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“I have not yet begun to fight”

These were the words of Captain John Paul Jones, an American immigrant who volunteered for service in the Navy. During the American Revolution, he was ordered to sail to European waters where he was expected to attack British ships and seaports and generally create havoc.

In 1779, following Jones’ attack on the coast of Ireland, he sailed a squadron of five ships north around the tip of Scotland to a position near Northern England. There, he met a large merchant convoy that was escorted by two ships in the British navy (including the impressive 44-gun Serapis) and immediately gave chase.

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It wasn’t long before the British ships gained the advantage, and Jones’ flagship, the Bonhomme Richard took critical damage and began to sink. Seeing this, the British captain demanded Captain Jones’ surrender.

However, rather than surrender, Jones responded with his now famous words “I have not yet begun to fight.” After this, Jones and his crew increased the ferocity of their attack so much that, despite their inferior ships, inferior training, and initially inferior position, they ultimately won the battle.

“My only regret ….”

These were the last words of American Nathan Hale just before he was hanged as a spy during the American Revolution. Hale, a teacher, joined the fight in 1775, at the age of 20. He quickly rose to the rank of captain, and, while serving under General George Washington at the battle of Harlem Heights, volunteered to go on a spy mission.

Masquerading as a Dutch schoolteacher, Hale spent a week collecting information on the position of British troops. However, when Hale attempted to return to the American side, he was captured. Based on the information that Hale was carrying, he was quickly accused of spying and sentenced to die.

Faced with his approaching hanging, Hale chose to look at his fate as a positive opportunity to serve, rather than a negative problem which he had to overcome. Consequently, Nathan Hale was hanged on September 22, 1776, without having made any serious attempts to escape his death.

Future

When the search term future is keyed in on Amazon.com, 134,329 search results are generated. Some titles found from the search include the following: Future Perfect: The Case for Progress in a Networked Age by Steven Johnson, Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100 by Michio Kaku, The Price of Inequality: How Today’s Divided Society Endangers Our Future by Joseph E. Stiglitz, and The $100 Startup: Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love, and Create a New Future by Chris Guillebeau.

Forward Movement

In the United States, maintaining forward movement is critical to success. Americans purposely set high goals, hoping to “stretch” themselves. And although mistakes will be made, Americans see greater progress in learning from them than in setting modest goals. To be persuasive in the American context means to propose large steps forward and a vision of the future.

Americans say “Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” The 19th century philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote: “Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.” Americans take action in order to make things happen.

“No problem“

Cultures which work closely together, at some point, come up with insider jokes about each other. An insider joke is one which just about everyone in the one culture immediately understands. Hopefully, the spirit of these jokes is friendly and good-natured. The Americans have theirs about the Germans. And the Germans have theirs about the Americans.

“No problem” isn’t even a joke, it’s a phrase. More is not necessary, for every German who has experience working with Americans knows what another German means when they speak it: That Americans are often quite naive about a problem, about its seriousness, impact, complexity (from the German perspective).

So when Americans substitute the term ‘opportunity’ for the word ‘problem’, Germans can become a bit nervous. For many problems offer little to no opportunities. They are simply problems. And they need to be dealt with.

Robber Barons

Robber Barons was the name given to exceptionally successful business people in America during the late 19th and early 20th century. Most of the Robber Barons came from humble backgrounds, and started businesses at times when many industries were beginning to grow substantially.

Robber Barons were both admired as people who became rich and powerful, yet hated as monopolists who exploited their workers. In fact, these Barons were able to create such a large divide between rich and poor that Jay Gould, a gold and railroad Baron, once allegedly said “I can hire one-half of the working class to kill the other half.”

In 1890, the Sherman Anti-Trust Act was passed, the first law enacted to limit the exploitation scope of the Robber Barons’ business practies. The Sherman Act outlawed monopolies and anything which unreasonably restricted trade, such as price fixing. Over the following decades, more business regulations were enacted, bringing the reign of the Robber Barons slowly to an end.

Searing

Searing: Very hot; marked by extreme intensity, harshness, or emotional power.

The United States is an immigrant country. More accurately stated: a younger, more recent immigrant country. For the history of mankind is the history of man moving, settling, then picking up and moving again.

There were and are reasons for why people moved and continue to move to the United States. Many seek greater freedom of thought, of religion, of way of life. Economic opportunity was/is certainly a motivation for many, if not most. And there are those who wanted to break out of the inflexible structures of their native country.

The immigrant experience is searing. It is of great emotional intensity, forming who we are as individuals, families, ethnic communities, and as a nation. The stories, the emotions, the choices made are passed down from generation to generation.

Oddly, but understandably, an American of German descent will say: “I’m German,” meaning, “My ethnic heritage is German,” in a deeper sense, “My national cultural hard-wiring is American and German,” just as it is for others: American and Italian, American and Irish, and Vietnamese, and Mexican, and Polish, and so on.

A searing experience. People left behind all that they knew. Language, culture, traditions, friends and relatives. The risks were both high and not entirely known. The immigrant experience leads to a complex relationship with what was once home. For people take their culture with them. National culture changes only slowly and painfully.

Immigrants admire, respect, long for their home. But they also leave it behind, in some ways they reject it. Americans have always seen America as the New World. Not just a new settlement, a new country. But a new world, as if mankind were starting afresh, anew. It is a part of the American self-understanding to believe that you can strike out on a new path, question old ways, methods, traditions.

Realistic for Americans means that the present is a starting point to the future, a new starting point towards a new future, possibly different and better than the past. Yes, the present is the result of the past, but not locked into a pre-determined, unalterable trajectory. The past, therefore, has less relevance. There is less need to explain how the present was arrived at.

Whereas for Germans realistic means “keeping your feet on the ground,” maintaining a sober view of the situation, not deviating too much from known ways; “knowing where you come from.” For Americans realistic means developing a vision, imagining new possibilities, stretching beyond, reaching for more and greater things.

Business Storytelling

Business Storytelling for Dummies. Author Karen Dietz. What does amazon(dot)com say about the book in order to promote it?

Learn to: translate data, facts, and figures into rich, captivating messages; harness the power of good storytelling to influence and motivate employees; effectively convey messages to buyers and funders; connect with your audience and drive your business to new heights; use storytelling to influence people and move them to action

Use stories to tap into their imaginations and translate sterile facts and stagnant case studies into exciting concepts they can identify with.

Buyer‘s Market

The United States has been growing since its birth. Growing in territory, in population, in economic output. For the most part the U.S. has striven for open markets, domestically and internationally. Americans also believe in meritocracy. People should benefit directly from their hard work.

Americans believe in competition. And America has always been a buyer‘s market, with supply outpacing demand. In such an environment, success cannot be attained without active effort to win customers. In America, sales and marketing are critical to success. Simply „building the better mousetrap“ is not enough.

An Amazon.com search on “Buyer’s Market” generates 13,959 results. Book titles include Solution Selling: Creating Buyers in Difficult Selling Markets by Michael T. Bosworth, The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to Use Social Media, Online Video, Mobile Applications, Blogs, News Releases, and Viral Marketing to Reach Buyers Directly by David Meerman Scott and Buyer Beware: Finding Truth in the Marketplace of Ideas by Janet Parshall. 10.5 percent of native-born Americans between the ages 25 and 64 are employed in the sales industry.

Resumé

A persuasive curriculum vitae (resumé) in the American context stresses achievements, awards and areas of special competence. It is not an official document produced by a neutral party such as a government agency or an educational institution, but rather a testament to how what was learned has been applied in the real world.

Resumés in the U.S. are in a way (self-)marketing documents. Americans highlight not only their subject area expertise, but also their character strengths, such as persistence, discipline, teamwork and, of course, leadership. Every American reader of an American resumé knows that they are carefully written subjective statements aimed at a specific effect.