By Jean Hollands

Jean on the Job

New television shows like “Fear Factor,” “Race,” “Survivor” and “Big Brother” are popping up every day. Our company was even called to send a counselor for one show that will be produced overseas in a new format. Why are the networks unleashing so many programs where often raw and primal emotions are thrown in our faces?

This marvelous computer upon which my hands are now playing has become my confidant, my slave, my employee, my translator, my handmaiden and my keeper. I am attached to the screen. My colleagues and my clients check their e-mail religiously. We cannot do business without it. Just listen to company employees shout and scream if their network is down. We pay bills and we are wired money from overseas banks.

My computer does not express rage or love to me. It will shut down and it will malfunction, but there is always a good, legitimate reason for the event, and it is usually my fault, or it can be redeemable. My computer never says it is sorry, never whines, never pleads (except maybe to renew my anti-virus program). But it never raises its voice, shouts for joy or stumbles for the right exclamation.

You may think the computer is my only friend. No, I do have those with whom I laugh, cry, pray, wonder, sing, problem-solve or play. But there are two populations in our high-tech communities that do not always have that luxury.

The isolated worker. Many a Silicon Valley person is single, lives alone, has no family here, or is a transplant. Or he or she is part of a couple where one is commuting - across the country weekly, across the world often. Or one of them works at home and rarely sees other colleagues.

Remote working teams. It is not unusual anymore to call your staff together on the conference phone with a half dozen countries represented within that phone call. Those people, separated by thousands of miles, rarely get to shake hands, slap each other on the back, give high fives, or watch each other handle the grief or the joy of a business win or a business loss. Oh, yes, they have an annual sales meeting, maybe even a face-on quarterly staff get-together. The day-to-day dramas, however, are handled alone, without the team.

So the new reality shows display people living together, trying to get along together, scheming and spying and betraying each other in simple, human ways. Yes, they show the most base or primal emotions of our lives. They show people who are not always sophisticated. But besides the movies, many folks see emotion only when they tune into something like a “Big Brother” series.

Many of my readers live in intact family homes, have relatives in the area, do not work with just a computer and its relative appliances and are immune to the isolation of today’s working world. If you get to smile at your customer, touch hands with your colleagues, work on a common project, celebrate together, strategize, agonize and grieve together in the same room, you will not have to watch the new reality series. You can live them.

Jean A. Hollands, CEO, Growth & Leadership Center, author of a new book, “Same Game Different Rules - How to Get Ahead Without Being a Bully Broad, Ice Queen or ‘Ms. Understood’,” was voted Business Woman of the Year in 1986 and 1996. Write to GLC, 1451 Grant Road, Mountain View 94040.