Transcript Tom Peters’ X25* EXCELLENCE. ALWAYS. Bloomberg Leadership Series/School of Public Health Johns Hopkins University/02 April 2007 *In Search of Excellence 1982-2007

Tom Peters’ X25*
EXCELLENCE.
ALWAYS.
Bloomberg Leadership Series/School of Public Health
Johns Hopkins University/02 April 2007
*In Search of Excellence 1982-2007
Slides* at …
tompeters.com
*Also LONG
“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
“It is not the
strongest of the
species that survives,
nor the most
intelligent, but the
one most responsive
to change.”
—Charles Darwin
Importance of Success Factors by Various
“Gurus”/(Unreliable) Estimates by Tom Peters
Strategy
Systems People
Passion
Porter
50%
20
20
10
Drucker
25%
35
25
15
Bennis
25%
20
30
25
Peters
15%
20
35
30
“Hard” Stuff/Analysis
& planning: 25%
“Soft” Stuff/people &
Politics & Passion
& execution: 75%
Disease/Branch of Medicine vs
Health/Social Reform/Prevention via
Community Effort
Research vs
Running a Health Department
Specialized Education vs
Popular Education
Germans vs English
Wickliffe Rose vs William Welch
Haaavad vs JHU
Why in the
World did you
go to Siberia?
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”
The Peters
Principles: Enthusiasm.
Emotion. Excellence. Energy.
Excitement. Service. Growth.
Creativity. Imagination. Vitality.
Joy. Surprise. Independence.
Spirit. Community. Limitless
human potential. Diversity.
Innovation. Design. Quality.
Entrepreneurialism. Wow.
EXCELLENCE.
INNOVATE.
OR.
DIE.
The Mess
Is The
Message!
Period!
The Mess Is the Message! Period!
An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution
of the United States —Charles Beard (1913)
The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World
Smaller and the World Economy Bigger —Marc Levinson
Tube: The Invention of Television —David & Marshall Fisher
Empires of Light: Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse,
and the Race to Electrify the World —Jill Jonnes
The Soul of a New Machine —Tracy Kidder
Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA —Brenda Maddox
The Blitzkrieg Myth —John Mosier
Lessons
Need-driven
A thousand “parents”
Messy
Evolutionary
“Trivial”
Relentless Experimentation
Trial &
many, many errors
“Real heroes” seldom around when the battle is won
Loooong time for systemic adaptation/s
(many innovations) (bill of lading, standard time)
Not …
“Plan-driven”
The product of “Strategic Thinking/Planning”
The product of “focus groups”
First-level Scientific Success
The smartest guy
in the room wins”
Or …
First-level Scientific Success
Fanaticism
Persistence-Dogged Tenacity
Patience (long haul/decades)-Impatience (in a hurry/”do it yesterday”)
Passion
Energy
Relentlessness (Grant-ian)
Enthusiasm
Driven (nuts!)
(Brutal?) Competitiveness
Entrepreneurial
Pragmatic (R.F!A.)
Scrounge (“gets” the logistics-infrastructure bit)
Master of Politics (internal-external)
Tactical Genius
Pursuit of (Oceanic) Excellence!
High EQ/Skillful in Attracting + Keeping Talent/Magnetic
Prolific (“ground up more pig brains”)
Egocentric
Sense of History-Destiny
Futuristic-In the Moment
Mono-dimensional (“Work-life balance”? Ha!)
Exceptionally Intelligent
Exceptionally Clever (methodological shortcuts/methodological genius)
Luck
Elizabeth Cady
Stanton, Women’s
Rights, and
movements that
rock the world
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
(more or less) (circa 0331.2007)
ECS: “She was defeated
again and again and
again, but she
continued the struggle
with passionate
impatience.”
Source: In Her Own Right: The Life of
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Elisabeth Griffith
“She had survived her
husband, outlived most
of her enemies, and
exhausted her allies. Her
mind remained alert, her
mood optimistic, and her
manner combative.”
Source: “Self Sovereign 1889-1902,” In Her Own Right: The
Life of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Elisabeth Griffith
(50 years down, 25 to go)
Driven by anger!! (not “focus groups”)
Great “vision,” no “strategic plan”
Whoops: conflicting “vision/s”
Execution (& vision) (“Dreamers with deadlines”)
Opportunistic
Insane optimism
Failure after failure; disappointment after disappointment
(secret to staying power: Stay pissed off!!)
Plan B rules
Changing cadres
Opportunistic alliances (here today, gone tomorrow)
“The enemy of my enemy is my friend”
Creating events and groups to serve a momentary need
Warring leaders (Freud-Jung)
Petulance (human frailty amidst a Great Struggle)
Agile re goal w/o sacrificing Vision
Go underground for long stretches
Patience (72 years) & impatience
Relentless!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (WSC: “Success stems from the ability
to go from failure without losing your enthusiasm”)
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
“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
“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
Screw.
things.
“FAIL, FAIL
AGAIN. FAIL
BETTER.”
—Samuel Beckett
“Fail .
Forward.
Fast.”
High Tech CEO, Pennsylvania
“Reward
excellent failures.
Punish mediocre
successes.”
Phil Daniels, Sydney exec
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
Planners
vs
Searchers
“Where planners
* raise high expectations
but take no responsibility for meeting them,
searchers prefer to work case-by-case,
using trial and error to tailor solutions to
individual problems, fully aware that most
remedies must be homegrown.” —WSJ, 0822.06 (on malaria
eradication, and hedge fund manager Lance Laifer)
[*“Planners [WHO, World Bank, etc] see poverty as a
technical engineering problem that their
answers will solve.” —William Easterly]
“All sorts of approaches need to be
tried and we need feedback.” —Roger Bate
“Some people look for
things that went wrong
and try to fix them. I
look for things that
went right, and try to
build off them.”
—Bob Stone (Mr ReGo)
Demos!
Heroes!
Stories!
REAL Org Change: Demos
& Models (“Model
Installations,” “ReGo Labs”)/ Heroes (mostly extant: “burned to
reinvent gov’t”)/
Stories & Storytellers (Props!)/
Chroniclers (Writers, Videographers, Pamphleteers, Etc.)/
Cheerleaders & Recognition (Pos>>Neg, Volume)/
New Language (Hot/Emotional/WOW)/ Seekers
(networking mania)/ Protectors/ Support Groups/
End Runs—“Pull Strategy” (weird alliances, weird
customers, weird suppliers, weird alumnae-JKC)/ Field “Real
People” Focus (3 COs) (long way away)/
Speed (O.O.D.A. Loops—act before the “bad guys” can react)
C.f., Bob Stone, Lessons from an Uncivil Servant
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.)
“Normal” =
“o for 800”
EXCELLENCE.
WOMEN.
RULE.
PERIOD/
“Forget China,
India and the
Internet: Economic
Growth Is Driven
by
Women.”
—Headline,
Economist, April 15, 2006, Leader, page 14
Women’s Trifecta+
*Buy
*Wealth
*Lead
+ECLIPSE
OF MALES
(Old/Retire; Young/Poorly educated)
The Perfect Answer
Jill and Jack buy
slacks in black…
“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
94% of loans to …
women
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 &
value-added 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?
Women:
Principal
Change Agents/
Health &
Finance
(Yunus.94%, Yunus94)
SKILLS.
Getting to WOW
Through Mastery of …
The
Sales25.
“Everyone
lives by
selling
something.”
.
– Robert Louis Stevenson
Al*: “I knew my stuff—and it was
damn good. What I finally figured
out, after a string of ‘unfair’
setbacks, was that I wasn’t a good
salesman. That’s when I started
studying top salesmen, and
that’s when I started to meet
with success.”
*Top TV producer for 30 years
Getting Things Done:
Power &
The
Implementation34.
Presentation
Excellence: The
PresX56
“In classical times when
Cicero had finished speaking,
the people said, ‘How well he
spoke,’ but when
Demosthenes had finished
speaking, they said, ‘Let
us march.’”
—Adlai Stevenson
The Interviewing
Excellence:
The IntX31
“Little Stuff”
(plus): The
True “Basics”
Thank
You!
“Courtesies of a small and
trivial character are the
ones which strike
deepest in the grateful
and appreciating heart.”
—Henry Clay
Jim Jeffords
oversight!
The …
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 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?
Are you too emotional? Not emotional enough? Do you
spend much time with “new people”? Do you think questions
like this are “so much BS”?
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.
Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect
TP ON
HEALTHCARE
“When I climb Mount
Rainier I face less
risk of death than
I’ll face on the
operating table.”
—Don Berwick
Quality!
DSS!
Prevention!
Wellness!
Chronic care!
Elder care!
Convenient care!
Childhood obesity!
H5N1!
COULD
IT TRULY BE THIS
AWFUL?
“Quality”:
90,000 killed
and 2,000,000
CDC 1998:
injured from
hospital-caused drug
errors & infections
HealthGrades/Denver:
195,000
hospital deaths per
year in the U.S., 2000-2002 = 390 full
jumbos/747s in the drink per year.
Comments: “This should give you pause
when you go to the hospital.”
National Quality Forum
—Dr. Kenneth Kizer,
. “There is little evidence
that patient safety has improved in
the last five years.” —Dr. Samantha Collier
Source: Boston Globe/07.27.04
1,000,000
“serious medication errors per
year” … “illegible handwriting,
misplaced decimal points, and
missed drug interactions and
allergies.”
Source: Wall Street Journal /Institute of Medicine
*77.9, below Costa Rica, Cuba/USN&WR, 0326.07
PLANETREE/
PLANETREE
ALLIANCE: A
DIFFERENT
MODEL
The 9 Planetree Practices
1. The Importance of Human Interaction
2. Informing and Empowering Diverse Populations: Consumer
Health Libraries and Patient Information
3. Healing Partnerships: The importance of Including Friends
and Family
4. Nutrition: The Nurturing Aspect of Food
5. Spirituality: Inner Resources for Healing
6. Human Touch: The Essentials of Communicating
Caring Through Massage
7. Healing Arts: Nutrition for the Soul
8. Integrating Complementary and Alternative Practices
into Conventional Care
9. Healing Environments: Architecture and Design Conducive
to Health
Source: Putting Patients First, Susan Frampton, Laura Gilpin, Patrick Charmel
139,380 former
patients from 225 hospitals:
Press Ganey Assoc:
none
of THE top 15 factors
determining Patient Satisfaction
referred to patient’s health outcome
PS directly related to Staff Interaction
PS directly correlated with Employee
Satisfaction
Source: Putting Patients First, Susan Frampton, Laura Gilpin, Patrick Charmel
Griffin:
Music in the parking
lot; professional musicians in
the lobby (7/week, 3-4hrs/day) ;
5 pianos ;
volunteers (120-140 hrs arts &
entertainment per month).
Source: Putting Patients First, Susan Frampton, Laura Gilpin, Patrick Charmel
Care!/Love!/Spirit!
Self-Control!
Connect!/learn!/
involve!/Engage!
Understanding!/Growth!
De-stress!/heal!
Whole patient &
family & friends!
Get well!/stay well!
Griffin Hospital/Derby CT (Planetree Alliance “HQ”) Results:
Financially successful.
Expanding programsphysically. Growing market
share. Only hospital in “100
Best Cos to Work for”—
7 consecutive years,
currently #6.
—“Five-Star Hospitals,” Joe Flower,
strategy+business (#42)
HEALTHCARE VS
HEALTH
TP Recommendation* #1:
Dubai Healthcare City
to
Dubai Health City
*Presentation at “First Middle Eastern Healthcare Summit/01.2006
Sexy Cures vs Quality/Safety
Surgeons vs
Family Practice Physicians/CIOs
Fixing vs Preventing
Healthcare vs Health
Tom/$53K vs 1,000 Africans
[Stanford?] vs Griffin/Planetree
SF Internist vs
Tom/Canyon Ranch
Childhood
Obesity >
Terrorism
Bust
fat docs!
Sprint/Overland Park KS:
Slow elevators, distant
parking lots with
infrequent buses, “food
court” as “poorly” placed
as possible, etc.
Source: New York Times
“Bump into factor”: Extra-size
portions, eat more. Higher
% shelf space snacks, more
obesity. More liquor stores,
more crime. High vs low fat:
Japanese who emigrate to
U.S. suffer 3X increase in
heart disease.
Source: Tom Farley & Deborah Cohen, Prescription for a Healthy Nation
EXCELLENCE.
BEDROCK.
LEADERSHIP.
9Ps.
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
“Management has a lot to do with
answers. Leadership is a function of
questions. And the first question for a
‘Who do
we intend to
be?’ Not ‘What are we going to
leader always is:
do?’ but ‘Who do we intend to be?’”
—Max De Pree, Herman Miller
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
“Nothing is so
contagious as
enthusiasm.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge
“A man
without a
smiling face
must not open
a shop.”
—Chinese Proverb
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
“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
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
“You must
be
the change you
wish to see in the
world.”
Gandhi
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
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
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
‘do’
“Leaders
people.
Period.”
—Anon.
PARC’s Bob Taylor:
“Connoisseur
of Talent”
“Leaders
‘SERVE’
people.
Period.”
—Anon. (After Robert Greenleaf)
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
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!
"The reasonable man adapts
himself to the world. The
unreasonable one persists in
trying to adapt the world to
himself. Therefore, all
progress depends upon the
unreasonable man.” —GB Shaw,
Man and Superman: The Revolutionists' Handbook.
“Do one thing
every day
that scares
you.”
—Eleanor Roosevelt
“Never doubt that a small
group of committed
people can change the
world. Indeed it is
the only thing that
ever has.” —Margaret Mead
eliot + 7
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
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
PURPOSE.
PASSION.
Potential.
Presence.
Personal.
PERSISTENCE.
PEOPLE.
Potent.
Positive.
“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)
"Life is not a journey to the
grave with the intention of
arriving safely in one pretty
and well preserved piece, but
to skid across the line
broadside, thoroughly used
up, worn out, leaking oil,
shouting ‘GERONIMO!’ ”
—Bill McKenna, professional motorcycle racer
(Cycle magazine 02.1982)
Geron-imo!