not to walk away from the corn hole toss when our opponent’s bean bags seem magnetized to go in the hole while ours always fall short.

When we agree to a game, we agree to the rules of that game and there’s a sense of grace and honor to stick with that game even when we lose. There is no honor in trying to change the rules of the game halfway through or crying foul every time an opponent comes out ahead. There is no valor in claiming that you couldn’t possibly have lost a baseball game since your team scored more runs than it ever had scored in a game before, even if such parsing ignores that fact that the opposing team won because he scored even more runs than your team.

Sure, winning is great. It’s a blast to the ego to come out on top. But part of the understanding of competition is that not everyone is going to win.

Learning to accept our losses graciously, to congratulate our opponents on their victory this time, and then to go off and perhaps work hard to try to win the next time; these are some of the marks of an honest competitor.

And when we lose, as each of us will at something sometime, it’s not because the outcome was rigged. Sometimes we just lose, and then we move on. Call yourself Deacon Blues if it helps, but the right thing is to show some honor in defeat.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

 

Is it a yard sale faux pas to re-sell items from a neighbor’s trash?

Is it OK to make a profit off items you got free or paid little for at a neighborhood yard sale?

As in many neighborhoods across the United States, every year, a neighborhood in Boston has a neighborhood yard sale right around Labor Day. It’s a chance for people to clean out their basements or attics or cupboards or desks of things they don’t want and try to lure their neighbors to take on possession at a modest price. In this particular neighborhood, the running joke is that in five or so years, whatever item you sold will make it’s way around the block after being sold house to house to house.

The setup is a communal affair with a neighbor creating maps to post on telephone poles indicating which houses are participating. Mentions of the sale go out on closed groups on social media as well. At the end of the sale, people leave boxes out with free items they couldn’t sell. A side benefit is that neighbors get out and chat with neighbors.

But occasionally a question arises over whether someone’s tactics are inappropriate.

A reader we’re calling Anthony regularly sets up a table of items in front of his house. Typically, his wares consist of clothing he no longer wears, kitchen items he’s rarely used, or the occasional piece of furniture that seemed like a good idea at the time he purchased it.

Anthony noticed that a few weeks before the yard sale, one of his neighbors put out five or six dining room chairs to be picked up by the trash. Before the trash collectors arrived to swoop them away, Anthony saw another neighbor take them two at a time to his house down the block.

On neighborhood yard sale day, Anthony saw that the neighbor was selling the chairs he had rescued from the trash for $10 a piece or $50 for six chairs. Something about his neighbor’s action struck Anthony as being wrong. Shouldn’t the person throwing out the chairs have gotten the money if people were willing to pay for the chairs? Should Anthony say anything to the prior owner or the new seller?

No, Anthony has no reason to say anything to anybody. There is absolutely nothing wrong with what his neighbor did. If the person tossing the chairs wanted to make some cash, he could have tried to sell them at the yard sale. He chose not to.

There also would be nothing wrong if one of Anthony’s neighbors bought something at the yard sale early in the day from one of his neighbors and then tried to sell it for more on his own table of offerings. This is how yard sales work. You accumulate stuff you don’t want anymore and you try to make a bit of cash by selling it.

The right thing is for Anthony to sell his stuff, enjoy his neighbors, and if in the future he sees some nice chairs being given away for free that he believes might sell at the annual yard sale, to grab them.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

How up-to-date must your business card be?

How obligated are you to make sure all information on any business card you share is up-to-date?

Some people using business cards have shifted to a digital business card where users can share information electronically. Information on these cards can be updated relatively swiftly, making it simple for users to keep their information up to date.

But millions of paper business cards are still printed and in circulation. Updating a paper business card takes a bit more effort than updating a digital business card app.

Some users changing jobs or titles might not have a printed business card in hand soon enough to share at an upcoming sales call, marketing event or other encounter that seems to call for a business card. If the phone number, email address and company affiliation are all still accurate, is it dishonest to use an old business card that contains other information that is no longer factually correct?

It might seem like it’s no big deal to go ahead and share. What’s the big deal? Often, it might not be a big deal and any change might mean little to anyone other than the card holder and his or her or their colleagues. But this is not always the case.

If, for example, someone had been the head of a department or the director of a program, but no longer held that role, then sharing a business card with that title on it would be misleading. It would suggest to a recipient that the card sharer held a position of authority at a company they didn’t really hold. The recipient might not care, but that doesn’t erase the fact that the information on the business card does not accurately reflect the role of the person doling it out.

The right thing is not to use a business card with information on it that is not accurate. But if someone is sold on wanting to share a business card, there are honest options from which to choose as the new business cards are being printed.

One is to simply tell the recipient that new business cards are being printed and offer to tell the person any contact information, which they can record. Another inelegant solution is to cross out anything inaccurate on the existing card and leave the contact information. Or even users sold on continuing to use printed business cards can make use of a digital business card to hold them over. While some digital business cards charge a fee, there are some free apps available. In such cases, it seems wise to clear the use of digital business cards with your employer who may or may not recommend using such services.

While there are numbers floating around about how many millions of business cards are printed every day, it’s hard to quantify how many of those actually get used. It’s more than likely that the vast majority of business cards shared don’t make it far beyond the closest wastebasket.

Perhaps it’s wise to figure out if a business card serves any real purpose before you have a few hundred printed up. It may be hard to turn the offer of a business card down without appearing rude, but perhaps letting someone know you’d rather just put their contact information in your phone might be welcomed.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Who polices the 15 items or less line?

Who is responsible for enforcing the rules at the super store?

Recently, a large retailer that owns thousands of super stores worldwide that sell discounted items implemented a change to its checkout policy. It allowed individual stores to decide if it would place a limit on how many items shoppers could buy using the self checkout kiosks at some of its stores. Many stores opted to impose a 15 item or less policy when using the self checkout.

According to an article in the The US Sun, the online edition of Britain’s Sun newspaper, the policy was met with disdain by some shoppers, especially when only a handful of the regular non-self-checkout registers were open. But others have noticed an inconsistency in how well the 15 items or less policy is policed, leaving shoppers to wonder if it is up to them to try to re-direct shoppers who run afoul of the policy.

There are a few issues raised here. First, is there anything unethical about limiting the number of items shoppers can purchase as a self checkout register or, for that matter, in an express line at a regular register? There is nothing wrong with instituting such policies, particularly if they are intended to speed up the overall wait times for shoppers to checkout.

For such policies to work fairly, however, the right thing is for any store implementing them to make sure they don’t have the opposite result than intended. It should be up to individual customers with 15 items or less to decide if they want to use the self checkout or to wait on one of the lines with no limitations. But if the stores don’t hire enough cashiers to keep as many of the traditional lines as possible open, the end result could be long waits at both the traditional lines and at the self checkout lines that are supposed to allow for a speedier shopping experience.

It is also up to consumers to be honest about how many items they have when checking out and not use the 15 items or less line for checking out a basket full of dozens of items…even if no one calls them on it when they do.

Then there’s the issue of who is responsible for monitoring and policing the 15 items or less checkout lines. It should not be left to other shoppers waiting in line to do this. Little good is likely to come from shoppers confronting one another about trying to cheat the system.

The right thing is for any store implementing a 15 items or less shopping line policy (or 12 items or less or 10, depending on the store) is for it to make sure someone is on hand to re-direct customers with more than the requisite number of items to another full-service line. Stores should also make sure that there are enough lines open to accommodate those re-directed customers or any customer who chooses not to use the express line. If staffing is an issue, then it might be time for stores to examine whether implementing such a policy is fair to customers until they have enough staff in place to be able to do so.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

 

Do too many signature credentials smack of pretension?

Is it wrong or pretentious to list initials for your credentials in the signatures to your letters, emails or texts?

A reader we’re calling Thoth wrote asking if there was anything wrong with listing acronyms for degrees or licenses earned in your correspondence, particularly if the correspondence is not work-related. My sense from his email was that Thoth found it fine to include such credentials in work-related emails, texts or letters, but that including it in personal correspondence was a bit much.

Most businesses don’t have a policy dictating whether an employee should list their credentials in the signature to their correspondence. At any academic institution where I’ve worked, the decision whether to do so or not has been left up to each individual. Some of my colleagues include credentials (often several), while others like me don’t.

Including credentials for professional correspondence can certainly make sense. It can be a way of establishing credibility with the recipient…if the recipient actually knows what the many acronyms for various degrees and certifications mean. A link to a bio on the company website might be a better way to do this, but there’s nothing wrong with listing your credentials as long as they are accurate.

There’s also nothing wrong with not including every degree and credential you’ve earned in your signature. Presumably, there are stronger ways to exhibit credibility with the recipients of your correspondence. While they might want to work with someone who is well-trained, typically they are more likely to be impressed with the actual work you’ve done rather than the initials you’ve earned along the way.

If you check out sites like Quora and Reddit, there are long discussion threads about whether it is ever OK to list honorary doctoral degrees as a credential. Since these degrees are not earned but are offered as an honor to those an institution has deemed to have done something notable, it can be misleading to use “Dr.” before your name if that doctorate was honorary. The one exception is the institution that awarded you the honorary degree. It very likely will address you as “Dr.” to further signify the honor.

The right thing is for each individual to decide how useful or meaningful it is to include credentials in professional correspondence signatures. Even if some recipients might find it pretentious, it’s up to the individual to make the decision what to include as long as what’s included is accurate and doesn’t run afoul of any company policies.

Personal correspondence signatures are a bit different. It seems a bit over the top to include all of your credentials in the signature to an email you write to your book club or an old friend. The challenge for those using their business email for personal correspondence is that there is often a default signature set up that gets created with each email sent. Still, it might be worth editing the excess from those default signatures, or to consider using a personal email account for personal email.

We can’t always control what others will find pretentious. But the right thing is to try to control that any trappings surrounding the messages we send don’t get in the way of the message we would like to be received.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Can neighbor dispose of trash next door?

Can you put your trash in a trash can on property not your own?

There are times when the desire to get rid of household trash doesn’t match up to when it is picked up in your neighborhood. And the thought of having that trash in a bin in the house or bagged up in the garage isn’t appealing.

A reader we’re calling Lee found himself in just such a situation. Lee was planning to take a vacation two days before the trash was scheduled to be picked up in his neighborhood. He knows that there is a regulation against putting out his barrels before 5 p.m. the night before trash is to be picked up. But after 5 p.m. the night before pickup he will be away with his family, so he won’t be able to put out the trash cans.

Lee also knows that trash is picked up a couple of days earlier on a street a few blocks away from him. He wants to know if it would be wrong for him to put his trash into a bin someone has pulled to the curb a few blocks over for pickup.

 

I am not a lawyer nor am I steeped in the details of trash regulations where Lee or even where I live. But I do know that in many municipalities, it is illegal for anyone to dump their trash into someone else’s trash receptacle without permission.

Do people engage in such behavior anyway? Yes. Is it OK for them to do so? No. Neither is it OK to drive around looking for a construction site that happens to have a dumpster on it and to toss your trash there without permission. Or to dump it in a receptacle up at the local park.

But is it wrong to put trash in a trash can on property not your own? Most regulations hold that it is wrong only if you don’t have permission from the owner of the receiving bins.

Lee has some options. He can ask a resident on the street with earlier pickup if he could place a bag of trash in one of their cans. That might be something Lee doesn’t want to do if he doesn’t know anyone on that street. Or he can ask a neighbor on his own street if they would be OK with him putting his trash in their bin before he leaves. Or he can ask a neighbor if they’d be willing to pull his trash cans to the curb and return his empty cans to their rightful place once they are empty.

 

If Lee doesn’t want to talk to his neighbors and ask permission or seek their help, then the right thing is to let his trash sit until he returns from vacation. A quick search of government websites around the country suggests that the fines for dumping your trash in someone else’s bins without permission can prove steep enough that an odorous garage is far preferable.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy, emeritus, at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2024 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.