Welcome to Tom Peters “PowerPoint World”! Beyond the set of slides here,
you will find at tompeters.com the last eight years of presentations, a
basketful of “Special Presentations,” and, above all, Tom’s constantly
updated Master Presentation—from which most of the slides in this
presentation are drawn. There are about 3,500 slides in the 7-part “Master
Presentation.” The first five “chapters” constitute the main argument:
Part I is context. Part II is devoted entirely to innovation—the sine qua
non, as perhaps never before, of survival. In earlier incarnations of the
“master,” “innovation” “stuff” was scattered throughout the presentation—
now it is front and center and a stand-alone. Part III is a variation on the
innovation theme—but it is organized to examine the imperative (for most
everyone in the developed-emerging world) of an ultra high value-added
strategy. A “value-added ladder” (the “ladder” configuration lifted with
gratitude from Joe Pine and Jim Gilmore’s Experience Economy) lays out a
specific logic for necessarily leaving commodity-like goods and services in
the dust. Part IV argues that in this age of “micro-marketing” there are
two macro-markets of astounding size that are dramatically underattended by all but a few; namely women and boomers-geezers. Part V
underpins the overall argument with the necessary bedrock—Talent, with
brief consideration of Education & Healthcare. Part VI examines
Leadership for turbulent times from several angles. Part VII is a
collection of a dozen Lists—such as Tom’s “Irreducible 209,” 209 “things
I’ve learned along the way.”
Enjoy! Download! “Steal”—that’s the whole point!
To appreciate
this presentation [and ensure
that it is not a mess], you need
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Tom Peters’
EXCELLENCE.
ALWAYS.
Global Leaders
Gallagher Estate/12.03.2008
Slides at …
tompeters.com
Part I
EXCELLENCE.
ALWAYS.
Essentials.
#1/14
“Excellence can be obtained if you:
... care more than others think
is wise;
... risk more than others think
is safe;
... dream more than others think
is practical;
... expect more than others think
is possible.”
Source: Anon. (Posted @ tompeters.com by
K.Sriram, November 27, 2006 1:17 AM)
MBWA
“20-minute
rule”
—Craig Johnson/30 yrs
5,000 miles for
a 5-minute
face-to
-face meeting
*
*Hank Paulson, China visits, Fortune 1127.06
“I call 60 CEOs
to
wish them happy
New Year. …”
[in
the first week of the year]
—Hank Paulson, former CEO, Goldman Sachs
Source: Fortune, “Secrets of Greatness,” 0320.05
MBWA, Grameen Style!
“Conventional banks ask their clients to come
to their office. It’s a terrifying place for the poor
and illiterate. … The entire Grameen Bank
system runs on the principle that people
should not come to the bank, the bank
should go to the people. … If any staff
member is seen in the office, it should be taken
as a violation of the rules of the Grameen Bank.
… It is essential that [those setting up a new
village Branch] have no office and no place to
stay. The reason is to make us as different as
possible from government officials.”
Source: Muhammad Yunus, Banker to the Poor
The “Have
you …” 50
“Mapping your
competitive
position”
or …
1. Have you in the last 10 days … visited a
customer?
2. Have you called a customer … TODAY?
3. Have you in the last 60-90 days … had a seminar in which several folks from the
customer’s operation (different levels, different functions, different divisions) interacted,
via facilitator, with various of your folks?
4. Have you thanked a front-line employee for a
small act of helpfulness … in the last three days?
5. Have you thanked a front-line employee for a small act of helpfulness … in the
last three hours?
6. Have you thanked a frontline employee for carrying around a great attitude … today?
7. Have you in the last week recognized—publicly—one of your folks for a small act of
cross-functional co-operation?
8. Have you in the last week recognized—publicly—one of “their” folks (another function)
for a small act of cross-functional co-operation?
9. Have you invited in the last month a leader of another function to your weekly team
priorities meeting?
10. Have you personally in the last week-month called-visited an internal or external
customer to sort out, inquire, or apologize for some little or big thing that went awry? (No
reason for doing so? If true—in your mind—then you’re more out of touch than I dared
imagine.)
1. Have you in the
last 10 days … visited
a customer?
2. Have you called a
customer … TODAY?
You = Your
calendar*
*Calendars
never lie
Conrad Hilton, at a gala celebrating his life,
was asked, “What was the most important lesson you’ve learned
in you long and distinguished career?”
His immediate answer:
“remember
to tuck the
shower curtain
inside the
bathtub”
2-cent
candy
<TGW
vs.
>TGR
“one idea.”
1966-2008.
What makes
God laugh?
People
making
plans!
“This is so simple it sounds stupid, but it is amazing
how few oil people really understand that
you only find
oil if you drill
wells.
You may think you’re finding it
when you’re drawing maps and
studying logs, but you have to drill.”
Source: The Hunters, by John Masters, Canadian O & G wildcatter
“We made mistakes, of course. Most of them were
omissions we didn’t think of when we initially wrote the
software. We fixed them by doing it over and over, again
and again. We do the same today. While our competitors
are still sucking their thumbs trying to make the design
perfect, we’re already on prototype version
#5.
By
the time our rivals are
ready with wires and screws, we are on version
#10. It gets back to planning
versus acting: We act from day
one; others plan how to plan—
for months.” —Bloomberg by Bloomberg
“Fail .
Forward.
Fast.”
High Tech CEO, Pennsylvania
“You miss
100% of
the shots you
never take.”
—Wayne Gretzky
Joe J. Jones
1942 – 2008
HE WOULDA DONE SOME
REALLY COOL STUFF
BUT …
HIS BOSS WOULDN’T
HIM!
LET
“one idea.”
1966-2008.
ry it. Try it. Screw
t up. Try it. Try it
Try it. Try it. Try it
ry it. Screw it up
Try it. Try it. try i
ry it. Screw it up
“one point
one idea/s.”
1966-2007.
“Execution is
strategy.”
—Fred Malek
“Execution is
the job of the
business
leader.”
—Larry Bossidy & Ram
Charan/ Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done
“Execution =
Deepest “Blue
Ocean”
The “XF-50”: 50 Ways to
Enhance CrossFunctional
Effectiveness and
Deliver Speed, “Service
Excellence” and “Valueadded Customer
‘Solutions’”
1. It’s
our organization to make work—or not. It’s not “them,” the
outside world that’s the problem. The enemy is us. Period.
2. Friction-free! Dump 90% of “middle managers”—most are advertent or inadvertent “power
freaks.” We are all—every one of us—in the Friction Removal Business, one moment at a time,
now and forevermore.
3. No “stovepipes”! “Stove-piping,” “Silo-ing” is an Automatic Firing Offense. Period. No
appeals. (Within the limits of civility, somewhat “public” firings are not out of the question—that
is, make one and all aware why the axe fell.)
4. Everything on the Web. This helps. A lot. (“Everything” = Big word.)
5. Open access. All available to all. Transparency, beyond a level that’s “sensible,” is a de facto
imperative in a Burn-the-Silos strategy.
Project managers rule!! Project managers running XF (crossfunctional) projects are the Elite of the organization, and seen as
such and treated as such. (The likes of construction companies
have practiced this more or less forever.)
6.
7. “Value-added Proposition” = Application of integrated resources. (From the entire supplychain.) To deliver on our emergent business raison d’etre, and compete with the likes of our
Chinese and Indian brethren, we must co-operate with anybody and everybody “24/7.” IBM, UPS
and many, many others are selling far more than a product or service that works—the new “it” is
pure and simple a product of XF co-operation; “the product is the co-operation” is not much of a
stretch.
The last
word:
There is
no “last
word.”
TP#1*:
Netscape!
*Where would you rather have worked for those 5 years, Netscape
or IBM-HP-Microsoft-Oracle? (Where, 25 years from now, would you
rather to be able to tell someone—e.g., grandchild—that you worked?)
Built to Last
vs
Built to
Change/Rock
the World
“How to flush
$500,000 down
the toilet in one
easy lesson!!”
TP:
< CAPEX
> People!
Brand =
Talent.
2/year =
legacy.
#1 cause of
Dis-satisfaction?
‘do’
“Leaders
people.
Period.”
—Anon.
“The role of the Director is to create a
space where the actors and
become more
than they’ve ever been
before, more than
they’ve dreamed of
being.”
actresses can
—Robert Altman, Oscar acceptance speech
“Leaders
‘SERVE’
people.
Period.”
—inspired by Robert Greenleaf
“No matter what the
situation, [the excellent
manager’s] first response is
always to think about the
individual concerned and
how things can be arranged
to help that individual
experience success.”
—Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing You Need to Know
“We are a
‘Life Success’
Company.”
Dave Liniger, founder, RE/MAX
“Do one thing
every day
that scares
you.”
—Eleanor Roosevelt
Kevin Roberts’ Credo
1. Ready. Fire! Aim.
2. If it ain’t broke ... Break it!
3. Hire crazies.
4. Ask dumb questions.
5. Pursue failure.
6. Lead, follow ... or get out of the way!
7. Spread confusion.
8. Ditch your office.
9. Read odd stuff.
10.
Avoid moderation!
“Normal” =
“o for 800”
The “Hang Out Axiom”: At
its core, every (!!!)
relationship-partnership
decision (employee,
vendor, customer, etc)
is a strategic decision
about:
“Innovate,
‘Yes’ or ‘No’ ”
“Every child is
born an artist.
The trick is to
remain an
artist.” —Picasso
“My wife and I went to a [kindergarten] parent-teacher conference
and were informed that our budding refrigerator artist, Christopher,
would be receiving a grade of Unsatisfactory in art. We were
shocked. How could any child—let alone our child—receive a poor
His teacher
informed us that he had
refused to color within the
lines, which was a state
requirement for
demonstrating ‘grade-level
motor skills.’ ”
grade in art at such a young age?
—Jordan Ayan, AHA!
Muhammad Yunus:
“All human beings
are entrepreneurs. When we
were in the caves we were all selfemployed . . . finding our food, feeding
ourselves. That’s where human history
began . . . As civilization came we
suppressed it. We became labor
because they stamped us, ‘You are
labor.’ We forgot that we are
entrepreneurs.”
Source: Muhammad Yunus/2006 Nobel Peace prize winner,
father of micro-lending /The News Hour—PBS/1122.2006
Single
greatest act
of pure
imagination
“Strive for
Excellence.
Ignore
success.”
—Bill Young, race car
driver (courtesy Andrew Sullivan)
Excellence1982: The Bedrock “Eight Basics”
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
A Bias for Action
Close to the Customer
Autonomy and Entrepreneurship
Productivity Through People
Hands On, Value-Driven
Stick to the Knitting
Simple Form, Lean Staff
Simultaneous Loose-Tight
Properties”
“Breakthrough” 82*
People!
Customers!
Action!
Values!
*In Search of Excellence
Hard Is Soft
Soft Is Hard
Hard Is Soft (Plans, #s)
Soft Is Hard (people,
customers, values,
relationships))
“If I could have chosen not to tackle the IBM culture head-on, I
probably wouldn’t have. My bias coming in was toward strategy,
analysis and measurement. In comparison, changing the
attitude and behaviors of hundreds of thousands of people is
[Yet] I came to see in
my time at IBM that culture
isn’t just one aspect of the
very, very hard.
game —it is the
game.”
—Lou Gerstner,
Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance
Hard Is Soft
Soft Is Hard
“What I learned from my years
as a hostage negotiator is that
we do not have to feel
powerless—and that
bonding
is the antidote to
the hostage situation.” —George
Kohlrieser, Hostage at the Table
“The terms ‘hard facts,’ and
‘the soft stuff’ used in business
imply that data are somehow
real and strong while emotions
are weak and less important.” —
George Kohlrieser, Hostage at the Table
Women’s Negotiating Strengths
*Ability to put themselves in their
counterparties’ shoes
*Comprehensive, attentive and detailed
communication style
*Empathy that facilitates trust-building
*Curious and attentive listening
*Less competitive attitude
*Strong sense of fairness and ability to persuade
*Proactive risk manager
*Collaborative decision-making
Source: Horacio Falcao, Cover story/May 2006, World Business, “Say It
Like a Woman: Why the 21st-century negotiator will need the female touch”
Hard Is Soft
Soft Is Hard
R.O.I.R.
Return On
Investment In
Relationships
“TAKE THIS QUICK QUIZ: Who manages more things
at once? Who puts more effort into their
appearance? Who usually takes care of the
details? Who finds it easier to meet new
people? Who asks more questions in a
conversation? Who is a better listener? Who
has more interest in communication skills?
Who is more inclined to get involved? Who
encourages harmony and agreement? Who has
better intuition? Who works with a longer ‘to
do’ list? Who enjoys a recap to the day’s
events? Who is better at keeping in touch
with others?”
Source: Selling Is a Woman’s Game: 15 Powerful Reasons Why
Women Can Outsell Men, Nicki Joy & Susan Kane-Benson
“Courtesies of a small and
trivial character are the
ones which strike
deepest in the grateful
and appreciating heart.”
—Henry Clay
Thank
you!!!
Relationships
(of all varieties):
THERE
ONCE WAS A TIME WHEN A
THREE-MINUTE
PHONE CALL WOULD
HAVE AVOIDED SETTING OFF THE
DOWNWARD SPIRAL THAT RESULTED
IN A COMPLETE RUPTURE.
THE PROBLEM IS
RARELY/NEVER THE
PROBLEM. THE
RESPONSE TO THE
PROBLEM INVARIABLY
ENDS UP BEING THE
REAL PROBLEM.
“I’m
really
sorry.”
“I screwed
up.”
Attending to
the “Last 98%”:
The New
Management “Science,”
or …
“Hard Is Soft,
Soft Is Hard”
Tom Peters/12.03.2008
S = f( ___ )
Success Is a
Function of …
S = f(#&DR; -2L, -3L, 4L; I&E)
Number and depth of relationships 2, 3, and 4 levels down,
inside and outside the organization
S = f(SD>SU)
Sucking down is more important than sucking up—the idea is to have
the entire organization working for you.
S = f(#non-FF, #non-FL)
Number of friends, number of lunches with people not in my function
S = f(#FF)
Number of friends in the finance function-organization
S = f(OF)
Oddball friends
S = f(PDL)
Purposeful, deep listening—this is very hard
S + f(#EODD3MC)
Number of end-of-the-day difficult (you’d rather avoid) “3-minutecalls” that
soothe raw feelings, mend fences, etc
S = f(UFP, UFK, OAPS)
Unsolicited favors performed, UFs involving co-workers’ kids, overt acts
politeness-solicitude toward co-workers’ spouses, parents, etc.
S = f(#TN)
Number of thank you notes sent
S = f(#C, PTS/“OLC”, SAPA)
# of consultations, perception of being taken serious (Responsible for “one line of
code,” small act of public appreciation
S = f(SU)
Showing up (Woody Allen, Deleware’s ridiculous influence on the
U.S. Constitution)
S = f(1D)
Seeking the assignment of writing first drafts, minutes, etc (1787)
S = f(#SEAs)
Number of solid relationships with Executive Assistants
S = f(%UL/w-m)
% useful lunches per week, month
S = f(FG,FOC-BOF, CMO)
Favors given, favors owed collectively, balance of favors,
conscious management thereof
S = f(CPRM, TS)
Conscious-planned Relationship management, time spent thereon
S = f(TN/d, FG/m, AA/d)
Thank you notes per Day, flowers given per Month, Acts of Appreciation per Day
S = f(PT100%A“T”S, E“NMF”—TTT)
Proactive, timely, 100% apologies for “tiny” screwups, even if not my fault
(it always takes two to tango)
FLOWER
FLOWER
POWER
POWER
S = f(AMR, NBS-SG)
Acceptance of mutual responsibilities for all affairs, no blameshifting, scape-goating
S = f(APLSLFCT)
Awareness, perception of little snubs—and lightening fast
correction thereof
S = f(G)
Grace
S = f(GA)
Grace toward adversary
S = f(GW)
Grace toward the wounded in bureaucratic firefights
S = f(PD)
Purposeful decency
S = f(TSPD, TSP-L1)
Time spent on promotion decisions, especially for 1st level managers
S = f(%“SS”, H-PD)
% soft stuff involved in Hiring, Promotion decisions
S = (TWA, P, NP)
Time wandering around, purposeful, non-planned
S = f(SBS)
Slack built into Schedule
S= f(TSHR)
Time spent … Hurdle Removing
S = f(%TM“TSS,” PM“TSS,”
D“TD”“TSS”)
% of time, measured, on This Soft Stuff, purposeful management of this Soft
Stuff, daily “to do” concerning “this Soft Stuff”
S = f(MB“TSS”MR)
Purposeful management of this Soft Stuff by people reporting to me
S = f(EC, MMO)
Emotional connection, mgt & maintenance of
S = f(IMDOP)
Investment in Mastery of detailed organization processes
S = f(H-TS)
Time spent on Hiring
S = f(%TM“TSS,”
PM“TSS,”
D“TD”“TSS”)
% of time, measured, on This Soft Stuff,
purposeful management of this Soft Stuff, daily
“to do” concerning “this Soft Stuff”
Q: But where’s
the beef?
A: This
is
the beef!
“Hard” is
“soft.”
“Soft” Is
“hard.”
Don’t forget
the “it”!
“It suddenly
occurred to me …
“It suddenly occurred
to me that in the space
of two or three hours
never
he
talked
about cars.” —Les Wexner
Franchise Lost!
TP:
“How many of you
really
[600]
crave a
new Chevy?”
NYC/IIR/061205
Did one of ’em ever turn to the
other and say: “Wow I wonder
what unimaginable new tools,
otherwise not possible, will
be quickly brought forth for
my 19-year-old daughter
Anne because of
this deal?”
Who buys “it” I:
Sunset for men!
“Forget China,
India and the
Internet: Economic
Growth Is Driven
by
Women.”
—Headline,
Economist, April 15, 2006, Leader, page 14
“Women are
the majority
market”
—Fara Warner/The Power of the Purse
“Goldman Sachs in Tokyo has
developed an index of 115
companies poised to benefit from
women’s increased purchasing
power; over the past decade the
value of shares in Goldman’s
basket has risen by 96%, against
the Tokyo stockmarket’s rise
of 13%.” —Economist, April 15
most significant
variable in every
“The
sales situation is the
gender
of the buyer, and
more importantly, how the
salesperson communicates
to the buyer’s gender.”
—Jeffery Tobias Halter, Selling to Men, Selling to Women
The Perfect Answer
Jill and Jack buy
slacks in black…
“One thing is certain: Women’s rise to power,
which is linked to the increase in wealth per
capita, is happening in all domains and at all
levels of society. Women are no longer content
to provide efficient labor or to be consumers
with rising budgets and more autonomy to
spend. … This is just the beginning. The
phenomenon will only grow as girls prove to be
more successful than boys in the school
For a number of observers, we
have already entered the age of
‘womenomics,’ the economy as
thought out and practiced by a
woman.” —Aude Zieseniss de Thuin, Financial Times, 10.03.2006
system.
“AS LEADERS,
WOMEN
RULE:
New Studies find that
female managers outshine their male
counterparts in almost every measure”
TITLE/ Special Report/ BusinessWeek
Women Leaders’ Time Has Come …
Project team (old): 23 people, all from our company (More
or less amenable to “orders”)
Project team (new): 43 people from 7 companies in 4
countries on 3 continents (Moved only by effective
persuasion and development of common commitment)
“Worker,” circa 1982: Rote work, incl. most white-collar
work (Amenable to “orders,” power exercised directly)
“Worker,” circa 2007: Project work, team work, mixedgroup work, creative work, co-creation with client—
microprocessors do the “rote stuff” (Commitment is
voluntary, leadership is by developing positive
relationships, inducing “creatives” to stretch, power
exercised indirectly)
“So ….”
TP: “Okay, okay, you
got me. ExCom, at
start, 2F of 11, 18months later, 9F of
18.”
CEO/F:
10 UNASSAILABLE REASONS WOMEN RULE
Women make [all] the financial decisions.
Women control [all] the wealth.
Women [substantially] outlive men.
Women start most of the new businesses.
Women’s work force participation rates have
soared worldwide.
Women are closing in on “same pay for same
job.”
Women are penetrating senior ranks rapidly
[even if the pace is slow for the corner
office per se].
Women’s leadership strengths are exceptionally well
aligned with new organizational effectiveness
imperatives.
Women are better salespersons than men.
Women buy [almost] everything—commercial
as well as consumer goods.
So what exactly is the point of men?
Who buys “it” II:
Sunrise for
old folks!
2000-2010 Stats
18-44: -1%
55+: +21%
(55-64:
+47%)
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“People turning 50
more
than half of
today have
their adult life
ahead of them.”
—Bill Novelli,
50+: Igniting a Revolution to Reinvent America
“gurugate”: The
Gurus’ fixation with
“the wrong stuff”*
*Not “they,” but “us.”
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
You don’t
get better by
being bigger.
You get
worse.”
Dick Kovacevich:
“Mr. Foster and his McKinsey
colleagues collected detailed
performance data stretching back 40
years for 1,000 U.S. companies. They
none
found that
of the longterm survivors managed to outperform
the market. Worse, the longer
companies had been in the database,
the worse they did.” —Financial Times
“I am often asked by would-be entrepreneurs
seeking escape from life within huge corporate
structures, ‘How do I build a small firm for
Buy
a very large one
and just wait.”
myself?’ The answer seems obvious:
—Paul Ormerod, Why Most Things Fail:
Evolution, Extinction and Economics
#4 Japan
#2T china
#2t USA
#1 Germany
Reason!!!
Mittelstand
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
Family Businesses
Two-thirds of total #s
of companies
One-half of biggest companies
>One-half GDP
>One-half employment
6% more profitable
7% better ROA
Higher income growth
Higher revenue growth
Source: John Davis, HBS
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
Jim’s
Group
Jim’s Mowing Canada
Jim’s Mowing UK
Jim’s Antennas
Jim’s Bookkeeping
Jim’s Building Maintenance
Jim’s Carpet Cleaning
Jim’s Car Cleaning
Jim’s Computer Services
Jim’s Dog Wash
Jim’s Driving School
Jim’s Fencing
Jim’s Floors
Jim’s Painting
Jim’s Paving
Jim’s Pergolas [gazebos]
Jim’s Pool Care
Jim’s Pressure Cleaning
Jim’s Roofing
Jim’s Security Doors
Jim’s Trees
Jim’s Window Cleaning
Jim’s Windscreens
Note: Download, free, Jim Penman’s book:
What Will They Franchise Next? The Story of Jim’s Group
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
“Natural selection is death. ...
Without huge amounts of
death, organisms do not
change over time. ... Death
is the mother of structure. ...
It took four billion years of
death ... to invent the human
mind ...” — The Cobra Event
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
Mission impossible?
$36B/’98
minus
$675M/‘07
Market capitalization
lost per day, 19982007:
$10,000,000/Day
*Lived in same town all adult life
*First generation that’s wealthy/
no parental support
*“Don’t look like millionaires, don’t
dress like millionaires, don’t eat like
millionaires, don’t act like millionaires”
*“Many of the types of businesses [they] are in could be
classified as ‘dull-normal.’ [They] are welding contractors,
auctioneers, scrap-metal dealers, lessors of portable toilets,
dry cleaners, re-builders of diesel engines, paving
contractors …”
Source: The Millionaire Next Door, Thomas Stanley & William Danko
Over-rated:
Big companies!
Public companies!
“Cool” industries!
Stability (“Built to last”)!
Famous CEOs!
The “Fabulous Five”:
*SMEs!
*Private companies!
*“Dull” industries!
*Productive churn:
Built to Rock the
World!
*Laudable CEOs!
And in
conclusion …
Sir Richard’s Rules:
Follow your passions.
Keep it simple.
Get the best people to help you.
Re-create yourself.
Play.
Source: Fortune on Branson
The greatest danger
for most of us
is not that our aim is
too high
and we miss it,
but that it is
too low
and we reach it.
Michelangelo
And in
conclusion …
The Common CEO Lament:
“If everything had been
good, then everything
would have been fine.”*
*Annual Reports: Good, “Our strategy …
Bad, “Unexpected …”
Black Swans: This
is how you earn
your pay!* **
*See: The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly
Improbable, Nassim Nicholas Taleb
*WSC: “When the seas are calm all ships alike
show mastership in sailing.”
#14/14
“Excellence can be obtained if you:
... care more than others think
is wise;
... risk more than others think
is safe;
... dream more than others think
is practical;
... expect more than others think
is possible.”
Source: Anon. (Posted @ tompeters.com by
K.Sriram, November 27, 2006 1:17 AM)
If Not
Excellence,
What?
bonus
The Eight
Basics of
Excellence:
Two Points
of View
One: A bias for action: a preference for doing something anything - rather than sending a question through cycles and
cycles of analyses and committee reports.
One: A bias for action: a preference for doing something anything - rather than sending a question through cycles and
cycles of analyses and committee reports. Understanding
that experimentation (trial & error), not theory, is the bedrock
of the scientific method and enterprise Excellence alike.
Two: Staying close to the customer – learning his preferences
and catering to them.
Two: Staying close to the customer – learning her
preferences, catering to her needs, engaging her in a
partnership, creating experiences for her that unleash the
sustainability of loyalty and the power of word-of-mouth
recommendation.
Three: Autonomy and entrepreneurship - breaking the corporation
into small companies and encouraging them to think
independently and competitively.
Three: Autonomy and entrepreneurship - breaking the corporation
into small companies, and the company into small groups—and
encouraging them all to think imaginatively, to “own” their part of
the enterprise, and to be accountable for their results.
Four: Productivity through people – creating in all employees the
awareness that their best efforts are essential and that they will
share in the rewards of the company’s success.
Four: Productivity through people – practicing “servant
leadership,” realizing that the leader’s job in pursuit of Excellence
is first and last and foremost to develop unsurpassable
competitive advantage through turned on, eternally growing,
highly committed talent in every position. To a large extent, This
Is Our Mission!
Five: Hands-on, value driven – insisting that
executives keep in touch with the firm’s essential
business.
Five: Hands-on, value driven – staying in close
personal touch with the action and actors “on the
ground,” no matter the distractions of other priorities,
through daily MBWA/Managing By Wandering Around.,
Preaching and “living” the “Gospel” of Excellence.
Six: Stick to the knitting – remaining with the business
the company knows best.
Six: Stick to the knitting – learning, growing, branching
out, but favoring organic growth and not straying
beyond the core competencies that are the basis of our
sustainable Excellence.
Seven: Simple form, lean staff – few administrative
layers, few people at the upper levels.
Seven: Simple form, lean staff – few administrative
layers, few people at the upper levels, “employees” each
acting as Brand You, constant pursuit of Excellence in
Execution through Simplicity and Clarity and IntegrityCharacter.
Eight: Simultaneous loose-tight properties – fostering a
climate where there is dedication to the central values of
the company combined with tolerance for all employees
who accept those values.
Eight: Simultaneous loose-tight properties – fostering a
climate where there is dedication and “buy in” and
excitement about the central values and the Ideal of
Excellence throughout the enterprise, combined with a
passion for constant growth and experimentation within
or close to the bounds of those shared values.
Doing “to” vs doing “with”
Job “done well” vs “openended Quest for growth,
full of surprises”
“Motivate” vs “Engage”
“Tolerance” vs “Expectation”
“Director” vs “Servant”
Unspecified vs “Excellence”
“Him” vs “Her”
Part II
Excellence:
The
Leadership
50
Tom Peters/Global Leaders
Gallagher Estate/12.03.2008
bedrock.
1. Leaders …
serve.
Organizations
exist to serve.
Period.
Leaders live to
serve. Period.
The Basic
Mechanism.
2. Leadership Is a
Mutual
Discovery
Process.
…
“Ninety percent of what
we call ‘management’
consists of making it
difficult for people to
get things done.”
– Peter Drucker
Organizing Genius / Warren Bennis
and Patricia Ward Biederman
“Groups become great only when
everyone in them, leaders and
members alike, is free to do his or
her absolute best.”
“The best thing a leader can do for a
Great Group is to allow its
members to discover their
greatness.”
Leaders’ “Mt Everest Test”
“free to do his or her
absolute best” …
“allow its members to
discover their
greatness.”
The Dream
Manager
—Matthew Kelly
E.g.: “An organization can only become the-best-version-of-itself to the
extent that the people who drive that organization are striving to
become better-versions-of-themselves.” “A company’s purpose is to
become the-best-version-of-itself. The question is: What is an
employee’s purpose? Most would say, ‘to help the company achieve its
purpose’—but they would be wrong. That is certainly part of the
employee’s role, but an employee’s primary purpose is to become thebest-version-of-himself or –herself. … When a company forgets that it
exists to serve customers, it quickly goes out of business. Our
employees are our first customers, and our most important customers.”
Quests!
Cause
Space
(worthy of commitment)
(room for/encouragement
for initiative)
Decency
(respect, humane)
Cause
Space
(worthy of commitment)
(room for/encouragement
for initiative-adventures)
Decency
(respect, grace,
integrity, humane)
service
(worthy of our clients’ & extended
family’s continuing custom)
excellence
(period)
Cause
Space
Decency
service
(worthy of commitment)
(room for/encouragement for initiative-adventures)
(respect, grace, integrity, humane)
(worthy of our clients’ & extended
family’s continuing custom)
excellence
servant leadership
(period)
Cause
Space
Decency
service
excellence
servant leadership
“I have always
believed that the
purpose of the
corporation is to be a
blessing to the
employees.” *
—Boyd Clarke
*TP: An “organization” is, in fact and after all
is said and done, a/the “house” in which
most of us “live” most of the time.
Why in the
World did you
go to Siberia?
An
emotional, vital, innovative,
joyful, creative,
entrepreneurial endeavor
that elicits maximum
Enterprise* ** (*at its best):
concerted human
potential in the
wholehearted service of
others.**
**Employees, Customers, Suppliers, Communities, Owners, Temporary partners
… no less than Cathedrals in
which the full and awesome
power of the Imagination and
Spirit and native
Entrepreneurial flair of
diverse individuals is
unleashed in passionate
pursuit of … Excellence.
Organizations Exist to Serve. Period.
Leaders Live to Serve. Period.
Passionate servant leaders, determined to create
a legacy of earthshaking transformation in their
domain (a 600SF retail space, a 4-person training department, an urban
school, a rural school, a city, a nation), create/ must necessarily
create organizations which are no less than
Cathedrals in which the full and awesome power
of the Imagination and Spirit and native
Entrepreneurial flair (We are all entrepreneurs—Muhammad
Yunus) of diverse individuals (100% creative Talent—from
checkout to lab, from Apple to Wegmans to Jane’s one-person accountancy in
is unleashed in passionate pursuit of
jointly perceived soaring purpose (= win a Nobel peace
Invercargill NZ)
prize like Yunus, or at least do something worthy of bragging about 25 years from
and personal and community and
client service Excellence.
now to your grandkids)
Such Talent unbound pursue Quests
(rapidly and
relentlessly experimenting and failing and trying
which surprise and surpass and
redefine the expectations of the individual
and the servant leader alike. The collective
“products” of these Quests offer the best
chance of achieving rapid organizational and
individual adaptation to fast-transforming
environments, and provide the nutrition for
continuing (and sometimes dramatic) reimaginings which re-draw the boundaries
of industries and communities and human
achievement and the very conception of
what is possible.
again)
In turn, such organizations, bent upon excellence
and re-imaginings based on maximizing human
creativity and achievement, will automatically
create cadres of imaginative and inspiring and
determined servant leaders who stick around to
take the organization to another level, and then
another—or, equally or more important, leave
to spread the virus of Freedom-CreativityExcellence-Transforming Purpose by pathfinding
new streets, highways and alleyways which
vitalize and revitalize, through creative
destruction, Entrepreneurial Capitalism, which
is the best hope for maximizing collective human
Freedom, Happiness, Prosperity, Wellbeing—and,
one prays, some measure of Peace on earth.
… such organizations, bent upon
excellence and re-imaginings based on
maximizing human creativity and
achievement … vitalize and
revitalize, through creative
destruction, Entrepreneurial
Capitalism, which is the best hope
for maximizing collective human
Freedom, Happiness, Prosperity,
Wellbeing—and, one prays, some
measure of Peace on earth.
Internal
organizational
excellence* ** =
Deepest “Blue
Ocean”
*A “Blue ocean” is by definition
very profitable … and will be
quickly copied. “sustainable
blue” (Internal
organizational excellence) is
far more difficult to copy.
**Internal
organizational
excellence =
“Brand inside”
B(I) > B(O)
“If I could have chosen not to tackle the IBM
culture head-on, I probably wouldn’t have. My
bias coming in was toward strategy, analysis and
measurement. In comparison, changing the
attitude and behaviors of hundreds of thousands
[Yet] I
came to see in my time at
IBM that culture isn’t
just one aspect of the
game—it is the game.”
of people is very, very hard.
—Lou Gerstner, Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance
The
Leadership
Types.
3. Great Leaders on White Horses Are
Great Talent
Developers (Type I
Leadership) are the Bedrock
Important – but
of Organizations that Perform Over
the Long Haul.
Whoops:
Jack didn’t have
a vision!
4. But There Are Times
When the “visionary”
“Type” (Type II
Leadership) Matters!
“A leader is a
dealer in
hope.”
—Napoleon
5. Find the
“Businesspeople”!
(Type III Leadership)
I.P.M.
(Inspired
Profit Mechanic)
6. All Organizations
Need … the Golden
Leadership
Triangle.
The Golden Leadership Triangle:
(1) Talent Fanatic …
(2) Visionary …
(3) Inspired Profit
Mechanic.
7. Leadership Mantra #1:
IT ALL DEPENDS!
Renaissance Men
are … a snare,
a myth,
a delusion!
8. The Leader Is
Rarely/Never the
Best Performer.
The
Leadership
Dance.
9. Leaders …
SHOW UP!
MBWA
“A body can
pretend to care,
but they can’t
pretend to be
there.”
— Texas Bix Bender
“It’s always
showtime.”
—David D’Alessandro, Career Warfare
10. Leaders …
LOVE the
MESS!
“If things seem
under control,
you’re just not
going fast
enough.”
—Mario Andretti
11. Leaders
“We have a
‘strategic’
plan. It’s
called doing
things.”
— Herb Kelleher
“This is so simple it sounds stupid, but it is amazing
how few oil people really understand that
you only find
oil if you drill
wells.
You may think you’re finding it
when you’re drawing maps and
studying logs, but you have to drill.”
Source: The Hunters, by John Masters, Canadian O & G wildcatter
12. Leaders
Re
-do.
Phil Crosby
is an idiot!
“We made mistakes, of course. Most of them were
omissions we didn’t think of when we initially wrote the
software. We fixed them by doing it over and over, again
and again. We do the same today. While our competitors
are still sucking their thumbs trying to make the design
perfect, we’re already on prototype version
#5.
By the time our rivals are
ready with wires and screws, we are on version
#10. It gets back to planning
versus acting: We act from day
one; others plan how to plan—
for months.” —Bloomberg by Bloomberg
13. BUT … Leaders
Know
When to
Wait.
Tex Schramm:
The
“too hard”
box!
14. Leaders Are …
Optimists.
Hackneyed but none the less
LEADERS SEE
CUPS AS “HALF
FULL.”
true:
“[Ronald
Reagan] radiated an
almost
transcendent
happiness.”
Half-full Cups:
—L ou Cannon
15. Leaders
FOCUS!
“Dennis, you need a …
‘To-don’t ’
List !”
“I used to have a rule for myself that at any point in
time I wanted to have in mind — as it so happens,
also in writing, on a little card I carried around with
me — the three big things I was trying to get done.
Three.
Not two.
Not four.
Not five.
Not ten.
Three.”
— Richard Haass, The Power to Persuade
“The one thing you need
to know about sustained
individual success:
Discover what you don’t
like doing and
stop
doing it.”
—Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing You Need to Know
16. Leaders … Send
V-E-R-Y Clear
Signals
About
What’s Important!
“Really Important
Stuff”: Roger’s
Rule of Three!
Robinson/American Express
Puckett/Hughes
Olsen/Digital
Mozilo/Countrywide
Milliken/Milliken
Welch/GE
Danger:
S.I.O.
(Strategic Initiative Overload)
If It Ain’t
Broke …
Break It.
17. Leaders …
FORGET!/
Leaders …
DESTROY!
Forget>“Learn”
“The problem is never how
to get new, innovative
thoughts into your mind,
but how to get the old
ones out.” —Dee Hock
“I am often asked by would-be entrepreneurs
seeking escape from life within huge corporate
structures, ‘How do I build a small firm for
Buy
a very large one
and just wait.”
myself?’ The answer seems obvious:
—Paul Ormerod, Why Most Things Fail:
Evolution, Extinction and Economics
18. BUT … Leaders
Have to Deliver, So They
Worry About “Throwing
the Baby Out with the
Bathwater.”
“Damned If You
Do, Damned If You
Don’t, Just Plain
Damned.”
Subtitle in the chapter, “Own Up to the Great Paradox: Success Is
the Product of Deep Grooves/ Deep Grooves Destroy Adaptivity,”
Liberation Management (1992)
19. Leaders …
HONOR THE
USURPERS.
Saviors-in-Waiting
Disgruntled Customers
Upstart Competitors
Rogue Employees
Fringe Suppliers
Source: Wayne Burkan, Wide Angle Vision
20. Leaders Make
[Lots of]
Mistakes – and
MAKE NO BONES
ABOUT IT!
“Fail faster.
Succeed
sooner.”
—David Kelley/IDEO
21. Leaders Make …
BIG MISTAKES!
“Reward
excellent
failures. Punish
mediocre
successes.”
—Phil Daniels
Create.
22. Leaders Know that THERE’S
MORE TO LIFE THAN “LINE
EXTENSIONS.” Leaders Love to …
CREATE NEW
MARKETS.
“Acquisitions are about
buying market share. Our
challenge is to
create markets.
There is a big difference.”
—Peter Job, CEO, Reuters
YESBANK*
*Commerce Bank
23. Leaders … Make
Their Mark /
Do Stuff
That Matters
Leaders …
“I never, ever thought of
myself as a businessman.
I was interested in
creating things
I would be
proud of.” —Richard Branson
24. Leaders Push Their
W-a-y
Up the Valueadded Chain.
Organizations …
And the “M” Stands for … ?
“Systems
Integrator of choice.”/BW
Gerstner’s IBM:
(“Lou, help us turn ‘all this’ into that long-promised ‘revolution.’ ” )
IBM Global Services*
Services Corp.):
$55B
(*Integrated Systems
“Big Brown’s New Bag: UPS
Traffic
Manager for
Corporate
America”
Aims to Be the
—Headline/BW/2004
“Every project we undertake starts with
‘How can
we do what has
never been done
before?’”
the same question:
—Stuart Hornery, Lend Lease
25. Leaders Push Past
Service “Transactions” to
… Scintillating
Experiences.
“Experiences
are as distinct
from services as
services are from
goods.”
—Joe Pine & Jim Gilmore, The
Experience Economy: Work Is Theatre & Every Business a
Stage
Experience: “Rebel Lifestyle!”
“What we sell is the
ability for a 43year-old accountant
to dress in black
leather, ride through
small towns and have
people be afraid
of him.”
Harley exec, quoted in Results-Based Leadership
26. Leaders
LOVE the
New Technology!
Power Tools
For Power
Strategies/
ARD 40K
27. Needed? Type IV
Leadership:
Technology
Dreamer-True
Believer
The Golden Leadership
Quadrangle: (1) Talent
Fanatic … (2) Visionary …
(3) Inspired Profit
Mechanic …
(4) Technology DreamerTrue Believer.
Talent.
28. Leaders …
DO TALENT!
‘do’
“Leaders
people.
Period.”
—Anon.
Brand =
Talent.
29. When It Comes
TALENT
to
…
Leaders Always Go
Berserk!
From “1, 2 or you’re out” [JW]
to …
“Best Talent in
each industry segment to
build best proprietary
intangibles” [EM]
Source: Ed Michaels, War for Talent
30. Leaders Listen.
Leaders
Consult.
The “One line of code”
Theorem: All we-“they”me want is (1) to be
consulted, (2) to be taken
seriously, (3) a tiny show
of appreciation
Passion.
31. Leaders …
“Sell”
PASSION!
“People want to be part of
something larger than
themselves. They want to be
part of something they’re
really proud of, that they’ll
fight for, sacrifice for ,
trust.”
—Howard Schultz, Starbucks (IBD/09.05)
“Create a
‘cause,’ not a
‘business.’ ”
Gary Hamel:
32. Leaders Know:
ENTHUSIASM
BEGETS
ENTHUSIASM!
BZ: “I am a …
Dispenser of
Enthusiasm!”
“Nothing is so
contagious as
enthusiasm.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge
33. Leaders Are …
in a Hurry
“We don’t sell insurance
We sell
speed.”
anymore.
Peter Lewis, Progressive
“Metabolic
Management”
34. Leaders
Focus on the
SOFT STUFF!
“Hard” is
“soft.”
“Soft” Is
“hard.”
Message: Leadership is
all about love! [Passion,
Enthusiasms, Appetite for
Life, Engagement,
Commitment, Great Causes &
Determination to Make a
Damn Difference, Shared
Adventures, Bizarre Failures,
Growth, Insatiable Appetite
for Change.]
The “Job” of
Leading.
35. Leaders Know It’s
ALL SALES ALL
THE TIME.
If you don’t
LOVE
SALES … find
another life. (Don’t pretend
you’re a “leader.”)
36. Leaders
LOVE
“POLITICS.”
If you don’t LOVE
POLITICS … find
another life.
(Don’t pretend
you’re a “leader.”)
All success is a
Matter of
implementation.
All implementation is
a matter of politics.
37. But … Leaders Also
Break a Lot
of China.
Characteristics of the “Also rans”*
“Minimize risk”
“Respect the chain of
command”
“Support the boss”
“Make budget”
*Fortune, “Most Admired Global Corporations”
38. Leaders
Give …
RESPECT!
“It was much later that I realized Dad’s
secret. He gained respect by giving it. He
talked and listened to the fourth-grade kids
in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same
way he talked and listened to a bishop or a
He was
seriously interested in
who you were and
what you had to say.”
college president.
Source: Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect
Amen!
“What creates trust, in
the end, is the leader’s
manifest respect for
the followers.” — Jim O’Toole,
Leading Change
39. Leaders Say
“Thank
You.”
“The deepest human
need to
be appreciated.”
need is the
William James
FLOWER
FLOWER
POWER
POWER
40. Leaders
Are …
Curious.
The Three Most Important Letters …
WHY?
41. Leadership Is
a…
Performance.
“It is necessary for the
President to be the
No. 1
actor.”
nation’s
FDR
42. Leaders … Are
The Brand
“You must
be
the change you
wish to see in the
world.”
Gandhi
“It’s always
showtime.”
—David D’Alessandro, Career Warfare
43. Leaders …
GREAT
STORY!
Have a
“A key – perhaps the key –
to leadership is
the effective
communication
of a story.”
Howard Gardner
Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership
“Leaders don’t just make
products and make decisions.
Leaders make
meaning.”
– John Seely Brown
Leader Job 1
Paint
Portraits of
Excellence!
Introspection.
44.
Leaders …
Enjoy
Leading.
“Tom, you
left out one
thing …”
45. Leaders
LAUGH!
46. Leaders …
KNOW
THEMSELVES.
Individuals (would-be leaders)
cannot engage in a
liberating mutual discovery
process unless they are
comfortable with their
own skin. (“Leaders” who are not
comfortable with themselves become petty
control freaks.)
Questions: What do others think of you? [Are you sure?] What
do you think of you? [Are you sure?] What is your impact on
others? [Are you sure?] What is your impact on others? [Are
you sure?] What is your impact on others? [Are you sure?]
What are the “little things” you (perhaps unconsciously) do that
cause people to shrivel—or blossom? [Are you sure?] What do
you want? [Are you sure?] Are you aware of your changing
moods? [Are you sure?] How fragile is your ego? [Are you sure?]
Do you have a true confidant? [Are you sure?] Do you perform brief
or not-so-brief self-assessments? Do you talk too much? [Are you
sure?] Do you know how to listen? [Are you sure?] Do you
listen? [Are you sure?] What is your style of “hashing things
out”? Are you perceived as (a) arrogant, (b) abrasive (c) attentive,
(d) genuinely interested in people, (e) etc? [Are you sure?] Are
you flexible? Have you changed your mind about anything important
in a while? Are you comfortable-uncomfortable with folks on the
front line? Do you think you’re “in touch with the pulse of
things around here”? [Are You Sure?] Are you too
emotional/intuitive? Are you too unemotional/rational? Do you
spend much time with people who are new to you? [Do you think
questions like this are “so much BS”?]
47. But …
Leaders have
MENTORS.
Upon having the
Leadership Mantle placed
upon one’s head, he/she
never
shall
hear
the unvarnished truth
again!*
(*Therefore, she/he needs one faithful compatriot
to lay it on with no jelly.)
The End
Game.
48. Leaders
are …
RELENTLESS.
“This [adolescent] incident [of getting from point A to point B] is notable
not only because it underlines Grant’s fearless horsemanship and his
determination, but also it is the first known example of a very important
Grant had an
extreme, almost phobic
dislike of turning back
and retracing his steps.
peculiarity of his character:
If he
set out for somewhere, he would get there somehow, whatever the
difficulties that lay in his way. This idiosyncrasy would turn out to be one
the factors that made him such a formidable general. Grant would always,
always press on—turning back was not an option for him.”
—Michael Korda, Ulysses Grant
Relentless: “One of
my superstitions had always been
when I started to go anywhere or
not to
turn back , or stop,
to do anything,
until the thing intended was
accomplished.” —Grant
“Success seems to be
largely a matter
of hanging on
after others have
let go.”
—William Feather, author
49. Leaders
???:
“Leadership is the
PROCESS of ENGAGING
PEOPLE in CREATING a
LEGACY of
EXCELLENCE.”
“LEADERS NEED TO
BE THE ROCK OF
GIBRALTAR ON
ROLLER BLADES.”
50. Leaders Free
the Lunatic
Within!
The greatest danger
for most of us
is not that our aim is
too high
and we miss it,
but that it is
too low
and we reach it.
Michelangelo
Kevin Roberts’ Credo
1. Ready. Fire! Aim.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
If it ain’t broke ... Break it!
Hire crazies.
Ask dumb questions.
Pursue failure.
Lead, follow ... or get out of the way!
Spread confusion.
Ditch your office.
Read odd stuff.
10. Avoid moderation!
“You can’t behave
in a calm, rational
manner. You’ve got
to be out there on
the lunatic fringe.”
— Jack Welch
51. Leaders
Relentlessly Pursue …
Excellence
“Excellence can be obtained if you:
... care more than others think
is wise;
... risk more than others think
is safe;
... dream more than others think
is practical;
... expect more than others think
is possible.”
Source: Anon. (Posted @ tompeters.com by
K.Sriram, November 27, 2006 1:17 AM)
Excellence Is a
Universal
Striving.
If Not
Excellence,
What?
Part IiI
people power:
talent
The
50
Tom Peters/Global Leaders
Gallagher Estate/12.03.2008
“I have always
believed that the
purpose of the
corporation is to be
a blessing to the
employees.”
—Boyd Clarke
1. People
First!
“How to piss away
$500,000 in one
easy lesson!!”
TP:
< CAPEX
> People!
Our Mission
To develop and manage talent;
to apply that talent,
throughout the world,
for the benefit of clients;
to do so in partnership;
to do so with profit.
WPP
2. “Soft” Is
“Hard.”
Excellence1982: The Bedrock “Eight Basics”
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
A Bias for Action
Close to the Customer
Autonomy and Entrepreneurship
Productivity Through People
Hands On, Value-Driven
Stick to the Knitting
Simple Form, Lean Staff
Simultaneous Loose-Tight
Properties”
3. FUNDAMENTAL
PREMISE: We Are in an
Age of Talent/
Creativity/
Intellectual-capital
Added.
Agriculture Age (farmers)
Industrial Age (factory workers)
Information Age (knowledge workers)
Conceptual Age
(creators and empathizers)
Source: Dan Pink, A Whole New Mind
“Human
creativity is the
ultimate
economic
resource.”
—Richard Florida,
The Rise of the Creative Class
4. Talent
“Excellence” in
Every Part of
Every
Organization.
Wegmans:
#1/100
“Best Companies to
Work for”/2005
5. Talent
“Excellence”
Stretches Far
Beyond Our
Borders.
We become
who we hang
out with 1
Measure “Strangeness”/Portfolio Quality
Staff
Consultants
Vendors
Out-sourcing Partners (#, Quality)
Innovation Alliance Partners
Customers
Competitors (who we “benchmark” against)
Strategic Initiatives
Product Portfolio (LineEx v. Leap)
IS/IT Projects
HQ Location
Lunch Mates
Language
Board
6. P.O.T./
Pursuit Of
Talent =
OBSESSION.
“The leaders of Great Groups
love talent and know
where to find it. They
revel in the talent
of others.”
—Warren Bennis &
Patricia Ward Biederman, Organizing Genius
PARC’s Bob Taylor:
“Connoisseur
of Talent”
7. Talent Masters
Understand
Talent’s
Intangibles.
A Few Lessons from the Arts
Each hired and developed and evaluated in unique ways
(23 contributors = 23 unique contributions = 23 pathways =
23 personalities = 23 sets of motivators)
Attitude/Enthusiasm/Energy paramount
Re-lent-less!
“Practice is cool” (G Leonard/Mastery)
Team and individual
Aspire to EXCELLENCE = Obvious
Ex-e-cu-tion
Talent = Brand = Duh
“The Project” rules
Emotional language
Bit players. No.
B.I.W. (everything)
Delta events = Delta rosters (incl leader/s)
8. HR Is
“Cool.”
Chicago:
HRMAC
“support function” /
“cost center” /
“bureaucratic drag”
or …
Are you …
“Rock Stars
of the
Age of
Talent”?
9. HR Sits at
The Head
Table.
A review of Jack and Suzy Welch’s Winning claims there are but
two key differentiators that set GE “culture” apart from the herd:
First: Separating financial forecasting and performance
measurement. Performance measurement based, as it usually is, on budgeting
leads to an epidemic of gaming the system. GE’s performance measurement is
divorced from budgeting—and instead reflects how you do relative to your past
performance and relative to competitors’ performance; i.e., it’s about how you
actually do in the context of what happened in the real world, not as compared to a
gamed-abstract plan developed last year.
Putting HR on
a par with finance
and marketing.
Second:
10. Re-name
“HR.”
Talent
Department
“H.R.” to “H.E.D.” ???
Human
Enablement
Department
People Department
Center for Talent Excellence
Seriously Cool People
Who Recruit & Develop
Seriously Cool People
Etc.
11. There Is an
“HR Strategy”/
“HR Vision”
EVP/
IBP?*
What’s your company’s …
*Employee Value Proposition, per Ed Michaels et al.,
The War for Talent; IBP/Internal Brand Promise per TP
EVP/IBP = Remarkable
challenge, rapid professional
growth, respect, satisfaction,
fun, stunning opportunity,
exceptional reward, amazing
peer group, full membership in
Club Adventure, maximized
future employability
Source: Ed Michaels, The War for Talent; TP
12. Acquire
for Talent!
Omnicom's acquisitions: “not for
“buying
talent;” “deepen a
size per se”;
relationship with a client.”
Source: Advertising Age
13. There Is a
FORMAL
Recruitment
Strategy.
“Busy Executives
Fail To Give
Recruiting
Attention It
Deserves”
—Headline, WSJ, 1121.05
C
O*
*Chief talent acquisition Officer
14. There Is a
FORMAL
Leadership
Development
Strategy.
Crotonville!
DD: 0 to 60mph
in a flash (months)
15. There Is a
FORMAL STRATEGIC
HR Review
Process.
“In most companies, the Talent Review Process is a
farce. At GE, Jack Welch and his two top HR people
visit each division for a day. They review the top 20
to 50 people by name. They talk about Talent Pool
The Talent
Review Process is a contact
sport at GE; it has the
intensity and the
importance of the budget
process at most
companies.”—Ed Michaels
strengthening issues.
16. “People”/
Talent” Reviews
Are the FIRST
Reviews.
17. HR Strategy
= BUSINESS
Strategy.
Wegmans: #1/100 Best Companies to Work for
84%: Grocery stores “are all alike”
46%: additional spend if customers have an “emotional connection”
to a grocery store rather than “are satisfied” (Gallup)
“Going to Wegmans is not just shopping, it’s an event.” —Christopher
Hoyt, grocery consultant
“You cannot separate
their strategy as a
retailer from their
strategy as an
employer.”
—Darrell Rigby, Bain & Co.
Cirque
du Soleil!
18. Make it a
“Cause Worth
Signing Up For.”
“People want to be part of
something larger than
themselves. They want to be
part of something they’re
really proud of, that they’ll
fight for, sacrifice for ,
trust.”
—Howard Schultz, Starbucks (IBD/09.05)
19. Unleash
“Their” Full
Potential!
“We are a
‘Life Success’
Company.”
Dave Liniger, founder, RE/MAX
“No matter what the situation,
[the great manager’s] first response is
always to think about the
individual concerned and how
things can be arranged to help
that individual experience
success.” —Marcus Buckingham,
The One Thing You Need to Know
20. Set Sky
High
Standards.
“The role of the Director is to create a
space where the actors and
become more
than they’ve ever been
before, more than
they’ve dreamed of
being.”
actresses can
—Robert Altman, Oscar acceptance speech
21. Enlist
Everyone in
Challenge
Century21.
“If there is nothing
very special about
your work, no matter
how hard you apply yourself
you won’t get noticed, and
that increasingly means you
won’t get paid much either.”
—Michael Goldhaber, Wired
Distinct
…
… or
Extinct
22. Pursue
the Best!
“We believe companies can increase their market cap
50 percent in 3 years. Steve Macadam at Georgia-
Pacific …
changed
20 of his
40 box plant managers
to put more talented,
higher paid managers in
charge. He increased profitability from
$25
million to
$80
million in
—Ed Michaels, War for Talent
2
years.”
23. Up or Out.
24. Ensure that
the Review
Process Has
INTEGRITY.
25 =
100*
* “But what do I do that’s more important than developing
people? I don’t do the damn work. They do.”—GK
25. Pay Up!
“Top performing companies
are two to four times more
likely than the rest to pay
what it takes
prevent losing top
performers.”
to
—Ed Michaels,
War for Talent
26. Training I:
Train! Train!
Train!
27. Training II:
100% “Business
People.”
New Work SurvivalKit.2008
1. MASTERY! (Best/Absurdly Good at Something!)
2. “Manage” to Legacy (All Work = “Memorable”/“Braggable” WOW Projects!)
3. A “USP”/UNIQUE SELLING PROPOSITION
4. Rolodex Obsession (From vertical/hierarchy/“suck up” loyalty to
horizontal/“colleague”/“mate” loyalty)
5. ENTREPRENEURIAL INSTINCT (A sleepless … Eye for Opportunity!
6.CEO/LEADER/BUSINESSPERSON/CLOSER (CEO, Me Inc. 24/7!)
7. Master of Improv (Play a dozen parts simultaneously, from
Chief Strategist to Chief Toilet Scrubber)
8. Sense of Humor (A willingness to Screw Up & Move On)
9. Comfortable with Your Skin (Bring “interesting you” to work!)
10. Intense Appetite for Technology (E.g.: How Cool-Active is your
Web site? Do you Blog?)
11. EMBRACE “MARKETING” (Your own CSO/Chief Storytelling Officer)
12. PASSION FOR RENEWAL (Your own CLO/Chief Learning Officer)
13. EXECUTION EXCELLENCE! (Show up on time! Leave last!)
28. Training III:
100% LEADERS.
29. Training IV:
Boss as Trainerin-Chief.
“Workout” =
24
DPY in the Classroom
30. Training V:
The REAL
Bedrock of the
“Talent Thing.”
“My wife and I went to a [kindergarten] parent-teacher
conference and were informed that our budding refrigerator
artist, Christopher, would be receiving a grade of
Unsatisfactory in art. We were shocked. How could any
child—let alone our child—receive a poor grade in art at such
His teacher informed
us that he had refused to color
within the lines, which was a
state requirement for
demonstrating ‘grade-level
motor skills.’ ” —Jordan Ayan, AHA!
a young age?
31. Wide-open
Communication:
NO BARRIERS.
“The organizations we created have
become tyrants. They have taken
control, holding us fettered, creating
barriers that hinder rather than help our
businesses. The lines that we
drew on our neat organizational
diagrams have turned into walls
that no one can scale or penetrate
or even peer over.” —Frank Lekanne Deprez &
René Tissen, Zero Space: Moving Beyond Organizational Limits
32. RESPECT!
“What creates trust,
in the end, is the
leader’s manifest
respect for the
followers.”
— Jim O’Toole, Leading
Change
“Don’t
belittle!”
—OD Consultant
33. Embrace
the Whole
Individual.
34. Build
Places of
“Grace.”
Rodale’s on “Grace” …
elegance … charm …
loveliness … poetry in
motion … kindliness ...
benevolence …
benefaction …
compassion … beauty
The Manager’s Book of Decencies:
How Small gestures Build Great
Companies. —Steve Harrison, Adecco
Servant Leadership
—Robert Greenleaf
One: The Art and Practice of
Conscious Leadership —Lance Secretan,
founder of Manpower, Inc.
35. MBWA:
Visible
Leadership!
36. Thank
You!
“Courtesies of a small and
trivial character are the
ones which strike
deepest in the grateful
and appreciating heart.”
—Henry Clay
37. Promote for
“people skills.”
(THE REST IS
DETAILS.)
“When assessing candidates, the first
thing I looked for was energy and
enthusiasm for execution. Does she
talk about the thrill of getting
things done, the obstacles
overcome, the role her people
played —or does she keep wandering
back to strategy or philosophy?”
Bossidy, Honeywell/AlliedSignal, in Execution
—Larry
38. Honor
Youth.
“Why focus on these late teens and twentysomethings? Because they are the
first young who are both in a
position to change the world, and
are actually doing so. … For the first
time in history, children are more comfortable,
knowledgeable and literate than their parents
about an innovation central to society. … The
Internet has triggered the first industrial
revolution in history to be led by the young.”
The Economist
39. Provide
Early
Leadership
Assignments.
The
WOW!
Project
40. Create a
FORMAL System
of Mentoring.
W. L. Gore
Quad/Graphics
41. Diversity!
CM Prof Richard Florida on “Creative
“You cannot get a
technologically
innovative place … unless
it’s open to weirdness,
eccentricity and
difference.”
Capital”:
Source: New York Times/06.01.2002
42. WOMEN
RULE.
“AS LEADERS,
WOMEN
RULE:
New Studies find that
female managers outshine their male
counterparts in almost every measure”
TITLE/ Special Report/ BusinessWeek
Women’s Strengths Match New
Economy Imperatives: Link [rather than rank]
workers; favor interactive-collaborative leadership
style [empowerment beats top-down decision
making]; sustain fruitful collaborations; comfortable
with sharing information; see redistribution of power
as victory, not surrender; favor multi-dimensional
feedback; value technical & interpersonal skills,
individual & group contributions equally; readily
accept ambiguity; honor intuition as well as
pure “rationality”; inherently flexible; appreciate
cultural diversity. —Judy B. Rosener,
America’s Competitive Secret: Women Managers
Period??!!*
Start:
3 0f 14
18 months later:
10 of 18
(“deep dip”!)
*AIM/September 2007
“Forget China,
India and the
Internet: Economic
Growth Is Driven
by
Women.”
—Headline,
Economist, April 15, 2006, Leader, page 14
10 UNASSAILABLE REASONS WOMEN RULE
Women make [all] the financial decisions.
Women control [all] the wealth.
Women [substantially] outlive men.
Women start most of the new businesses.
Women’s work force participation rates have
soared worldwide.
Women are closing in on “same pay for same
job.”
Women are penetrating senior ranks rapidly
[even if the pace is slow for the corner
office per se].
Women’s leadership strengths are exceptionally well
aligned with new organizational effectiveness
imperatives.
Women are better salespersons than men.
Women buy [almost] everything—commercial
as well as consumer goods.
So what exactly is the point of men?
43. Hire (& Protect!)
Weird!
“Are there
enough weird
people in the lab
these days?”
—V. Chmn., pharmaceutical
house, to a lab director
Why Do I love Freaks?
(1) Because when Anything Interesting happens … it was
a freak who did it. (Period.)
(2) Freaks are fun. (Freaks are also a pain.) (Freaks are
never boring.)
(3) We need freaks. Especially in freaky times. (Hint:
These are freaky times, for you & me & the CIA & the
Army & Avon.)
(4) A critical mass of freaks-in-our-midst
automatically make us-who-are-not-so-freaky at least
somewhat more freaky. (Which is a Good Thing in freaky
times—see immediately above.)
(5) Freaks are the only (ONLY) ones who succeed—as in,
make it into the history books.
(6) Freaks keep us from falling into ruts. (If we listen to
them.) (We seldom listen to them.) (Which is why most
organizations are in ruts. Make that chasms.)
44. We Are All
Unique.
One
size NEVER fits
all. One size fits
Beware Standardized Evals:
one.
Period.
“Never, ever again
will I evaluate anyone
using a standardized
instrument devised by
a “professional” in
inhuman Resources.”
Promise #1:
53 Players =
53 Projects =
53 different
success measures.
“Things don’t stay the same. You
have to understand that not only
your business situation changes,
but the people you’re working with
aren’t the same day to day.
Someone is sick. Someone is
having a wedding. [You must]
gauge the mood, the thinking level
of the team that day.” —Coach K [Krzyzewski]
220 workdays
= 220 “rosters”
Source: Coach K
new goal …
every game!
Source: Coach K
45. Capitalize
on Strengths.
“The key difference between
checkers and chess is that in
checkers the pieces all move
the same way, whereas in chess
all the pieces move differently.
… Discover what is unique
about each person and
capitalize on it.” —Marcus Buckingham,
The One Thing You Need to Know
“The mediocre manager believes that most
things are learnable and therefore that the
essence of management is to identify ach
person’s weaker areas and eradicate them.
The great manager believes the opposite.
He believes that the most influential
qualities of a person are innate and
therefore that the essence of management
is to deploy these innate qualities as
effectively as possible and so drive
performance.” —Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing
You Need to Know
46. Bosses “Win
People Over.”
“Coaching
is winning
players over.”
PJ:
47. GOAL: Voyages
of Mutual
Discovery.
“The organization would
ultimately win not
because it gave agents
more money, but
because it gave them a
chance for better lives.”
—Everybody Wins, Phil Harkins & Keith Hollihan
Quests!
C
O*
*Chief quest-meister
48. Foster
Independence.
“You must realize that how you invest your human
capital matters as much as how you invest your
financial capital. Its rate of return determines your
future options. Take
a job for what it
teaches you, not for what it pays.
Instead of a potential employer asking,
‘Where do you see yourself in 5 years?’
you’ll ask, ‘If I invest my mental assets
with you for 5 years, how much will they
appreciate? How much will my portfolio
of career options grow?’ ”
Source: Stan Davis & Christopher Meyer, futureWEALTH
49. En-
thus-iasm!
“I am a
dispenser of
enthusiasm.”
—Ben Zander
50. Talent
= Brand.
The Top 5 “Revelations”
Better talent wins.
Talent management is my job as leader.
Talented leaders are looking for the
moon and stars.
Over-deliver on people’s dreams – they
are volunteers.
Pump talent in at all levels, from all
conceivable sources, all the time.
Source: Ed Michaels et al., The War for Talent
BRAND =
TALENT.
Part Iv
Tom peters on
implementation
19 January 2008
“Never forget
implementation , boys. In
our work, it’s what I
call the ‘last 98 percent’
of the client puzzle.”
—Al
McDonald, former
Managing Director, McKinsey & Co, to a project team,
reported by subsequent McKinsey MD, Ron Daniel
1. The “Have
you …” 50
“Mapping your
competitive
position”
or …
While waiting last week [early December 2007] in the Albany
airport to board a Southwest Airlines flight to Reagan, I
happened across the latest Harvard Business Review, on the
cover of which was a yellow sticker. The sticker had on it the
words “Mapping your competitive position.” It referred to a
feature article by my friend Rich D’Aveni. His work is uniformly
good—and I have said as much publicly on several occasions
dating back 15 years. I’m sure this article is good, too—though
I didn’t read it. In fact it triggered a furious negative “Tom
reaction” as my wife calls it. Of course I believe you should
But instead of
obsessing on competitive position and other
abstractions, as the B-schools and
consultants would always have us do, I
instead wondered about some “practical
stuff” which I believe is more important to
the short- and long-term health of the
enterprise, tiny or enormous.
worry about your “competitive position.”
“Unfortunately many
leaders of major
companies believe their
job is to create the
strategy, organization
and organization
processes—remaining
aloof from the people
doing the work.” —George
Kohlrieser, Hostage at the Table (GK is, among other things, a
hostage negotiator with a 95% success rate)
1. Have you in the last 10 days … visited a
customer?
2. Have you called a customer … TODAY?
3. Have you in the last 60-90 days … had a seminar in which several folks from the
customer’s operation (different levels, different functions, different divisions) interacted,
via facilitator, with various of your folks?
4. Have you thanked a front-line employee for a
small act of helpfulness … in the last three days?
5. Have you thanked a front-line employee for a small act of helpfulness … in the
last three hours?
6. Have you thanked a frontline employee for carrying around a great attitude … today?
7. Have you in the last week recognized—publicly—one of your folks for a small act of
cross-functional co-operation?
8. Have you in the last week recognized—publicly—one of “their” folks (another function)
for a small act of cross-functional co-operation?
9. Have you invited in the last month a leader of another function to your weekly team
priorities meeting?
10. Have you personally in the last week-month called-visited an internal or external
customer to sort out, inquire, or apologize for some little or big thing that went awry? (No
reason for doing so? If true—in your mind—then you’re more out of touch than I dared
imagine.)
1. Have you in the
last 10 days … visited
a customer?
2. Have you called a
customer … TODAY?
Blog1231.07
FLASH!
FLASH!
FLASH!
FOR IMMEDIATE ACTION!
FOR IMMEDIATE ACTION!
FOR IMMEDIATE ACTION!
OLD YEAR’S RESOLUTION!
Call (C-A-L-L!) (NOT E-MAIL!) 25-50 (NO LESS THAN 25)
people … TODAY * …to thank them for their support this
year (2007) …
and wish them and their families and colleagues a
Happy 2008! ** *** **** ***** ******
*Today = TODAY = N-O-W (not “within the hour”)
**Remember: ROIR > ROI. ROIR = Return On Investment in Relationships.
Success = f(Relationships).
***This is the most important piece of advice I have provided this year.
****This is … Not Optional.
*****Trust me: This is fun!!!!
******Trust me: This “works.”
Happy 2008!!!
I posted this at
tompeters.com on New
Year’s Eve 2007.
11. Have you in the last two days had a chat with someone (a couple of levels down?) about specific deadlines
concerning a project’s next steps?
12. Have you in the last two days had a chat with someone (a couple of levels down?) about specific deadlines
concerning a project’s next steps … and what specifically you can do to remove a hurdle? (“Ninety percent of
what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to get things done.”—Peter “His eminence”
Drucker.)
13. Have you celebrated in the last week a “small” (or large!) milestone reached? (I.e., are you a milestone
fanatic?)
14. Have you in the last week or month revised some estimate in the “wrong” direction and apologized for making
a lousy estimate? (Somehow you must publicly reward the telling of difficult truths.)
15. Have you installed in your tenure a very
comprehensive customer satisfaction scheme for all
internal customers? (With major consequences for hitting or missing the mark.)
16. Have you in the last six months had a week-long, visible, very intensive visit-“tour” of external customers?
17. Have you in the last 60 days called an abrupt halt to a meeting and “ordered” everyone to get out of the office,
and “into the field” and in the next eight hours, after asking those involved, fixed (f-i-x-e-d!) a nagging “small”
problem through practical action?
18. Have you in the last week had a rather thorough discussion of a “cool design thing” someone has come
across—away from your industry or function—at a Web site, in a product or its packaging?
19. Have you in the last two weeks had an informal meeting—at least an hour long—with a frontline employee to
discuss things we do right, things we do wrong, what it would take to meet your mid- to long-term aspirations?
20. Have you had in the last 60 days had a general meeting to discuss “things we do wrong” … that we can fix in
the next fourteen days?
UniCredit Group/
UniCredito Italiano* **
—3rd party measurement
—Customer-initiated
measurement
—Primary $$$$ incentives
—“Factories”
—Primary Corporate Initiative
—Etc
*#13
**TP/#1
The director of staff services
at the giant financial services
firm, UniCredit Group,
installed the most thorough
internal customer satisfaction
measures scheme I have
seen—with exceptional
rewards for those who make
the grade with their internal
customers.
21. Have you had in the last year a one-day, intense offsite with each (?) of your
internal customers—followed by a big celebration of “things gone right”?
22. Have you in the last week pushed someone to do some family thing that you fear
might be overwhelmed by deadline pressure?
23. Have you learned the names of the children of everyone who reports to you? (If
not, you have six months to fix it.)
24. Have you taken in the last month an interesting-weird outsider to lunch?
25. Have you in the last month invited an interesting-weird outsider to sit in on an
important meeting?
26. Have you in the last three days discussed something interesting, beyond your
industry, that you ran across in a meeting, reading, etc?
27. Have you in the last 24 hours injected into a meeting “I ran across this
interesting idea in [strange place]”?
28. Have you in the last two weeks asked someone to report on something, anything
that constitutes an act of brilliant service rendered in a “trivial” situation—
restaurant, car wash, etc? (And then discussed the relevance to your work.)
29. Have you in the last 30 days examined in detail (hour
by hour) your calendar to evaluate the degree “time
actually spent” mirrors your “espoused priorities”?
(And repeated this exercise with everyone on team.)
30. Have you in the last two months had a presentation to the group by a “weird”
outsider?
You = Your
calendar*
*Calendars
never lie
All we have is our time. The
way we spend our time is
our priorities, is our
“strategy.” Your calendar
knows what you really
care about. Do you?
31. Have you in the last two months had a presentation to the group by a customer,
internal customer, vendor featuring “working folks” 3 or 4 levels down in the vendor
organization?
32. Have you in the last two months had a presentation to the group of a cool,
beyond-our-industry ideas by two of your folks?
33. Have you at every meeting today (and forever more) re-directed the conversation
to the practicalities of implementation concerning some issue before the group?
34. Have you at every meeting today (and forever more) had an end-of-meeting
discussion on “action items to be dealt with in the next 4, 48 hours? (And then made
this list public—and followed up in 48 hours.) And made sure everyone has at least
one such item.)
35. Have you had a discussion in the last six months about what it would take to get
recognition in local-national poll of “best places to work”?
36. Have you in the last month approved a cool-different training course for one
of your folks?
Have you in the last month taught a front-line
training course?
37.
38. Have you in the last week discussed the idea of Excellence? (What it means, how
to get there.)
39. Have you in the last week discussed the idea of “Wow”? (What it means, how
to inject it into an ongoing “routine” project.)
40. Have you in the last 45 days assessed some major process in terms of the
details of the “experience,” as well as results, it provides to its external or internal
customers?
41. Have you in the last month had one of your folks attend a meeting you were supposed to go
to which gives them unusual exposure to senior folks?
42. Have you in the last 60 (30?) days sat with a trusted friend or “coach” to discuss your
“management style”—and its long- and short-term impact on the group?
43. Have you in the last three days considered a professional
relationship that was a little rocky and made a call to the person
involved to discuss issues and smooth the waters? (Taking the
“blame,” fully deserved or not, for letting the thing-issue fester.)
44. Have you in the last … two hours … stopped by someone’s (two-levels “down") officeworkspace for 5 minutes to ask “What do you think?” about an issue that arose at a more or
less just completed meeting? (And then stuck around for 10 or so minutes to listen—and
visibly taken notes.)
45. Have you … in the last day … looked around you to assess whether the diversity pretty
accurately maps the diversity of the market being served? (And …)
46. Have you in the last day at some meeting gone out of your way to make sure that a normally
reticent person was engaged in a conversation—and then thanked him or her, perhaps
privately, for their contribution?
47. Have you during your tenure instituted very public (visible) presentations of performance?
48. Have you in the last four months had a session specifically aimed at checking on the
“corporate culture” and the degree we are true to it—with all presentations by relatively junior
folks, including front-line folks? (And with a determined effort to keep the conversation
restricted to “real world” “small” cases—not theory.)
49. Have you in the last six months talked about the Internal Brand Promise?
50. Have you in the last year had a full-day off site to talk about individual (and group)
aspirations?
Relationships
(of all varieties):
THERE
ONCE WAS A TIME WHEN A
THREE-MINUTE
PHONE CALL WOULD
HAVE AVOIDED SETTING OFF THE
DOWNWARD SPIRAL THAT RESULTED
IN A COMPLETE RUPTURE.
R.O.I.R.
Return On
Investment In
Relationships
Job
One.
“You
must
care.”
—General
Melvin Zais
“Courtesies of a small and
trivial character are the
ones which strike
deepest in the grateful
and appreciating heart.”
—Henry Clay
2. The “XF-50”: 50 Ways to
Enhance CrossFunctional
Effectiveness and
Deliver Speed, “Service
Excellence” and “Valueadded Customer
‘Solutions’”
X =XFX*
*Excellence = Cross-functional Excellence
A 2007 letter from John Hennessy, president of
(1) Stanford University, to alumni laid out his long-term
“vision” for that esteemed institution. The core of the
vision’s promise was more multi-disciplinary research,
aimed at solving some of the world’s complex systemic
problems. (2) The chief of GlaxoSmithKline, a few years
ago, announced a “revolutionary” new drug discovery
process—human-scale centers of interdisciplinary
excellence, called Centers of Excellence in Drug
Discovery. (It worked.) (3) Likewise, amidst a study of
organization effectiveness in the oil industry’s exploration
sector, I came across a particularly successful firm—one
key to that success was their physical and organizational
mingling of formerly warring (two sets of prima donnas)
geologists and geophysicists.
(4) The cover story in Dartmouth Medicine, the Dartmouth
med school magazine, featured a “revolutionary”
approach, “microsystems,” as “the big idea that [might]
save U.S. healthcare.” The nub is providing successful
patient outcomes in hospitals by forming multi-function
patient-care teams, including docs, nurses, labtechs and
others. (“Co-operating doc” may top the oxymoron scale.)
(5) One of the central responses to 911 is an effort to get
intelligence services, home to some of the world’s most
viscous turf wars, talking to one another—we may have
seen some of the fruits of that effort in the recently
released National Intelligence Estimate. And in the
military, inter-service co-operation has increased by an
order of magnitude since Gulf War One—some of the
services’ communication systems can actually be linked
to those of other services, a miracle almost the equal of
the Christmas miracle in my book!
1. It’s
our organization to make work—or not. It’s not “them,” the
outside world that’s the problem. The enemy is us. Period.
2. Friction-free! Dump 90% of “middle managers”—most are advertent or inadvertent “power
freaks.” We are all—every one of us—in the Friction Removal Business, one moment at a time,
now and forevermore.
3. No “stovepipes”! “Stove-piping,” “Silo-ing” is an Automatic Firing Offense. Period. No
appeals. (Within the limits of civility, somewhat “public” firings are not out of the question—that
is, make one and all aware why the axe fell.)
4. Everything on the Web. This helps. A lot. (“Everything” = Big word.)
5. Open access. All available to all. Transparency, beyond a level that’s “sensible,” is a de facto
imperative in a Burn-the-Silos strategy.
Project managers rule!! Project managers running XF (crossfunctional) projects are the Elite of the organization, and seen as
such and treated as such. (The likes of construction companies
have practiced this more or less forever.)
6.
7. “Value-added Proposition” = Application of integrated resources. (From the entire supplychain.) To deliver on our emergent business raison d’etre, and compete with the likes of our
Chinese and Indian brethren, we must co-operate with anybody and everybody “24/7.” IBM, UPS
and many, many others are selling far more than a product or service that works—the new “it” is
pure and simple a product of XF co-operation; “the product is the co-operation” is not much of a
stretch.
“We have met
the enemy
and he is us.”
—
Walt Kelly/“Pogo”
Schlumberger!
A January 2008 BusinessWeek cover story informed us that
Schlumberger may well take over the world: “THE GIANT STALKING BIG
OIL: How Schlumberger Is Rewriting the Rules of the Energy
Game.” In short, Schlumberger knows how to create and run oilfields,
anywhere, from drilling to fullscale production to distribution. And the
nugget is hardcore, relatively small, technically accomplished, highly
autonomous teams. As China and Russia, among others, make their
move in energy, state run companies are eclipsing the major
independents. (China’s state oil company just surpassed Exxon in market
value.) At the center of it all, abetting these new players who are edging
out the Exxons and BPs, the Kings of Large-scale, Long-term Project
Management wear Schlumberger overalls. (The pictures in the article
from Siberia alone are worth the cover price.) At the center of the center
of the Schlumberger “empire” is a relatively newly configured outfit,
reminiscent of IBM’s Global Services and UPS’ integrated logistics’
experts and even Best Buy’s now ubiquitous “Geek Squads.” The
Schlumberger version is simply called IPM, for Integrated Project
Management. It lives in a nondescript building near Gatwick Airport, and
its chief says it will do “just about anything an oilfield owner would want,
from drilling to production”—that is, as BusinessWeek put it, “[IPM]
strays from [Schlumberger’s] traditional role as a service provider* and
moves deeper into areas once dominated by the majors.” (*My old pal
was solo on remote offshore platforms interpreting geophysical logs and
the like.)
8. “XF work” is the direct work of leaders!
9. “Integrated solutions” = Our “Culture.” (Therefore: XF = Our culture.)
10. Partner with “best-in-class” only. Their pursuit of Excellence helps us get beyond
petty bickering. An all-star team has little time for anything other than delivering on
the (big) Client promise.
11. All functions are created equal! All functions contribute equally! All = All.
12. All functions are “PSFs,” Professional Service Firms. “Professionalism” is the
watchword—and true Professionalism rise above turf wars. You are your projects,
your legacy is your projects—and the legacy will be skimpy indeed unless you pass,
with flying colors, the “works well with others” exam!
13. We are all in sales! We all (a-l-l) “sell” those Integrated Client Solutions. Good
salespeople don’t blame others for screw-ups—the Clint doesn’t care. Good
salespeople are “quarterbacks” who make the system work-deliver.
14. We all invest in “wiring” the Client organization—we
develop comprehensive relationships in every part
(function, level) of the Client’s organization. We pay
special attention to the so-called “lower levels,” short
on glamour, long on the ability to make things happen at
the “coalface.”
15. We all “live the Brand”—which is Delivery of Matchless Integrated Solutions
which transform the Client’s organization. To “live the brand” is to become a raving
fan of XF co-operation.
C(I)>C(E)*
*Internal customer relations [C(I)] are perhaps-often more important than external
relationships [C(E)]. That is, if you Internal Relationships are excellent, you’ll have your
whole company working for you to get your jobs to the head of the queue.
16. We use the word “partner” until we want to barf! (Words matter! A lot!)
17. We use the word “team” until we want to barf. (Words matter! A lot!)
18. We use the word “us” until we want to barf. (Words matter! A lot!)
19. We obsessively seek Inclusion—and abhor exclusion. We want more
people from more places (internal, external—the whole “supply chain”)
aboard in order to maximize systemic benefits.
20. Buttons & Badges matter—we work relentlessly at team (XF team)
identity and solidarity. (“Corny”? Get over it.)
21. All (almost all) rewards are team rewards.
22. We keep base pay rather low—and give whopping bonuses for excellent
team delivery of “seriously cool” cross-functional Client benefits.
WE NEVER BLAME OTHER PARTS OF THE
ORGANIZATION FOR SCREWUPS.
24. WE TAKE THE HEAT—THE WHOLE TEAM. (For
anything and everything.) (Losing, like winning, is a
team affair.)
25. “BLAMING” IS AN AUTOMATIC FIRING OFFENSE.
23.
26. “Women rule.” Women are simply better at the XF communications
stuff—less power obsessed, less hierarchically inclined, more group-team
oriented.
Women’s Negotiating Strengths
*Ability to put themselves in their
counterparties’ shoes
*Comprehensive, attentive and detailed
communication style
*Empathy that facilitates trust-building
*Curious and attentive listening
*Less competitive attitude
*Strong sense of fairness and ability to persuade
*Proactive risk manager
*Collaborative decision-making
Source: Horacio Falcao, Cover story/May 2006, World Business, “Say It
Like a Woman: Why the 21st-century negotiator will need the female touch”
Women’s Strengths Match New
Economy Imperatives: Link [rather than rank]
workers; favor interactive-collaborative leadership
style [empowerment beats top-down decision
making]; sustain fruitful collaborations; comfortable
with sharing information; see redistribution of power
as victory, not surrender; favor multi-dimensional
feedback; value technical & interpersonal skills,
individual & group contributions equally; readily
accept ambiguity; honor intuition as well as
pure “rationality”; inherently flexible; appreciate
cultural diversity. —Judy B. Rosener,
America’s Competitive Secret: Women Managers
“TAKE THIS QUICK QUIZ: Who manages more things
at once? Who puts more effort into their
appearance? Who usually takes care of the
details? Who finds it easier to meet new
people? Who asks more questions in a
conversation? Who is a better listener? Who
has more interest in communication skills?
Who is more inclined to get involved? Who
encourages harmony and agreement? Who has
better intuition? Who works with a longer ‘to
do’ list? Who enjoys a recap to the day’s
events? Who is better at keeping in touch
with others?”
Source: Selling Is a Woman’s Game: 15 Powerful Reasons Why
Women Can Outsell Men, Nicki Joy & Susan Kane-Benson
27. Every member of our team is an honored contributor. “XF project Excellence”
is an “all hands” affair.
28. We are our XF Teams! XF project teams are how we get things done.
29. “Wow Projects” rule, large or small—Wow projects demand by definition XF
Excellence.
30. We routinely attempt to unearth and then reward “small gestures” of XF cooperation.
31. We invite Functional Bigwigs to our XF project team reviews.
32. We insist on Client team participation—from all functions of the Client
organization.
33. An “Open talent market” helps make the projects “silo-free.” People want in on
the project because of the opportunity to do something memorable—no one will
tolerate delays based on traditional functional squabbling.
34. Flat! Flat = Flattened Silos. Flat = Excellence based on XF project outcomes,
not power-hoarding within functional boundaries.
35. New “C-level”? We more or less need a “C-level” job titled Chief Bullshit
Removal Officer. That is, some kind of formal watchdog whose role in life is to
make cross-functionality work, and I.D. those who don’t get with the program.
36. Huge
(H-U-G-E) co-operation bonuses. Senior team
members who conspicuously shine in the “working
together” bit are rewarded or punished Big Time. (A
million bucks in one case I know—and a noncooperating very senior was sacked.)
James Robinson III:
$500K (on the spot,
collaboration)
Alan Puckett:
Fire the best!
(failure to collaborate)
37. Get physical!! “Co-location” is the most powerful “culture changer. Physical
X-functional proximity is almost a guarantee (yup!) of remarkably improved cooperation—to aid this one needs flexible workspaces that can be mobilized for a
team in a flash.
38. Ad hoc. To improve the new “X-functional Culture,” little XF teams should be
formed on the spot to deal with an urgent issue—they may live for but ten days,
but it helps the XF habit, making it normal to be “working the XF way.”
39. “Deep dip.” Dive three levels down in the organization to fill a senior role
with some one who has been pro-active on the XF dimension.
40. Formal
evaluations. Everyone, starting with the receptionist,
should have an important XF rating component in their
evaluation.
41. Demand XF experience for, especially, senior jobs. The military requires all
would-be generals and admirals to have served a full tour in a job whose only
goals were cross-functional. Great idea!
42. Early project “management” experience. Within days, literally, of coming
aboard folks should be “running” some bit of a project, working with folks from
other functions—hence, “all this” becomes as natural as breathing.
43. “Get ’em out with the customer.” Rarely does the accountant or bench
scientist call one the customer. Reverse that. Give everyone more or less
regular “customer-facing experiences.” One learns quickly that the customer is
not interested in our in-house turf battles!
44. Put “it” on the–every agenda. XF “issues to be resolved” should be on every
agenda—morning project team review, weekly exec team meeting, etc. A “next
step” within 24 hours (4?) ought to be part of the resolution.
45. XF “honest broker” or ombudsman. The ombudsman examines XF “friction
events” and acts as Conflict Resolution Counselor. (Perhaps a formal conflict
resolution agreement?)
46. Lock it in! XF co-operation, central to any value-added mission, should be an
explicit part of the “Vision Statement.”
47. Promotions. Every promotion, no exceptions, should put XF Excellence in the
top 5 (3?) evaluation criteria.
48. Pick partners based on their “co-operation proclivity.” Everyone must be on
board if “this thing” is going to work; hence every vendor, among others, should
be formally evaluated on their commitment to XF transparency—e.g., can we
access anyone at any level in any function of their organization without
bureaucratic barriers?
49. Fire vendors who don’t “get it”—more than “get it,” welcome “it” with
open arms.”
50. Jaw. Jaw. Jaw. Talk XF cooperation-value-added at every opportunity. Become
a relentless bore!
Excellence! There is a state of XF
Excellence per se. Talk about it. Pursue
it. Aspire to nothing less.
51.
X =XFX*
*Excellence = Cross-functional Excellence
“C-levels” to Abet Cross-functional Excellence
CGRO/Chief Grunge Removal Officer
CXFCO/Chief Cross-functional Communication Officer
CIS-CDO/Chief Information Sharing & Common
Database Officer
CHRO(PL) /Chief Human resources Officer (Project
Managers, Love and Care of)
CPMFO/Chief Project Management Finance Officer
CTAO/Chief Team-space Assignments Officer
CE(XFNC) /Chief Executioner (Cross-functional
Non-cooperation!)
CXFBPO/Chief Cross-functional Brownie-points
Officer
In We have “C-level” officers for any damn
thing you can mention. So I thought I’d add
my voice to the fray. If XF (Cross-functional)
performance is a/the paramount issue for
modern enterprise effectiveness (where one
is bringing to bear the wherewithal of the
entire enterprise to provide high-value,
systemic “solutions” for customers), then
XFX/Cross-functional excellence is
necessarily priority #1. And we need an exec
to lead the charge—try these job titles on for
size!
The “XF Bible”
Building a Knowledge-driven
Organization: Overcome
Resistance to the Free Flow of
Ideas. Turn Knowledge into
New Products and Services.
Move to a Knowledge-based
Strategy —Robert Buckman
The 180-degree “Middle Manager Flip”
@ Buckman Labs …
From:
“information choke points”
To:
“knowledge transfer
facilitators,” with 100% (!!!)
of their rewards based on
spurring co-operation across
former barriers.
Bob Buckman runs Buckman Labs, a half-billion dollar, Memphis-based
specialty chemicals company. You might well roll your eyes at the
overused “customer solutions” moniker—but Buckman does just that
with panache and for profit, creating and applying chemical compounds
in customized ways to deal with production and cleanup issues for
specific customer facilities in the likes of the paper and leather-making
industries. The devotion to custom “solutions” is the bedrock, the alpha
to omega, of the firm’s extraordinary new-product and financial record.
Those closer to the intellectual fray than me claim that Bob gets
“inventor” rights in the now ubiquitous “knowledge management” arena.
In any event, this book is the Buckman Labs saga in
extraordinary detail—it is particularly valuable because
it moves so far beyond the relatively easy softwaretechnology bit and emphasizes the way in which a
company’s culture must be jerked around 180-degrees
to destroy former functional barriers. E.g., middle
managers, typically choke points guarding information
and access to their domain, became “knowledge
transfer facilitators,” with 100% (!!!) of their rewards
based on spurring co-operation across former barriers.
3. The Checklist:
The Power of a
“Blinding Flash of
the Obvious”!
Tom Peters/11 December 2007
Hospital (patient safety) problems are a bad joke—
killing us in America alone at a rate far in excess of
100,000 per year. In the home [U.S.] of the world’s
sexiest acute-care equipment, often the fix is as
lowtech as it gets. E.g., concocting and then
religiously using (pilot-like) the humble paper
checklist. The idea came to Johns Hopkins doc
Peter Pronovost. In short, it has revolutionary
impact, as some of the figures in this brief
presentation suggest. Humans being humans, and
brittle professionals (docs) being brittle
professionals, the widespread implementation has
been far slower than it needs to be or ought to be.
But my purpose here is to endorse the simple
ideas—a paper checklist in 2008—that can change
the world.
90K in ICU on any given day
178 steps/day
50%
“serious
complication”
Source: Atul Gawande, “The Checklist” (New Yorker, 1210.07)
**Peter Pronovost, Johns Hopkins, 2001
**Checklist, line infections
**1/3rd at least one error
**Nurses/permission to stop procedure
**1 year/10-day line-infection rate:
11% to
0%
(43 infections, 8 deaths, $2M
saved)
Source: Atul Gawande, “The Checklist” (New Yorker, 1210.07)
**Docs, nurses make own
checklists on whatever
process-procedure they choose
**Within weeks, average stay in
ICU down
50%
Source: Atul Gawande, “The Checklist” (New Yorker, 1210.07)
**Replicate in Inner City Detroit
(resource strapped—$$$, staff cut 1/3rd, poorest patients in USA)
**Nurses QB
**Project manager
**Exec involvement (help with “little things”—it’s all “little things”)
**Blues, small bonuses for participating
**6 months,
66% decrease in infection rate; USA:
bottom 25% to
top 10%
Source: Atul Gawande, “The Checklist” (New Yorker, 1210.07)
“[Pronovost] is focused on work that is not normally
considered a significant contribution in academic
medicine. As a result, few others are venturing to extend
Yet his work has
already saved more lives
than that of any
laboratory scientist in
the last decade.”
his achievements.
—Atul Gawande,
“The Checklist” (New Yorker, 1210.07)
“Beware of the
tyranny of making
Small Changes to Small
Things. Rather, make
Big
Changes to
Things.”
Big
—Roger Enrico, former Chairman, PepsiCo
“Beware of the tyranny of making
Small
Things.
Small
Changes to
Rather, make Big
Big Things …
using Small, Almost
Invisible Levers with
Big Systemic
Impact.”
Changes to
—TP
4. Excellence 1/40:
Try It!
Tom Peters
1/40
I lied. I’ve actually only
learned one thing in the
last 40 years—“Try it!”
Try it. Try it. Try it
ry it. Try it. Screw
up. Try it. Try it. Try
t. Try it. Try it. Try
t. Try it. Screw it up
t. Try it. Try it. try
What makes
God laugh?
People
making
plans!
"Life is what
happens while
you're busy
making other
plans.”
—John Lennon
“The secret of fast
progress is
inefficiency, fast
and furious and
numerous failures.”
—Kevin Kelly
“Active mutators in placid
times tend to die off. They
are selected against.
Reluctant mutators in
quickly changing times are
also selected against.”
—Carl Sagan & Ann Druyan,
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors
“We have a
‘strategic plan.’
It’s called doing
things.”
— Herb Kelleher
A man approached JP Morgan, held up an envelope, and said, “Sir, in
my hand I hold a guaranteed formula for success, which I will gladly
sell you for $25,000.”
“Sir,” JP Morgan replied, “I do not know what is in the envelope,
however if you show me, and I like it, I
give you my word as a gentleman that I will pay you what you ask.”
The man agreed to the terms, and handed over the envelope. JP
Morgan opened it, and extracted a single sheet of paper. He gave it
one look, a mere glance, then handed the piece of paper back to the
gent.
And paid him the
agreed upon $25,000.
1. Every morning, write
a list of the things
that need to be done
that day.
2.
Do them.
Source: Hugh MacLeod/tompeters.com/NPR
“This is so simple it sounds stupid, but it is amazing
how few oil people really understand that
you only find
oil if you drill
wells.
You may think you’re finding it
when you’re drawing maps and
studying logs, but you have to drill.”
Source: The Hunters, by John Masters, Canadian O & G wildcatter
“We made mistakes, of course. Most of them were
omissions we didn’t think of when we initially wrote the
software. We fixed them by doing it over and over, again
and again. We do the same today. While our competitors
are still sucking their thumbs trying to make the design
perfect, we’re already on prototype version
#5.
By the time our rivals are
ready with wires and screws, we are on version
#10. It gets back to planning
versus acting: We act from day
one; others plan how to plan—
for months.” —Bloomberg by Bloomberg
Hizzonor and the Governator*:
“The New
Action
Heroes”
(Time/07.23.07)
*Bloomberg, Schwarzenegger
“Experiment
fearlessly”
Source: BW0821.06, Type A Organization Strategies/
“How to Hit a Moving Target”—Tactic #1
"I think it is very important
for you to do two things:
act on your temporary
conviction as if it was a
real conviction; and when
you realize that you are
wrong, correct course very
quickly.” —Andy Grove
“We ground
up more pig
brains!”
The True Logic* of Decentralization:
6 divisions = 6 “tries”
6 divisions = 6 DIFFERENT leaders =
6 INDEPENDENT “tries” = Max
probability of “win”
6 divisions = 6 very DIFFERENT
leaders = 6 very INDEPENDENT
“tries” = Max probability of “far
out”/”3-sigma” “win”
*“Driver”: Law of Large #s
SERIOUS
PLAY
Culture of Prototyping
“Effective prototyping may
the most
valuable core
competence an
be
innovative organization can
hope to have.” —Michael Schrage
Think about It!?
Innovation =
Reaction to the
Prototype
Source: Michael Schrage
“You can’t be a serious
innovator unless and until
you are ready, willing and
able to seriously play.
‘Serious play’ is not an
oxymoron; it is the essence
of innovation.”
—Michael Schrage, Serious Play
“Learn not to
be careful.”
—Photographer Diane Arbus
to her students (Careful = The sidelines, from
Harriet Rubin in The Princessa)
“If it’s not fun
you’re not doing
it right.”
—Fran Tarkenton
“The key to a great
painting is the nerve,
after weeks of effort,
to ‘bet the painting’
on the next brush
stroke,”
Master musician, San Francisco
Screw.
things.
“Natural selection is death. ...
Without huge amounts of
death, organisms do not
change over time. ... Death
is the mother of structure. ...
It took four billion years of
death ... to invent the human
mind ...” — The Cobra Event
“FAIL, FAIL
AGAIN. FAIL
BETTER.”
—Samuel Beckett
“Fail .
Forward.
Fast.”
High Tech CEO, Pennsylvania
“Fail faster.
Succeed Sooner.”
David Kelley/IDEO
Sam’s
Secret
#1!
“Reward
excellent failures.
Punish mediocre
successes.”
Phil Daniels, Sydney exec
“If people tell me
they skied all day
and never fell
down, I tell them to
try a different
mountain.”
—Michael Bloomberg (BW/0625.07)
“In business, you reward
people for taking risks.
When it doesn’t work out
you promote them-because
they were willing to try new
things. If people tell me
they skied all day and never
fell down, I tell them to try
a different mountain.”
—Michael Bloomberg (BW/0625.07)
Read This!
Richard Farson & Ralph Keyes:
Whoever Makes
the Most Mistakes
Wins: The Paradox
of Innovation
“The Silicon Valley of
today is built less atop
the spires of earlier
triumphs than upon the
rubble of earlier
debacles.”—Newsweek/ Paul Saffo
“The secret of fast progress
is inefficiency, fast and
furious and numerous
failures.” --Kevin Kelly
“[other]
admirals more
frightened of
losing than
anxious to win”
On NELSON:
try.
Miss.
READY.
FIRE!
Ideas.
Plans.
Actions.
“We are in a
brawl with no rules.”
Paul Allaire/Xerox:
TP:
“There’s
[literally]
only one
Screw
Around Vigorously!
possible answer …
RAF
RFA
RFFFA RFFFA … FFFFA
RAAAAAAAAAAA …
IID DSS*
INID DSS**
*If In Doubt … Do Some S$%^ (stuff)
**If Not In Doubt … Do Some S%*&
Life 101: A 40-year Reflection
Go on offense.
Give everybody a shot.
Decentralize.
Try a bunch of stuff.
Make it up as you go along.
Get some stuff wrong.
Laugh a lot.
Get some stuff right.
Become a “success.”
Extract “lessons learned” or “best practices.”
Thicken the Book of Rules for Success.
Become evermore serious.
Enforce the rules to increasingly tight tolerances.
Go on defense.
Install walls.
Protect-at-all-costs today’s franchise.
Centralize.
Calcify.
Install taller walls.
Write more rules.
Become irrelevant and-or die.
No try.
No deal.
“You miss
100% of
the shots you
never take.”
—Wayne Gretzky
“Intelligent people
can always come up
with intelligent
reasons to do
nothing.”
—Scott Simon
“Andrew Higgins , who built landing craft in
WWII, refused to hire graduates of
He believed
that they only teach
you what you can’t do
in engineering school. He
engineering schools.
started off with 20 employees, and by the
middle of the war had 30,000 working for
him. He turned out 20,000 landing craft.
D.D. Eisenhower told me, ‘Andrew Higgins
won the war for us. He did it without
engineers.’ ”
—Stephen Ambrose/Fast Company
Try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
Try.
Excellence1982: The Bedrock “Eight Basics”
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
A Bias for Action
Close to the Customer
Autonomy and Entrepreneurship
Productivity Through People
Hands On, Value-Driven
Stick to the Knitting
Simple Form, Lean Staff
Simultaneous Loose-Tight Properties”
Innovation:
mad. Start Doing
something
about it. Now.
Get
The Limits of “Systems Thinking”:
Surprise,
Transformation &
Excellence
Through
Spontaneous
Discovery
The Limits of “Systems Thinking”:
Surprise, Transformation & Excellence
Through Spontaneous Discovery (1 of 2)
This summer was the summer of brush clearing.
And, it turned out, much more.
It started as simple exercise. After a day or two, scratches from head to toe,
and enjoyment, I set myself a goal of clearing a little space to get a better view
of one of the farm ponds. That revealed something else … to my surprise.
At a casual dinner, I sat next to a landscaper, and we got to talking about our
farm and my skills with clipper, saw, etc. In particular, she suggested that I do
some clearing around a few of our big boulders. Intrigued, I set about clearing,
on our main trail, around a couple of said boulders. I was again amazed at the
result.
That in turn led to attacking some dense brush and brambles around some
barely visible rocks that had always intrigued me—which led to “finding,” in
effect, a great place for a more or less “Zen garden,” as we’ve taken to calling
it.
Which led to … more and more. And more.
(Especially a rock wall, a hundred or so yards long, that is a massive wonder—
next year I’ll move up the hill behind it—I can already begin to imagine what
I’ll discover, though my hunch will be mostly “wrong,” and end up leading me
somewhere else.)
The Limits of “Systems Thinking”:
Surprise, Transformation & Excellence
Through Spontaneous Discovery (2 of 2)
To make a long story short:
I now have a new hobby, and maybe, ye gads, my life’s work for years to
come. This winter I’ll do a little, but I also plan to read up on outdoor spaces,
Zen gardens, etc; visit some rock gardens—spaces close by or amidst my
travels; and, indeed, concoct a more or less plan (rough sketches) for next
spring’s activities—though I’m sure that what I do will move forward mostly by
what I discover as I move forward. (what discovers itself may actually be a
better way to put it—there’s a “hidden hand” here.) As I’m beginning to see it,
this is at least a 10-year project—maybe even a multi-generation project.
I proceeded by trial and error and instinct, and each experiment led
to/suggested another experiment (or 2 or 10) and to a greater understanding
of potential—the “plan,” though there was none, made itself. And it was far, far
better (more ambitious, more interesting, more satisfying) than I would have
imagined. In fact, the result to date bears little or no relationship to what I
was thinking about at the start—a trivial self-designed chore may become the
engine of my next decade; the “brushcutting project” is now leading Susan and
I to view our entire property, and what it might represent, in a new light.
I was able to do much more than I’d dreamed—overall, and project by project.
“Systems thinking”? It would have killed the whole thing.
Is “everything connected to every thin else”? Well, duh. But I had no idea how
everything was connected to everything else until I began (thank you, Michael
Schrage) “serious play.”
I proceeded by trial and error and instinct,
and each experiment led to/suggested
another experiment (or 2 or 10) and to a
greater understanding of potential—the
“plan,” though there was none, made itself.
And it was far, far better (more ambitious,
more interesting, more satisfying) than I
would have imagined. In fact, the result to
date bears little or no relationship to what I
was thinking about at the start—a trivial
self-designed chore may become the engine
of my next decade; the “brushcutting project”
is now leading Susan and I to view our
entire property, and what it might becomerepresent, in a new light.
Note (more of the same): Last year I got a pacemaker for Christmas
(13 December, actually); the #1 no-no is using a chain saw. (The
magnetic field is fearsome.) Taking that warning a step farther, I
decided to do this project entirely with hand tools. Of course that
means more exercise—a good thing. But the “great wonder,” again
unexpected, is that the resultant slowness and quiet is the de facto
engine of my entire spontaneous discovery process.
Note: Some of you will have discovered my implicit debt to the
economist-of-freedom, F.A. Hayek. His stunningly clear view of
market capitalism as a “spontaneous discovery process” is my
intellectual bedrock, my “context” for three decades in Silicon
Valley, and now even for my recreational pursuits (which are, as
noted, becoming so much more than that).
Note (more of the same): Last year I got a pacemaker for Christmas
(13 December, actually); the #1 no-no is using a chain saw. (The
magnetic field is fearsome.) Taking that warning a step farther, I
decided to do this project entirely with hand tools. Of course that
means more exercise—a good thing. But the “great wonder,” again
unexpected, is that the resultant slowness and quiet is the de facto
engine of my entire spontaneous discovery process.
Note: Some of you will have discovered my implicit debt to the
economist-of-freedom, F.A. Hayek. His stunningly clear view of
market capitalism as a “spontaneous discovery process” is my
intellectual bedrock, my “context” for three decades in Silicon
Valley, and now even for my recreational pursuits (which are, as
noted, becoming so much more than that).
“How do I know what I think until I see what I say.”
—C.K. Chesterton
“We made mistakes, of course. Most of them were omissions
we didn’t think of when we initially wrote the software. We
fixed them by doing it over and over, again and again. We do
the same today. While our competitors are still sucking their
thumbs trying to make the design perfect, we’re already on
prototype version #5. By the time our rivals are ready with
wires and screws, we are on version #10. It gets back to
planning versus acting: We act from day one; others plan
how to plan—for months.” —Bloomberg by Bloomberg
“This is so simple it sounds stupid, but it is amazing how few
oil people really understand that you only find oil if you drill
wells. You may think you’re finding it when you’re drawing
maps and studying logs, but you have to drill.” —The Hunters, by
John Masters, Canadian Oil & Gas wildcatter
“Experiment fearlessly”
—BusinessWeek, in a Special Report, on the
premier innovation strategy of the best innovators
“The secret of fast progress is inefficiency, fast and furious
and numerous failures.” —Kevin Kelly, founding editor, Wired
“How do I know
what I think
until I see what I
say.”
—C.K. Chesterton
Your
call.
BLAME NOBODY.
EXPECT NOTHING.
DO SOMETHING.
Source: Locker room sign posted by
football coach Bill Parcells
The End