It's Not Luck (25 page)

I think about it. Pete is right, but I need Don to work with me. No, there is nothing more important than guaranteeing that Pete’s solution does work. My whole plan is dependent on Pete demonstrating that such a marketing solution can quickly turn around a company. It is essential for the entire group’s survival.

“When do you need him?” I ask.

“The sooner the better. Starting tomorrow would be ideal.”

“Let me see what I can do. I’ll call you back.”

I went directly to Don’s office.

“Dad?” Dave interrupts my gloomy thoughts. “Can I ask your advice?”

I can’t believe my ears. When is the last time Dave carne to me for advice? I can’t even remember.

“Of course.” I turn the TV off and look at him. He seems normal. “Have a seat,” I say.

“I prefer to stand.”

I wait, but he doesn’t say a word. He just shifts his weight from one foot to the other.

“Carry on,” I encourage him. “What’s your problem?” “It’s not really a problem.” He looks uncomfortable. “It’s more . . . like, a situation.”

“A situation that you don’t know exactly how to handle?”

“Yeah, sort of.”

“You’ve come to the right person,” I assure him. “I’m the expert of sticking myself into unpleasant situations.”

“You?” Dave is surprised.

I just smile. Let my kids hold on to their illusions about their father. “Tell me about it.” I decide to take a businesslike approach.

That makes him more comfortable. “You know Herbie,” he starts.

I nod my head. Of course I know Herbie. How could I not know him when he spends half his time at our house, constantly raiding the fridge.

“Well, he came up with an interesting idea.”

“Yes?”

“It has many pluses . . . ” He starts to fudge. “You know . . . ” I know my boy. The next sentence will be, “Sorry, forget it” and he’ll disappear.

“Dave, what is Herbie’s idea?”

“You know that Herbie is as crazy about old cars as his father is.”

“And as you are,” I Cannot resist the temptation to add.

He smiles. “Nothing compared to them. You know the collection that they have. Six antique cars. One cooler than the other.”

“Yes, I know,” I assure him before he tells me again about Herbie’s father’s hobby. It’s nice to have such a hobby. The problem is that first you have to be a millionaire.

“So,” Dave returns to the issue, “Herbie wants us to buy an old wreck and rebuild it. He found a fifty-six Olds ninety-eight convertible. It’s falling apart. The engine is one solid block of rust but the chassis is okay. And the body can be nicely restored. It could be a real beauty.”

I keep quiet as he rambles on.

“Herbie knows where we can buy the parts that we’ll need. He even located an old transmission. It’s a fifty-nine model but we think it’ll fit. Herbie and I are pretty good mechanics. I think that we can turn it into almost a collector’s item. It has a lot of potential.”

“So what’s your problem, Dave? Do you want me to lend you money for it? That’s the advice you want?”

“No, not at all.” He seems somewhat offended, as if he never before asked for money. And for much worse purposes.

“Sure?”

“Quite sure. I think that we can manage ‘with less than fifteen hundred dollars. And I have enough for my share. I still have most of the money I made last summer. Besides, grandma promised me five hundred for my eighteenth birthday. Maximum I’ll need is a short-term loan.”

From past experience I’m starting to suspect that short-term loan, in my kids’ vocabulary, means to be repaid from their inheritance. And my mother intended the gift to be for Dave’s pocket money this fall when he goes to college. But what the heck, rebuilding a car from almost scratch will be good for him. I think that he can do it.

“I’m not sure about a loan,” I say. “But if that’s not the problem, what is?”

“I don’t know,” he says. “I have an uneasy feeling about it.”

“Any real reason?”

“I don’t know. I’m afraid that Herbie won’t be able to come up with his share, and I’ll end up financing the whole thing myself.”

“How are you going to manage that?”

“Don’t worry, Dad. It will never happen. I’d rather drop the project in the middle. I don’t think it’s likely, Herbie claims that he can get the money. I don’t know. There are more problems than that.”

“Like?”

“Like, who will take the car, when? Right now we go out together, but . . .” He starts to fudge again.

I let him ramble for a while. “I think I understand,” I finally say.

“So, Dad, what should I do?”

I don’t know what to answer. Herbie’s idea sounds okay, it seems they know what they’re getting into. But there are pitfalls, many things that might go wrong. Should I advise him to go ahead? Or to drop it?

Whatever I recommend, one thing is sure, before long I’ll be blamed for my recommendation. I almost cop out by saying, let me think about it, when I realize what I should do.

“Dave,” I start slowly, “whatever advice I give you, will you follow it without question? I hope not. So ask yourself, what good will it do?”

“It will help. I respect your opinion Dad.”

“Frankly, I don’t know what advice to give you. It’s not a simple matter, there are pluses and minuses on both sides.”

“Yes,” he sighs, looking disappointed.

“But there is a way I can help you,” I say. “I can teach you how you can make the decision. Without compromises, and without guesses.”

“Oh, come on. Can you? Even when it looks like there is no decisive answer?”

“Let’s go to my study,” I say, standing up.

“I hope it’s not too complicated,” he mutters, following me.

We sit down at my desk, and I give him a dime. “Heads is go ahead. Tails is tell Herbie to drop it.”

“That’s your method?” he asks.

“No, that’s just the way to pick a starting point. It really doesn’t matter.” “Whatever you say.” He flips the dime. It comes up heads. “Okay. So let’s assume it’s a go. Start by listing all the positive things you see in the idea.”

After writing two lines, he hesitates.

“What’s the matter, Dave?” I ask. “Are there some positives you don’t want to tell me?”

“Sort of,” he grins.

Even better, I think to myself. “Let me describe a situation very similar to yours when I used this technique. I think I even have the work I did.”

As I look for it, I start to tell the story. “It happened about four years ago, when we were still living near your uncle Jimmy. One day he came to me and suggested we buy a boat together.”

“What a neat idea,” Dave says.

“Yes,” I agree. “It had a lot of pluses, but similar to your case, I felt uneasy about it. Let me show you what I did. Where is it? It must be somewhere here in this drawer.”

I flip through the papers. I forgot how many interesting things are stored here. Dave almost gives up.

“Ah, yes, here it is. Of course, at the bottom. The first page is a list of all the positive aspects of buying the boat.”

“You flipped a coin before you started this list?”

“Probably. I don’t remember. In any event here are the reasons to buy a boat with Jimmy: I will have a boat in my possession; I will share the financial burden of purchasing and maintaining a boat—the only realistic way to make it possible.”

“Those two are identical to my situation,” Dave interrupts.

“No wonder, the situations are very similar. Probably the other positives are applicable to you as well. Like: I don’t have to do all the maintenance myself; or due to Jimmy’s superior mechanical ability, the boat will be well taken care of.”

“No, that last one is definitely not applicable,” Dave laughs.

“Here, read it yourself.” I hand him the page.

He glances at it. “Yes, most of these points are good for me, except for the last one.” And, grinning, he reads, “ ‘I will have an ally to help persuade Julie to allow me to spend money on my dream, a boat.’ Quite a persuasive list, so what happened?”

“Look at the next page, the negative list is not less persuasive.”

“ ‘We might disagree about the selection of the boat,’ ” he starts reading. “I don’t have this problem, we already know what we want to buy. Next. ‘We might disagree about who will use the boat when.’ Yes, that’s a problem, but not as big as in your case. We are double-dating.”

“Even in our case,” I say, “it wasn’t a big problem. You know your mother likes to spend time with her brother, and I like him too.”

“Yeah, but what about Aunt Jane?”

I ignore his question. “Read on.”

He continues down the list, making funny remarks. I don’t know who enjoys it more, him or me.

“Nice,” he says when he finishes. “A nice summary. But how did it help you decide? Now it looks even more difficult than before you started.”

“This is not the end,” I tell him. “It’s just the beginning. Now, starting from, ‘We agreed to buy a boat together’ I have used if-then logic to reach each of the negative arguments. The same way I did when you asked to use my car. Remember?”

“Yes, Dad. And thank you. There was no problem, was there? I did take care of the car. And I don’t bug you for it now.”

“No, not more than before,” I admit. “So when I finished connecting to each one of the undesirable effects, I started to check whether or not I could take actions to trim them.”

“What do you mean by trimming them?”

“Figuring out if I can take an action to guarantee that the negative will not happen. For most of the negatives it was possible. But for one, every idea I came up with needed Jim’s collaboration.”

“Which one?”

“The one that says it would be a problem if one of us had to sell his share.”

“You were thinking long term,” Dave is impressed.

“Is there any other way?” I ask.

“Probably not,” he admits. “Anyway, what did you do?”

“I slaved on it some more, polishing the words so that when I showed it to Jimmy, he wouldn’t be offended. Here, look at it.” I hand him the negative branch.

“See, first I stated my starting points: we agree to buy a boat together; you might want to get rid of your share; I don’t have enough money to buy a boat alone. Not that type of boat anyway. You see the conclusion?”

“Yes, it is quite obvious. You can’t afford to pay for Jimmy’s share.”

“Couple it with the fact that I am very picky about who my partner is, and you see the result. Jimmy might get rid of his share to a person I don’t approve of.

“Now you see? Whatever choice I made, we were bound to end up badly. I might not compromise, which meant that I would have to sell my share as well. Not a good option; at that point in time we could safely assume that I would be in love with the boat.”

“I see,” Dave concludes, “you wouldn’t like Jimmy too much for forcing you to sell.”

“That’s for sure,” I say.

“And the other possibility is not so good either. You might compromise and then you’d be stuck with a partner you didn’t like. Then you’d have an even bigger grudge against Jimmy.

“And as you know,” I summarize, “if there is one thing I don’t want, it’s to stand between your mother and her brother. So I took this page and read it to Jimmy, asking him to come up with a resolution.”

“And what happened?” he asks with interest. “You know what happened. We don’t have a boat and we have a great relationship with Uncle Jimmy.” “So what are you suggesting? That I don’t rebuild the car with Herbie?”

“Nothing of the sort. What I’m suggesting is that you write all the negatives, and connect to them with if-then logic. Don’t leave them just hanging there substantiated only by gut feel.”

“Why is it so important to do it?”

“For two reasons,” I say. “One is that once you detail the logic, you are much more able to really examine which actions you can take in order to trim the negatives.”

“And the other?”

“The other is even more important. If you don’t see how to trim a negative by actions depending entirely on yourself, if you need Herbie’s collaboration, don’t suggest any actions to Herbie. That might lead to unpleasant arguments. Instead, show him your logical derivations, exactly as I’ve done with you. Read it to him step by step. If there is a good solution, he will come up with it and you can both polish it. In that case, since there are no more negatives left to worry about, there is no reason you shouldn’t rebuild the car together.”

“And if he can’t?” Dave asks. “What happens when I show him why a negative effect is expected, and he can’t come up with a way to avoid it?”

“Then you will both have to make a choice. But it is no longer you against him due to the problem; it is you and he against the problem. In any event, your friendship is protected.”

“Good idea. Maybe I’ll try it. Dad, can I borrow these papers?”

“Only if you promise to put them back where they belong.”