It’s Stanley Cup Finals time.

Hockey is a rough game, and hits and checking are part of the game.  In this posting you see a photo of the Bruins’ Nathan Horton, who took a vicious blind-side hit knocking him unconscious and jeopardizing his career and taking this important clutch player out of the Stanley Cup finals.  His opponent, Aaron Rome, is also suspended for the rest of the year (and perhaps into next year if the Finals end early).

Not a good thing for sports fans – at least real sports fans.  Play hockey, gentlemen.

So what could this possibly have to do with projects, project management, or the triple bottom line?

As you know, one aspect of the triple bottom line is the environment, and one aspect of the environment has got to be concern for climate change.

In the same Boston Globe that is covering the hockey games mentioned above, there is an editorial in today’s paper called “Playing Rough”.  And there’s the link.  The article talks about the hits that climate scientists take when their research points to climate changes caused by humans.  They get hit blindsided just as did Nathan Horton.

In particular, the editorial covers the “hits” put on (generally) well-respected climate scientist Raymond Bradley, and with another connection to the Stanley Cup, his “hockey stick” graph that shows increases in global temperature that can be connected with industrial activity.  Bradley, who had had enough bullying by politicians, recently wrote a book on the topic, and his experiences, “Global Warming and Political Intimidation: How Politicians Cracked Down as the Earth Heated Up”

With this posting we don’t mean to take sides as much as to request that we as business people do not act like Aaron Rome.  Wait a moment before the attack.  Is it worth jeopardizing TWO careers because you are dead-set against a conclusion, pre-disposed to be in disagreement with it?  Or should you open your mind a bit and consider the analysis provided by a respected scientist?  We vote for the latter.

Have a look at the editorial from today’s Globe, but you can see right there in the 50-ish comments that immediately the discussion becomes polarized, even violent and certainly non-productive.  Let’s stay above the fray.

No biting, no pulling hair, and no blind-side dangerous hits. Okay?

Check.