The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century

How not to apologize

Among the “brilliant jerks” who are losing their jobs in Silicon Valley these days is venture capitalist Justin Caldbeck of Binary Capital. That’s because it recently came to light that for years, he’s been sexually harassing women in tech while discussing business and using his power as a connected person with influence and money to gain sexual favors and silence anyone calling him out on his sleazy behavior.

He’s stepping down, and issued a typical abuser’s apology, which went over about as well as this:

It’s a terrible apology for many reasons, the first of which is that it open with it being all about “me, me, MEEEE!!!”:

The past 24 hours have been the darkest of my life. I have made many mistakes over the course of my career, some of which were brought to light this week. To say I’m sorry about my behavior is a categorical understatement. Still, I need to say it: I am so, so sorry.

You can read it here (be prepared to roll your eyes), and make sure you read these two exegeses as well:

• Brad Feld: I don’t accept this apology
• Brenden Mulligan: Everything I hate about Justin Caldbeck’s statement

How to apologize

Sooner or later, you’ll end up in a situation where you are in the wrong and will have to make some kind of apology. When this happens, you should keep in mind that in building civilization over the past 10,000, we’ve had plenty of time to refine the art of the apology. There’s no shortage of resources out there that cover the topic of saying “I’m sorry.”

Most of these guides say that good apologies follow the same pattern, and Dr. Beth Polin, co-author of The Art of the Apology, has distilled this pattern to 6 components:

• An expression of regret — this, usually, is the actual “I’m sorry.”
• An explanation (but, importantly, not a justification).
• An acknowledgment of responsibility.
• A declaration of repentance.
• An offer of repair.
• A request for forgiveness.

As she says in this article, The Apology Critics Who Want to Teach You How to Say You’re Sorry:

“We found that an apology with all six components is much more effective at repairing trust than an apology that includes only one component, or some combination of three of the components. So if you’re apologizing, if you can get all six in there, that’s going to be better than offering one to three.”

You might also find SorryWatch interesting. It’s a blog devoted to dissecting and critiquing public apologies. It’s pretty interesting reading!

Bill Hinton — a vice president at AOTMP, a firm with whom I’ve collaborated with in the past — had a family emergency that let his stepfather unable to travel. He had to talk with two airlines, each one responsible for a leg of the trip. One of the airlines was JetBlue, the other was United. Here’s his summary of what happened:

With JetBlue, the Customer Service Representative with compassion and immediacy provided a full credit for the flight – a fantastic customer experience and clearly positioning for additional business with any future travel plans as well as sharing the story of such great customer service.

With United Airlines, the Customer “disservice” Representative indicated the only thing United could do was charge a cancellation fee or a change fee and when the flight is re-used a ‘re-booking’ fee would be applied. When a Doctor’s note was offered along with escalation to a “Supervisor” nothing changed. So the leg of that flight will go unused as the most economic choice – a horrendous and despicable customer experience which will be considered for all future travel and shared.

Sadly, Bill wasn’t the worst-served customer in recent United history. All these incidents took place after the David Dao “re-accommodation”:

• United Flight Nearly Takes Off With Fuel Leak Until Passengers Convince Crew There’s a Problem
• United Airlines: Couple who raised alarm over plane fuel leak forced to spend night in airport lounge
• Musician says United Airlines agent ‘attacked’ her, tried to grab 17th-century violin
• United sorry for falsely accusing gay father of fondling his child
• United Airlines and top Chinese tennis star in bust-up over ‘excess baggage’

And yet, people will still fly United, even if they don’t want to. One reason is that airline passengers are price-sensitive and convenience-driven, but there’s also that fact that consolidation has reduced the number of major U.S. airlines down to four. Thanks to United’s 2010 merger with Continental, it handles more than half the passengers in Newark and Houston, and one in three fliers from Washington Dulles and San Francisco is boarding a United flight.

When Cher tweeted the top image, she included the text “TRUMP HAS MAMMOTH ASS, AND VISIBLE PANTY LINE.”

This comic exaggerates things, but only a little. I once interviewed for a job that required both senior mobile developer and marketing director experience in the same person.

Oddly enough, I have that experience now, but I don’t think they ever filled the position, and I don’t think it exists anymore.

I took these photos on last Sunday’s grocery shopping trip.

I had no idea that Bacon Spam existed! Clearly I’m behind on the advances in canned meat.

If you’re familiar with my cooking photo posts — that’s largely what my Instagram account is about — you could be forgiven for thinking that I’m being sarcastic about having so much Spam choice. But you’d be wrong.

I used to be teased by ignorant white friends at Crazy Go Nuts University about my love for Spam, but they didn’t believe me when I told them that it was practically a staple in the Philippines — they just thought it was a misguided attempt at being more of a banana, twinkie, or coconut (“yellow/brown on the outside, white on the inside”) because I didn’t fit their “Long Duk Dong” expectation of what an Asian was supposed to be.

In fact, Spam is the key ingredient in a lot of Asian/Pacific island dishes, including Spam musubi (sometimes mistakenly referred to as Spam sushi, but if the rice isn’t vinegared, it ain’t sushi)…

…and Spam fried rice, which treats Spam as a softer, more easily sliced version of Chinese sausage:

Korean cuisine has budae jjigae, “army base stew”, a recipe created at the end of the Korean War that used scraps of food from U.S. Army bases, which included hot dogs, instant noodles, and of course, Spam (an old Army joke describes the low-grade version of Spam they were served as “ham that couldn’t pass its physical”):

Hormel has made a special Filipino spam flavor: tocino, which is sweet cured pork that’s kind of like Chinese char siu...

…and it’s one of a number of flavors:

And yes, you can get this on Amazon!

And finally, there’s Hawaiian breakfast: eggs, rice, and Spam:

It’s so quintessentially Hawaiian that it’s offered there as a breakfast option (and as a side order, just like the fries) at McDonald’s…

…and Burger King as well:

In Korea, Spam is so beloved that you can get it in gift sets…

Click the photo to see the Spammy goodness at full size.

…and just last year, Canadian-Korean K-pop star Jeon So Mi became the Spam spokemodel:

Further reading

• What Is SPAM And Why Are Filipinos Obsessed With It?
• Spam Is Korean History in a Can
• Spam and Hawaii: Why Does Hawaii Love Spam?
• In Korea, Spam Isn’t Junk Meat — It’s A Treat
• Five Things Asians Love That White People Hate

Seen on the “impulse-buy candy” shelf in a cashier lane on Sunday…

Click the photo to see it at full size.