Winning (33 page)

Pastor-parent types see the hidden hierarchies in people’s minds—the invisible org chart that exists at every company.

Very few companies have meaningful evaluation systems in place. That’s not just bad—it’s terrible!

Plaques and public fanfare have their place. But without money, rewards lose a lot of their impact.

Good people never think they’ve reached the top of their game. But they’re dying to get there!

Ideally, the star will be replaced within eight hours. This sends the message that no single individual is bigger than the company.

A slider just shows up at work and goes through the motions.

Hierarchies tend to make little generals out of perfectly normal people who find themselves in organizations that respond only to rank.

Make your company flatter. Managers should have ten direct reports at the minimum and 30 to 50 percent more if they are experienced.

Every employee, not just the senior people, should know how a company is doing.

The most complex and delicate kind of firing is when an individual has to be let go because of poor performance.

He blew up in anger, shouting, “You’ve got to be crazy. We don’t fire people at this company!”

Every person who leaves goes on to represent your company. They can bad-mouth or praise.

Unfortunately, it took about a year before Steve was let go. At every staff meeting, we watched in agony as the self-confidence seeped out of him.

Yes, the employee has done a poor job. But until he departs, your job is to make sure he doesn’t feel as if he is in a leper colony.

If the company has been through enough change programs, employees consider you like gas pains. You’ll go away if they just wait long enough.

Real change agents comprise less than 10 percent of all businesspeople. They have courage—a certain fearlessness about the unknown.

Managers often hold on to resisters because of a specific skill set or because they’ve been around for a long time. Don’t!

It goes without saying that no businessperson wants disasters to occur, but they will.

Managers can waste a lot of time at the outset of a crisis denying that something went wrong. Skip that step.

There is a silver lining to crisis management in that you rarely have to live through the same disaster twice.

I’m not saying that the correct mind-set means you should fold at the get-go. Sometimes you are absolutely clean and you need to fight.

During a crisis, your lawyers will tell you to say less, not more. That advice is not all wrong. But don’t take it as gospel.

Your lack of visibility will be taken as an admission of guilt, the same way it looks to laypeople when someone does not take the stand in his own defense.

With big crises, don’t ever forget you have a business to run.

When it comes to strategy, ponder less and do more.

Strategy means making clear-cut choices about how to compete. You cannot be everything to everybody, no matter what the size of your business or how deep its pockets.

If they’re headed in the right direction and are broad enough, strategies don’t really need to change all that often.

Strategy also means matching people with jobs—a match that often depends on where a business is on the commodity continuum.

Companies and their people love to share success stories. All you have to do is ask.

The right budgeting process can change how a company functions—and reinventing the ritual makes winning so much easier, you can’t afford not to try.

The people in the field are operating with one simple goal, albeit unstated: to minimize their risk and maximize their bonus.

At this point, you might be thinking, “Yeah, yeah, this approach sounds great, but what about my bonus?”

What good is beating targets you set in a windowless room?

While most people take to reinvented budgeting with enthusiasm, there are always a few diehards who try to undermine it.

Companies have a habit of sending expendable bodies to run new ventures. It’s nuts. For a new business to succeed, it has to have the best people in charge, not the most available.

New ventures should report at least two levels higher than sales would justify. If possible, they should report directly to the CEO.

You will find you are not getting enough money from the mother ship, nor are you getting the best people. Fight like hell—even throw a few elbows.

You are always going to want more autonomy than you get. Your best shot is to earn it.

Deal heat is completely human, and even the most experienced people fall under its sway.

A merger can feel like a death. Everything you’ve worked for, every relationship you’ve forged—they’re suddenly null and void.

Technically, we owned the company, but for all intents and purposes, it was running the show.

It is uncertainty that causes organizations to descend into fear and inertia. The objective should be full integration within ninety days of the deal’s close.

Fight the conqueror syndrome. Think of a merger as a huge talent grab.

If you miss a merger on price, life goes on. There is no last best deal.

Resisting a deal, no matter how scared, confused, or angry you are is usually suicidal to your career, not to mention your emotional well-being.

Done right, Six Sigma is energizing and incredibly rewarding. It can even be fun.

A huge part of making your customers sticky is meeting or exceeding their expectations, which is exactly what Six Sigma helps you do.

“We’re off to a good start. We’ve hired several statisticians, and we’re looking for more.” I thought to myself: This poor guy has really drunk the Kool-Aid!

You need to find “your people,” the earlier in your career the better. No job is ideal without the presence of shared sensibilities.

Any new job should feel like a stretch, not a layup.

Working for some companies is like winning an Olympic medal. For the rest of your career, you are associated with great performance.

Every job you take is a gamble that could increase your options or shut them down.

Working to fulfill someone else’s needs or dreams almost always catches up with you.

If a job doesn’t excite you on some level—just because of the
stuff
of it—don’t settle.

Authenticity may be the best selling point you’ve got.

The goal, if you’ve been let go, is to stay out of what I refer to as “the vortex of defeat,” in which you let yourself spiral into inertia and despair.

Every manager in the world knows what “I resigned” or “I left for personal reasons” really means.

All careers, no matter how scripted they appear, are shaped by some element of pure chance.

The most reliable way to sabotage yourself is to be a thorn in your organization’s rear end.

Eventually, he had to leave the company. In the end, there wasn’t a person left with any desire to spend political capital on him.

Career lust shows itself in tearing down the people around you, insulting or disparaging them in order to make your own candle burn brighter.

The boss-subordinate relationship is easy to neglect. Your boss is in your face, and your peers are on your mind, while your subordinates do what you say.

There is no one right mentor. There are
many
right mentors.

Business is like any game, with players, a language, rules, controversies, and a rhythm. The media covers it all.

You can win without being upbeat—if every other star is aligned—but why would you want to try?

The world has jerks. Some of them get to be bosses.

In any bad boss situation, you cannot let yourself be a victim.

Generally speaking, bosses are not awful to people whom they like, respect, and need. Think hard about your performance.

What an awful feeling when your boss is not on your side.

There is a reason why kids don’t tattle on bullies. Unfortunately, the same principle applies in the office.

Work-life balance is a swap—a deal you’ve made with yourself about what you keep and what you give up.

“I chose to put my career first,” she said, “and I cannot blame anyone for my happiness or lack thereof.”

It’s not that bosses
want
you to give up your family or your hobbies. They’re just driven by the desire to capture all of your energy and harness it for the company.

If you want real work-life balance, find a company that accommodates it as part of its everyday business.

If you don’t fulfill your own joy with your work-life plan, one day you’ll wake up in a special kind of hell, where everyone is happy but you.

First and most obvious, bring out the three old warhorses of competition—cost, quality, and service—and drive them to new levels.

You can look at China and feel victimized. Or you can look at it and be excited about conquering the challenges and opportunities it presents.