188•JetWings•May 2015

JetWingsManageMent

Jason Jennings explains the premise of his latest book, The High-Speed Company.

Does not the culture of urgency bring in its wake a pressure to perforM? This 'pressure to perform' is simply a fact of business life and 15 years of intense study has shown us that urgency really does not make the workday more stressful.

• A lack of direction makes the day stressful.

• Seeing good customers leave makes the day stressful.

• Finger pointing makes the day stressful.

• Bureaucracy makes the day stressful.

• Being micromanaged makes the day stressful.

• 20/20 hindsight from headquarters makes the day stressful.

We found less strain, less anxiety, less exhaustion at the high-speed companies we studied because they create a more predictable and productive workplace focused with a clear direction, guiding principles, and the determination that [their first job] is to keep and grow the right customers. Yes, there is the pressure to perform, but helpful feedback from managers, clear accountability, no second-guessing, and great leadership turn performance pressure from a mountain into a molehill.

Jason Jennings is a business thought leader and author of many books including The Reinventors and Think Big, Act Small.

how uphill a task is it to arrive at a Meaningful purpose? From the early days we are taught that being businesslike means being practical, organised, methodical, unemotional, and coldly efficient. But that old-school definition of businesslike misses the incredible innovation and motivation that occurs when executives reconnect their heads with their hearts.

After fifteen years of interviewing and observing business leaders we have found the vast majority began their careers as an effort to find fulfillment; to right wrongs, feed their souls, and do good.

Stan Bergman, the CEO at Henry Schein, who grew up in South Africa, is a terrific example and he told us how he connected his career with his heart.

“My parents made sure I knew what was going on, as the South African government was quite good at insulating white people from the reality of their policies. I got to see the evil right in front of me and compare it to the good I saw my father, a doctor, do to help others. Thankfully for me, what you see at home is what drives you. So when I came to the US and was introduced to Henry Schein, I saw what the former owners were doing to make a difference in the world. The company led the effort to help change generic-drug laws, making lifesaving drugs available for more people, among many other noble efforts. That connected with me. All of us at Henry Schein feel the sense of wrong and are alert to the injustices of our society, and fixing those injustices became our common purpose, along with a commitment to our customers, suppliers, and investors and to growth.”

Today Henry Schein has nearly $10bn in sales with more than 8,00,000 loyal clients. Henry Schein does well,” Bergman says, “because we do good.”

In the book, we give simple practical steps and many examples to follow so [that] any leader who wants to find and then unite everyone around their purpose can do it.

Doesn’t big Data reDuce chances of coMpanies falling prey to the forces of the ‘iMMutable law of suckage’? I believed ‘big data’ would keep business from the clueless decision-making and dropped balls that cause so many good customers to think, “This sucks.” But the early returns haven’t met expectations.

“Fewer than 5% of companies reported that their executives agree on the most fundamental data point of all… specifically what customers need,” said the MIT Management Review. And if you ask the actual customers, as Bain Consultants did after 80% of firms gave themselves a 'superior rating' in customer satisfaction, you’ll find out that 92% of their customers say, “Superior? I don’t think so.”

One of the pioneers in big data, Procter and Gamble, showed us you need more than terabits of data and reams of million dollar surveys to know the customer, adapt, and change your strategy to better fit the changes in the market.

P&G organises off-site conferences for the 1,30,000 members of its global workforce. It takes care of conference business between 7.30 am and noon and then all attendees spend the afternoon outside the hotel listening and learning. Every executive, including the president and the CEO, line up in teams of two and

190•JetWings•May 2015

are driven to meetings with customers. Half the teams visits retailers and the other half will see consumers in their homes.

They do not talk about products. They spend time listening to the thoughts and aspirations, hearing stories about the children, their challenges, and what might make their lives easier and their families happier.

By late afternoon, all the teams gather again in the hotel ballroom. They share what they saw and heard in the form of a story: no analytics and no numbers, just compelling slices of life, complete with pictures taken on smartphones. Stories and first-hand interactions between customers and executives turn big data into the practical wisdom that neutralises the immutable law of suckage.

what Does the journey to stewarDship entail?“To understand the entrepreneurs’ mind,” wrote a Harvard professor, “you should look at the juvenile delinquent.”

“Self interest seeking with guile” (guile meaning slyness, deviousness, or cunning) is expected practice in business, concluded a Nobel Prize-winning economist.

Those are just two examples that feed that

dominant cultural meme—business is filled with executives who are venal, deceitful, Machiavellian monsters. The winning formula in capitalism, we hear and read is, “It’s all about me, me, me”.

But many business leaders have decided to throw off that old stereotype. They’ve realised that lasting satisfaction and greater business success come when leaders feel it’s not mostly about them, and instead accepted that “it’s mostly about other people.” And as they practice that simple guiding principle their journey to becoming a steward begins.

You can follow any of a thousand unique steps on your journey. But they are each the result of deciding it is mostly about your responsibilities… to lead others and leave behind a better world.

Early in his career, CoBank’s CEO, Engel was working for Marine Midland (which eventually became HSBC) and attending his first senior leaders’ meeting. The CEO asked each of the division heads onstage with him to give a summary of his or her business unit’s performance during the previous year. “Each stood up, talked about how well their

business unit had done, how they’d exceeded their plan and each had a great story. When they were done,” Engel says, “the CEO stood up, lowered the head on his six-foot-six-inch frame, and announced the company has just had one of its worst years ever.”

“I was stunned,” recalls Engel. “All those supposed leaders had gamed the system and won and probably got big bonuses while the bank lost. That day I promised myself that for me it would never be about individual wins but the entire team winning. What kind of person would enjoy winning if their team loses?”

A steward learns what not to do from that bad boss. Stewards do not repeat the bad behavior of a flawed father, mother, teacher, or boss. They learn from the missteps of others and do what will help their people, even if that was not done for them.

- As told to Anitha Moosath

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JASON JENNINGS on the need to develop a culture of urgency. [ PAGE-18 ]

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