When people tell me to keep politics out of Human Resources, I say that one of the biggest issues in the 2008 presidential election in the United States is succession planning.
If John McCain wins the election & then keels over, Sarah Palin will be our next president.
What do you guys think? Palin is a barracuda on the basketball court, a former beauty queen, and she has a very funny accent that reminds me of the mothers who live in the upper peninsula of Michigan. I haven’t heard anything about her education or her credentials as a crtitical thinker. She’s a mother and a fan of mooseburgers, which is cool, but I also hear that she’s pro-creationism and thinks that the polar bear is fine, thankyouverymuch.
Schwoo, doggies! If the presidential election isn’t about succession planning, I don’t know what is…
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This is totally aiming for the women vote. McCain needed a headline to counter with the rousing Democratic convention and wanted to select a woman. I knew Palin was in some lists, but was falling off. I’m shocked tht he didn’t choose Hutchinson as the VP if you wanted a woman.
I also say as well Sarah has her own scandal to deal with the firing of a state trooper, who was the sister in law of Palin. IMO, McCain panic.
What happens when you put a more qualified, experienced person behind a hotshot youngster? What happens when you do the opposite?
i heard somewhere she has a degree in journalism and was a sports broadcaster for a while. she entered the pageant for the scholarship money.
i don’t know about critical thinking skills.
she’s also a member of the n.r.a.
all the best!
deb
you know, she does have great approval ratings… MANY of Alaska’s 670k people love the fact she took on a known corrupt politician. And, she does dig on mooseburgers. Clearly, any org doing succession planning would be wis to look at popularity relative to a crook and dietary preferences when making it’s choice.
Bah want to write alot about this but I am visiting my parents and they have a ergonomic keyboard (I hate these things).
Laurie this post was particularly unfair and snarky in my opinion. Yes, we understand she is a ignorant conservative from a backwater state, but she has achieved some exciting things in her life. She has an 80% approval rating in her state and she has more executive experience than Obama while being 3 years younger. If she were a 44 year old man who is a conservative governor would you be being so bitchy?
Are you sexist? You can tell me you know….I would still love you
@Tracy The GOP wants me to vote with my vagina. I just can’t choose to exercise any control over it.
@WillyF What if this election was about issues and not age? I’d love to see what happens when people start talking about positions and policies. No wait, I wouldn’t love it because I couldn’t make jokes about McCain’s age.
@deb I just read that Palin is a social conservative and wanted to be on ESPN as a sportscaster. That *would* be a sweet job.
@Jason I’ve heard all sorts of things about her popularity. It’s high, it’s dropping, it’s low, it’s never been lower. I would ask a couple of quesitons: is she a natural leader? Is she selfless? Can she be the decider-in-chief? Does she put ketchup on her mooseburgers?
@Dan Yes, I would *totally* be bitchy if Palin was a dude. I was prepared to go all out on Pawlenty but then McCain served me this curveball.
I think the phrase is “served me this softball.” Curveballs are a actally hard to hit, as so many would-be major leaguers can tell you ….
honestly, i’ve been wondering if they thought we hillary supporters would now automatically vote for this ticket JUST because she’s a woman. (as if we can’t tell the difference between hillary and palin. uh huh.)
she very well may appeal to conservative women though.
all the best!
deb
Sarah Palin has a B.A. in Journalism from U of Idaho or something. She *wanted* to be a sportscaster, but didn’t want to move to the East Coast.
She’s been Miss Wasilla, a city council member, and mayor of Wasilla-prior to becoming Governor of Alaska
“She has a wealth of executive experience”-somebody on MSNBC not an hour ago
@John I meant curveball. I wasn’t expecting it, and I think she’s a harder target than Pawlenty. My husband reminded me that it’s tough to attack a mom & a pretty woman. Guys come to the aid of a pretty woman in distress — even if the pretty woman is an arch-conservative who is a lifelong member of the NRA and can cut you down with an AK47.
@deb She’ll appeal to anyone who is pro-life and pro-gun — basically, the GOP base.
Read the TIME interview with McCain last night. It was the weirdest, most hostile interview I’ve ever read. Totally bizarre.
Please do not compare Palin to Obama. Such comparisons make my stomach turn. The difference in their educational backgrounds alone is stark, much less their experience on the political stage.
She wouldn’t be qualified to be the mayor of Columbus, Ohio — which has about 100K more people in it than the entire state of Alaska — much less leader of the free world.
The “executive experience” argument that some are trying to make is so ridiculous that they should be embarrassed to let it slip past their lips. George W. had plenty of “executive experience,” but yet his presidency has been the worst in American history.
Wow, she has a high approval rating! Well, then she is qualified to be the president. Are you kidding me? McCain’s VP pick reeks of both desperation and pandering. One can only hope that this duo does not somehow get elected.
@Wench I haven’t read it, yet, but I heard it’s eye-opening.
@Bryan LOL, you are on fire.
@ brian…so you are trying to make the argument that Palin has both no “real” executive experience and that executive experience doesn’t matter? Boy that is a great argument. Yes, yes, Obama went to a good school…Oh wait….so did George Bush…a good thing that worked out.
The point is that the people who elected her actually like the job she is doing. Honestly, Brian your elitist crap and two faced arguments are why we can’t have a decent discussion about issues in this country.
All I hear in most of these posts is “Blah Blah Blah…I hate her because she is a conservative”….”Blah Blah Blah she is from a small backward state” “blah blah blah She didn’t go to an Ivy league school” etc.
If you don’t like conservatives just say it. Then we can move on.
@Dan Bryan skews more conservative than 99% of the readers of this blog. 1) I think Bryan’s points are valid & 2) there’s a place for his point of view on my blog because Bryan is my friend & 3) Bryan is awesome. PS – As a side note, most conservatives I know think Palin is a hail-mary-joke of a pick. They prefer Romney (except for the Mormon thing) or Pawlenty.
People get pissy about the Obama/Palin comparison because it is painful. It is painful to know that two people with so little experience will either be the President or be very close to the Presidency.
Obama has very little experience on the national stage. He was a junior senator who spent his first two years in the minority party and he has spent the better part of the last two years as a part to full time campaign machine. His legislative record isn’t impressive because of the above parts. His exposure on the national stage involves a speech he made four years ago and a handful of committee meetings.
Palin’s record is short as well but I think it is important to know that experience at the state level is also important. If you disregard that like many have, you throw out almost all of Obama’s legislative experience (and all of his legislative accomplishments). It’s a double standard that shouldn’t be tolerated.
If we want to talk about the issues of this campaign, let’s do it. But if we want to keep comparing experience, it’s a really easy decision:
If both are woefully inexperienced and one has a 100% chance of being president and one has a much lower than 100% chance of being president, which one do you think is more appealing on experience alone?
That’s the silliness of this whole discussion over comparing this to succession planning. An issue based argument would be much more sound and business oriented. Focusing more on a potential Executive VP than a CEO wouldn’t make sense in the business world either.
@Lance I guess ur right that the presidency is not a direct comparison to succession planning — ‘cept that businesses manage succession planning in much the same way.
*Who’s been around the longest?
*Who looks good in a suit?
It’s all subjective and rarely based on a quantitative analysis of knowledge, skills & abilities. I’ve never done a talent review where we emerge from the discussion with anything other than the pre-determined list of candidates that the executives/managers brought to the discussion in the first place.
Maybe the title of a post should be SUCCESSION PLANNING: EPIC FAIL. The thesis would be simple: we need an algorithm, like Google, to pick our future leaders.