Counterfeit Cherokee Warriors

Tangible and intangible products

All organizations produce some combination of tangible or intangible products. The distinction between the two affects the degree and type of dishonest manipulation that can occur.

Every organization of any size is likely to have some people whose manipulative skills exceed their productive skills. These people usually cut an impressive image and snow many people in the organization. Here are a few conditions that provide fertile ground for the counterfeit:

Producing tangible widgets

A widget factory is at one end of the spectrum and offers little opportunity for misrepresenting the success of a day’s work. The number of widgets produced cannot be easily double-talked up or down, and the widgets either work or they don’t.

Producing intangible education

An educational institution is at the other end of the spectrum because there is ample opportunity for manipulators to claim dubious successes and accuse co-workers of failure. The number of students who graduate is countable, but there is an almost infinite set of opportunities for questioning the education’s quality.

Measuring quality is often subjective and can be anywhere between excellent and terrible. It is a manipulator’s paradise in which a glib bull slinger can build up his work and ideas and tear down the people around him. This world is all about slickly obfuscating facts or demeaning inconvenient facts.

Loyalties: outsiders vs. insiders

An insider, for our purposes, is a person whose loyalties lie with the organization more than they lie elsewhere or with a personal agenda. This distinction is different from how long a person has been part of the organization. In the case of a business, an insider would be someone who owns enough stock in the company that the value of the stock is a more significant concern than is the person’s salary.

The nonprofit organization insider believes in the organization first and sees the job as a source of money second. There is a conflict of interest when an insider reports to an outsider who does not have the same loyalties. The boss wants a commitment to his little empire, so there is always the risk that an improperly committed insider-subordinate will become a whistleblower when the boss pulls a fast one. This dynamic provides a strong incentive for the outsider boss to hire only outsiders and drive insiders and their loyalties out of his domain.

Over time, the empire-building of outsiders works its way into ever greater sinecures of influence. Eventually, the organization becomes dysfunctional to the detriment of its primary mission. The emperors will build self-serving “companies within the company” or “universities within the university,” which serve the emperor’s interests first and the organization’s interests second.

Imagine a hospital with doctors and janitors who are co-equals that have to spend time placating empire builders. This dysfunctional hospital would have a medical care environment similar to the education environment at Oberlin College today.

Spotting the counterfeit people

Outsiders often portray themselves as “experts from afar,” which makes them more exotic than others around them. The truth is usually that these people were probably not viewed as experts in the place they came from but were likely regarded as just the jerk next door with dandelions in his lawn.

Beaurocracies are bureaucracies regardless of the organizational mission in which they live. Eventually, the conniving outsiders will reduce insiders to impotence.

Now let’s take a look at the more common obfuscations that allow outsiders to achieve nearly total organizational hegemony and build empires within empires.

The over credentialed obfuscator

An over credentialed obfuscator is usually an insecure person who is in over his head and will flaunt his credentials — sometimes with great subtlety. Look for prominently displayed diplomas, awards, or achievement certificates. A certain level of obfuscation and double talk will divert attention from the person’s shortcomings.

The motormouth obfuscator

Motormouth obfuscation is where Oberlin’s most enthusiastic PR spokespersons truly shine. The hallmark of a true motormouth is more than speaking faster than an auctioneer — it is a good strategy for a trial lawyer arguing a hopeless case. This strategy uses a large number of rapidly delivered words that say virtually nothing. The purpose of this delivery style is to unbalance an opponent by quickly switching from vacuous thought to vacuous thought faster than the listener can evaluate the flow of verbiage. With sufficient delivery speed, most listeners will not ask too many questions.

The polysyllabic obfuscator

A polysyllabic obfuscator snows his listener with big words that are not in common usage. Using obscure words is often effective because the listener doesn’t want to show his ignorance by asking what the terms mean. Polysyllabic obfuscation is particularly useful in combination with motor mouthing.

The screaming kid obfuscator

Screaming kid obfuscation is a particular case of obfuscating. It is either a kid trying to speak the truth when portrayed as too small to know better, or he is a con artist who expects people will give him what he wants just to shut him up.

Carefully staged temper tantrums are variants of the screaming kid that can be quite effective in organizational settings. Successful intimidation is part of well-thought-out empire-building strategies.

Counterfeit people in action

The members of the BOT all have impressive credentials, so let’s look at some possible explanations for how they dropped the ball so badly with Gibson’s Bakery:

These explanations can occur or in any combination. A good obfuscator/counterfeiter can juggle all these explanations with the smoothest artistry imaginable.

Counterfeit warriors at Oberlin College

The email below sent to Oberlin College president Marvin Krislov shows how tone-deaf the counterfeit warriors in the college leadership were in the TDS panic after the Gibson robbery:

Dan Brent letter re alumni gifts. This letter was evidence in the Gibson v Oberlin trial.

Re Twitter: OberlinChaos.com has observed the tight ethical commonality between former President Trump and Oberlin’s President Ambar. Both understand how to use Twitter effectively to pursue their similar PR objectives. OberlinChaos will reluctantly use Twitter in the future because if it is powerful enough and good enough for these two Presidents, it is good enough for OberlinChaos. Twitter is, at the least, not as ethically obnoxious as is Facebook.