Wednesday June 16th 7:07 AM AirTran Flight to Pensacola Florida

I am on a flight to Pensacola Florida where I plan to experience the oil spill first hand. The whole catastrophe has been on my mind every day since it started almost 2 months ago. I am not sure what I am going to experience, but I have the sense it will be profound.  From a trust perspective I can’t think of a worse example in recent times.

This is a disaster on almost every level. I am not ready to blame people right now. I am just really upset about it, and  the eleven people who lost their lives; and look at what we have we done to the beautiful Gulf of Mexico. How many creatures are suffering an ugly death? What about the local and national economy as a result of the spill?

I’ve landed in Pensacola, here is my first impression.

I went to the BP staging area today with hopes I could get a better feel for what the recovery effort looked and felt like. It took me a long while to find their location, it is tucked away under a bridge and has an out of the way entrance. I did not expect to find out much, but my curiosity pushed me try anyway.

As I approached  I asked the first security guard if  I could talk with someone to give me more information about what is happening here. He suggested that I park my car and talk to the man in the red shirt who I assumed was his supervisor. I parked my car, and started toward the supervisor. As I got closer he stared to cross his arms over his chest. I introduced myself, told him the truth about who I was and what I was looking for. He never made eye contact, just shook his head. I’m not sure if he even said a word during our visit. I asked him 5 different ways if there was any information about anything that I could see or hear or experience. Nothing… It reminded me of how a lack of information makes us suspicious. The more he stonewalled me, the more I felt like there was something hide. Trust has a lot to do with transparency and when there is no transparency there is assumption and that is usually not good for either party.  I can’t say I expected anything else but I wanted to experience it. This is how people act when they have no trust…  He didn’t trust me anymore than I trusted him.  BP is in a war, and in my opinion a fight for their very survival and it is going to be a long one.

P.S. I just watched the President of BP speak in front of the congressional hearing… with that as a model, now I know why this guy acted this way. The truth is our legal system does not allow for open conversation… I wonder is the people at BP could speak their truth openly what they would  say.. I have no idea but the words, PLEASE HELP!!! come to mind. You know… I wish this world was different, we could all help.

We should all be in the business of economic development.  Here are some thoughts about why.

This  is a picture of Ron holding a remote control helicopter. Ron and I met briefly yesterday but I doubt either one of us will ever forget the experience.  He is a good sport and allowed me take his picture after we had a trust encounter. Click on the arrow above to hear the story.

Click the arrow above to hear today’s Trust Tour experience.

Last night I had two interactions with the police within 15 minutes. They were very different and they made me think about trust and power. Here are my thoughts…

In this short lunch conversation with my friend Darryl Rentz from DSK. We talk about the balance between good and evil. Can good come from horrific evil? Or, if the Trust Tour is super successful could evil be the end result? Does nature require a balance between the two? What do you think?

On my way back to the St Pete airport, my taxi driver shared with me some interesting perspectives on how he thinks about our country. As we approached the terminal I asked him if I could share a summary his thinking with you. He agreed, and here is Jim sharing taxi cab trust.