How The Immigrant Rallies Affected Me

I was in charge of ordering Togos food for the guest speakers this evening at school. Togos couldn't deliver the food because they were short staffed as a result of the immigrant protest. Which meant I had to go pick it up. Dammit.

I went to Togos and felt bad for the four employees who were "holding down the fort."

I also listened to the radio and there seems to be a big gulf in the hispanic business community about protesting by not working. It seems like a lot people feel like it sends the wrong message.

I'd be worried less about sending the wrong message than the realization that if all these people stopped working, it really wouldn't make that big of a difference. That's the sad truth about the world, that one person or group isn't all that important to making it run. The world moves on.

Just like Togos. They had several people working harder and more. If all the other employees quit tomorrow, Togos would still survive. They would find other workers. If they couldn't, they would pay more, and then charge more for sandwiches. In short, they would adjust and figure it out.

This exact type of thing happened at my old job. There was a project that was totally disorganized and messy, poorly run, oddly staffed, just a weird set up. I was asked to shift over to the project to help change things up. I immediately recognized how unmanagable the process was, things were a mess, there was no order, and the client only knew about half of it. One day, for some reason, about 4 members of a 10 member team weren't in the office, they were out for training or something. Somehow, with only a 7 person team (versus an 11 person team) everything was calm, we were able to get things organized and our productivity was just as good. I told this to my boss and within a couple of weeks we had shrunk and were doing a much better job.

I just don't advise betting big with a low hand.