Transcript LONG Tom Peters’ Excellence. Always. Management Forum Bogota/16 March 2009 To appreciate this presentation [and ensure that it is not a mess], you need Microsoft fonts: NOTE: “Showcard Gothic,” “Ravie,” “Chiller” and.

LONG
Tom Peters’
Excellence.
Always.
Management Forum
Bogota/16 March 2009
To appreciate
this presentation [and ensure
that it is not a mess], you need
Microsoft fonts:
NOTE:
“Showcard Gothic,”
“Ravie,” “Chiller”
and “Verdana”
Slides at …
tompeters.com
Conrad Hilton, at a gala
celebrating his career,
was asked, “What was the
most important lesson
you’ve learned in your long
and distinguished career?”
His immediate answer …
“remember
to tuck the
shower curtain
inside the
bathtub”
“Execution
is strategy.”
—Fred Malek fffffii
“almost inhuman
disinterestedness in
… strategy”
—Josiah Bunting
on
U.S. Grant (from Ulysses S. Grant)
MBWA
“Tom let
me tell you the definition of a
good lending officer. After
church on Sunday, on the way
home with his family, he takes
a little detour to drive by the
factory he just lent money to.
Doesn’t go in or any such
thing, just drives by and takes
a look.”
Message from a banker, circa 1988:
“It suddenly
occurred to me …
“It suddenly
occurred to me that
in the space of two
or three hours he
never talked
about cars.”
—Les Wexner
“Too Much Cost, Not Enough Value” … “Too
Much Speculation, Not Enough Investment” …
“Too Much Complexity, Not Enough Simplicity”
… “Too Much Counting, Not Enough Trust” …
“Too Much Business Conduct, Not Enough
Professional Conduct” … “Too Much
Salesmanship, Not Enough Stewardship” …
“Too Much Focus on Things, Not Enough Focus
on Commitment” … “Too Many Twenty-first
Century Values, Not Enough EighteenthCentury Values” … “Too Much ‘Success,’ Not
Enough Character”
—chapter titles from John Bogle,
Enough. The Measures of Money, Business, and Life (Bogle is
founder of the Vanguard Mutual Fund Group)
L(+21) = L(-21)
Leadership(21A.D.) =
Leadership(21B.C.)
1982
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))
2007
Siberia
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
2007
Sydney
Organizations exist
to serve. Period.
Leaders live to
serve. Period.
… 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.
“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
“You have to
treat your
employees like
customers.”
—Herb Kelleher,
complete answer, upon being asked his “secrets to success”
Source: Joe Nocera, NYT, “Parting Words of an Airline Pioneer,” on the occasion of
Herb Kelleher’s retirement after 37 years at Southwest Airlines (SWA’s pilots union
took out a full-page ad in USA Today thanking HK for all he had done; across the
way in Dallas American Airlines’ pilots were picketing the Annual Meeting)
The Customer
Comes Second
—Hal Rosenbluth and Diane McFerrin Peters* (*no relation)
“We are a
‘Life Success’
Company.”
Dave Liniger, founder, RE/MAX
The Dream Manager
—Matthew Kelly
“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
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 the-bestversion-of-himself or –herself. … When a
question is:
company forgets that it exists to serve customers, it quickly
Our employees are our first
customers, and our most important customers.”
goes out of business.
“The four most important
words in any
organization
‘What do
you think?’ ”
are …
Source: courtesy Dave Wheeler, posted at
tompeters.com, source of original unknown (0609.08)
"Trust the
development
experts—all
seven billion of
them.”
—headline, Financial Times,
0529.08, to an article by development guru William Easterly,
commenting negatively on the World Bank Growth
Commission’s recent report that concludes, in effect,
“trust the World Bank experts”
“The deepest
human need is
the need to be
appreciated.”
William James
“Buy in”“Ownership”Authorial bragging
rights-“Born again”
Champion = One
Line of Code!
“Leaders
‘SERVE’
people.
Period.”
—inspired by Robert Greenleaf
“Business has to give
people enriching,
rewarding lives,
or it's simply not
worth doing.” —Richard Branson
“Managing winds up being
the management of the
allocation of resources
against tasks. Leadership
focuses on people. My
definition of a leader is
someone who helps people
succeed.” —Carol Bartz, Yahoo!
Ben
Changes His
BHAG!*
*Big Hairy Audacious Goal/Collins
“How to flush
$500,000 down
the toilet in one
easy lesson!!”
TP:
< CAPEX
> People!
Wegmans
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
Brand =
Talent.
The 19 Es of
Excellence
If Not Excellence, What?
If Not Excellence Now, When?
The “19 Es” of Excellence
Enthusiasm. (Be an irresistible force of nature!)
Energy. (Be fire! Light fires!)
Exuberance. (Vibrate—cause earthquakes!)
Execution. (Do it! Now! Get it done! Barriers are baloney!
Excuses are for wimps! Accountability is gospel!
Adhere to the Bill Parcells doctrine: “Blame nobody! Expect nothing! Do something!”)
Empowerment.
(Respect and appreciation! Always ask, “What do you think?”
Then: Listen! Liberate! Celebrate! 100% innovators or bust!)
Edginess. (Perpetually dancing at the frontier, and a little or a lot beyond.)
Enraged. (Determined to challenge & change the status quo!)
Engaged. (Addicted to MBWA/Managing By Wandering Around. In touch. Always.)
Electronic. (Partners with the world 60/60/24/7 via electronic community building
and entanglement of every sort. Crowdsourcing/doing power!)
Encompassing. (Relentlessly pursue diverse opinions—the more diversity the merrier! Diversity per se “works”!)
Emotion. (The alpha. The omega. The essence of leadership. The essence of sales.
Empathy.
The essence of marketing. The essence. Period. Acknowledge it.)
(Connect, connect, connect with others’ reality and aspirations! “Walk
in the other person’s shoes”—until the soles have holes!)
Experience.
(Life is theater! Make every activity-contact memorable! Standard:
“Insanely Great”/Steve Jobs; “Radically Thrilling”/BMW.)
Eliminate. (Keep it simple!)
Errorprone. (Ready! Fire! Aim!
Try a lot of stuff and make a lot of booboos and then try some more stuff
and make some more booboos—all of it at the speed of light!)
Evenhanded.
Expectations.
Eudaimonia.
Excellence.
(Straight as an arrow! Fair to a fault! Honest as Abe!)
(Michelangelo: “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.” Amen!)
(Pursue the highest of human moral purpose—the core of Aristotle’s philosophy. Be of service. Always.)
(The only standard! Never an exception! Start now! No excuses! If not Excellence, what?
If not Excellence now, when?)
“Mr. Watson,
how long does it
take to achieve
Excellence?”
minute”
Some like
it hot!
“Insanely
Great”
“Radically
thrilling”
BMW
“You do not merely want to
be the best of the best. You
want to be
considered the
only ones who do
what you do.”
—Jerry Garcia
Single
greatest act
of pure
imagination
Does your
project
portfolio
“have
a dubai”?
#1 Truthteller …
You = Your
calendar*
*Calendars
never lie
“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
“Dennis, you need a …
‘To-don’t ’
List !”
“You must
be
the change you
wish to see in the
world.”
Gandhi
“To develop others,
start with yourself.”
—Marshall Goldsmith
#1 Trait …
“I am a
dispenser of
enthusiasm.”
—Ben Zander
“Nothing is so
contagious as
enthusiasm.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Halt. Do. It.
Now. …
Skip the map
“Mapping your
competitive
position”
or …
1. Have you in the
last 10 days …
visited a
customer?
2. Have you called a
customer … TODAY?
The “Have
you …” 50
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.)
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?
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?
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?
Pursuing
Discomfort!
“I’m not comfortable
unless I’m
uncomfortable.”
—Jay Chiat
“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!
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
“You miss
100% of
the shots you
never take.”
—Wayne Gretzky
“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
You don’t
get better
by being
bigger. You
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
“Data drawn from the real world
attest to a fact that is beyond
Everything
in existence tends
to deteriorate.”
our control:
—Norberto Odebrecht, Education Through Work
#4 Japan
#2T USA
#2T China
#4 Japan
#3 USA
#2 China
#1 Germany
Reason!!!
Mittelstand
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
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
Dick ‘n
dan
“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
“Experiment
fearlessly”
Source: BW0821.06, Type A Organization Strategies/
“How to Hit a Moving Target”—Tactic #1
“Fail .
Forward.
Fast.”
High Tech CEO, Pennsylvania
“Reward
excellent failures.
Punish mediocre
successes.”
Phil Daniels, Sydney exec
“It is not the
strongest of the
species that survives,
nor the most
intelligent, but the
one most responsive
to change.”
—Charles Darwin
DECENTRALIZATION.
EXECUTION.
ACCOUTABILITY.
6:15A.M.
30%
MH: 80%
CF:
(no salesfolk)
(salesfolk)
Response to “most important
contribution”: “I focused this
discipline on People and Power;
on Values, Structure, and
Constitution; and above all,
on responsibilities—that is,
focused the Discipline of
Management on management as
a truly liberal art.” (18 January 1999)
Small
is (can often be)
“Design is everything.
Everything is design.”
“We are all designers.”
Inspiration: The Power of Design: A Force for
Transforming Everything, Richard Farson
Behavioral Primacy!
E.g.: plate size;
location of platters,
6.5 feet Away =
-63% “Seconds”
Source: Brian Wansink, Mindless Eating
(20 lbs per year; 200 decisions per day)
“Paint it
white!”
— On Hashem Akbari’s [Lawrence Livermore labs] powerful program
to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions; using conservative
assumptions, it could reduce 44 billion tons of CO2 emissions by cooling
buildings, roads, entire cities (The Guardian, 0116.09)
Socks = 10K
“Everything matters”
-80%
Source:
Nudge, Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein ,
90K in U.S.A. ICUs on any
given day; 178 steps/day
in ICU.
50%
stays result
in “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 when he started
**Nurses/permission to stop procedure
if doc, other not following checklist
**In 1 year, 10-day line-infection rate:
11% to …
0%
Source: Atul Gawande, “The Checklist” (New Yorker, 1210.07)
Seating arrangement
Table shape
Physical arrangements (distance,
co-location, grand or not/Apple)
Geologists/Geophysicists
XFX/Cross-functional Excellence
(meetings, talks, etc)
“The hang out axiom” (“We are
what we eat.”)
See greenery, recover faster (map,
smell of cookies, pianos/
Planetree)
Vary road crossing times/engage
Why We Buy/Nudge/Sway/
Kahneman-Tversky
No waste baskets/paper recycling
Cases vs charts
Default/401(k)/45% vs 86%
Designer next to the CEO
Opel plant away from factory
Rickover’s chair/Sunlight in my
eyes/LBJ on the edge of the rug
Thank you notes/10 years
Stew/Wrapped and loose fish/2X
Stew/No exit aisles
Wal*Mart/Oversized carts
Coins with likenesses
Post Office architecture
Pat visits the Local president
Thom Mayer and the crossed arms
“Management” of body language
(2/3rds of communication)
Prowl the bowels of the
organization
First question asked
Top of the agenda
Calendar!
Checklist/Peter Pronovost/ICU line
infections/50%-0%
Visible measures/Creech and
billboards
Creech/mechanics’ “drive by”
Food at front
Sexy voice/USAF
Walls of yesterday or tomorrow
Staff “lives with” line
“Broken windows”-“beer and piss
patrol”/sense of order, small
crimes beget large ones
Washington and “dress for
success”/winter 1776
Dress code
Fly in the urinal/-80%
Parking lot location/elevator
speed/food court
Plate size/distance from “seconds”
(6.5 feet = 63%)
>50 feet = 50 miles/T Allen
Casual gathering places/ “nooks”/
3M-Austin
Walk down the stairs once a month/
9-11 survivor
Glasses in the cup (two weeks)
TP party prep
“Renegade” buildings
Welcoming reception area (Insta“smell culture”)
Burlington Police Department/
decals on glasses/12.31.06
Bike at the door/Running shoes
next to the bed
Measures/New (TP & Seabees)
Reports (WIAR/Women’s Initiative
Annual Report/Deloitte & Touche)
MBWA
Grant sleep on the ground,
travel with one assistant
Promotions/Deep dip
“Small” personal gestures
Focus/One inescapable campaign/
Welch-GE
Hustle
Stand-up meetings
Ask vs talk
“What do you think?”
Engaged listening
Go to door to meet
Obama transition
Awareness of “Kremlinologists”
Hire for smile!
TOV/tone of voice
Master the arcane rules/
Al Smith/LBJ/Dole/Tom DeLay
“Eighty percent of success is
showing up”/Woody Allen/
Delaware
“Courtesies of a small and trivial
character are the ones which
strike deepest in the grateful and
appreciating heart.”/Henry Clay
Jeffords/Missing invitation
Flowers
We Are
What We
Eat
We are the
company
we keep
“You will become
like the five people
you associate with
the most—this can
be either a blessing
or a curse.”
—Billy Cox
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
The “Hang Out Axiom”: At
its core, every (!!!)
relationship-partnership
decision (employee,
vendor, customer, etc)
is a strategic decision
about:
“Innovate,
‘Yes’ or ‘No’ ”
Axiom: Never use a vendor
who is not in the top
quartile (decile?) in
their industry on R&D
spending!*
*Inspired by Hummingbird
“Normal” =
“o for 800”
“Diverse groups of problem solvers—groups
of people with diverse tools—consistently
outperformed groups of the best and the
brightest. If I formed two groups, one
random (and therefore diverse) and one
consisting of the best individual performers,
the first group almost always did better. …
Diversity trumped
ability.”
—Scott Page, The Difference: How
the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups,
Firms, Schools, and Societies Diversity
“The best predictor [of
accuracy of prediction]
was fame: The more feted
by the media, the worse a
pundit’s accuracy.”
—Sharon Begley,
“When Should a Process Be Art, Not Science?” by Joseph Hall and Eric
Johnson Time (03.02.09, based in part on the work of Philip Tetlock,
who studied 82,361 predictions by 284 pundits)
“The Billion-man
Research Team:
Companies offering
work to online
communities are
reaping the benefits of
‘crowdsourcing.’”
—Headline, FT, 0110.07
Rob McEwen/CEO/
Goldcorp Inc./
Red Lake
gold
Source: Wikinomics: How Mass
Collaboration Changes Everything,
Don Tapscott & Anthony Williams
“The
Bottleneck Is at
the Top of the Bottle”
“Where are you likely to find people with the least diversity of
experience, the largest investment in the past, and the greatest
reverence for industry dogma:
At the top!”
— Gary Hamel/Harvard Business Review
“In Blackburn,
olds
four-year-
are making podcasts. In Suffolk,
the sometimes tedious and impractical ritual of
morning Assembly has been replaced in one
school by a news video compiled by pupils;
posting it on YouTube means parents can
watch as well—and they do. … Learners at all
stages and ages, from all over the world, are
downloading free tutorials while they replenish
their iPods, courtesy of iTunes U. …
Source: The Guardian, 0113.09, “Resource 2009,” a preview of BETT 2009
“What is your most
marked characteristic?”
Vanity Fair:
Mike Bloomberg:
“Curiosity.”
“Who’s the most
interesting person
you’ve met in the
last 90 days? How
do I get in touch
with them?”
—Fred Smith
Greater
than …
“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
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…
Cases! Cases! Cases!
McDonald’s (“mom-centered” to “majority consumer”; not
via kids)
Home Depot (“Do it [everything!] Herself”)
P&G (more than “house cleaner”)
DeBeers (“right-hand rings”/$4B)
AXA Financial
Kodak (women = “emotional centers of the household”)
Nike (> jock endorsements; new def sports; majority consumer)
Avon
Bratz (young girls want “friends,” not a blond stereotype)
Source: 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
“AS LEADERS,
WOMEN
RULE:
New Studies find that
female managers outshine their male
counterparts in almost every measure”
TITLE/ Special Report/ BusinessWeek
“The growth and
success of womenowned businesses is
one of the most
profound changes
taking place in the
business world
today.” —
Margaret Heffernan, How She Does It
“CEMEX realized that women are
the key drivers of savings in
[Mexican] families. … They are entrepreneurial
in nature, and they actively participate in the tanda
system [neighborhood groups who pool money and save any
that’s left over]. Regardless of whether they are
homemakers or outside-the-home workers, they are
responsible for any savings in the family. Patrimonio
Hoy [Private Property Today, a CEMEX program to aid the poor in
building homes] discovered that 70% of the women who
saved were saving money in the tanda system to
construct homes for their families. The men in the
society consider their job done if they bring in their
paycheck at the end of the day.” —C.K. Prahalad, The
Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid, on Lorenzo Zambrano and
CEMEX, the Mexican company that’s the world’s #3 cement maker
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?
“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
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
boys in the school system.
Times, 10.03.2006
Where the
Money is …
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“People turning 50
more
than half of
today have
their adult life
ahead of them.”
—Bill Novelli,
50+: Igniting a Revolution to Reinvent America
2000-2010 Stats
18-44: -1%
55+: +21%
(55-64:
+47%)
44-65:
“New
Customer
Majority” *
*45% larger than 18-43; 60% larger by 2010
Source: Ageless Marketing, David Wolfe & Robert Snyder
We are the Aussies & Kiwis & Americans & Canadians.
We are the Western Europeans & Japanese. We are the
fastest growing, the biggest, the wealthiest, the
boldest, the most (yes) ambitious, the most
experimental & exploratory, the most different, the
most indulgent, the most difficult & demanding, the
most service & experience obsessed, the most
vigorous, (the least vigorous,) the most health
conscious, the most female, the most profoundly
important commercial market in the history of the
we will be the
Center of your universe
for the next twenty-five
years. We have arrived!
world—and
No “Anger
Management,”
Please!
All You Need to Know About
“Sources of Innovation”:
Angry
people!
[angry with the
status quo]
“SkunkWorks”/ “ParallelUniverse”
“the
solution”
Source: Scott Bedbury (Others: 3M, Google, Shell, NAVFAC)
SkunkWorks/
“Skunks” (!!!)
“[CEO A.G.] Lafley has shifted P&G’s
focus on inventing all its own products
others’
inventions at
least half the
time. One successful
to developing
example Mr. Clean Magic Eraser,
based on a product found in an
Osaka market.”
—Fortune
The “8Ps” of Innovation Success:
Pissed off!
Passion!!!!
Prototypes.
pow!!
Pals.
Protector.
Politics.
Persistence.
[Determined to change the world]
[Persist, take the heat, sell]
[Fast & Furious]
[Insanely great!]
[Buddies with different skills, recruiting ability]
[Run cover, champion your cause]
[Political skill]
[Can handle the bumps and U-turns]
Innovation Index: How many
of your Top 5 Strategic
Initiatives/Key Projects score
8 or higher [out of 10] on a
“Weird”/ “Profound”/
“Wow”/“Game- changer”
Scale?
The
quality and quantity
and imaginativeness
of innovation shall
be the same in all
functions —e.g., in HR and
Iron Innovation Equality Law:
purchasing as much as in marketing or
product development.
X =XFX*
*Excellence = Cross-functional Excellence
Never
waste a
lunch!
????
% XF
lunches*
*Measure!
(Way) Underutilized Lever
Space!
Space!
Space!
Space!
The “XF-50”: 50 Ways to
Enhance Cross-Functional
Effectiveness and Deliver
Speed, “Service Excellence”
and “Value-added
Customer ‘Solutions’”*
*Entire “XF-50” List is an Appendix to the LONG version of
this presentation, posted at tompeters.com
“Development can help great
but if
I had a dollar to
spend, I’d spend 70
cents getting the
right person in the
door.” —
people be even better—
Paul Russell, Director, Leadership &
Development, Google
the
most important
aspect of business
“In short, hiring is
and yet remains woefully
misunderstood.”
Source: Wall Street Journal, 10.29.08,
review of Who: The A Method for Hiring,
Geoff Smart and Randy Street
Who?
—The screening interview
—The “Topgrading Interview”
(story and patterns)
—Focused interview
—Reference interview*
*Detailed rituals, goals, follow-up
Source: Who: The A Method for Hiring,
Geoff Smart and Randy Street
#1.
Strategic.
Priority.
Period.
#1 cause of
Dis-satisfaction?
Employee retention & satisfaction:
Overwhelmingly,
based on the firstline manager!
Source: Marcus Buckingham & Curt Coffman, First, Break All
the Rules: What the World’s Greatest Managers Do Differently
2/year =
legacy.
‘do’
“Leaders
people.
Period.”
—Anon.
“Leaders
‘SERVE’
people.
Period.”
—inspired by Robert Greenleaf
Tea
Power
Give
good
tea!
“Allied commands depend
on mutual confidence
[and this confidence]
is gained, above all
through the development
of friendships.”
—General D.D. Eisenhower,
Armchair General * (05.08)
*“Perhaps his most outstanding ability [at West Point] was
the ease with which he made friends and earned the trust
of fellow cadets who came from widely varied backgrounds;
it was a quality that would pay great dividends during his
future coalition command.”
“eighty percent
of success is
showing up.”
—Woody Allen
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.*
*PERCEPTION IS ALL THERE IS!
“I regard apologizing as the
most magical, healing,
restorative gesture human
beings can make. It is the
centerpiece of my work with
executives who want to get
better.” —Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You
Here Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become
Even More Successful
“Courtesies of a small and
trivial character are the
ones which strike
deepest in the grateful
and appreciating heart.”
—Henry Clay
“eighty percent
of success is
showing up.”
—Woody Allen
R.O.I.R.
Return On
Investment In
Relationships
Profitable
“We are
thoughtful
in all we do.”
Thoughtfulness is key to customer retention.
Thoughtfulness is key to employee recruitment
and satisfaction.
Thoughtfulness is key to brand perception.
Thoughtfulness is key to your ability to look in
the mirror—and tell your kids about your job.
“Thoughtfulness is free.”
Thoughtfulness is key to speeding things up—
it reduces friction.
Thoughtfulness is key to transparency and even
cost containment—it abets rather than stifles
truth-telling.
none!
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
P.S. directly related to Staff Interaction
P.P.S. directly correlated with Employee
Satisfaction
Source: Putting Patients First, Susan Frampton, Laura Gilpin, Patrick Charmel
“Kindness
is free.”
“You know a
design is good
when you want
to lick it.”
—Steve Jobs
Source: Design: Intelligence Made Visible,
Stephen Bayley & Terence Conran
2-cent
candy
Commerce Bank: From “Service” to “Experience”
7X. 730A800P. F12A.
“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
<TGW
vs.
>TGR
[Things Gone WRONG/Things Gone RIGHT]
Hypothesis:
DESIGN is
the principal
difference
between love
and hate!*
*Not “like” and “dislike”
M
“M” = $0
IB :
$55B*
M
*Also HP-EDS
“THE GIANT STALKING BIG OIL: How
Schlumberger Is
Rewriting the Rules of the Energy
Game.”: “IPM [Integrated Project
Management] strays from
[Schlumberger’s] traditional role
as a service provider and moves
deeper into areas once dominated
by the majors.”
Source: BusinessWeek cover story, January 2008
“Big Brown’s New Bag: UPS Aims
to Be the Traffic Manager for
Corporate America” —Headline/BW
“UPS wants to take over the
sweet spot in the endless loop
of goods, information and
capital that all the packages
[it moves] represent.” —ecompany.com
(E.g., UPS Logistics manages the logistics of 4.5M Ford vehicles,
from 21 mfg. sites to 6,000 NA dealers)
Huge: Customer
Satisfaction
versus
Customer
Success
The Value-added Ladder/TRANSFORMATION
Customer Success/
Gamechanging
Solutions
Services
Goods
Raw Materials
The Real
Deal
The Heart of
Business Strategy:
48 Things That
Matter
We usually think of business strategy
as some sort of aspirational market
positioning statement. Doubtless
that’s part of it. But I believe that
the number one “strategic strength”
is excellence in execution and
systemic relationships (i.e., with
everyone we come in contact with).
Hence I offer the following 48 pieces
of advice in creating a winning
“strategy” that is inherently
sustainable.
“Thank you.” Minimum several times a day.
Measure it.
“Thank you” to everyone even peripherally
involved in some activity—especially those
“deep in the hierarchy.”
Smile. Work on it.
Apologize. Even if “they” are “mostly” to
blame.
Jump all over those who play the “blame
game.”
Hire enthusiasm.
Low enthusiasm. No hire. Any job.
Hire optimists. Everywhere. (“Positive
outlook on life,” not mindless optimism.)
Hiring: Would you like to go to lunch with
him-her. 100% of jobs.
Hire for good manners.
Do not reject “trouble makers”—that is those
who are uncomfortable with the status quo.
Expose all would-be hires to something
unexpected-weird. Observe their reaction.
Overwhelm response to even the smallest
screw-ups.
Become a student of all you will meet with.
Big time.
Hang out with interesting new people.
Measure it.
Lunch with folks in other functions. Measure it.
Listen. Hear. Become a serious student
of listening-hearing.
Work on everyone’s listening skills. Practice.
Become a student of information extractioninterviewing.
Become a student of presentation giving.
Formal. Short and spontaneous.
Incredible care in 1st line supervisor selection.
World’s best training for 1st line supervisors.
Construct small leadership opportunities for
junior people within days of starting on the
job.
Insane care in all promotion decisions.
Promote “people people” for all managerial
jobs. Finance-logistics-R&D as much as,
say, sales.
Hire-promote for demonstrated curiosity.
Check their past commitment to continuous
learning.
Small “d” diversity. Rich mixes for any and
all teams.
Hire women. Roughly 50% women on exec
team.
Exec team “looks like” customer population,
actual and desired.
Focus on creating products for and selling
to women.
Focus on creating products for and selling
to boomers-geezers.
Work on first and last impressions.
Walls display tomorrow’s aspirations, not
yesterday’s accomplishments.
Simplify systems. Constantly.
Insist that almost all material be covered by a
1-page summary. Absolutely no longer.
Practice decency.
Add “We are thoughtful in all we do” to
corporate values list. Number 1 force for
customer loyalty, employee satisfaction.
Make some form of employee growth (for all)
a formal part of values set. Above
customer satisfaction. Steal from RE/MAX:
“We are a life success company.”
Flowers.
Celebrate “small wins.” Often. Perhaps a
“small win of the day.”
Manage your calendar religiously: Does it
accurately reflect your espoused priorities?
Use a “calendar friend” who’s not very
friendly to help you with this.
Review your calendar: Work assiduously and
mercilessly on your “To don’ts.”—stuff
that distracts.
Bosses, especially near the top: Formally
cultivate one advisor whose role is to tell you
the truth.
Commit to Excellence.
Talk up Excellence.
Put “Excellence in all we do” in the values set.
Measure everyone on demonstrated
commitment to Excellence.
Difficult
Times …
“[other]
admirals more
frightened of
losing than
anxious to win”
On NELSON:
-Costs
+R&D
+Sales
+Marketing
+excellence
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