Leadership Development | Hard Lessons

Turnarounds…

…don’t just happen; not in life, not in businesses, not in churches. When an organization—or person—is in decline, something has to change for the direction to turn upward.

For Ebay, the change was a new CEO: John Donahoe. Ebay’s stock was in free-fall from a peak of $58/share in 2004 to $30/share, and was still declining when Donahoe took the reins on March 31, 2008. It slipped to $10/per share in 2009 (along with the rest of the market), but has since rebounded to $52/share, more than twice as much as the overall market has rebounded.

You can get the whole Ebay story in EBAY’S BACK by J. P. Mangalindan (Fortune, 2/25/2013). But for my purposes in this post, the story is simple: when things are in decline, something has to change. It could mean you have to change. Either the leader has to change, or the organization has to change leaders.

I have been on the receiving end of “change the leader” scenarios. Believe me, it is a lot less painful for the leader to change than it is to change the leader. So, what are you waiting for? Today is a great day to change! Get started.

By the way, this principle applies in your personal life as well. If your health, finances, emotions or relationships are in decline, CHANGE! Waiting for others to change is a waste of time that accomplishes nothing. You change! Start today.

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Quicksand Chicken

As boys growing up in SW Oklahoma, our only swimming holes were stock tanks, or the Red River. Most of the year and especially during summer, the river was just a dry, wide bed of sand, some of which was quicksand.

One of our summertime games was called quicksand chicken. The winner was whoever would sink the deepest before being pulled out by his buddies. Stupid? Not so much. Unlike in the movies where the quicksand swallows up entire wagon trains, it is usually only a couple of feet deep. So somewhere about the knees or thighs, we usually hit firm sand, and if we didn’t, the cry was “chicken, chicken, get me out of here.”

Life and leadership can often be like playing quicksand chicken. So a few good things to remember are:

Quicksand is often hidden under a hard, but thin, crust of sand. It doesn’t take much to break through and start sinking. So be careful where you walk.
Don’t carry extra weight into quicksand; the normal weight of life and leadership is heavy enough.
Until you know for sure whether it is quicksand or not, it’s a good thing to stay close to the river bank so you can grab something if you start to sink.
Don’t get in quicksand alone. Have a buddy who can help out if you start to sink.
If you get in quicksand, you will start to sink, but don’t panic. Not much good happens in life or leadership when panic sets in.
Don’t be stubborn and go under. Get help or get out.

Unless you are super-cautious and unadventurous, you are likely to get in quicksand at some point. So expect it and don’t be surprised. If you have a quicksand escape plan, you have a good chance of getting out before you are up to your neck in…well, quicksand.

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Chasing The Stagecoach

Old B&W westerns with stagecoach chases are near the top of my list for spending downtime. Invariably, the robbers wait on a hill, let the stagecoach pass, and then give chase. The chase can go on for miles with both the chasing horses and the coach at top speed. I have never understood why the robbers don’t surprise the coach from the front rather than chase it from behind. (I suppose stagecoach robbers are not too smart and chase scenes are more exciting for movie audiences.)

Here are a few truths about stagecoach chases that apply to a lot of things in life:

No horse on planet earth can run as long and as hard as the ones in stagecoach chases. Not even Union Rags (who ran the 1½-mile 2012 Belmont Stakes in 2 min., 30 sec.) could chase down a stagecoach from 300-400 yards behind. Do you think a run-of-the-mill cowpony could?
You can’t shoot a stagecoach driver with a six gun from 100 yards while riding a horse at full gallop.
The cash box always has the miners’ payroll. Miners aren’t paid much so don’t expect to get rich chasing down and robbing stagecoaches.
There is rarely a beautiful girl in the stagecoach waiting for you to rescue her.
If your horse doesn’t die and you get in a lucky shot, you don’t get to spend the loot in Acapulco; your reward is getting to hide out in a rundown cabin at the end of a dead end canyon with John Wayne waiting to pick you off when you make a trip to the privy.

So how does this apply to you? If you are worn out chasing something and your horse is about dead, if all your best shots have missed, if your dream (the beautiful girl or miners’ payroll) seems further away than ever, the remedy is QUIT CHASING SOMEONE ELSE’S STAGECOACH AND GET YOUR OWN. Quit chasing and get out front. Quit dreaming and go to work. Quit wishing you were Steve Jobs or whoever, and be yourself. There are a lot of successful stagecoach lines and there is always room for one more, but put your own name and brand on it rather than trying to borrow (steal) someone else’s. It’s a lot easier, and a lot more satisfying.

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Side Effects

It must have happened something like this:

Henry: “Hey, Henrietta (Henry’s wife), this Loniten is a miracle drug. I feel great! My blood pressure is down to normal!”

Henrietta: “Yeah, and you’re lookin’ better too.”

Henry: “Why so?”

Henrietta: “You have fuzz on your bald spot—your hair is coming back.”

Henry: “Really? Wow. I wonder what brought that on?”

What we now know as Rogaine was originally an antihypertensive vasodilator drug used to treat high blood pressure. One of its side effects was (and still is) stimulating hair regrowth. So Loniten was repurposed from the heart to the head and renamed Rogaine.

Side effects aren’t usually positive. Listen to the fast-speaking part of drug ads and you’ll be scared to death by the “rare, but has been known to cause….”

Like drugs, organizations have a lot of side effects, usually caused by the leader’s style.

If you lead as a boss, the side effect will be that best and brightest in your organization won’t stay long.

If you use anger as a leadership tool, the side effect will be pervasive fear that buries the truth.

If the leader has favorites, the side effect will be losing the support and respect of the non-favorites.

If command and control is the leadership style, the side effect will be an organization full of yes men who never question or challenge decisions—even really bad ones.

If the organization is stuck and unwilling to change, the side effect will be obsolescence and eventually, disappearance.

I could give a lot of other examples, but the point is, remember this: everything you do—at work, at home, at church, etc.—will have a side effect. It is up to you whether it will be positive or negative.

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Want To Make The Forbes List? Start With…

There are several “Best Places To Work” articles in business publications every year. Fortune magazine featured its “100 best” in the February 4^th edition. The list includes all the usual suspects with Google as #1 for the 4^th time. Technology, healthcare, consulting, service and similar companies dominate the various lists; coal mining, farming, and manufacturing aren’t much in vogue when it comes to “best places to work.”

Perks like onsite healthcare and recreation (Google has shuffleboard, basketball, horseshoe pits, etc.), high pay including 401K matching, flex time, sabbaticals, and lots of community involvement are tickets to making the lists. Who wouldn’t want to work for such companies?

But here is the hard truth: a company can offer all that and more and still be a lousy place to work if led and managed by “jerks.” Plante Moran, #25 on Fortune’s list, claims they are “relatively jerk-free.” My guess is they’ll stay on the list a long time if they remain jerk-free.

Nothing affects an employee’s workday—for good or bad—as much as the immediate supervisor/manager of the employee. People do not want to work for jerks—especially the best and brightest who can always find a job somewhere else with the same or better perks, but without the jerks.

Is morale low in your organization? Are you having trouble keeping the stars and “up-and-comers”? If either answer is “yes,” the problem may be too many jerks in leadership. Get rid of them. You can try reforming them, but it doesn’t often work. (Hopefully, the jerk isn’t you.)

Start today to transform your organization into a “jerk-free” zone. Maybe you’ll make the Forbes list someday.

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The Moody Way

One of my heroes in life, Ed Moody, passed a few weeks ago. Ed was one of the three or four finest men I have ever known (and I’ve been around long enough to know a lot of men). He is a legend here in Franklin (TN), and so is the business he started back in the ‘40s with his brother, Tom: Moody’s Tires.

At Moody’s, the focus is on serving people, not selling to customers. Ed has been known to replace a faulty tire he didn’t sell in the first place. Why? “People come back. Customers may not.” Tire rotation is free at Moody’s and they don’t ask whether you bought the tires there or not. Why? “People come back. Customers go shopping.” And I do. Year after year, for tires or whatever I need. Why? They treat me like a people, not like a customer.

So whatever you are doing in life, if you’ll focus on serving, not selling (tires or yourself), you have a great chance of being successful, maybe even for as long as the Moodys have.

By the way, the Moody Way continues as the store is now run by a second generation Moody, Jim, and a third generation Moody is waiting in the wings. I suspect they’ll be around serving people for another 60+ years.

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"Wet Bias"

“Prejudice…partiality…predisposition” are words used to define bias. Based on that, everyone is biased, including me…and you. The Weather Channel is too.

The Weather Channel (TWC) has what the WSJ (1/26-27/2013) calls “wet bias,” meaning that when the next day forecast is iffy, TWC will shade the forecast toward rain so we will be pleasantly surprised if the forecast is wrong. In fact, the next day’s weather will be better than forecasted about 50% more often than it will be worse than forecasted.

What does this have to do with life and leadership? Everything we hear from people in business (or at home or at church or wherever) is likely to have some bias in it. Most of us have a “bias set”: we are likely to be predisposed that it will rain (negative or glass half empty bias) or predisposed that it will be sunny (positive or glass half full bias). I tend a bit toward wet bias; my wife, Dottie, tends a bit toward sunny bias.

The life and leadership relevance is:

● Know your own bias

● Know the bias of those you receive input/advice from

● Don’t ignore input because of bias, just be aware of it

● Don’t label wet bias people as overly negative and don’t label sunny bias people as overly positive

Always remember that a 30% chance of rain tomorrow actually means there is a 70% chance it won’t rain. Plan your day accordingly; make sure you have an umbrella in the trunk, but don’t cancel the picnic.

[By the way, I have a positive bias about my just released book, 16 Stones: Raising the Level of Your Leadership One Stone at a Time. Check it out at www.16stonesbook.com]

The catalyst for this post was a WSJ article by Carl Bialik, Some Percentages Are Just Fair-Weather Friends (26-27 January 2013).

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Why Employees LUV It

Year after year, Southwest Airlines makes one or more of the various “Best Places To Work” lists. In some years (e.g., 2009), they are #1—THE best place to work.

In addition to being a great place to work, Southwest has been profitable for 40 consecutive years. Unlike all its major competitors, it has never filed for bankruptcy, and like all its major competitors, it is heavily unionized.

There are a lot of reasons for Southwest’s success: strategy, focus, execution, and so on. A big part of their success is a simple leadership philosophy that founder and chairman emeritus, Herb Kelleher, recently summarized in a Fortune interview:

“Be there when they’re [employees] having problems, and stay out of the way when things are going well.”
“Power should be reserved for weightlifting and boats…leadership really involves responsibility.”
“…if you regard being a CEO as important because it’s a powerful position, you’re always going to regret that at some point you have to step down.”

(From Still Crazy After All These Years, Interview by Jennifer Reingold, Fortune, 1/14/2013. The next time you hanging in the airport news-stand, pick up Fortune; it’s always worth the price.)

It is unnecessary for me to add to what Kelleher had to say. All of us would be better leaders if we took his words to heart at work, home, church, wherever.

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Remembering MLK Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr. would make any thinking persons’ list of the top five 20^th Century leaders in America. Who else would you put on the list? (Send in a comment and I’ll post it for everyone to see.)

Monday (1/21) is MLK Jr. Day. I will join in the celebration at Williamson College; millions more will observe the day all across the US. For African-Americans, MLK Jr. Day is more significant than July 4^th—they were still slaves in 1776.

We tend to think of MLK Jr. in terms of the civil rights movement of the ‘60s—and well we should. But in this post, I want to remember him by sharing some of his thoughts about life in general.

I wish our politicians of all stripes were not guilty of…
MLK Jr.: Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.

Are you in a job that seems insignificant? It’s not!
MLK Jr.: All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.

What are you most concerned about: how you live or how long you will live?
MLK Jr.: The quality, not the longevity, of one’s life is what is important.

Go ahead and do that thing that you have been putting of because it is hard.
MLK Jr.: We are faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. Procrastination is still the thief of time.

Before you judge someone, make sure he has a pair of boots.
MLK Jr.: It’s all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps.

There are about 38 million African-Americans who are distinctly better off because of the life of Martin Luther King Jr.; actually, all of us are distinctly better off because of the life of Martin Luther King Jr.

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Herding Cats

Annabelle (picture) showed up on my daughter’s (Cathy) doorstep about 15 years ago. Minnie showed up on my other daughter’s (Elizabeth) doorstep last summer. Nuisance “turned up one day at our window, a little black cat with bowlegs and signs of the stress that spending too long outside alone can bring” (“our window” referring to the home of Gwyn Teatro).

If you have a cat, you know that the expression “herding cats” is an overstatement. You can’t herd even one cat. And the truth is, you can’t herd people either.

For the rest of Nuisance’s story and its parallels to relationships at home or in the workplace, read Gwen Teatro’s post at http://gwynteatro.wordpress.com/2012/12/23/four-leadership-reminders-from-nuisance-the-cat

Gwyn Teatro is always worth reading, and Nuisance’s story is both amusing (especially if you have ever been adopted by a cat) and thought provoking.

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