It's a bird...It's a drone...It's Santa Claus!

Look up, step out from your echo chamber, challenge your assumptions, don't limit your giving to the holiday (and mandatory performance appraisal) season, and tune in to episode 102 of The Energy Detox podcast.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Well, it's a pretty big time ofyear for things that are up in
the sky.
First and foremost, of course,we've got the big man, Santa
Claus, who will be travelingthrough the sky in just a couple
of days to deliver presents.
We've also got all thoseheadlines about the drones that
are in the skies above NewJersey and headlines about the
airplanes that are above all ofour heads right now, as a record
number of travelers take to theskies this holiday season, we've

(00:23):
also got a headline about thatguy that flies to the sky once
in a while, Superman, because anew Superman movie is coming out
in a couple of months, andtoday, December 19, a highly
anticipated trailer for thosewho highly anticipate such
things was released. All thatbeing said, we've also got

(00:43):
another headline that's in thenews, and that is about bald
eagles. Because right now, onthe desk of President Biden is a
bipartisan bill that will makethe bald eagle the official
National Birth. And now, ifyou're like me, you're probably
saying is the bald eagle notalready the national bird. In

(01:04):
fact, some historians were quickto point out that in 1792 or,
sorry, 1782 I'm not a historian,regardless of the year about 250
years ago, the bald eagle wasalready put on the seal of the
United States. So why do we needthis designation? Does Congress
not have anything better to dothan to put forth this
legislation so that they cantake credit for making the bald
eagle the national bird? Well,I'll leave that rhetorical

(01:29):
question for you to answer,because that's not the point of
today's episode of the energydetox.
The point today, as always, isto take all those various
headlines that you might comeacross this time of year
regarding things that are up inthe sky and tie them in to
things that are relevant to youas a leader in the energy
industry. And to do that, I JoeSinnott, am standing here in the

(01:49):
south side part of Pittsburgh infront of the American Eagle
Outfitters headquarters, whichis also a mere two blocks away
from the Steelers practicefacility, where they are doing
what they can do to try to movepast that not so nice loss they
had to the Eagles a couple ofdays ago. All that being said,

(02:10):
what's our plan for today? Well,it's to lay out three very
simple things that you alreadyknow, but that you know, what
some of these headlines mightserve as a quick, simple
reminder so that you can deploythese things that you already
know, not just this time ofyear, but as you move into 2025
and so what are those threethings that we're going to step
through? Well, one is theimportance of looking up,

(02:32):
picking up your head, movingbeyond the echo chamber, if you
will, to find other informationthat nobody else might have,
that you can use to youradvantage and to the advantage
of your stakeholders. The secondreminder, second tip that we'll
offer today is the importance ofnot assuming, again, not exactly
a novel idea, but something thatwe could all use a friendly

(02:54):
reminder about once in a while.
And the third item that we'llreinforce today, that we've
talked about on many episodes ofthe energy detox is the
importance of giving, but notjust giving, in the sense that,
again, Christmas is a merecouple of days away, but giving
that all important thing tothose around you, that being
feedback. And so with that,let's go back to item number one

(03:14):
and expand just a little bit.
Why is it important to look up?
Well, looking up isn't justimportant to see if there's
birds flying above your head orSupermen or drones or whatever
the heck might be. There no theimportance of looking up, in the
figurative sense, is to makesure that you have your eyes and
your ears on things that youmight not otherwise ingest, on

(03:37):
sources of information andconversations that you might not
otherwise have. Now, again, thisis not rocket science. This is
nothing new, but it's easy toforget, especially this time of
year, when you've got the hustleand the bustle that can detract
you from you know what, pickingup your head, looking around for
a bit, maybe going for a walk,and having a conversation with
somebody that you might notnormally have? This is a great

(03:58):
time of year to do that, and tobuild some of that momentum that
you can carry into 2025 so thatyou can have those conversations
again that are outside of yourcomfort zone, outside of your
echo chamber. And a good way toreinforce this, and bringing it
back to the oil and gas industryin particular, is the responses
that I've seen over the last twodays to the LNG report that the
United States Department ofEnergy released because they

(04:19):
released a report.
Not a lot of surprises about thetone of the report, but also not
a lot of surprises about theresponse to that report from
various industry groups. Many ofthose responses leaned on the
same standard talking points,true and important as they might
be, but not necessarilyoriginal, you know. And this is

(04:40):
a lot like even some of thetalking points that people might
say somewhat tongue in cheekabout alternate forms of energy
windmills in particular. Again,be remiss not to bring up the
normal talking point about howmany hundreds of 1000s of birds
windmills kill annually, and whoknows how many bald eagles they
kill annually? Again, a validpoint. Sure you. But what can

(05:00):
you do to move beyond thosetalking points so that your
message, your argument, if youwill, is more sustainable than
it would be otherwise. Well,again, we're not talking to you
so that you can go out and be anenergy advocate this Christmas
season. But how you can bringthat same idea back internally
again? What are thoseconversations that you need to
have? What can you do to pick upyour head, get out of your Echo
Chamber, not just relay the samestandard talking points about,

(05:23):
well, we'll see what happensnext year. I don't know about
promotions yet, or, you knowbudgets are tight, or whatever.
What can you find that you cangive, that you can share with
others, that you can gain byhaving conversations that you
know what you might not normallyhave, by hearing the fears, the
concerns, the worries of thepeople around you that, again,
require you to stand up havethose conversations and have a

(05:46):
genuine interaction, if youwill, an intentional interaction
with people that you might nototherwise have if you just kept
your head down and kept pluggingaway in a safe, comfortable
manner. That being said, let'smove on to item number two,
because they're all related.
Item number two is to make surethat you're not assuming and if
you're picking your head up, ifyou're looking up, if you're

(06:08):
seeing what's around you, ifyou're having those
conversations, if you'rechallenging existing talking
points, or, more importantly,asking how you can go above and
beyond existing talking points.
Well that's a great way to makesure that you're not assuming
things. And you know, again,bringing it back to this bald
eagle story, there was one quotefrom somebody, Ed Hahn of the

(06:28):
National Eagle Center, and hesaid, you know, assuming
something doesn't necessarilymake it so. But again, whether
you're assuming that you're onthe nice list and not the
naughty list, whether you'reassuming that enough people
around you understand the meritsof what you do for a living when
it comes to again, if you happento be in the oil and gas
industry producing fossil fuels,whether you're assuming that

(06:51):
internally you're respectedenough that you're going to be
able to survive another year inthis industry, in whatever
company you're in. Well,obviously those assumptions can
be dangerous. I don't need totell you that, but hopefully
this episode can serve as areminder that you know what.
Don't just assume. And don't letothers assume that they're in a
better position than theyalready are. Also, don't assume

(07:15):
that people are out to get you.
Also don't assume that peoplehave ill intent, especially
people who, again, are outsideof your normal bubble, different
departments, perhaps differentindustries, start by assuming
positive intent. Now, again,that doesn't mean that you don't
need to be on guard againstpeople that are antagonistic or
looking for ways to knock you oryour team or your company or
industry down, but assumepositive intent. It's a good way

(07:38):
to make sure that nobody'sguards are higher than they need
to be, that you get more of thatopen information that is going
to prove valuable, and thatagain, you don't find yourself
relying on assumptions movingforward, that again, could come
and burn you later on. Thatbeing said, let's move on to our
third and final item for today,and that is the importance of

(08:01):
giving, giving early, givingoften, and not just giving this
time of year, which again, mightdesignate as the season of
giving. And again, what doesthat have to do with all of
this? Well, again, we couldbring it back to that first
person we said, we'll be up inthe sky in a couple of days.
That, of course, being Santa,the ultimate giver of gifts. And
again. Heck, I don't think weneed to move much beyond him.

(08:24):
Use Santa as a reminder that youknow what you don't just have to
give at Christmas time. Youdon't just have to give this
time of year, the feedback thatyou might be forced to give this
time of year if you're amanager, because many companies,
of course, are going throughtheir annual performance
appraisals. Well, guess what?
You don't have to wait for thatto go through all the various
channels so that it's eventuallyrevealed to your employees in a

(08:46):
couple of weeks. No, you can useyour phone right now and send a
text message or an email or ateams message to somebody give
them a short piece of simplefeedback right now. You don't
have to wait again. You don'thave to have them moving forward
assuming whether they had a goodyear or a not so good year. You
can do that right now. Itdoesn't have to be earth

(09:07):
shattering. It doesn't have tobe any sort of grand piece of
feedback, and it doesn'tnecessarily have to be positive,
I promise you, right now youpick up your phone, you think
about one person. Heck, itdoesn't even have to be from a
professional standpoint. Pick afamily member, pick a colleague
from a past life, pick a friend.
Go ahead and shoot themsomething and say, hey, you
know, I just thought ofsomething, and I thought you

(09:29):
might want to know this. Everytime that you know we talk, you
tend to bring up X, Y and Z. AndI'll be honest, you know what? I
feel like. It's, it's, you know,it's maybe painting you in a bad
light. No, I don't think it'sthat big a deal, but I just
thought you might want to knowthat something like that's going
to knock people off their feet.
They're going to say, Hey,what's going on here? Are you
drinking? Which, again, thistime of year, there's a good

(09:51):
chance you might be drinkingwhen you send that.
But either way, ask yourself,how you can give above and
beyond and beyond. Again, thisStandard Time. Of year, of
giving presents, and thisstandard time of year, of
putting feedback in some sort ofsystem that'll work its way
through only to be revealed in acouple of weeks. What can you do
right now to give somethingsomething, to give something to

(10:12):
somebody that's valuable? Sowith that question in mind, with
all three of these reminders inmind, allow me again your host,
Joe Sinnott, to wish you a veryMerry Christmas, to remind you
again, to look up, look around,be aware of your surroundings at
all times, so that you don'tunwittingly miss something that

(10:34):
could damage you, yourstakeholders, your company, or
something even more valuablethan all of that. So with that
again, Merry Christmas. Hope therest of your year is great, and
I look forward to seeing youagain on the next episode of the
energy detox.