RIP Amy

My cousin Amy died earlier this week. During the late 70's and early '80's Amy was one of the few who could actually pull off the Farrah Fawcett look-alike style. Back then her eyes smiled and she could light up a room when she broke into a full facial smile. When she died this week she was alone in her apartment. The Amy I remember from when we were kids could have never conceived she'd have a mostly sad adulthood spent trying to find her meaningful place in life. I hope the Amy still had memories of the Amy that once existed. She was a young girl filled with potential. I'll never know if she died too soon or too late when her body was discovered earlier in this week; she was in her mid 40's.

On the day I went to Amy's memorial service I spent most of my time working with a couple of different cross-functional teams trying to solve frustrating operational problems and institutionalize improved cost-efficiencies. The teams were comprised of skilled professionals, highly knowledgeable in their craft, all extremely passionate about their work. The issues we were confronting weren't easy. Every time the stakes in our problem-solving excercises were raised or when we would get to oftentimes difficult truths, someone would invariably say "look, it's not like what we do here is life-and-death important" (or some similar version of that remark) as a way to let everyone off the hook.
Today I won't digress in to one of my rants or dissect the meaning of or implications of cross-functional team members letting one another off the hook. No, the real subject here is way too important as I think back on Amy's life not lived---considering that there are probably millions of people in the world who have said or thought the same ("it's not life and death") about the work they do.


If my cousin Amy had found her meaningful place in the world, had she found a fulfilling career in a field she was passionate about, where she had been respected for her knowledge, admired for her skill, I dare say she would still be alive today and those expressive eyes and the mile wide smile would still radiate life that was really and sadly extinguished long ago.

So, please, for your own sake and for my cousin Amy's memory, no matter what you do, no matter what your industry or career path, never ever demean yourself or the work you do by even thinking anything as absurd as "it's not life or death." I'm here to tell you, with Amy as a haunting image, what you do, how you do it, and the meaning you get from all significant aspects of everything you do is very much a matter of life and death.

Perhaps 49er Coach, Mike Singletary's "Getting-Results-Style" could be an example of how to succeed in business for 2010?

I couldn't have wished for a better end-of-year lengthy discussion than my lengthy session with Chris this week. He's one of the brightest, curious and most committed young professionals I've ever had the privilege to work with. As we get set to bury the truly God-awful 2009 reconnecting with Chris is the best reinforcement that better days are ahead because ambitious emerging talent always leads to a better future.

During our discussion Chris talked about a particular department he had been working with that certainly had issues but he said was thankfully comprised of "many experienced people." He reeled off a rather extensive list of issues, but the headlines were:
1. The department didn't have a true manager;

2. Each of the department employees did things their own way;

3. 2009 was a disappointing year for the company, revenues were off and although they had made great progress, costs were still higher than they should be. As he assessed it, the biggest cause for higher costs was waste due to breakdowns in the order entry-to-production cycle;

4. The department was supported by tools that were decent enough and although they were constantly being upgraded not everyone in the department thought it necessary to use them;

5. The company and its industry was going through radical and perhaps even painful changes but not everyone in the department was sensitive enough to these changes to adopt new methods.
So here I am with a wonderfully gifted individual who represents the future, fascinated by his apparent celebration of the past--one that was no longer working--who valued experience.

Clearly,"experience" can mean a great deal of many positive things, but in an environment that is defined by change, I'm rather certain that captivity to experience --for the sake of it-- is a guaranteed losing strategy. Of course Chris, like all of us, must respect and honor proven experience yet I believe it is just as important to keep in mind that experience is not a synonym for expertise.

Given the five isolated problems (listed above), does this seem like an expert group?

Shortly after speaking with Chris I found the time to finally check out the 2010 NFL Pro Bowl rosters. The first thing I noticed was, although named an alternate, NY Jets' Left Tackle D'Brickashaw Ferguson didn't make the AFC roster. A classic case where voters confused experience with expertise because in his 4th year Ferguson played so expertly he deserved to earn Pro Bowl. But the selection that really leaped off the page was San Francisco 49er Tight End Vernon Davis earning the starting Pro Bowl spot for the NFC. That's the same Vernon Davis who wanted to do things his own way during the 2008-2009 season his coach, Mike Singletary, publicly blasted him, more than once. A year ago it sure looked like Vernon Davis was headed for the scrap heap of "uniquely gifted athletes never to be heard from again, destroyed by a lousy attitude."

Singletary, an NFL Hall of Fame player and a 10-time Pro Bowl selection himself cared enough about excellence, followed his convictions to push Vernon Davis, and one year after Davis was shocked by his head coach's tirades against him, undoubtedly was the catalyst for Vernon Davis becoming an NFL all star.

For Chris and his company and all others, I wish only the best things for you in 2010 and suggest it can be a wish-come-true by applying a bit of Mike Singletary's style of getting results to succeed in business climate more volatile, competitive and exhausting than the NFL.

Happy 2010 Everyone!

It's Time for Business to Focus on Meaningful Performance Standards: Let's Get Back to Inspiring and Teaching

In recent weeks I've heard from a surprisingly large number of you urging me to post a new column. This space is intended to share useful information and insights from my interesting business encounters and experiences; quite frankly I thought I was becoming redundant and not breaking new ground. So I've resisted the temptation to write for the sake of it and am now reappearing because I've got something worthwhile to share.
As the economy plods along, as adjusted real unemployment figures are estimated at nearly 18%, as companies struggle to compete, the great strains are showing in most insidious ways. Not enough managers are truly leading their organizations by inspiring them, teaching them, better equipping them and it's creating greater levels of fear and suspicion in the workplace. At a time where organizational strength is an imperative far too many employees are looking to play the hero; freelancing and pushing others away from what they believe is their turf. In many respects this stands to reason: the fear of being unemployed is now so powerful that otherwise capable and rational human beings are determined to prove themselves to be indispensable. It's happening at alarming rates and these misguided efforts are universally making bad situations worse. I won't go as far to say we're approaching organizational anarchy, but there are too many signs of it coming from too many companies to not put a spotlight on this dangerous trend.
Signs of this self-indulgent behavior are evidenced throughout society, whether it's the Henne's of Colorado or Salahi's of Virginia who aspire to fame through outrageous and no-value behavior that will earn them starring roles on (anything but) reality tv. Just as the Salahi's believe they're worth a few hundred thousand dollars so a television network can interview them, many in the workforce evidently believe crashing their organizational structure or undermining corporate unity of command will not only guarantee their continued employment doing so will earn them big bonuses. I find the seeds for the twisted logic were sewn well before this diabolical behavior became apparent.

In one case a senior executive had delegated virtually everything in his business to tenured staff, but over time both company staff and their customer base eroded. This is hardly coincidental; employees developed deep resentment for a leader that hadn't been involved for quite some time but ruled his business as an emporer so they left and took customers with them. His reaction was to further wall off access to his staff and customers as an attempt to be the hero to parent company executives that had lost patience in direct correlation to the control he had lost in his business. Even though steps have been taken to prohibit this senior manager from following a disastrous course of self and turf protection, it will be a constant effort to stay on him and manage the situation that will undoubtedly further drain corporate resources.

Another example is a sales person who recently closed a couple of deals; his first significant sales in roughly 18 months. Between 2007 and ytd 2009 this sales person's business was off by nearly 60%; of course he attributed this to "the economy" and nothing he had any control over. Emboldened by a couple of new deals he is now attempting to hold his company hostage by demanding no less than a 50% increase in his compensation. His rationale is that he's owed extra pay to compensate him for the tough couple of years he's had, never mind his company continues to lose substantial money or that his tough couple of years was a direct reflection of his poor sales performance.
It's as easy to make this a story of individual behavior as it is for me to cite other examples, but I believe the root cause is deeper. Any system that seems to have replaced merit with entitlement, achievment with grandstanding, is badly broken and must be repaired through compelling leadership and reinforced management. We've all let standards devolve over the years and as companies prepare themselves for 2010 I urge them to put an immediate and significant focus on meaningful performance standards.

Let's rebuild our businesses through the sincere efforts of the committed professionalism of top performers...

With Kirk and many like him still very much in my face and on my mind, I was thrilled to run into the Anti-Kirk the other day. The timing couldn't have been any better because focusing our attention on professionals that are part of the proverbial solution, rather than those who define the problem, is the ticket to creating and sustaining high achievement.

For many years I've commuted home on the 8:04 PM Metro North train out of Grand Central Station and it was on this ride I got to know Joe the Conductor. If Joe ever told me his last name I've long since forgotten it, but I've gotten to know him rather well and have always admired his work. When bucketed in to stereotyped categories, Joe (a proud union member working for the Metropolitan Transit Authority on the Metro North New Haven Line where the train cars date back to the 1970's), would seem to be a leading candidate for a horror story. But Joe the Conductor served as a nightly reminder that pride in workmanship, a keen sense of professionalism, and a deep understanding of customer service transcends even the most hardened stereotypes.

Over the years I learned a great deal by watching Joe; the way he handled belligerent drunks, resolved disputes between passengers, calmly dealt with the occasional rider who didn't see any reason to buy a ticket, kept order when trains broke down or were forced to endure delays. Whether it was a cold winter night where several cars didn't have heat or brutally hot summer days when the air conditioning didn't work, Joe stayed in calm control. From time-to-time he would tell me about MTA policies or management decisions that made no sense, occasionally observing that the New Haven line was in sorry shape. Like all of us he undoubtedly had his bad days, felt pressures from professional or personal challenges, but Joe was the rare talent who was able to rise above any of these forces. I never saw him have a bad shift, I can't ever recall him mishandling any situation (and on the 8:04 there were many tough ones, none of them could have been predicted), and he lit up every car of every train with his constant smile.

Joe retired earlier this summer and yet there he was the other night, kicking back as one of the passengers. Maybe it was his farewell tour or perhaps he simply missed being at his office, but it was great seeing him one last time. Seeing Joe the (retired) Conductor again was a much needed reminder for me that companies, industries and the entire economy as a whole can only be rebuilt through the sincere efforts of the highly knowledgeable, the deeply skilled, and the committed professionalism of top performers like Joe.