“Focal Point”
Brian Tracy
American Management Association, 2002
When you were starting your career, you heard this, not only once, but many times: “You don’t have a focus!” And you are jolted to your senses – looking for ways to “organize” or “prioritize.” And you somehow, intuitively so, succeed.
In the business of discussion – or in life – we have always been told that “to have a focus” will surely make us accomplish more. The problem with discussion is there are many issues, and the problem with life is there are many priorities crying for attention.
In a game of chess, from an amateur’s standpoint, there are two kinds of players: One player goes for an early checkmate gingerly steering clear of a phalanx of pawns, penetrating lines of bishops, and the omnipotence of the queen; the other player forces a “simplification process” toward the end game, pushes for mutual “sacrifice” of pieces – so battleground is run of complexity – and deliver the coup de grace.
One player thrives on complexity, the other had the edge in simplicity. In either case, you need a high level of focus. As in a game of chess, so in a game called life.
“Focal Point,” new book by Brian Tracy, America’s favorite motivational speaker and mentor/coach, is one of many books geared to one objective: Enable us to sharpen our focus – and therefore increase our chance for success. The sub-title actually summarizes it well: “a proven system to simplify your life, doubles your productivity, and achieve all your goals.”
The author begins with the story of a consultant. There was a major technical problem at a nuclear power plant, a malfunction that was slowing every generation. So the nation’s top consultant was brought in – who wasted not time looking for the problem. For the next two days, the consultant walked around, studied and gauges in the control room, took notes and made calculations.
At the end of second day, he took a black felt marker, climbed up the ladder, and out a large black “X” on one of the gauges. “This is the problem,” he said. Shortly, the defect was repaired.
A week later, the plant manager received a bill for $10,000 from the consultant for “services rendered.” The plant manager of this multi-billion dollar facility protested the exorbitant bill, and thus asked for itemized expenses.
The consultant obliged. He sent a new invoice: “For placing ‘X’ on a single gauge, $1. For knowing which gauge to place ‘X’ on: $9,999.”
This “X” is your focal point, said author Tracy – “the one thing you can do to get the best result.”
The book discusses what the author calls the “Focal Point Process” – namely, Values, Vision, Goals, Knowledge and Skills, Habits, Daily Activities and Actions. Each part of the process is discussed in the style of this engaging speaker and author.
The book has an abundance of quotes and principles. One is applying the “80/20 Rule” – we call it “Pareto Law” them. It foes like this: Identify 20 percent of the value of everything you do. Many of our readers might have tried this with success. The author this joins those who have remarkably prospered because of this one simple rule.
The author brings us to self-evaluation, and hold us by the hand toward new ways to succeed. Whether you are a CEO on top of them heap, or a fledging management trainee below, you would find his advice relevant. There are times that he sounds more like motivational speaker and not an author, but that’s pardonable considering the gems of advice he freely throws our way.
Listen: “There are four ways to change: You can do more of some things, you can do less of other things, you can start doing something that you have not done before, and you can stop doing something that is not helpful to you or to achieving your goals.”
That is a mouthful to begin with, and then you journey on with the author in this book.
You can’t help but be inspired by the desire of the speaker to bring you to heights yet unscaled: “Most people settle for far less than they are truly capable of … They settle for a mediocre existence rather than committing themselves to breaking their own mental shackles and escaping from their own mental prisons.”
You get the impression that the author is telling you that you can truly dramatically succeed – that you can do almost anything. Minus the hyperbole, really, he could be right.
And he also knows the requirements for success. He underscores the need for Discipline, and quotes Elbert Hubbard for the purpose: “The ability to make yourself do what you should, when you should do it, whether you feel like it or not.”
The author throws in many more tips – including the “1,000 percent formula,” which promises us to achieve a thousand percent improvement on your productivity in ten years. He has calculations, too, to convince you. But somewhere in the book, he gives a very encouraging quote that should make your day and mine. He says: “You were born to do something wonderful with your life.”
Sunday, December 22, 2002
Sunday, December 08, 2002
Everyday wisdom: An oasis in a desert
“Expect the Unexpected”
Roger Von Oech
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2002
Have you met someone who is bursting with information – current events, statistics, encyclopedic knowledge, every item in the Guinness Book, and every detail about science and business? But, you aren’t impressed – because the same guy – for the many years you’ve associated with him – has not said anything original. Or he hasn’t come up with any idea that comes close to brilliance – or even and insight,
It’s true then, it’s truer not – and Heraclitus said it 2, 500 years ago: “Knowing many things does not teach insight.”
If one is too purified up with information – and is proud of it – he has not time to distill such knowledge. “Practice forgetting,” said Roger Von Oech, and you are on your way to gaining insight. Who is Von Oech? He is the author of a bestselling creativity classic, “A Whack on the Side of the Head,” who came up with a freshly minted book – “Expect the Unexpected,” the subject of this review.
You must learn the value of forgetting. Von Oech relates this story: A creativity teacher once invited his student for afternoon tea. The teacher poured some tea into the student’s cup. Even after the cup was full, he continued to pour, and the tea over-flowed into the floor.
The student exclaimed: “You must stop pouring … the tea is not going into the cup.” The teacher replied: “The same is true with you. If you’re to receive any of my teachings, you must first empty out the contents of your mental cup.” We also heard id said that if your soul is full mundane concerns, the Divine cannot fill you with His power.
This Executive Read could have been titled “Heraclitus Re-visited,” because this book under review is a collection of 30 epigrams culled by the author from some 125 epigrams compiled by the 19th century compiler Hermann Diels. Heraclitus’ style, according to Von Oech, is similar to a Zen teacher’s paradoxical koan or a Delphic Oracle’s ambiguous prophecy. In my opinion, it partakes of the parable of Jesus of Nazareth.
His epigrams – whether oracle, koan or parable – provide insight into life. And you stumble into them like oases in an endless stretch of desert sand.
Consider this astonishing thought: “Expect the unexpected, or you won’t find it.” The author paraphrases it, saying “If we open our minds, we’ll discover wondrous array of ideas to help us solve the problems inevitably fall into out path.” I summarize this with a statement: “e prepared for a surprise!” In fact, many of our readers who have come upon a brilliant idea experienced such “surprising” or unexpected blessing.
“Drop an assumption,” the author says, and relates an anecdote about celebrated inventor Thomas Edison, who had a simplest to measure the “unexpectedness quotient” of prospective employees. He would invite a candidate to lunch and serve him a bowl of soup. He would then watch whether the person salted his soup before tasting it. If he did, he wouldn’t be offered the job. Edison felt that people are more open to possibilities if they don’t salt their experience of life before tasting it.
One epigram has a word of caution to the powerful and the mighty who have ascended to their “thrones”: “The way up and the way down are one and the same.” He who lives by the sword will die by the sword, the Scriptures say. He who wrests power by guns, goons and gold will also lose such power by the same three G’s. Recent history bears us out.
We are always told to look at the “big picture.” Or, we will miss the forest for the trees, as they often say. Heraclitus contributes this epigram: “The cosmos speaks in patterns.” We find patterns all around us.
We see similarities: stellar galaxies and water emptying out of a bathtub both spiral in the same way. We see relationships: The tighter a government’s restrictions on its press, the less prosperous that society’s economy is likely to be. We truly hope the last statement would soon ring true.
Have you marveled at the wisdom of your venerable dad or mom, when he or she links what are otherwise unconnected – and then come up with something astonishingly new? Heraclotus again has a gem of wisdom: “A wonderful harmony is created when we join together the seemingly unconnected.” Guttenberg joined the wine press and the coin punch to create moveable type and the printing press. Greek metallurgists alloyed soft copper with even softer tin to produce hard bronze.
When there is not sun, we can see the evening stars. You discover something new when a dominant feature is removed. The executive bosses should try getting out of their offices and thus enable their subordinates to shine.
“The doctor inflicts pain to cure suffering.” If a part causes the whole to suffer, cut it. An editor removes a favorite paragraph in order to save the manuscript. This article has said enough about this refreshing book. Before any sentence is cut, this piece must end. Let Heraclitus speak.
Roger Von Oech
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2002
Have you met someone who is bursting with information – current events, statistics, encyclopedic knowledge, every item in the Guinness Book, and every detail about science and business? But, you aren’t impressed – because the same guy – for the many years you’ve associated with him – has not said anything original. Or he hasn’t come up with any idea that comes close to brilliance – or even and insight,
It’s true then, it’s truer not – and Heraclitus said it 2, 500 years ago: “Knowing many things does not teach insight.”
If one is too purified up with information – and is proud of it – he has not time to distill such knowledge. “Practice forgetting,” said Roger Von Oech, and you are on your way to gaining insight. Who is Von Oech? He is the author of a bestselling creativity classic, “A Whack on the Side of the Head,” who came up with a freshly minted book – “Expect the Unexpected,” the subject of this review.
You must learn the value of forgetting. Von Oech relates this story: A creativity teacher once invited his student for afternoon tea. The teacher poured some tea into the student’s cup. Even after the cup was full, he continued to pour, and the tea over-flowed into the floor.
The student exclaimed: “You must stop pouring … the tea is not going into the cup.” The teacher replied: “The same is true with you. If you’re to receive any of my teachings, you must first empty out the contents of your mental cup.” We also heard id said that if your soul is full mundane concerns, the Divine cannot fill you with His power.
This Executive Read could have been titled “Heraclitus Re-visited,” because this book under review is a collection of 30 epigrams culled by the author from some 125 epigrams compiled by the 19th century compiler Hermann Diels. Heraclitus’ style, according to Von Oech, is similar to a Zen teacher’s paradoxical koan or a Delphic Oracle’s ambiguous prophecy. In my opinion, it partakes of the parable of Jesus of Nazareth.
His epigrams – whether oracle, koan or parable – provide insight into life. And you stumble into them like oases in an endless stretch of desert sand.
Consider this astonishing thought: “Expect the unexpected, or you won’t find it.” The author paraphrases it, saying “If we open our minds, we’ll discover wondrous array of ideas to help us solve the problems inevitably fall into out path.” I summarize this with a statement: “e prepared for a surprise!” In fact, many of our readers who have come upon a brilliant idea experienced such “surprising” or unexpected blessing.
“Drop an assumption,” the author says, and relates an anecdote about celebrated inventor Thomas Edison, who had a simplest to measure the “unexpectedness quotient” of prospective employees. He would invite a candidate to lunch and serve him a bowl of soup. He would then watch whether the person salted his soup before tasting it. If he did, he wouldn’t be offered the job. Edison felt that people are more open to possibilities if they don’t salt their experience of life before tasting it.
One epigram has a word of caution to the powerful and the mighty who have ascended to their “thrones”: “The way up and the way down are one and the same.” He who lives by the sword will die by the sword, the Scriptures say. He who wrests power by guns, goons and gold will also lose such power by the same three G’s. Recent history bears us out.
We are always told to look at the “big picture.” Or, we will miss the forest for the trees, as they often say. Heraclitus contributes this epigram: “The cosmos speaks in patterns.” We find patterns all around us.
We see similarities: stellar galaxies and water emptying out of a bathtub both spiral in the same way. We see relationships: The tighter a government’s restrictions on its press, the less prosperous that society’s economy is likely to be. We truly hope the last statement would soon ring true.
Have you marveled at the wisdom of your venerable dad or mom, when he or she links what are otherwise unconnected – and then come up with something astonishingly new? Heraclotus again has a gem of wisdom: “A wonderful harmony is created when we join together the seemingly unconnected.” Guttenberg joined the wine press and the coin punch to create moveable type and the printing press. Greek metallurgists alloyed soft copper with even softer tin to produce hard bronze.
When there is not sun, we can see the evening stars. You discover something new when a dominant feature is removed. The executive bosses should try getting out of their offices and thus enable their subordinates to shine.
“The doctor inflicts pain to cure suffering.” If a part causes the whole to suffer, cut it. An editor removes a favorite paragraph in order to save the manuscript. This article has said enough about this refreshing book. Before any sentence is cut, this piece must end. Let Heraclitus speak.
Sunday, October 20, 2002
Fundraising’s soul: Touching the donor’s heart with a vision
“The Fund Raiser’s Guide to fund Raising”
By Mayan G. Quebral
Venture for Fund Raising, 2002
Have you received news from the mail lately that Unicef cards are being readied for the Christmas Season and asking you to firm up your orders now?
You open a bulky envelope one morning, and you find a handcrafted card from children of Tuloy sa Don Bosco. You recall that Tuloy is a highly successful center for streetchildren.
You get two tickets to play golf in the Aoki Golf Course in the Eagle Ridge, with the added request that you please be a “hole sponsor,” so you can support mission work.
If you still have those cards or tickets – outdated they may be – hold on to them, as we tell you about fundraising – and about this book that has expressed the “soul” behind philanthropy..
Question: Is philanthropic giving alive and well in this country of 7,600 islands, mired in poverty, shaken by pockets of violence and marked by a lackluster economy?
Aren’t donor funds being re-channeled to new independent states freed from the Soviet monolith, to Latin America and to most of Africa. Earlier on, non-profit organizations – global, regional or national – knew what this meant: They must now rely more and more on local philanthropy.
Is the future for non-profits, starved for funds, bleak? Or is there a sunny side to this seeming darkness?
The book, “The Fundraiser’s Guide to Fund Raising,” is just the shaft of sunlight non-profits need – not only to brighten hope once again, but to light their way to labyrinthine ways leading to the donor’s heart.
Don’t expect just a quick reading of a “nuts-and-bolts” manual on fundraising in this book. While it has tips in abundance in every chapter, you may miss the soul of such a worthy human enterprise. Striking just the right note for the book, author Mayan Quebral speaks in the imperative: “Realize that fundraising is NOT about money.”
She adds: “ Fundraising is about a human need that has to be met. It is about the ability of your organization to make a contribution to the alleviation of that need.” She is actually saying that, if you are just interested in money, this book is not for you. She wants to address those non-profit organizations which have latched on their efforts to higher goals “money cannot buy.”
She volunteers “seven success seeds for growing your non-profit organization” – beginning with the very first seed: “Believe.” She says: “Believing establishes the credibility of your cause … Now tell us, would you buy insurance from a salesman who is not insured, a Ford car dealer who drives a Honda, or a lung cancer foundation fundraiser who smokes?” Touche, Mayan!
The next six “success seeds” guide the reader through concepts, principles, success stories, tables and, yes, generous quotes from the Scriptures and renowned thinkers. Heartwarming stories abound in this book – which gives you the feeling you are in the midst of a seminar listening to every motivation speaker whose “cup runneth over” narrating one successful campaign after the other.
Is this book comprehensive? Reading from first page to the last, one gets the impression that the author and contributors did not hold back any “trade secrets”. Isn’t this self-defeating? If they have given their all, no one would approach them anymore. Their desire to share a “good thing” seems to be greater than the anxiety over outliving their usefulness. They are what they stand for: generous. Look, at the end every chapter is a treasure trove of website addresses for current and would-be fundraisers.
A parallel thought builds up while one moves on to more complex subjects on targeting small and big donors, planning for myriad events, creating an efficient organization, selecting a working board, building a data base – and it is this: The book is telling the organization leader to revisit his reason for existence.
The last chapter asks the reader/leader to “face the mirror.” While the author intends it to remind the fundraiser to evaluate his/her fundraising plan, the sense to this reader is for the NGO leader to go back to the fundamentals: What moves your organization?
The book overflows with quotes, but the one used by the book captures the central message of the book telling organizations to have, first and foremost, a vision. The statement comes from a famous blind person, Helen Keller: “The only thing worse than having no sight is to have sight but no vision.” That, dear readers, is the soul of fundraising. And that keeps this worthwhile effort aflame in the hearts of donors – big and small.
By Mayan G. Quebral
Venture for Fund Raising, 2002
Have you received news from the mail lately that Unicef cards are being readied for the Christmas Season and asking you to firm up your orders now?
You open a bulky envelope one morning, and you find a handcrafted card from children of Tuloy sa Don Bosco. You recall that Tuloy is a highly successful center for streetchildren.
You get two tickets to play golf in the Aoki Golf Course in the Eagle Ridge, with the added request that you please be a “hole sponsor,” so you can support mission work.
If you still have those cards or tickets – outdated they may be – hold on to them, as we tell you about fundraising – and about this book that has expressed the “soul” behind philanthropy..
Question: Is philanthropic giving alive and well in this country of 7,600 islands, mired in poverty, shaken by pockets of violence and marked by a lackluster economy?
Aren’t donor funds being re-channeled to new independent states freed from the Soviet monolith, to Latin America and to most of Africa. Earlier on, non-profit organizations – global, regional or national – knew what this meant: They must now rely more and more on local philanthropy.
Is the future for non-profits, starved for funds, bleak? Or is there a sunny side to this seeming darkness?
The book, “The Fundraiser’s Guide to Fund Raising,” is just the shaft of sunlight non-profits need – not only to brighten hope once again, but to light their way to labyrinthine ways leading to the donor’s heart.
Don’t expect just a quick reading of a “nuts-and-bolts” manual on fundraising in this book. While it has tips in abundance in every chapter, you may miss the soul of such a worthy human enterprise. Striking just the right note for the book, author Mayan Quebral speaks in the imperative: “Realize that fundraising is NOT about money.”
She adds: “ Fundraising is about a human need that has to be met. It is about the ability of your organization to make a contribution to the alleviation of that need.” She is actually saying that, if you are just interested in money, this book is not for you. She wants to address those non-profit organizations which have latched on their efforts to higher goals “money cannot buy.”
She volunteers “seven success seeds for growing your non-profit organization” – beginning with the very first seed: “Believe.” She says: “Believing establishes the credibility of your cause … Now tell us, would you buy insurance from a salesman who is not insured, a Ford car dealer who drives a Honda, or a lung cancer foundation fundraiser who smokes?” Touche, Mayan!
The next six “success seeds” guide the reader through concepts, principles, success stories, tables and, yes, generous quotes from the Scriptures and renowned thinkers. Heartwarming stories abound in this book – which gives you the feeling you are in the midst of a seminar listening to every motivation speaker whose “cup runneth over” narrating one successful campaign after the other.
Is this book comprehensive? Reading from first page to the last, one gets the impression that the author and contributors did not hold back any “trade secrets”. Isn’t this self-defeating? If they have given their all, no one would approach them anymore. Their desire to share a “good thing” seems to be greater than the anxiety over outliving their usefulness. They are what they stand for: generous. Look, at the end every chapter is a treasure trove of website addresses for current and would-be fundraisers.
A parallel thought builds up while one moves on to more complex subjects on targeting small and big donors, planning for myriad events, creating an efficient organization, selecting a working board, building a data base – and it is this: The book is telling the organization leader to revisit his reason for existence.
The last chapter asks the reader/leader to “face the mirror.” While the author intends it to remind the fundraiser to evaluate his/her fundraising plan, the sense to this reader is for the NGO leader to go back to the fundamentals: What moves your organization?
The book overflows with quotes, but the one used by the book captures the central message of the book telling organizations to have, first and foremost, a vision. The statement comes from a famous blind person, Helen Keller: “The only thing worse than having no sight is to have sight but no vision.” That, dear readers, is the soul of fundraising. And that keeps this worthwhile effort aflame in the hearts of donors – big and small.
Sunday, October 06, 2002
21st Century e-Leadership: new wineskins for new wine
“E-Leader”
By Robert Hargrove
Perseus Publishing, 2001
You hear contradictory phrases these days. For example, you have “chaordic organization,” meaning a combination of “chaos and order,” an oxymoron at first glance: Isn’t an organization supposed to install order? This was coined by Dee Hock, founder and CEO emeritus of Visa International, the same firm that grew phenomenally. Of course, he was antedated by Alfred North Whitehead who defined progress as “the art of creating chaos in the midst of order, and preserving order in the midst of chaos.”
“Lateral leadership” is another phrase that assaults our time-tested concept of leaders who preside from the top over everyone else below him. This phrase talks about a leader who steps down from his elevated position and deals with his people as his “equals.” The latter, in turn, leave a slight concession to their leader by accepting him as primus inter pares (first among equals).
Another phrase, “spontaneous CEO,” unsettles our widely held view that a CEO is steeped in strategic planning and thus hardly acts on impulse at the spur of the moment.
The above three are only part of a wide range of new vocabulary that now punctuates third millenium leadership books. It delivers an earthshaking message: We have really such a deeply altered world that the old leadership formula longer works, and leaders, if they have to thrive -- if not merely survive --must change.
This is the startling message of the book “E-Leader: Reinventing Leadership in a Connected Economy.” It is rightly called a “brilliant flash of light on the new emerging leadership paradigm of the 21st century.”
Author Robert Hargrove, leadership coach of many CEOs, declared at the outset that CEOs in this century must move quickly from being stewards “conserving what has been built” to being revolutionaries engaged in a balancing act of “maintaining equilibrium and creative destruction.”
Is this the domain of young emergent leaders, ruling out retirable fiftyish and sixtyish CEOs? Not necessarily. Mr. Hargrove was generously quoting Dee Hock of Visa, Jack Welch of GE, Lou Gerstner of IBM, Carly Fiorina, all of whom preached – then practiced – re-branding their companies thus propelled them to new growth platforms and unheard of efficiency and profitability.
“People’s horizon of possibilities,” he points out, “is limited.” What he is saying is that the connected economy presents possibilities that are so infinite but traditional leaders’ visions are so finite. The profoundly transformed environment demands a deeplly-altered CEO mindset.
This truth is actually both timely and timeless. One ever timeless advice actually came from “Jesus the CEO” who said: “For new wine, you need new wineskins.” New ideas require new strategies and structures.
The book thus recommends Triple-Loop Learning” which asks three fundamental questions dealing with three verbs: to be, think, and do.
First question: How do I need to be different? (Begin seeing yourself differently.) Second: How do I need to think differently? (Start to question what you take for granted.) The third question: What do I need to do differently? (Jump into action – the eEconomy waits for no one.) The book templates on exercises that involve the transition from … to, with the useful insight that these have worked in many coaching tasks by the author.
Does this mean that the old reliable leadership and management concepts are passe? Not really. The author still quotes Peter Drucker’s “classic question” (his words): “What is our business and what should it be?” You still have to ask the question: What is the logic of our business? But logic, according to Asian Institute of Management Associate Dean Sonny Coloma, has given way to the fashionable question: “What is your business model?”
Actually, the book offers four steps by which CEOs can build a super-successful “business Internet model”. First, start with some customer reconnaissance and intelligence gathering. Second, create a strategy of pre-eminence, assuming the mantle of leadership. Third, choose partners wisely so as to leverage your strategy. Fourth, enable your business design with relationship technology.
One message stands out in this book: Even in the midst of rapid changes in technology requiring leadership style transformation, some things remain constant – that the logic of business – listening to and reaching the customer (improved version: anticipating the customer) remains the most important function of business.
The difference is technology. The book cites the “clickable corporation,” a phrase popularized in a book of that title, which enumerates in a table eight success strategies to successful customer relationship. Get the book and click away.
The book is not only one’s road map to look yourself and your company over for needed transformation. It is wondrously keyed to liberating the CEO from the strictures of the past. The leadership coach concludes with, perhaps, his favorite theme – which could be the conclusion of the reader when he is through with the book: “Release the human spirit.”
By Robert Hargrove
Perseus Publishing, 2001
You hear contradictory phrases these days. For example, you have “chaordic organization,” meaning a combination of “chaos and order,” an oxymoron at first glance: Isn’t an organization supposed to install order? This was coined by Dee Hock, founder and CEO emeritus of Visa International, the same firm that grew phenomenally. Of course, he was antedated by Alfred North Whitehead who defined progress as “the art of creating chaos in the midst of order, and preserving order in the midst of chaos.”
“Lateral leadership” is another phrase that assaults our time-tested concept of leaders who preside from the top over everyone else below him. This phrase talks about a leader who steps down from his elevated position and deals with his people as his “equals.” The latter, in turn, leave a slight concession to their leader by accepting him as primus inter pares (first among equals).
Another phrase, “spontaneous CEO,” unsettles our widely held view that a CEO is steeped in strategic planning and thus hardly acts on impulse at the spur of the moment.
The above three are only part of a wide range of new vocabulary that now punctuates third millenium leadership books. It delivers an earthshaking message: We have really such a deeply altered world that the old leadership formula longer works, and leaders, if they have to thrive -- if not merely survive --must change.
This is the startling message of the book “E-Leader: Reinventing Leadership in a Connected Economy.” It is rightly called a “brilliant flash of light on the new emerging leadership paradigm of the 21st century.”
Author Robert Hargrove, leadership coach of many CEOs, declared at the outset that CEOs in this century must move quickly from being stewards “conserving what has been built” to being revolutionaries engaged in a balancing act of “maintaining equilibrium and creative destruction.”
Is this the domain of young emergent leaders, ruling out retirable fiftyish and sixtyish CEOs? Not necessarily. Mr. Hargrove was generously quoting Dee Hock of Visa, Jack Welch of GE, Lou Gerstner of IBM, Carly Fiorina, all of whom preached – then practiced – re-branding their companies thus propelled them to new growth platforms and unheard of efficiency and profitability.
“People’s horizon of possibilities,” he points out, “is limited.” What he is saying is that the connected economy presents possibilities that are so infinite but traditional leaders’ visions are so finite. The profoundly transformed environment demands a deeplly-altered CEO mindset.
This truth is actually both timely and timeless. One ever timeless advice actually came from “Jesus the CEO” who said: “For new wine, you need new wineskins.” New ideas require new strategies and structures.
The book thus recommends Triple-Loop Learning” which asks three fundamental questions dealing with three verbs: to be, think, and do.
First question: How do I need to be different? (Begin seeing yourself differently.) Second: How do I need to think differently? (Start to question what you take for granted.) The third question: What do I need to do differently? (Jump into action – the eEconomy waits for no one.) The book templates on exercises that involve the transition from … to, with the useful insight that these have worked in many coaching tasks by the author.
Does this mean that the old reliable leadership and management concepts are passe? Not really. The author still quotes Peter Drucker’s “classic question” (his words): “What is our business and what should it be?” You still have to ask the question: What is the logic of our business? But logic, according to Asian Institute of Management Associate Dean Sonny Coloma, has given way to the fashionable question: “What is your business model?”
Actually, the book offers four steps by which CEOs can build a super-successful “business Internet model”. First, start with some customer reconnaissance and intelligence gathering. Second, create a strategy of pre-eminence, assuming the mantle of leadership. Third, choose partners wisely so as to leverage your strategy. Fourth, enable your business design with relationship technology.
One message stands out in this book: Even in the midst of rapid changes in technology requiring leadership style transformation, some things remain constant – that the logic of business – listening to and reaching the customer (improved version: anticipating the customer) remains the most important function of business.
The difference is technology. The book cites the “clickable corporation,” a phrase popularized in a book of that title, which enumerates in a table eight success strategies to successful customer relationship. Get the book and click away.
The book is not only one’s road map to look yourself and your company over for needed transformation. It is wondrously keyed to liberating the CEO from the strictures of the past. The leadership coach concludes with, perhaps, his favorite theme – which could be the conclusion of the reader when he is through with the book: “Release the human spirit.”
Sunday, September 22, 2002
Balancing life and work well is an everyday hero’s journey
“Downshifting”
By John D. Drakes
Berrett-Koehler Publishers Inc., 2000
For the past two weeks, conversations with friends and associates began with work and ended with something loftier and longer than work: Life.
You say, it may be the company I keep. But, no. One was born before World War II, and the other when it just began. Two of them are “baby boomers” (born after the war). The last is a Martial Law baby, born in 1972 when the country was placed under martial rule.
The pre-WW II baby just retired — and he is producing a book containing speeches delivered over a ten-year period, if he is not busy at the golf course in Malarayat or fishing near a vacation house facing the Batangas Bay.
The WW II baby is concluding a dizzying — and very rewarding career in the corporate world as CEO of a number of firms — who began with three private planes and decided to retain just one, as part of his “downshifting” strategies. (Mortals like us settle for earthbound and land-based vehicles, while the rich and famous simply downscale their options for airborne “toys”.)
A baby boomer has limited his consultancy jobs to a few favorite clients and decided to lay the foundation for becoming an “arm chair” professor and, possibly, an author – after earning a doctoral degree in a year or two.
The youngish manager, armed with an MBA, decided to put up an outlet for a specialty coffee shop with his bride-to-be, and relishes the prospects of a slowed down life over coffee and cookie.
That’s the theme of “Downshifting,” a book whose sub-title says it all — almost: “How to work less and enjoy life more.” The author is John D. Drake, who was himself a workaholic CEO who, one day, decided to drop everything — and start a simpler and satisfying life.
Mr. Drake says the decision to “downshift” has become more attractive to some – but at the same much more difficult — because of the demands of the internet age. He quotes a consultant from McKinsey & Company:
“The fast pace and pressure to be plugged-in at all times, made by the omnipresent cell phones, voicemail, e-mail, laptops and faxes, fueled the expectation that employees quite literally be available to deal with work issues 24 hours a day —wherever they are whatever they are doing.”
He tells of a boast from a co-employee on time spent in the office: I work half-days —12 hours!”
The book -- written in an easy, warm style — leads the executive through the process of considering shorter hours at work for the bosses and longer hours for life at home with loved ones and friends — from staring the “work trap” in the eye to egging you to act with the question: “What’s stopping you?”
From considering “low-risk downshifting options” to strategizing how to persuade your boss or your organization to buy your idea of a less stressful job, reduced hours, or working at home half of the time. Finally, the book gives you insights on how to deal with your “newfound free time” as semi-retired. Locally, others call this “retire-ded” (derisively taking off from “retarded).
The author opens up a long discussion on “work that consumes our lives” — even the justification that it is only in the workplace where you get fulfillment, recognition and the means to buy the finer things in life. That’s quite true, the author admits. An interesting chapter is his juxtaposition of what “one would miss” with options that begin with the phrase, “on the other hand.”
For example on the issue: “Will I have enough money?” the author adds: “On the other hand, you may not need as much.” Read happy stories of lives enhanced with altered work habits. The author, who once was CEO of the world’s largest human resources consulting firm, shares insights on the liberating effect of a decision to downshift. By no means is he advising that the executive bid goodbye to work; only changing his work mindset.
His discussion on Type A personalities — the driven, perfectionist ones — is enlightening, and we see ourselves. “We make our own crises,” he declares, and we can only agree — because we make such high demands on ourselves.
He advises: “Avoid business travel on weekends,” and we know he is pointing his finger at you and me. He gives a quote: “Control your destiny or someone else will.” It’s from Jack Welch, celebrated CEO of General Electric, now enjoying his retirement.
His parting shot could be our shot in the arm as humans first, workers second: “Your quest for success defined by simplicity, love, and meaningfulness, in a world that defines success as material gain, is truly a hero’s journey. Go for it!
By John D. Drakes
Berrett-Koehler Publishers Inc., 2000
For the past two weeks, conversations with friends and associates began with work and ended with something loftier and longer than work: Life.
You say, it may be the company I keep. But, no. One was born before World War II, and the other when it just began. Two of them are “baby boomers” (born after the war). The last is a Martial Law baby, born in 1972 when the country was placed under martial rule.
The pre-WW II baby just retired — and he is producing a book containing speeches delivered over a ten-year period, if he is not busy at the golf course in Malarayat or fishing near a vacation house facing the Batangas Bay.
The WW II baby is concluding a dizzying — and very rewarding career in the corporate world as CEO of a number of firms — who began with three private planes and decided to retain just one, as part of his “downshifting” strategies. (Mortals like us settle for earthbound and land-based vehicles, while the rich and famous simply downscale their options for airborne “toys”.)
A baby boomer has limited his consultancy jobs to a few favorite clients and decided to lay the foundation for becoming an “arm chair” professor and, possibly, an author – after earning a doctoral degree in a year or two.
The youngish manager, armed with an MBA, decided to put up an outlet for a specialty coffee shop with his bride-to-be, and relishes the prospects of a slowed down life over coffee and cookie.
That’s the theme of “Downshifting,” a book whose sub-title says it all — almost: “How to work less and enjoy life more.” The author is John D. Drake, who was himself a workaholic CEO who, one day, decided to drop everything — and start a simpler and satisfying life.
Mr. Drake says the decision to “downshift” has become more attractive to some – but at the same much more difficult — because of the demands of the internet age. He quotes a consultant from McKinsey & Company:
“The fast pace and pressure to be plugged-in at all times, made by the omnipresent cell phones, voicemail, e-mail, laptops and faxes, fueled the expectation that employees quite literally be available to deal with work issues 24 hours a day —wherever they are whatever they are doing.”
He tells of a boast from a co-employee on time spent in the office: I work half-days —12 hours!”
The book -- written in an easy, warm style — leads the executive through the process of considering shorter hours at work for the bosses and longer hours for life at home with loved ones and friends — from staring the “work trap” in the eye to egging you to act with the question: “What’s stopping you?”
From considering “low-risk downshifting options” to strategizing how to persuade your boss or your organization to buy your idea of a less stressful job, reduced hours, or working at home half of the time. Finally, the book gives you insights on how to deal with your “newfound free time” as semi-retired. Locally, others call this “retire-ded” (derisively taking off from “retarded).
The author opens up a long discussion on “work that consumes our lives” — even the justification that it is only in the workplace where you get fulfillment, recognition and the means to buy the finer things in life. That’s quite true, the author admits. An interesting chapter is his juxtaposition of what “one would miss” with options that begin with the phrase, “on the other hand.”
For example on the issue: “Will I have enough money?” the author adds: “On the other hand, you may not need as much.” Read happy stories of lives enhanced with altered work habits. The author, who once was CEO of the world’s largest human resources consulting firm, shares insights on the liberating effect of a decision to downshift. By no means is he advising that the executive bid goodbye to work; only changing his work mindset.
His discussion on Type A personalities — the driven, perfectionist ones — is enlightening, and we see ourselves. “We make our own crises,” he declares, and we can only agree — because we make such high demands on ourselves.
He advises: “Avoid business travel on weekends,” and we know he is pointing his finger at you and me. He gives a quote: “Control your destiny or someone else will.” It’s from Jack Welch, celebrated CEO of General Electric, now enjoying his retirement.
His parting shot could be our shot in the arm as humans first, workers second: “Your quest for success defined by simplicity, love, and meaningfulness, in a world that defines success as material gain, is truly a hero’s journey. Go for it!
Sunday, September 08, 2002
Learn to see the world thru other people’s eyes
“Developing Global Executives”
By Morgan W. McCall Jr. and George P. Hollenbeck
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
You have bumped into some of them on several occasions — at work, cocktail parties, meetings of chambers of commerce and, yes, at the golf course.
They come in different stereotypes — multinational or transnational executives, officials of international organizations like the United Nations or USAID, overseas mission managers, country directors of funding agencies and executives of global enterprises.
In fact, dear reader, you may be one — an expatriate — or about to be one: You are about to leave the Philippines for Singapore, Thailand or Indonesia — and be an expat there with an expat’s compensation package.
Actually, this is no longer new to many local executives. Since some businesses here are run by expats, we know many of them, some of whom have become friends. We also are aware that, somehow, they have been acculturized (a shortcut to saying they have adapted to our culture).
Many of these expats here not only survive; they thrive. But, some of them fail, too. You hear one global executive saying he replaced someone who “bungled the job.”
What about Filipinos being global executives? That’s nothing new too. Multinationals (more in to say “global firms,” taking off from the concept of a “borderless world”) operating here have, in fact, sent outstanding Filipino managers to run refineries, begin a distribution network, complete a project or lead an audit team in many parts of the world.
Yes, Filipinos are not only OFWs; they are expats. It’s not a case of brain-drain. Our brains are a gift to the world. Viewed from another country’s standpoint, it would be similarly proud of its “contribution” to businesses around the globe.
Whether you are a global executive, if not sending or even receiving one, you will find the book “Developing Global Executives” an insightful road map to understanding a globe-trotting manager.
“What’s happening out there,” we ask — and this book tells us. The authors sent 300,000 questionnaires and made an in-depth study of 101 global leaders. The book also answers the question, “What’s happening in there” — meaning, within the mind of the expat himself — from developing a “global mindset” to finally internalizing it like second nature.
After 259 pages and many interviews plus tables, the book concludes: “The whats remain the same, but the hows are different.” It means that the logic of business is true anywhere around the world from Sarawak to Paris, but the cultures are different.
Many executives interviewed concluded: “Business is business wherever you are.” So, if the executive is already well-equipped with the right mix of business strategies, all he needs is to adapt to the host country’s culture.
One of the key conclusions made by the book is this: “The executives learned to focus on the similarities offered by business purpose, and, when possible, to exploit the cultural differences to create business advantages.”
The authors have also identified universal factors in any business. They point out:
“Strategic consistency across cultures, they learned, could be achieved if they focused on the customer, leveraged scope and scale, tapped shared business values, benchmarked against world class processes, and thought about how to make money on a global (rather than local) basis.”
One chapter is devoted to the “dynamics of derailment” — unhappy cases of global executives who didn’t make the grade. The reasons for failure were varied — from someone who was arrogant to another who focused on the wrong thing, from someone who was made a scapegoat to another who was the unwitting victim of an altered global strategy.
Speaking of risks, this chapter amply prepares global executives for some factored-in uncertainties. Simply titled, “When Things Go Wrong,” this chapter is just one of 10 chapters. It’s the book’s reassurance that things normally go well, and thus devote nine chapters to such cases.
You will better understand the expats running our companies here or helping us with a new technology, with this book detailing to us how these global executives really struggle with language. When you are the expat, back here in furlough or preparing for a great adventure away from home, this book is a great companion.
It’s like listening to 101 global leaders telling you how they soared with success and how some fell crashing down. Invariably, they leave one valuable advice:
“You must learn to see the world through other people’s eyes.”
By Morgan W. McCall Jr. and George P. Hollenbeck
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
You have bumped into some of them on several occasions — at work, cocktail parties, meetings of chambers of commerce and, yes, at the golf course.
They come in different stereotypes — multinational or transnational executives, officials of international organizations like the United Nations or USAID, overseas mission managers, country directors of funding agencies and executives of global enterprises.
In fact, dear reader, you may be one — an expatriate — or about to be one: You are about to leave the Philippines for Singapore, Thailand or Indonesia — and be an expat there with an expat’s compensation package.
Actually, this is no longer new to many local executives. Since some businesses here are run by expats, we know many of them, some of whom have become friends. We also are aware that, somehow, they have been acculturized (a shortcut to saying they have adapted to our culture).
Many of these expats here not only survive; they thrive. But, some of them fail, too. You hear one global executive saying he replaced someone who “bungled the job.”
What about Filipinos being global executives? That’s nothing new too. Multinationals (more in to say “global firms,” taking off from the concept of a “borderless world”) operating here have, in fact, sent outstanding Filipino managers to run refineries, begin a distribution network, complete a project or lead an audit team in many parts of the world.
Yes, Filipinos are not only OFWs; they are expats. It’s not a case of brain-drain. Our brains are a gift to the world. Viewed from another country’s standpoint, it would be similarly proud of its “contribution” to businesses around the globe.
Whether you are a global executive, if not sending or even receiving one, you will find the book “Developing Global Executives” an insightful road map to understanding a globe-trotting manager.
“What’s happening out there,” we ask — and this book tells us. The authors sent 300,000 questionnaires and made an in-depth study of 101 global leaders. The book also answers the question, “What’s happening in there” — meaning, within the mind of the expat himself — from developing a “global mindset” to finally internalizing it like second nature.
After 259 pages and many interviews plus tables, the book concludes: “The whats remain the same, but the hows are different.” It means that the logic of business is true anywhere around the world from Sarawak to Paris, but the cultures are different.
Many executives interviewed concluded: “Business is business wherever you are.” So, if the executive is already well-equipped with the right mix of business strategies, all he needs is to adapt to the host country’s culture.
One of the key conclusions made by the book is this: “The executives learned to focus on the similarities offered by business purpose, and, when possible, to exploit the cultural differences to create business advantages.”
The authors have also identified universal factors in any business. They point out:
“Strategic consistency across cultures, they learned, could be achieved if they focused on the customer, leveraged scope and scale, tapped shared business values, benchmarked against world class processes, and thought about how to make money on a global (rather than local) basis.”
One chapter is devoted to the “dynamics of derailment” — unhappy cases of global executives who didn’t make the grade. The reasons for failure were varied — from someone who was arrogant to another who focused on the wrong thing, from someone who was made a scapegoat to another who was the unwitting victim of an altered global strategy.
Speaking of risks, this chapter amply prepares global executives for some factored-in uncertainties. Simply titled, “When Things Go Wrong,” this chapter is just one of 10 chapters. It’s the book’s reassurance that things normally go well, and thus devote nine chapters to such cases.
You will better understand the expats running our companies here or helping us with a new technology, with this book detailing to us how these global executives really struggle with language. When you are the expat, back here in furlough or preparing for a great adventure away from home, this book is a great companion.
It’s like listening to 101 global leaders telling you how they soared with success and how some fell crashing down. Invariably, they leave one valuable advice:
“You must learn to see the world through other people’s eyes.”
Sunday, August 25, 2002
Corporate history in a tapestry of a nation’s checkered story
“Firebringer”
By Raul Rodrigo
Eugenio Lopez Foundation, 2001
The engine of socio-economic growth, private industry, is hardly mentioned in a nation’s — or world — history. Our historians preoccupy themselves with political events and people that make them, if not political movements and leaders that drive them.
Review history books — and these are filled with the sounds of the drums of war, the voices in parliament, the screams of gunfire and of street parliamentarians, and the deadly cadence of soldiers on the march. History, in general, does not pay attention to industrial breakthroughs or corporate revolutions: these are left to corporate biographers and industry chroniclers — tidily apart from the “real” history of humankind.
On hindsight, however, you know that much of the advancement of the human community as we know it is due to the discoveries and innovations driven by industrialists — or inventors funded or employed by industries. General Electric gave us the incandescent lamp, Ford gave us the car assembly line, Kodak popularized the camera, Xerox triggered the paper revolution through copiers, etc.
Once you take a long considered look at the impact of these inventions, you know that they are more powerful than army tanks, mightier than foot soldiers, and more eloquent than the most stirring speeches in parliaments around the world. Corporate histories, in fact, become even more interesting, if they are interwoven into the larger epic of global or national life.
This is the case of “Firebringer” — subtitled “Forty Years of First Philippine Holdings” – an epic story of the Lopez Family’s role in the business and corporate world. Whether they wanted it or not, the Family’s corporate involvements, were intertwined into the tapestry of the Philippines’ socio-political history — marked by political turbulence, corporate upheavals, unceremonious exiles and dramatic comebacks.
It is rare enough that a corporate giant like the Lopez Group was, at times, embroiled in the political upheavals of the time, principal of which was the takeover of the Meralco Securities by a once powerful man in the Marcos regime. It is rarer that its top heirs and executives were taken prisoners, and then staged a dramatic escape — then lived to tell the story on television, print media — and in a blockbuster movie.
This is the narrative stuff of “Firebringer,” whose book jacket explains it as “another name for Prometheus, the Titan who brought fire down from heaven as boon to mankind.” It is actually a takeoff from a Greek myth where once man lived without fire — and thus was consigned to coping with darkness at night and surviving, yes, without cooked food by day — to say the least.
This book tells the story of First Philippine Holdings — with huge ventures in power generation and distribution, property development, electric utilities, agribusiness, manufacturing — and, yes, broadcast media. Firebringer is also the story of the patriarch of the Lopez family, Don Eugenio Lopez, who founded First Holding’s forerunner, the Meralco Securities Corporation (MSC), and his sons and heirs.
As corporate history would have it, MSC was actually the holding company formed in 1961 by Don Eugenio, who, as the book says, declared his faith that Filipinos could run a power company like the Meralco “at a time when most Filipinos didn’t think they had what it took to acquire and run a world-class company.” His son, Oscar Lopez says that it was his father’s “vision, audacity and competence” that completed the Filipinization of Meralco acquired from its American owners.
The book is both history and biography, proving a sage’s view that history is actually biography. Firebringer is history punctuated with riveting accounts of hostile takeovers, buyouts, mergers and acquisitions, ambitious financing packages, backroom negotiations, and grand projects with epic proportions. It also presents a cast of characters (young then) who initiated and forged agreements and who implemented ambitious projects like laying pipelines cutting across provinces and less than friendly communities.
Firebringer is also a story of many more “firebringers” — young men schooled in the leadership style of the Lopez patriarch — and who became leaders of this country or who now occupy the helm of top corporations in the country as “captains of industry.” Stories are told of how Don Eugenio recruited promising young men to work for the company when they were yet in their early 20s and who fulfilled their potential by rising to become CEOs of some of the country’s top 100.
Don Eugenio wrote years before taking over Meralco “that human values are superior to material values… that our success should be measured not by the wealth we can accumulate,” but by the amount of happiness we can spread to our employees.” Heartwarming accounts about the patriarch pepper the pages of this book — handing a check as bonus or a letter of promotion.
He also had a knack for people’s names. The book narrates that, when Filemon T. Berba, Jr., a very new employee at MSC, and other MSC executives were at the airport to meet Don Eugenio. “There was no reason he should remember me. But when he passed by me, he held out his hand and said: ‘O Berba, how are you?’” Jun Berba cannot forget that in his lifetime. He muses now: “If that doesn’t grab your loyalty, nothing will.” Berba, now with Ayala Corporation, is now dubbed the CEO’s CEO.
As bringer of fire, the Lopez Group has been positioned as one being a channel of man’s greatest blessings like “fire.” After all, fire represents the benefits of modern civilization like electricity, information via broadcasting, and telecommunications. More than these, it has gifted our country with corporate leaders who knew how to survive and thrive in times of peace and conflict, in eras of certainty and discontinuity.
By Raul Rodrigo
Eugenio Lopez Foundation, 2001
The engine of socio-economic growth, private industry, is hardly mentioned in a nation’s — or world — history. Our historians preoccupy themselves with political events and people that make them, if not political movements and leaders that drive them.
Review history books — and these are filled with the sounds of the drums of war, the voices in parliament, the screams of gunfire and of street parliamentarians, and the deadly cadence of soldiers on the march. History, in general, does not pay attention to industrial breakthroughs or corporate revolutions: these are left to corporate biographers and industry chroniclers — tidily apart from the “real” history of humankind.
On hindsight, however, you know that much of the advancement of the human community as we know it is due to the discoveries and innovations driven by industrialists — or inventors funded or employed by industries. General Electric gave us the incandescent lamp, Ford gave us the car assembly line, Kodak popularized the camera, Xerox triggered the paper revolution through copiers, etc.
Once you take a long considered look at the impact of these inventions, you know that they are more powerful than army tanks, mightier than foot soldiers, and more eloquent than the most stirring speeches in parliaments around the world. Corporate histories, in fact, become even more interesting, if they are interwoven into the larger epic of global or national life.
This is the case of “Firebringer” — subtitled “Forty Years of First Philippine Holdings” – an epic story of the Lopez Family’s role in the business and corporate world. Whether they wanted it or not, the Family’s corporate involvements, were intertwined into the tapestry of the Philippines’ socio-political history — marked by political turbulence, corporate upheavals, unceremonious exiles and dramatic comebacks.
It is rare enough that a corporate giant like the Lopez Group was, at times, embroiled in the political upheavals of the time, principal of which was the takeover of the Meralco Securities by a once powerful man in the Marcos regime. It is rarer that its top heirs and executives were taken prisoners, and then staged a dramatic escape — then lived to tell the story on television, print media — and in a blockbuster movie.
This is the narrative stuff of “Firebringer,” whose book jacket explains it as “another name for Prometheus, the Titan who brought fire down from heaven as boon to mankind.” It is actually a takeoff from a Greek myth where once man lived without fire — and thus was consigned to coping with darkness at night and surviving, yes, without cooked food by day — to say the least.
This book tells the story of First Philippine Holdings — with huge ventures in power generation and distribution, property development, electric utilities, agribusiness, manufacturing — and, yes, broadcast media. Firebringer is also the story of the patriarch of the Lopez family, Don Eugenio Lopez, who founded First Holding’s forerunner, the Meralco Securities Corporation (MSC), and his sons and heirs.
As corporate history would have it, MSC was actually the holding company formed in 1961 by Don Eugenio, who, as the book says, declared his faith that Filipinos could run a power company like the Meralco “at a time when most Filipinos didn’t think they had what it took to acquire and run a world-class company.” His son, Oscar Lopez says that it was his father’s “vision, audacity and competence” that completed the Filipinization of Meralco acquired from its American owners.
The book is both history and biography, proving a sage’s view that history is actually biography. Firebringer is history punctuated with riveting accounts of hostile takeovers, buyouts, mergers and acquisitions, ambitious financing packages, backroom negotiations, and grand projects with epic proportions. It also presents a cast of characters (young then) who initiated and forged agreements and who implemented ambitious projects like laying pipelines cutting across provinces and less than friendly communities.
Firebringer is also a story of many more “firebringers” — young men schooled in the leadership style of the Lopez patriarch — and who became leaders of this country or who now occupy the helm of top corporations in the country as “captains of industry.” Stories are told of how Don Eugenio recruited promising young men to work for the company when they were yet in their early 20s and who fulfilled their potential by rising to become CEOs of some of the country’s top 100.
Don Eugenio wrote years before taking over Meralco “that human values are superior to material values… that our success should be measured not by the wealth we can accumulate,” but by the amount of happiness we can spread to our employees.” Heartwarming accounts about the patriarch pepper the pages of this book — handing a check as bonus or a letter of promotion.
He also had a knack for people’s names. The book narrates that, when Filemon T. Berba, Jr., a very new employee at MSC, and other MSC executives were at the airport to meet Don Eugenio. “There was no reason he should remember me. But when he passed by me, he held out his hand and said: ‘O Berba, how are you?’” Jun Berba cannot forget that in his lifetime. He muses now: “If that doesn’t grab your loyalty, nothing will.” Berba, now with Ayala Corporation, is now dubbed the CEO’s CEO.
As bringer of fire, the Lopez Group has been positioned as one being a channel of man’s greatest blessings like “fire.” After all, fire represents the benefits of modern civilization like electricity, information via broadcasting, and telecommunications. More than these, it has gifted our country with corporate leaders who knew how to survive and thrive in times of peace and conflict, in eras of certainty and discontinuity.
Sunday, August 04, 2002
The Will of a General, The Tact of a Diplomat
“The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell”
By Oren Harari
McGraw-Hill, 2002
The professions have their own stereotypes – fair or unfair. Doctors “act” like God over life and health of their patients. Lawyers “lie” for their clients. Generals motivate their men with tongue-lashing. Diplomats are a paragon of tact and, yes, diplomacy.
So when generals become Presidents and “chew” their men and cigar – or both – we forgive them for a hard-to-break habit. On the other hand, when ambassadors lose their cool, we don’t forgive them – because that’s “out of character.”
Is a “tactful general,” therefore, a contradiction in terms, a paradox?
Consider the world’s current interest -- one trained in soldiery, but who can shame the finest smooth-talking diplomat: Colin Powell, American Secretary of State.
What makes this charismatic African-American tick, one considered by two U.S. Presidents to be a “presidential timber”? Has he become a sensation simply because he is a blend of contradictory qualities?
The book, “The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell,” zeroes in on the qualities of this man who again took center stage right after the September 11 tragedy that “forever changed Americans’ view of themselves.” The author, Oren Harari, is quick to say that this is not a biography but a “battle-tested leadership book.”
True enough, we are introduced to the paradoxes of leadership, a phenomenon that continues to drive scholars to enumerate in tidy terms what a leader should be – especially in the 21st century. But human qualities cannot actually be placed in neat formulas.
That’s true – even truer – for Powell. With Jamaican parentage, schooled in America, and navigating the corridors of power, Powell is a living paradox. The book, with its three sections, calls Powell a “provocateur” in one breath, and then cites him for his “strategy and execution” than next. Of course, the juxtaposition is not contradictory; just intriguing.
Behind the cool façade, for example, is a gadfly. Powell does not retreat from ruffling other people’s feelings, if it’s unavoidable. “Colin Powell is perfectly prepared to make people angry, even really angry, in pursuit of organizational excellence,” Harari reveals.
Still on this startling subject, the book reveals more about Powell: “Making people mad was part of being a leader.” What! Powell continues: “As I had learned long ago … an individual’s hurt feelings run a distant second to the good of the service. Trying not to offend anyone … will set you on the road to mediocrity.” That explains Powell, the tough leader.
“Good leaders don’t evade or cover up anger; they lead it,” annotates the author. “Powell will tell you that when leaders press for new directions, new behaviors, and new performance expectations, peoples’ comfort zones will be invaded, and they’ll get angry. And that’s precisely what’s supposed to happen.”
As a leader you can be forceful but not blunt. The book tells of an anecdote when, looking out the window from an aircraft, Powell thought he noticed an unfamiliar terrain below. No, said the pilot, he knew exactly where they were.
Powell immediately challenged him. In polite and forceful language, he ordered the pilot to turn the plane around and get them out of there. As it turned out, the plane had been flying over enemy territory!
Powell was instrumental in building a global coalition to support the inexorable move of the U.S. to bomb Afghanistan. He pursued his strategy over the objections of the “hawks” in the White House. Surely, he turned on his charm and his used his diplomatic skills to the hilt.
It doesn’t mean, however, that he vacillates. The book has ample stories to paint a decisive no-nonsense leader of Powell. One story is Powell’s urgent call to the headman of Pakistan who was initially ambivalent about whether to back the U.S. or to be neutral. That was within 48 hours of the September 11 attack. Powell’s message was terse: “General, you have got to make a choice.”
He always wants to get to the bottom of things. He once told his people: “This particular emperor expects to be told when he is naked.” (A story was told that an Emperor had no clothes, but no one was brave enough to tell him – until a child came along – to reveal such “naked truth.”) On another occasion, Powell said: “Untidy truth is better than smooth lies that unravel in the end anyway.” Many executives can identify with Powell’s “must” that even “bad news” is welcome. He has no use for fiction.
A three-word statement captures the crucial role of a leader like Powell. He said once: “Command is lonely.”
The author, equally eloquent, says that leaders do go through their “midnight moment of loneliness – that long moment of self-doubt, second-guessing and deep anxiety that is reserved for leaders” on the brink of a crucial decision. Dear readers: You don’t have to be the Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary to able to be up close and personal with Colin Powell. This book is the next best thing – if not better.
By Oren Harari
McGraw-Hill, 2002
The professions have their own stereotypes – fair or unfair. Doctors “act” like God over life and health of their patients. Lawyers “lie” for their clients. Generals motivate their men with tongue-lashing. Diplomats are a paragon of tact and, yes, diplomacy.
So when generals become Presidents and “chew” their men and cigar – or both – we forgive them for a hard-to-break habit. On the other hand, when ambassadors lose their cool, we don’t forgive them – because that’s “out of character.”
Is a “tactful general,” therefore, a contradiction in terms, a paradox?
Consider the world’s current interest -- one trained in soldiery, but who can shame the finest smooth-talking diplomat: Colin Powell, American Secretary of State.
What makes this charismatic African-American tick, one considered by two U.S. Presidents to be a “presidential timber”? Has he become a sensation simply because he is a blend of contradictory qualities?
The book, “The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell,” zeroes in on the qualities of this man who again took center stage right after the September 11 tragedy that “forever changed Americans’ view of themselves.” The author, Oren Harari, is quick to say that this is not a biography but a “battle-tested leadership book.”
True enough, we are introduced to the paradoxes of leadership, a phenomenon that continues to drive scholars to enumerate in tidy terms what a leader should be – especially in the 21st century. But human qualities cannot actually be placed in neat formulas.
That’s true – even truer – for Powell. With Jamaican parentage, schooled in America, and navigating the corridors of power, Powell is a living paradox. The book, with its three sections, calls Powell a “provocateur” in one breath, and then cites him for his “strategy and execution” than next. Of course, the juxtaposition is not contradictory; just intriguing.
Behind the cool façade, for example, is a gadfly. Powell does not retreat from ruffling other people’s feelings, if it’s unavoidable. “Colin Powell is perfectly prepared to make people angry, even really angry, in pursuit of organizational excellence,” Harari reveals.
Still on this startling subject, the book reveals more about Powell: “Making people mad was part of being a leader.” What! Powell continues: “As I had learned long ago … an individual’s hurt feelings run a distant second to the good of the service. Trying not to offend anyone … will set you on the road to mediocrity.” That explains Powell, the tough leader.
“Good leaders don’t evade or cover up anger; they lead it,” annotates the author. “Powell will tell you that when leaders press for new directions, new behaviors, and new performance expectations, peoples’ comfort zones will be invaded, and they’ll get angry. And that’s precisely what’s supposed to happen.”
As a leader you can be forceful but not blunt. The book tells of an anecdote when, looking out the window from an aircraft, Powell thought he noticed an unfamiliar terrain below. No, said the pilot, he knew exactly where they were.
Powell immediately challenged him. In polite and forceful language, he ordered the pilot to turn the plane around and get them out of there. As it turned out, the plane had been flying over enemy territory!
Powell was instrumental in building a global coalition to support the inexorable move of the U.S. to bomb Afghanistan. He pursued his strategy over the objections of the “hawks” in the White House. Surely, he turned on his charm and his used his diplomatic skills to the hilt.
It doesn’t mean, however, that he vacillates. The book has ample stories to paint a decisive no-nonsense leader of Powell. One story is Powell’s urgent call to the headman of Pakistan who was initially ambivalent about whether to back the U.S. or to be neutral. That was within 48 hours of the September 11 attack. Powell’s message was terse: “General, you have got to make a choice.”
He always wants to get to the bottom of things. He once told his people: “This particular emperor expects to be told when he is naked.” (A story was told that an Emperor had no clothes, but no one was brave enough to tell him – until a child came along – to reveal such “naked truth.”) On another occasion, Powell said: “Untidy truth is better than smooth lies that unravel in the end anyway.” Many executives can identify with Powell’s “must” that even “bad news” is welcome. He has no use for fiction.
A three-word statement captures the crucial role of a leader like Powell. He said once: “Command is lonely.”
The author, equally eloquent, says that leaders do go through their “midnight moment of loneliness – that long moment of self-doubt, second-guessing and deep anxiety that is reserved for leaders” on the brink of a crucial decision. Dear readers: You don’t have to be the Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary to able to be up close and personal with Colin Powell. This book is the next best thing – if not better.
Sunday, July 21, 2002
‘Positioning’ re-visited: The potion has not lost its magic
“Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind
-- 20th Anniversary Edition”
By Al Ries and Jack Trout
McGraw-Hill, 2001
There are books that acquire the status of a “classic”. And once a book is conferred such an honor, it occupies a special place in your bookshelf. There are actually two sides to a timeless classic:
One, it preserves yesterday’s occurrence so major or an idea so earthshaking then, and serves as an interesting study on how people lived or thought then. We look back and say, wistfully even, “O, that’s how it was.” It’s history for the scholar and the curious.
Two, it keeps a watershed event or a groundbreaking idea all happening in the past that somehow, as representative of a period, can be retrieved later – today or tomorrow -- to shed light on current happenings. It is history explaining contemporary or future events or ideas.
The book, “Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind – Twentieth Anniversary Edition,” published 20 years ago, is a classic belonging to the second category. The book was an event that revolutionized advertising and marketing strategic thought. It was also an idea whose “time had come” two decades ago, to paraphrase Victor Hugo.
It’s the same idea -- “positioning” -- that “is even more important today,” say the publishers. Is it a case of “retrieving” a relic from the dusty shelf, refurbish it, and thus pass it off as fresh as it was 20 years ago?
Or is it a case of a “formula” that continues to work wonders, a potion that hasn’t lost its magic, a time-tested (not time-worn) strategy that gets results, or an idea that always comes as “fresh from the oven.”
Re-reading is normally a chore – if not a bore. You feel you are short-changing yourself. I was prepared for the worst when I took hold of this book – after I was attracted by its 20th anniversary edition cover. It turns out that the book offers more than just a re-run of what I have read, yes, about 12 years ago.
It has come fresh for two reasons: One, the authors give a running commentary on what they wrote much earlier – thus illuminating the past with the present and vice versa. Two, the commentaries are easy to spot since they are placed on wide margins, with (many times) matching illustrations, to boot.
On media explosion, for example. The old version spoke only of television, print, and radio. At the margin is the familiar logo of “America Online” with the note: “Add the internet to the media list. The Internet, in our opinion, will become the greatest of all media with the most impact on our lives.” This is the book updating itself!
In the old version, the authors said that line extension for General Motors (makers of Cadillac) was ill- advised. In this newly-minted book, the same authors – much wiser – admitted: “We were wrong about the Cadillac Seville. It’s still with us.” This is the book correcting itself.
While Ries and Trout were wrong about the Cadillac, they took an “I-told-you-so” posture on the Volkswagen. They said then that it was a “terrible strategy” for Volkswagen to extend its product lines beyond the Beetle – despite the cute headline: “Different Volks for different folks.” “In 1993,” the new book says, “their (Volkswagen’s) share was less than three percent. Recently, of course, they brought back the Beetle and sales soared.”
There are many things that change. There are a few things that are unchanging. The authors did not revise their definition of “positioning”: “Positioning is not what you do to a product. Positioning is what you do to the mind of the prospect. That is, you position the product in the mind of the prospect.” And the entire book, with 22 chapters, guide you once again to becoming successful with “positioning.”
When you do decide to revisit the “Positioning” idea, especially when you are interested to position a company, not a product, page 159 narrates how Monsanto came up with a positioning idea that gave it pre-eminence as an industry leader in chemicals.
Revisiting a book – like a place – sometimes gives you a new eye for details that you missed the first time. I overlooked some interesting points when I read the old book – in the section titled “Make Sure Your Name Is Right.” Who is Leonard Slye? Who was Marion Morrison? Who was Issur Danielovitch? They are, in that order, Roy Rogers, John Wayne and Kirk Douglas! The message was clear then and clear now. Change your product or corporate name if they are forgettable – or are tongue twisters.
Reading the book the second time around, if only for the marginal notes, illuminates both the present and the past. “Positioning” as a marketing and creative approach remains effective today – alongside David Ogilvy’s “unique selling proposition” and “The Big Idea.”
If you haven’t read the book you have the advantage of knowing what works and what hasn’t work in a two-decade stretch. If you’ve read the 20-years-ago edition, this latest one is “Positioning Revisited.” It’s viewing this durable concept with a new lens.
-- 20th Anniversary Edition”
By Al Ries and Jack Trout
McGraw-Hill, 2001
There are books that acquire the status of a “classic”. And once a book is conferred such an honor, it occupies a special place in your bookshelf. There are actually two sides to a timeless classic:
One, it preserves yesterday’s occurrence so major or an idea so earthshaking then, and serves as an interesting study on how people lived or thought then. We look back and say, wistfully even, “O, that’s how it was.” It’s history for the scholar and the curious.
Two, it keeps a watershed event or a groundbreaking idea all happening in the past that somehow, as representative of a period, can be retrieved later – today or tomorrow -- to shed light on current happenings. It is history explaining contemporary or future events or ideas.
The book, “Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind – Twentieth Anniversary Edition,” published 20 years ago, is a classic belonging to the second category. The book was an event that revolutionized advertising and marketing strategic thought. It was also an idea whose “time had come” two decades ago, to paraphrase Victor Hugo.
It’s the same idea -- “positioning” -- that “is even more important today,” say the publishers. Is it a case of “retrieving” a relic from the dusty shelf, refurbish it, and thus pass it off as fresh as it was 20 years ago?
Or is it a case of a “formula” that continues to work wonders, a potion that hasn’t lost its magic, a time-tested (not time-worn) strategy that gets results, or an idea that always comes as “fresh from the oven.”
Re-reading is normally a chore – if not a bore. You feel you are short-changing yourself. I was prepared for the worst when I took hold of this book – after I was attracted by its 20th anniversary edition cover. It turns out that the book offers more than just a re-run of what I have read, yes, about 12 years ago.
It has come fresh for two reasons: One, the authors give a running commentary on what they wrote much earlier – thus illuminating the past with the present and vice versa. Two, the commentaries are easy to spot since they are placed on wide margins, with (many times) matching illustrations, to boot.
On media explosion, for example. The old version spoke only of television, print, and radio. At the margin is the familiar logo of “America Online” with the note: “Add the internet to the media list. The Internet, in our opinion, will become the greatest of all media with the most impact on our lives.” This is the book updating itself!
In the old version, the authors said that line extension for General Motors (makers of Cadillac) was ill- advised. In this newly-minted book, the same authors – much wiser – admitted: “We were wrong about the Cadillac Seville. It’s still with us.” This is the book correcting itself.
While Ries and Trout were wrong about the Cadillac, they took an “I-told-you-so” posture on the Volkswagen. They said then that it was a “terrible strategy” for Volkswagen to extend its product lines beyond the Beetle – despite the cute headline: “Different Volks for different folks.” “In 1993,” the new book says, “their (Volkswagen’s) share was less than three percent. Recently, of course, they brought back the Beetle and sales soared.”
There are many things that change. There are a few things that are unchanging. The authors did not revise their definition of “positioning”: “Positioning is not what you do to a product. Positioning is what you do to the mind of the prospect. That is, you position the product in the mind of the prospect.” And the entire book, with 22 chapters, guide you once again to becoming successful with “positioning.”
When you do decide to revisit the “Positioning” idea, especially when you are interested to position a company, not a product, page 159 narrates how Monsanto came up with a positioning idea that gave it pre-eminence as an industry leader in chemicals.
Revisiting a book – like a place – sometimes gives you a new eye for details that you missed the first time. I overlooked some interesting points when I read the old book – in the section titled “Make Sure Your Name Is Right.” Who is Leonard Slye? Who was Marion Morrison? Who was Issur Danielovitch? They are, in that order, Roy Rogers, John Wayne and Kirk Douglas! The message was clear then and clear now. Change your product or corporate name if they are forgettable – or are tongue twisters.
Reading the book the second time around, if only for the marginal notes, illuminates both the present and the past. “Positioning” as a marketing and creative approach remains effective today – alongside David Ogilvy’s “unique selling proposition” and “The Big Idea.”
If you haven’t read the book you have the advantage of knowing what works and what hasn’t work in a two-decade stretch. If you’ve read the 20-years-ago edition, this latest one is “Positioning Revisited.” It’s viewing this durable concept with a new lens.
Sunday, July 14, 2002
Kotler, et al, help marketers sense, thrive in new economy
“Marketing Moves”
By Philip Kotler, Dipak Jain & Suvit Maesingee
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
When mindset-altering changes hit us — scientific, business or mathematical — we, like a groggy boxer hit by a whammy, ask: “Wha’ happened?”
When Copernicus declared that the sun is the center of the universe, not the earth, that revolutionary statement rocked the scientific and theological foundations of the leaders of his time. When, after circumnavigating the world, the voyager said that the earth is round, not flat, everyone was confused and scholars went back to their drawing boards and threw away all studies that proceeded from a false premise.
When many scholars and businessmen declared that the “new economy” is upon us — driven by the information revolution — many wondered what happened, others wandered around in the “new wilderness” confused as ever, still many others unable to cope with dramatic changes went bankrupt — and the majority of us ask: “What is really happening?”
Many books have been written on the “new” economy, on “customer-driven” firms, on the meteorically rising and falling dot-coms, and on the baffling digital world. Many of these have been useful, giving us as they do, an understanding of one facet of such economy, or one astonishing aspect of such phenomenon. Thus, we sigh that, somehow, we can make sense out of this “new thing.”
But, it takes Philip Kotler, the marketing guru and principal author of “Marketing Moves” to make the “new economy” in its variegated forms understandable to many of us. Trust Kotler to spot previous concepts and say that they no longer hold true. For example, he juxtaposes two contrasting laws:
“Company growth in the industrial age was limited by the operation of the law of diminishing returns… (but) growth in the new economy is governed by self-reinforcing cycles. Consider Metcalfe’s law: The cost of the network expands linearly with increase in network size, but the value of the network increases exponentially.”
The above is just one of the nine “major shifts toward the digital economy,” which are discussed at length with a lot of insights in the book. You will be shocked to know that the phrases we used just yesterday have been thrown out of the window by Kotler and his team. For example, one other major movement is the shift “from corporate governance to market governance.” Just the other day, a seminar on corporate governance was held as if it was a newfound concept. Talking of keeping abreast of what is “in” and what is “out,” this book gives you a leading edge.
The book will not only make you fashionable and ahead of the rest. In fact, the more important contribution of this book is the way it has organized the new manifestations of the “digital economy” into bite-size clusters, making you able to relate otherwise separate developments.
The book says that marketing should not be the function of the marketing department alone — and that’s not new. What’s groundbreaking, though, is the authors’ construction of the “Holistic Marketing Framework” — which combines three important concerns — Customer Focus, Core Competencies and Collaborative Network.
At first glance, that doesn’t seem new either, until the authors show how market offerings, marketing activities, business architecture, and operational system all work together to drive corporate and business strategies that lead to profitability and shareholder value. Well, that’s a mouthful – but it is such because it delivers in a capsule how a company thrives in the digital economy.
Gird up for studying every “competitive platform” as prescribed by the guru himself. This book is not as thick as “Marketing Management,” authored by Kotler also and published two decades ago. (That’s our textbook at Asia’s premier graduate business school in the early eighties.) Has Kotler reinvented himself? Is he now saying that the concepts he introduced no longer hold?
Listen to him: “New business strategies call for new marketing strategies and practices. We no longer believe that the marketer’s job is limited to managing the four P’s or to determining segmentation, targeting, and positioning.” Yes, Kotler is acknowledging major changes — and he has revised his theories.
And yet, Kotler always manages to be at the crest of the wave of these changes — and, from that perch, he sees major patterns and thus composes the big picture. He points out: “The old economy is based on the model of manufacturing that came out of the industrial revolution… The new economy, by contrast, emerges from the information revolution, with its advances in computerization, digitization, and telecommunications.”
Again, trust Kotler to illuminate history and current events. And trust him, too, to make fine distinctions: “Unfortunately, many people confuse the new economy with the high-flying dot-coms that burst on the scene … But the new economy is not only about dot-coms. It is about something more fundamental: the emergence of a network economy.”
There lies the central truth in this book. Businesses are much more networked — and firms that use such “connectedness” to the hilt will not only survive — but thrive in this century. The last word of the book’s title — “MarketingMoves” — was set in italics to underscore a point: Everything is dynamic. What we know as truth now may change overnight. Kotler, the marketing guru, made sure that point sinks. He changed his mind on many concepts and strategies. It’s time we changed ours.
By Philip Kotler, Dipak Jain & Suvit Maesingee
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
When mindset-altering changes hit us — scientific, business or mathematical — we, like a groggy boxer hit by a whammy, ask: “Wha’ happened?”
When Copernicus declared that the sun is the center of the universe, not the earth, that revolutionary statement rocked the scientific and theological foundations of the leaders of his time. When, after circumnavigating the world, the voyager said that the earth is round, not flat, everyone was confused and scholars went back to their drawing boards and threw away all studies that proceeded from a false premise.
When many scholars and businessmen declared that the “new economy” is upon us — driven by the information revolution — many wondered what happened, others wandered around in the “new wilderness” confused as ever, still many others unable to cope with dramatic changes went bankrupt — and the majority of us ask: “What is really happening?”
Many books have been written on the “new” economy, on “customer-driven” firms, on the meteorically rising and falling dot-coms, and on the baffling digital world. Many of these have been useful, giving us as they do, an understanding of one facet of such economy, or one astonishing aspect of such phenomenon. Thus, we sigh that, somehow, we can make sense out of this “new thing.”
But, it takes Philip Kotler, the marketing guru and principal author of “Marketing Moves” to make the “new economy” in its variegated forms understandable to many of us. Trust Kotler to spot previous concepts and say that they no longer hold true. For example, he juxtaposes two contrasting laws:
“Company growth in the industrial age was limited by the operation of the law of diminishing returns… (but) growth in the new economy is governed by self-reinforcing cycles. Consider Metcalfe’s law: The cost of the network expands linearly with increase in network size, but the value of the network increases exponentially.”
The above is just one of the nine “major shifts toward the digital economy,” which are discussed at length with a lot of insights in the book. You will be shocked to know that the phrases we used just yesterday have been thrown out of the window by Kotler and his team. For example, one other major movement is the shift “from corporate governance to market governance.” Just the other day, a seminar on corporate governance was held as if it was a newfound concept. Talking of keeping abreast of what is “in” and what is “out,” this book gives you a leading edge.
The book will not only make you fashionable and ahead of the rest. In fact, the more important contribution of this book is the way it has organized the new manifestations of the “digital economy” into bite-size clusters, making you able to relate otherwise separate developments.
The book says that marketing should not be the function of the marketing department alone — and that’s not new. What’s groundbreaking, though, is the authors’ construction of the “Holistic Marketing Framework” — which combines three important concerns — Customer Focus, Core Competencies and Collaborative Network.
At first glance, that doesn’t seem new either, until the authors show how market offerings, marketing activities, business architecture, and operational system all work together to drive corporate and business strategies that lead to profitability and shareholder value. Well, that’s a mouthful – but it is such because it delivers in a capsule how a company thrives in the digital economy.
Gird up for studying every “competitive platform” as prescribed by the guru himself. This book is not as thick as “Marketing Management,” authored by Kotler also and published two decades ago. (That’s our textbook at Asia’s premier graduate business school in the early eighties.) Has Kotler reinvented himself? Is he now saying that the concepts he introduced no longer hold?
Listen to him: “New business strategies call for new marketing strategies and practices. We no longer believe that the marketer’s job is limited to managing the four P’s or to determining segmentation, targeting, and positioning.” Yes, Kotler is acknowledging major changes — and he has revised his theories.
And yet, Kotler always manages to be at the crest of the wave of these changes — and, from that perch, he sees major patterns and thus composes the big picture. He points out: “The old economy is based on the model of manufacturing that came out of the industrial revolution… The new economy, by contrast, emerges from the information revolution, with its advances in computerization, digitization, and telecommunications.”
Again, trust Kotler to illuminate history and current events. And trust him, too, to make fine distinctions: “Unfortunately, many people confuse the new economy with the high-flying dot-coms that burst on the scene … But the new economy is not only about dot-coms. It is about something more fundamental: the emergence of a network economy.”
There lies the central truth in this book. Businesses are much more networked — and firms that use such “connectedness” to the hilt will not only survive — but thrive in this century. The last word of the book’s title — “MarketingMoves” — was set in italics to underscore a point: Everything is dynamic. What we know as truth now may change overnight. Kotler, the marketing guru, made sure that point sinks. He changed his mind on many concepts and strategies. It’s time we changed ours.
Sunday, July 07, 2002
A movement must change Its ‘theory’ or be marginalized
“The Communist Party
of the Philippines”
by Kathleen Weekley
University of the Philippines Press,
2001
We begin with a paraphrase of a saying that went the rounds among former or reluctant activists at age 30 or below, you have no heart; but if you are still an activist at 31 and above, you have no mind.”
Obviously, this quote downgrades activism as a passing interest. Which is not necessarily true. We have, for example, an activist Supreme Court, inhabited by justices already pushing 70!
But, a grain of truth is inescapable. Otherwise, how do you explain firebrand activists that figured in the First Quarter Storm in the early ‘70s – who now occupy comfortable sinecures in government or are top strategist in corporate boardrooms?
How do you make sense of leftists editors, who wrote editorials in college campus papers ringing with Marxist – Leninist rhetoric, who are now resident intellectuals in the highest rung of public policy makers.
Also, they have become gurus of propaganda and advocacy efforts of civil society. Or, they remained “ideologically pure” as academicians waxing nostalgic over a glorious past.
Where have all the revolutionaries gone? Quo vadis, “Revolution”?
What has happened to the revolutionary movement in the Philippines – a highly visible force in the ‘70s and ‘80s? Is it now a faint memory, a spent force? Or, is it lying low and quiet preceding a dramatic comeback?
“The Communist Party of the Philippines – 1968 – 1993,” written by Kathleen Weekley, a research fellow from Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, is an interesting study of a movement that was very close to coming to power – or, at the very least, to sharing power with the country’s traditional rulers.
In 1985, according to this book, “the national revolutionary movement was a serious threat to the state” with around 30,000 members, 59 guerilla fronts and 24,000 regulars and part-timers.
This book is interesting on two counts. First, it is an instructive study of a national movement, driven by a revolutionary theory, swelled by “believers,” and strengthened by a show of force.
Second, it is a movement of “discovery” or “rediscovery” – as if a think layer of our social fabric is peeled off to reveal a world largely hidden from the public eye, whose underground activities occasionally shook the foundations of “visible society.”
We know much about recent history from the Marcosian dictatorship to the Ninoy Aquino assassination; from the first Edsa revolt to the ascendancy of two post Edsa Presidents Cory Quino and Fidel Ramos.
This book gives us a parallel – albeit largely hidden – history of a movement inspired by Karl Marx and indoctrinated by Mao Tse Tung, which infused energy to the left leaning labor movement and surfaced as a broad-based socialist coalition named the “National Democratic Front.”
As a doctoral dissertation, the study was actually interested in finding out the “place of theory” in revolutionary practice – with a disturbing conclusion that the “25 years of revolutionary practice indicated a problem with formulae.”
In layman’s terms, the author is saying that the movement could not have petered out if, midstream, it reassessed its assumptions and changed strategy to suit deep changes in political and social conditions.
The Communist Party’s mistake, the author concludes, is that it “ignored the relationship between the ‘objective and subjective reality.’” The view of the masses must be part of reality, and “not a convenient feature of a democratic struggle.”
The account is given a human face, especially when it discusses Jose Maria Sison’s intellectual treatises and Bernabe Buscayno’s folk heroism. It also provides us an insight into the previous appeal of the globalized “revolution” that has placed Mao and Che Guevarra on a pedestal.
The author is incisive when she discusses the deep split within the ranks of the Party, especially addressing the question whether the movement will continue the “armed struggle”.
She quotes a weary armed insurgent: “The argument for war is lost when the light of peace – however dim – shines through.”
This organizational “wedge” cut more deeply when the Party was divided over whether to boycott the 1986 elections or not. The Party finally decided to stay away from the electoral exercise – which led, according to Ms Weekley, to its “political marginalization.”
A section, titled “From Vanguard to Rearguard,” captures the decline (from the author’s viewpoint) of movement.
Actually, one discerns a sympathetic treatment from an author whose passion and interest are on issues of national identity, citizenship and human rights. She rues the fact that the movement even during its “rectification campaign, “ still wanted to “return to a world that no longer exists.”
So you ask: What’s the value of a study that analyzes the decline of a movement?
First (if you just change the ideological bent), this becomes an excellent guide to driving a new movement toward achieving a goal. Second, you will realize once again, especially in this century, that theory must change when times are deeply altered. And third, know that a socialist opposition – this time wearing the garb of non-violence – may still provide the necessary counterweight to the extreme right. And thus, make real democracy possible.
of the Philippines”
by Kathleen Weekley
University of the Philippines Press,
2001
We begin with a paraphrase of a saying that went the rounds among former or reluctant activists at age 30 or below, you have no heart; but if you are still an activist at 31 and above, you have no mind.”
Obviously, this quote downgrades activism as a passing interest. Which is not necessarily true. We have, for example, an activist Supreme Court, inhabited by justices already pushing 70!
But, a grain of truth is inescapable. Otherwise, how do you explain firebrand activists that figured in the First Quarter Storm in the early ‘70s – who now occupy comfortable sinecures in government or are top strategist in corporate boardrooms?
How do you make sense of leftists editors, who wrote editorials in college campus papers ringing with Marxist – Leninist rhetoric, who are now resident intellectuals in the highest rung of public policy makers.
Also, they have become gurus of propaganda and advocacy efforts of civil society. Or, they remained “ideologically pure” as academicians waxing nostalgic over a glorious past.
Where have all the revolutionaries gone? Quo vadis, “Revolution”?
What has happened to the revolutionary movement in the Philippines – a highly visible force in the ‘70s and ‘80s? Is it now a faint memory, a spent force? Or, is it lying low and quiet preceding a dramatic comeback?
“The Communist Party of the Philippines – 1968 – 1993,” written by Kathleen Weekley, a research fellow from Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, is an interesting study of a movement that was very close to coming to power – or, at the very least, to sharing power with the country’s traditional rulers.
In 1985, according to this book, “the national revolutionary movement was a serious threat to the state” with around 30,000 members, 59 guerilla fronts and 24,000 regulars and part-timers.
This book is interesting on two counts. First, it is an instructive study of a national movement, driven by a revolutionary theory, swelled by “believers,” and strengthened by a show of force.
Second, it is a movement of “discovery” or “rediscovery” – as if a think layer of our social fabric is peeled off to reveal a world largely hidden from the public eye, whose underground activities occasionally shook the foundations of “visible society.”
We know much about recent history from the Marcosian dictatorship to the Ninoy Aquino assassination; from the first Edsa revolt to the ascendancy of two post Edsa Presidents Cory Quino and Fidel Ramos.
This book gives us a parallel – albeit largely hidden – history of a movement inspired by Karl Marx and indoctrinated by Mao Tse Tung, which infused energy to the left leaning labor movement and surfaced as a broad-based socialist coalition named the “National Democratic Front.”
As a doctoral dissertation, the study was actually interested in finding out the “place of theory” in revolutionary practice – with a disturbing conclusion that the “25 years of revolutionary practice indicated a problem with formulae.”
In layman’s terms, the author is saying that the movement could not have petered out if, midstream, it reassessed its assumptions and changed strategy to suit deep changes in political and social conditions.
The Communist Party’s mistake, the author concludes, is that it “ignored the relationship between the ‘objective and subjective reality.’” The view of the masses must be part of reality, and “not a convenient feature of a democratic struggle.”
The account is given a human face, especially when it discusses Jose Maria Sison’s intellectual treatises and Bernabe Buscayno’s folk heroism. It also provides us an insight into the previous appeal of the globalized “revolution” that has placed Mao and Che Guevarra on a pedestal.
The author is incisive when she discusses the deep split within the ranks of the Party, especially addressing the question whether the movement will continue the “armed struggle”.
She quotes a weary armed insurgent: “The argument for war is lost when the light of peace – however dim – shines through.”
This organizational “wedge” cut more deeply when the Party was divided over whether to boycott the 1986 elections or not. The Party finally decided to stay away from the electoral exercise – which led, according to Ms Weekley, to its “political marginalization.”
A section, titled “From Vanguard to Rearguard,” captures the decline (from the author’s viewpoint) of movement.
Actually, one discerns a sympathetic treatment from an author whose passion and interest are on issues of national identity, citizenship and human rights. She rues the fact that the movement even during its “rectification campaign, “ still wanted to “return to a world that no longer exists.”
So you ask: What’s the value of a study that analyzes the decline of a movement?
First (if you just change the ideological bent), this becomes an excellent guide to driving a new movement toward achieving a goal. Second, you will realize once again, especially in this century, that theory must change when times are deeply altered. And third, know that a socialist opposition – this time wearing the garb of non-violence – may still provide the necessary counterweight to the extreme right. And thus, make real democracy possible.
Sunday, June 30, 2002
A Backroom Operator Can Still Be an Inspiring Leader Tomorrow
“The Rumsfeld Way”
By Jeffrey A. Krames
McGraw-Hill, 2002
This review could have been titled “Leaders are a work-in-progress.” It stresses an important point: We must not put a label on someone or someone’s leadership style and leave it at that. But, that sounds very academic.
So, I chose the above title because it zeroes in on an important point: We just don’t dismiss someone over sixty as a “has-been” because there must be a 9/11 event (remember September 11?) that may yet bring out the finest in him.
A philosophy professor once told our class that you can’t describe a person with finality until he is, well, permanently rested. Otherwise, anyone alive is forever in the “process of becoming,” he said, in a classic Heraclitus-style pronouncement.
Donald Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense, will turn 70 on July 9. He has just evolved from a backroom operator into a leader whose words are treated as quotable quotes by America’s respected media. And his thinking suddenly acquires a certain strategic edge befitting a 21st century leader confronted with 21st century challenges.
The book, “The Rumsfeld Way,” is sub-titled “Leadership Wisdom of a Battle-Hardened Maverick.” But, after reading the book – and, yes, picking up some tips on strategy and execution along the way – you come away with something that warms the heart of people who are sixty and above: Hindi pa sila laos (closest translation: They are not yet has-beens).
And when you are a cocky thirtyish manager or a sober-minded forty-something executive, you would realize that every experience that adds a line to your curriculum vitae (CV), even those failures you omit in the same CV, count. Later, you will summon these all up to inspire your organization with a strategic direction refined to perfection. Or with a word of wisdom which provides room for all-important nuances and calibrated responses that escape brash young professionals.
Rumsfeld was not a mediocre leader at all. A Princeton University scholar, he went on to become staff assistant, congressman, White House bureaucrat, ambassador to NATO, chief of staff, corporate CEO a couple of times, Secretary of Defense a few times, special envoy of various American Presidents and one-time seeker of the U.S. Presidential nomination. Inspite of all these, media categorized him as a “backroom operator” and master of the labyrinthine power corridors of the White House and the Capitol. Hardly a flattering reputation.
The book quotes Henry Kissinger to stress this point: “I think we are dealing with Rumsfeld now at a different stage of his life. In the 70s he was at the beginning of his political career. Now he is beyond further ambition. But I thought he was a formidable man then, and he’s an outstanding leader now.”
Was there a new Rumsfeld, following a dramatic conversion? Or did the quintessential Rumsfeld, winnowed through years of slow but steady achievement, emerge at that defining moment on September 11 when terrorists attacked the World Trade Center? How did he respond?
The book lifts a quote from The Economist: “He (Rumsfeld) had done what soldiers have to do: stand fasty when the world explodes around you. He had led by example.”
Rumsfeld, like maybe a quiet bureaucrat across your cubicle, might have been grossly underestimated. We know better now. He was being prepared for something greater. And when that time came, he was ready.
Listen to the once cold warrior who spoke (after February 11) with words that warm the heart: “The strength that matters most is not the strength of arms, but the strength of character; character expressed in service to something larger than ourselves.” He was standing in the midst of the ash and ruins in New York.
Interesting are the assessments on Rumsfeld by his fellow leaders. Robert Hartmann, chief of staff for then Vice President Gerald Ford, said of the Defense Secretary:
“Fortune often favors those that have the rare gift of being in the right place at the right time. Even rarer, however, is the knack of being somewhere else. Donald Rumsfeld possessed both.” The story has it that when the Watergate Scandal rocked the Nixon Administration, Rumsfeld was conveniently in Brussels with an assignment in Pentagon.
Rumsfeld is not your idea of Everyman, the guy next door. He is our idea of a leader, taking positions we didn’t agree on and distrusting him for his ideology. Suddenly, he takes a position we do embrace, and we welcome him as the leader of this century. And then, when you review his record, steer clear of ideological differences – you note a dedication to a mission at hand and you see valuable gems on leadership.
This book, while giving us a glimpse of a newly-minted leader who is now the darling of the American press, is also a rich trove of, yes, leadership wisdom. Either way, you are not short-changed. As for Mr. Rumsfeld, we won’t dare make assessments with finality. It is enough to say that he is America’s man of the hour.
By Jeffrey A. Krames
McGraw-Hill, 2002
This review could have been titled “Leaders are a work-in-progress.” It stresses an important point: We must not put a label on someone or someone’s leadership style and leave it at that. But, that sounds very academic.
So, I chose the above title because it zeroes in on an important point: We just don’t dismiss someone over sixty as a “has-been” because there must be a 9/11 event (remember September 11?) that may yet bring out the finest in him.
A philosophy professor once told our class that you can’t describe a person with finality until he is, well, permanently rested. Otherwise, anyone alive is forever in the “process of becoming,” he said, in a classic Heraclitus-style pronouncement.
Donald Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense, will turn 70 on July 9. He has just evolved from a backroom operator into a leader whose words are treated as quotable quotes by America’s respected media. And his thinking suddenly acquires a certain strategic edge befitting a 21st century leader confronted with 21st century challenges.
The book, “The Rumsfeld Way,” is sub-titled “Leadership Wisdom of a Battle-Hardened Maverick.” But, after reading the book – and, yes, picking up some tips on strategy and execution along the way – you come away with something that warms the heart of people who are sixty and above: Hindi pa sila laos (closest translation: They are not yet has-beens).
And when you are a cocky thirtyish manager or a sober-minded forty-something executive, you would realize that every experience that adds a line to your curriculum vitae (CV), even those failures you omit in the same CV, count. Later, you will summon these all up to inspire your organization with a strategic direction refined to perfection. Or with a word of wisdom which provides room for all-important nuances and calibrated responses that escape brash young professionals.
Rumsfeld was not a mediocre leader at all. A Princeton University scholar, he went on to become staff assistant, congressman, White House bureaucrat, ambassador to NATO, chief of staff, corporate CEO a couple of times, Secretary of Defense a few times, special envoy of various American Presidents and one-time seeker of the U.S. Presidential nomination. Inspite of all these, media categorized him as a “backroom operator” and master of the labyrinthine power corridors of the White House and the Capitol. Hardly a flattering reputation.
The book quotes Henry Kissinger to stress this point: “I think we are dealing with Rumsfeld now at a different stage of his life. In the 70s he was at the beginning of his political career. Now he is beyond further ambition. But I thought he was a formidable man then, and he’s an outstanding leader now.”
Was there a new Rumsfeld, following a dramatic conversion? Or did the quintessential Rumsfeld, winnowed through years of slow but steady achievement, emerge at that defining moment on September 11 when terrorists attacked the World Trade Center? How did he respond?
The book lifts a quote from The Economist: “He (Rumsfeld) had done what soldiers have to do: stand fasty when the world explodes around you. He had led by example.”
Rumsfeld, like maybe a quiet bureaucrat across your cubicle, might have been grossly underestimated. We know better now. He was being prepared for something greater. And when that time came, he was ready.
Listen to the once cold warrior who spoke (after February 11) with words that warm the heart: “The strength that matters most is not the strength of arms, but the strength of character; character expressed in service to something larger than ourselves.” He was standing in the midst of the ash and ruins in New York.
Interesting are the assessments on Rumsfeld by his fellow leaders. Robert Hartmann, chief of staff for then Vice President Gerald Ford, said of the Defense Secretary:
“Fortune often favors those that have the rare gift of being in the right place at the right time. Even rarer, however, is the knack of being somewhere else. Donald Rumsfeld possessed both.” The story has it that when the Watergate Scandal rocked the Nixon Administration, Rumsfeld was conveniently in Brussels with an assignment in Pentagon.
Rumsfeld is not your idea of Everyman, the guy next door. He is our idea of a leader, taking positions we didn’t agree on and distrusting him for his ideology. Suddenly, he takes a position we do embrace, and we welcome him as the leader of this century. And then, when you review his record, steer clear of ideological differences – you note a dedication to a mission at hand and you see valuable gems on leadership.
This book, while giving us a glimpse of a newly-minted leader who is now the darling of the American press, is also a rich trove of, yes, leadership wisdom. Either way, you are not short-changed. As for Mr. Rumsfeld, we won’t dare make assessments with finality. It is enough to say that he is America’s man of the hour.
Sunday, June 16, 2002
‘Hand-me-down’ ideas on crisis handling not enough
“Risk Issues and Crisis Management”
By Michael Regester and Judy Larkin
Kogan Page Limited, 2002 (Second Edition)
What is the price of a ruined reputation? For an individual, where reputation equals honor, a tarnished reputation is a “forever thing.” For a corporation, it means the end of “forever” – meaning, cutting short a corporate existence keyed toward perpetuity.
More to the point, damage to corporate image due to a failure in risk management or a mishandling of a crisis runs into hundreds of millions and billions of pesos or dollars. Exxon lost $13 billion due to the oil spill of Exxon Valdez. Union Carbide’s “reputational damage” was estimated at $527 billion due to the Bhopal incident in India. The collapse of the Barings Bank due to a failure in issues management cost $900 million.
These figures represent clean up costs, days of lost production, product boycotts, product recalls, falling markets and share prices, escalating compensation and brand reputational damage.
“There is a growing litany of corporate and government mismanagement of issues which pose a threat to that most important of all assets – reputation.” Thus point out the authors of the book “Risk Issues and Crisis Management.” Are the authors exaggerating? No. They cite a survey made by the Association of Insurance and Risk Managers in 2000 -- among the top 250 companies in the United Kingdom – and thus conclude that “damage to reputation was the biggest business risk they faced.”
The book looks at the organization in the 21st century and tells us that it is vulnerable to many pressures. It must, therefore, “understand and respond to our rapidly shifting values, rising expectations, demands for public consultation and an increasingly intrusive news media.”
What the authors say are not alien to us here in this country. The issue of purchased power adjustment (PPA), for example, has presented a “risk issue” to both the state power firm and the largest electric power distributor in the country.
Have their respective reputations been hurt? For one, there is a brewing boycott of their services. Second, embedded resentment has re-surfaced. And news media have picked it up due to its populist appeal, getting a little help from a “populist” President earning brownie points from the “masa.”
Years before, a multinational softdrink company was plunged into widespread protests because of a failed numbers promo. After arrests, prolonged bad publicity, organized protest actions and numerous courts cases – the company suffered a shrinking market share due to reputational damage.
Companies do not have to be helpless when crisis strikes or a controversial issue against them hogs the headlines. There are strategies for “preparedness.”
This book provides analysis and advice in two main parts: Risk Issues Management and Crisis Management. Sounds simple enough?
Yes, but not simplistic. The authors, drawing from a rich experience in these fields begin with definitions (to make sure authors and readers are on the same wave length), bring us in major parts of the world for up-to-date cases, and provide analysis. The last part is the most valuable contribution of this book.
Since this book is written by English public relations and advocacy practitioners, it somehow introduces us to European thinking – and thus makes for a refreshing change. It also results in greater confidence among practitioners that they are in touch with the world’s best practices.
This one does not read like a textbook. It sounds like practitioners “talking shop” over a cup of steaming coffee – exchanging ideas, trading experiences, sharing statistics. Then you come away wiser – and readier to tackle issue-related and crisis-in-the-making problems.
The discussion on the “issue lifecycle” is instructive. American experts call it the “path of a controversial issue.” Reality-based tips on handling a crisis – from sparing the CEO to avoiding legal pitfalls; from expressing regrets to making “ex-gratia payments”; and avoiding blind faith in lawyers to having a gut-feel – are generously given in the book.
In these parts, issues management and crisis handling tactics and strategies have been cut-and-dried and tired (not tried) and tested. But the diversity of problems and the complexity of 21st century society require from practitioners – and clients – a larger or newer “frame” that enable them to identify potential or real problems – and come up with new – because target-specific – strategies.
Hand-me-down ideas from older hands don’t suffice. The old experts lived in a different era. You need books like this one – which is equivalent to attending a refresher course on preserving and expanding your “reputational capital” in Europe. Then, after reading it, test it in the real world – with a newfound confidence.
By Michael Regester and Judy Larkin
Kogan Page Limited, 2002 (Second Edition)
What is the price of a ruined reputation? For an individual, where reputation equals honor, a tarnished reputation is a “forever thing.” For a corporation, it means the end of “forever” – meaning, cutting short a corporate existence keyed toward perpetuity.
More to the point, damage to corporate image due to a failure in risk management or a mishandling of a crisis runs into hundreds of millions and billions of pesos or dollars. Exxon lost $13 billion due to the oil spill of Exxon Valdez. Union Carbide’s “reputational damage” was estimated at $527 billion due to the Bhopal incident in India. The collapse of the Barings Bank due to a failure in issues management cost $900 million.
These figures represent clean up costs, days of lost production, product boycotts, product recalls, falling markets and share prices, escalating compensation and brand reputational damage.
“There is a growing litany of corporate and government mismanagement of issues which pose a threat to that most important of all assets – reputation.” Thus point out the authors of the book “Risk Issues and Crisis Management.” Are the authors exaggerating? No. They cite a survey made by the Association of Insurance and Risk Managers in 2000 -- among the top 250 companies in the United Kingdom – and thus conclude that “damage to reputation was the biggest business risk they faced.”
The book looks at the organization in the 21st century and tells us that it is vulnerable to many pressures. It must, therefore, “understand and respond to our rapidly shifting values, rising expectations, demands for public consultation and an increasingly intrusive news media.”
What the authors say are not alien to us here in this country. The issue of purchased power adjustment (PPA), for example, has presented a “risk issue” to both the state power firm and the largest electric power distributor in the country.
Have their respective reputations been hurt? For one, there is a brewing boycott of their services. Second, embedded resentment has re-surfaced. And news media have picked it up due to its populist appeal, getting a little help from a “populist” President earning brownie points from the “masa.”
Years before, a multinational softdrink company was plunged into widespread protests because of a failed numbers promo. After arrests, prolonged bad publicity, organized protest actions and numerous courts cases – the company suffered a shrinking market share due to reputational damage.
Companies do not have to be helpless when crisis strikes or a controversial issue against them hogs the headlines. There are strategies for “preparedness.”
This book provides analysis and advice in two main parts: Risk Issues Management and Crisis Management. Sounds simple enough?
Yes, but not simplistic. The authors, drawing from a rich experience in these fields begin with definitions (to make sure authors and readers are on the same wave length), bring us in major parts of the world for up-to-date cases, and provide analysis. The last part is the most valuable contribution of this book.
Since this book is written by English public relations and advocacy practitioners, it somehow introduces us to European thinking – and thus makes for a refreshing change. It also results in greater confidence among practitioners that they are in touch with the world’s best practices.
This one does not read like a textbook. It sounds like practitioners “talking shop” over a cup of steaming coffee – exchanging ideas, trading experiences, sharing statistics. Then you come away wiser – and readier to tackle issue-related and crisis-in-the-making problems.
The discussion on the “issue lifecycle” is instructive. American experts call it the “path of a controversial issue.” Reality-based tips on handling a crisis – from sparing the CEO to avoiding legal pitfalls; from expressing regrets to making “ex-gratia payments”; and avoiding blind faith in lawyers to having a gut-feel – are generously given in the book.
In these parts, issues management and crisis handling tactics and strategies have been cut-and-dried and tired (not tried) and tested. But the diversity of problems and the complexity of 21st century society require from practitioners – and clients – a larger or newer “frame” that enable them to identify potential or real problems – and come up with new – because target-specific – strategies.
Hand-me-down ideas from older hands don’t suffice. The old experts lived in a different era. You need books like this one – which is equivalent to attending a refresher course on preserving and expanding your “reputational capital” in Europe. Then, after reading it, test it in the real world – with a newfound confidence.
Sunday, May 26, 2002
Know how to deregulate an Industry, privatize state firm
“The Evolving Bargain”
By Willis Emmons
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
There is public ambivalence about industry deregulation and privatization. On the positive side, people welcome that they can gas up in many more gas stations sporting names beyond Petron, Caltex and Shell. They have a choice among Globe, Smart, PLDT, Bayantel, Islacom, Digitel and Eastern Telecoms for mobile and landline communications.
However, they are disappointed that water rates are rising, even adter privatizing the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System – giving birth to Manila Water of Ayala and Maynilad of the Lopez Group. Of course, they fail to note that water supply has greatly improved in many areas. Labor and transport sectors complain that prices of petroleum products keep rising, inspite of deregulation. But, they gloss over the fact that production cutbacks by oil producers worldwide push these prices up.
Policy makers cannot make up their minds about the wisdom of privatizing stateowned National Power Corporation. Is it safe to unbundled such a monolith into small privately owned power companies? Consumers want to know: Will it result in lower power rates and stable supply of electricity? While the debate rages on the purchased power adjustment (PPA), the fate of privatizing Napocor hangs.
The issue and concerns regarding deregulation and privatization have been confined to so called experts – or newly converted specialists after a month of training. The rest of us are expected to take their word for it, because we don’t know any better.
Take heart. There is a book to make you literate (at least) about these buzz words – “The Evolving Bargain.” Sub-titled “Strategic Implications of Deregulation and Privatization,” the author has decided, first, to set you on a higher mood as he takes you on a world tour where governments are deregulating industries and state firms are handed over to private hands.
A witty quote on privatization from a cartoon in the New Yorker does the job: “In a move secure to attract the attention of regulators, the private sector made a bid to acquire the public sector!”
This was prefaced by the author’s observation that “everything heretofore state-owned or regulated us now for sale – from postal systems (the Netherlands) to social security systems (Chile) to stock exchanges (the United States),"
Like the scholar that he is, Emmons made a distinction between two terms that sometimes are lumped together. “Deregulation,” he points out, “refers to an increasing reliance on markets, not governments, to guide economic activity…Privatization refers to an increasing reliance on private firms, not government enterprises, for the provision of goods and services.”
Think of the dynamism that took over the telecommunications industry after it was deregulated, and these points will aptly describe “easing or eliminating” of government restrictions in three major areas: a firms freedom of entry into a market, its freedom of action within a market, and its profitability (maximum or minimum) within a market.
But, why the disillusionment on what is supposed to be a shot in the arm for economy? The book addresses this with three “paradoxes”. In the U.S., the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) requires rising budgets, expanding manpower and increasing rules. That must also be the case for the Philippines’ telecommunications sector, with the National Telecommunications Commission becoming more active than in the past when PLDT rules the roost.
The second paradox states that free markets in a deregulated environment are actually possible government requires “mandatory access” to critical infrastructure. This would happen when Napocor’s transmission grid, serving as a power superhighway, is required to open itself to independent power producers. This was also the case of PLDT when it was required to share its gateway to the new entrants.
The third paradox is that deregulation does not necessarily mean greated competition. The author cites the case of the U.S. airline industry, deregulated in the seventies. In the nineties, the industry was still concentrated in the hands of a small number of players.” Observers of the Philippine economy say that this is also true for the oil industry still controlled by the “Big Three,” inspite of the entry of new players.
The book is a slow read, not because it uses convoluted language, but because the subject itself requires time for analysis and the instinctive impulse to relate successful and failed efforts in various countries to our own national experience. You come away understanding what has been happening to our own liberalization efforts, noting uncanny similarities in other economies.
Whether you are a policy maker, an industry observer, a leader of an employers’ group or a labor leader – you will find this book giving you an informed perspective of a movement in economies that seems inexorable. In short, we might as well be familiar with the “wave of the future.” We might as well swim, not sink.
By Willis Emmons
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
There is public ambivalence about industry deregulation and privatization. On the positive side, people welcome that they can gas up in many more gas stations sporting names beyond Petron, Caltex and Shell. They have a choice among Globe, Smart, PLDT, Bayantel, Islacom, Digitel and Eastern Telecoms for mobile and landline communications.
However, they are disappointed that water rates are rising, even adter privatizing the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System – giving birth to Manila Water of Ayala and Maynilad of the Lopez Group. Of course, they fail to note that water supply has greatly improved in many areas. Labor and transport sectors complain that prices of petroleum products keep rising, inspite of deregulation. But, they gloss over the fact that production cutbacks by oil producers worldwide push these prices up.
Policy makers cannot make up their minds about the wisdom of privatizing stateowned National Power Corporation. Is it safe to unbundled such a monolith into small privately owned power companies? Consumers want to know: Will it result in lower power rates and stable supply of electricity? While the debate rages on the purchased power adjustment (PPA), the fate of privatizing Napocor hangs.
The issue and concerns regarding deregulation and privatization have been confined to so called experts – or newly converted specialists after a month of training. The rest of us are expected to take their word for it, because we don’t know any better.
Take heart. There is a book to make you literate (at least) about these buzz words – “The Evolving Bargain.” Sub-titled “Strategic Implications of Deregulation and Privatization,” the author has decided, first, to set you on a higher mood as he takes you on a world tour where governments are deregulating industries and state firms are handed over to private hands.
A witty quote on privatization from a cartoon in the New Yorker does the job: “In a move secure to attract the attention of regulators, the private sector made a bid to acquire the public sector!”
This was prefaced by the author’s observation that “everything heretofore state-owned or regulated us now for sale – from postal systems (the Netherlands) to social security systems (Chile) to stock exchanges (the United States),"
Like the scholar that he is, Emmons made a distinction between two terms that sometimes are lumped together. “Deregulation,” he points out, “refers to an increasing reliance on markets, not governments, to guide economic activity…Privatization refers to an increasing reliance on private firms, not government enterprises, for the provision of goods and services.”
Think of the dynamism that took over the telecommunications industry after it was deregulated, and these points will aptly describe “easing or eliminating” of government restrictions in three major areas: a firms freedom of entry into a market, its freedom of action within a market, and its profitability (maximum or minimum) within a market.
But, why the disillusionment on what is supposed to be a shot in the arm for economy? The book addresses this with three “paradoxes”. In the U.S., the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) requires rising budgets, expanding manpower and increasing rules. That must also be the case for the Philippines’ telecommunications sector, with the National Telecommunications Commission becoming more active than in the past when PLDT rules the roost.
The second paradox states that free markets in a deregulated environment are actually possible government requires “mandatory access” to critical infrastructure. This would happen when Napocor’s transmission grid, serving as a power superhighway, is required to open itself to independent power producers. This was also the case of PLDT when it was required to share its gateway to the new entrants.
The third paradox is that deregulation does not necessarily mean greated competition. The author cites the case of the U.S. airline industry, deregulated in the seventies. In the nineties, the industry was still concentrated in the hands of a small number of players.” Observers of the Philippine economy say that this is also true for the oil industry still controlled by the “Big Three,” inspite of the entry of new players.
The book is a slow read, not because it uses convoluted language, but because the subject itself requires time for analysis and the instinctive impulse to relate successful and failed efforts in various countries to our own national experience. You come away understanding what has been happening to our own liberalization efforts, noting uncanny similarities in other economies.
Whether you are a policy maker, an industry observer, a leader of an employers’ group or a labor leader – you will find this book giving you an informed perspective of a movement in economies that seems inexorable. In short, we might as well be familiar with the “wave of the future.” We might as well swim, not sink.
Sunday, May 05, 2002
Resonant leadership touches the heart first
“Primal Leadership”
Daniel Golman, Richard Boyatzis and Annie McKee
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
When popularity ratings of leaders (including Presidents) fall, analysts focus on issues they failed to address – the economy, unemployment, peace and order and wrangling political factions.
Inspite of so much analysis, these political observers don’t go to the heart of the problem — which (pardon the pun) is the collective heart of the Filipino. This should be more than an emotional appeal on television, for example, that only succeeds in stimulating our lachrymal glands.
According to this book, this certainly is not a leader who is “clueless” — “who try to resonate in a positive tone, but who is actually out of touch and out of tune.” The book, “Primal Leadership,” makes important and eye-opening distinctions: There are resonant and dissonant leaders.
Emotions can, of course, be manipulated. The book describes leadership situations that are uncannily familiar to us.
In a boxed item on “demagogues,” the book’s description is close to home:
“Demagogues elicit negative emotions, particularly a mix of fear and anger: the threat to ‘us’ from ‘them,’ and the dread that ‘they’ will take what ‘we’ have.”
The book continues: “Their message polarizes people rather than unites them in a common cause. They “fan the flames” of ethnic hatred or a class war.
So, what is resonant leadership? This is one which is “attuned to people’s feelings and move them in a positive emotional direction,” the book points out.
Thus, a resonant leader is he who, “speaking authentically from his own values and resonating with the emotions of those around him, hits just the right chords with his message.” When a leader triggers resonance, you can read it in people’s eyes: They are engaged and they light up.”
You ask: Did a President’s “Ina ng Bayan” series trigger resonance? Did it so touch people’s hearts that they now say: Let’s follow our leader!
But, there must be some dissonance somewhere. Is there a gap between what is said and what is preached? These questions are actually meant to bring the President’s handlers closer to evaluating the campaign accurately so that a program of projecting the President truly delivers the authentic person in her. And thus “connect” with the people.
The book, based on leadership and organizational studies, suggests a way in evaluating one’s leadership style — and then go for the needed change. The authors prescribe the “five discoveries.”
The book could just have titled the process simply, but it has chosen to use “discovery” — for a reason. The introspecting leader goes through the process of “discovering or re-discovering” himself. Such “discoveries” cover the leader’s “ideal self,” then his “real self,” followed by his “learning agenda” and subsequent “experimentations on new behaviors and thoughts” – and finally, developing supporting and trusting relationships.
These may sound simple enough, but the authors have scientific discoveries, case studies and a successful track record with CEOs to make you believe them. There was this CEO, a hotshot in R & D as scientist, who was promoted to his “level of incompetence (according to time-tested Peter Principle) as R & D division head. His new job required from him leadership qualities, not technical expertise, that he was not prepared for. He failed initially. Until he went through the journey of five discoveries.
Many books have discussed this many times enough, but did not identify what these leaders lack except to generalize that they are not meant to be managers or leaders. It turns out — that all they need is to develop “resonant leadership” – one that touches the heart of people, and then the mind. Understandably, the authors believe that “leaders are made, not born.” That “nurture” can alter “nature.”
This is not your usual motivational book on leadership. It has scientific moorings, including a “neuroanatomy of leadership.” The authors go somehow technical when they discuss parts of the brain that respond to resonant leaders. This is a slow analytical read when you reach this part.
Leadership styles go by various names and titles depending on theories being advanced. Early on, we were taught about Theory X and Theory Y, the latter being the more enlightened approach. Parallel to this is the debate between what style is effective – one of a task master or a “process person.” These have been sufficient to persuade us to go for Theory Y or for the process.
Until this book came. This well-thought out study, coming from a school that has been producing hot shot MBAs that run “Corporate America,” brings you inside the brain – and there discover that the key to inspiring people in organizations, in armies or an entire country is lodged in the human heart.
Daniel Golman, Richard Boyatzis and Annie McKee
Harvard Business School Press, 2002
When popularity ratings of leaders (including Presidents) fall, analysts focus on issues they failed to address – the economy, unemployment, peace and order and wrangling political factions.
Inspite of so much analysis, these political observers don’t go to the heart of the problem — which (pardon the pun) is the collective heart of the Filipino. This should be more than an emotional appeal on television, for example, that only succeeds in stimulating our lachrymal glands.
According to this book, this certainly is not a leader who is “clueless” — “who try to resonate in a positive tone, but who is actually out of touch and out of tune.” The book, “Primal Leadership,” makes important and eye-opening distinctions: There are resonant and dissonant leaders.
Emotions can, of course, be manipulated. The book describes leadership situations that are uncannily familiar to us.
In a boxed item on “demagogues,” the book’s description is close to home:
“Demagogues elicit negative emotions, particularly a mix of fear and anger: the threat to ‘us’ from ‘them,’ and the dread that ‘they’ will take what ‘we’ have.”
The book continues: “Their message polarizes people rather than unites them in a common cause. They “fan the flames” of ethnic hatred or a class war.
So, what is resonant leadership? This is one which is “attuned to people’s feelings and move them in a positive emotional direction,” the book points out.
Thus, a resonant leader is he who, “speaking authentically from his own values and resonating with the emotions of those around him, hits just the right chords with his message.” When a leader triggers resonance, you can read it in people’s eyes: They are engaged and they light up.”
You ask: Did a President’s “Ina ng Bayan” series trigger resonance? Did it so touch people’s hearts that they now say: Let’s follow our leader!
But, there must be some dissonance somewhere. Is there a gap between what is said and what is preached? These questions are actually meant to bring the President’s handlers closer to evaluating the campaign accurately so that a program of projecting the President truly delivers the authentic person in her. And thus “connect” with the people.
The book, based on leadership and organizational studies, suggests a way in evaluating one’s leadership style — and then go for the needed change. The authors prescribe the “five discoveries.”
The book could just have titled the process simply, but it has chosen to use “discovery” — for a reason. The introspecting leader goes through the process of “discovering or re-discovering” himself. Such “discoveries” cover the leader’s “ideal self,” then his “real self,” followed by his “learning agenda” and subsequent “experimentations on new behaviors and thoughts” – and finally, developing supporting and trusting relationships.
These may sound simple enough, but the authors have scientific discoveries, case studies and a successful track record with CEOs to make you believe them. There was this CEO, a hotshot in R & D as scientist, who was promoted to his “level of incompetence (according to time-tested Peter Principle) as R & D division head. His new job required from him leadership qualities, not technical expertise, that he was not prepared for. He failed initially. Until he went through the journey of five discoveries.
Many books have discussed this many times enough, but did not identify what these leaders lack except to generalize that they are not meant to be managers or leaders. It turns out — that all they need is to develop “resonant leadership” – one that touches the heart of people, and then the mind. Understandably, the authors believe that “leaders are made, not born.” That “nurture” can alter “nature.”
This is not your usual motivational book on leadership. It has scientific moorings, including a “neuroanatomy of leadership.” The authors go somehow technical when they discuss parts of the brain that respond to resonant leaders. This is a slow analytical read when you reach this part.
Leadership styles go by various names and titles depending on theories being advanced. Early on, we were taught about Theory X and Theory Y, the latter being the more enlightened approach. Parallel to this is the debate between what style is effective – one of a task master or a “process person.” These have been sufficient to persuade us to go for Theory Y or for the process.
Until this book came. This well-thought out study, coming from a school that has been producing hot shot MBAs that run “Corporate America,” brings you inside the brain – and there discover that the key to inspiring people in organizations, in armies or an entire country is lodged in the human heart.
Sunday, April 21, 2002
The Rainforest: Business Icon for this Century?
“What We Learned in the Rainforest”
By Tachi Kiuchi & Bill Shireman
Berrett-Koehler Publishers Inc., 2002
Alvin Toffler (“The Third Wave”) said it a few years ago – that we were then at the threshold of a post-industrial age about to step into the “information society.” Many more social and economic prophets forewarned us to brace up for the expanded role — and rule — of information processing and distribution offices, while they announced the greatly reduced influence of the factory floor.
Side by side, however, with the exciting prospects of super abundant information being delivered with the speed of light through fiber optics, we of the third millennium are also facing the prospects of diminishing resources and increasing wastes.
While the promise of a higher quality of life is within the grasp of the 21st century individual, the specter of extinction hangs over everyone. We are optimistic in one breath, and we are overwhelmed with pessimism the next. Is this the destiny of human life on earth? What about business whose view is to exploit our natural resources so it can grow, as if nature and business cannot pro-exist? More philosophically, we ask: Is there a future for mankind – and for its preoccupations like business?
There is a book, just off the press, titled “What We Learned in the Rainforest,” which provides us a metaphor that illuminates what is actually happening and the lights the way for some definitive steps. That way, we can have the best of both worlds: businesses can continue to grow while Mother Nature remains rich, diverse and plays its role to feed and sustain us all.
“If instead of controlling nature we listen to and learn from it, we can find our way with minimal pain and maximal gain,” say Tachi Kiuchi and Bill Shireman, the authors. These people know whereof they speak. Mr. Kiuchi is chairman and CEO emeritus of Misubishi Electric America, while Mr. Shireman is chairman and CEO of Global Futures.
While this is an easy-to-read book, the concepts are neither simplistic nor shallow — because they actually go against the grain — introducing new mindsets that are short of revolutionary. They start us off with a fundamental point: Business is part of nature, and so it must work like nature with its diversity, collaborative/competitive processes, death and rebirth.
The authors — who have visited a Costa Rican rainforest and who have tried skydiving in order to use two illuminating metaphors — offer seven lessons that must be clear enough to executives like you and me.
The first lesson: Use limit to create value — close the loop. Setting off with the premise that even the rainforest has limits, the authors noted that nature has a way of preserving itself in a give and take universe (a loop). Business, they say, must also find ways to close the loop — meaning, a recovery system, where wastes are re-used in a self-nuturing cycle. The book cites the case of Coors, makers of beer, who gave birth to many other businesses because it learned from the rainforest.
The second lesson: Replace physical resources with information — and learn to do more with less. “Information has a curious quality,” the authors say. “If I give you a physical resource, then you have it, and I don’t. But if I give you information, then you have it, and so do I.” (Actually, Hilarion Henares said basically the same thing when he criticized the Philippines’ export policy almost a decade ago. He said, if I may recall, that the reason we lose in the international trade game is we confine our exports to something physical like bananas and sugar, while the Japanese and other advanced countries export technology. He pointed out that if we sell bananas, we lose the bananas; but if the Japanese sell technology, they don’t lose such knowhow!)
An article in Fortune magazine many issues ago compared the cost of producing a Ford automobile prototype and a Microsoft software — saying that the profit from software is far far heftier than that from a car. The book is illuminating: “Information can be expensive to create, but it is cheap to reproduce and distribute.” The errors of Xerox and Apple are also discussed here, principally for basing their business models “on the illusion that the value was in the hardware rather than the software.”
Five more lessons from nature are offered by the book — from creating a whole new way to profit to inventing an entirely new economy consistent with the ways of nature; from creating diversity of products to knowing the “four seasons of business” — namely innovation, growth, improvement and release. The book recommends that we must also be sensitive to signals when a certain enterprise is at its death’s throes and must, therefore, “release.” Because, they are quick to add, release will be followed by a “rebirth.”
Are these authors offering unrealistic policies, born of their rich imagination? Certainly not. Their observations are rooted in a study of the world’s 20 leading companies who have discovered that they could maximize their business performance “as they become like nature, a complex and dynamic living system.”
The assembly line was once the icon of the industrial age. We thought the microchip is the apt trademark of the information age. Read this book when it reaches the book stores — and you will conclude that the verdant, lush rainforest is the better icon for the first century. After all, we have already gone full circle. We are all going back to nature!
By Tachi Kiuchi & Bill Shireman
Berrett-Koehler Publishers Inc., 2002
Alvin Toffler (“The Third Wave”) said it a few years ago – that we were then at the threshold of a post-industrial age about to step into the “information society.” Many more social and economic prophets forewarned us to brace up for the expanded role — and rule — of information processing and distribution offices, while they announced the greatly reduced influence of the factory floor.
Side by side, however, with the exciting prospects of super abundant information being delivered with the speed of light through fiber optics, we of the third millennium are also facing the prospects of diminishing resources and increasing wastes.
While the promise of a higher quality of life is within the grasp of the 21st century individual, the specter of extinction hangs over everyone. We are optimistic in one breath, and we are overwhelmed with pessimism the next. Is this the destiny of human life on earth? What about business whose view is to exploit our natural resources so it can grow, as if nature and business cannot pro-exist? More philosophically, we ask: Is there a future for mankind – and for its preoccupations like business?
There is a book, just off the press, titled “What We Learned in the Rainforest,” which provides us a metaphor that illuminates what is actually happening and the lights the way for some definitive steps. That way, we can have the best of both worlds: businesses can continue to grow while Mother Nature remains rich, diverse and plays its role to feed and sustain us all.
“If instead of controlling nature we listen to and learn from it, we can find our way with minimal pain and maximal gain,” say Tachi Kiuchi and Bill Shireman, the authors. These people know whereof they speak. Mr. Kiuchi is chairman and CEO emeritus of Misubishi Electric America, while Mr. Shireman is chairman and CEO of Global Futures.
While this is an easy-to-read book, the concepts are neither simplistic nor shallow — because they actually go against the grain — introducing new mindsets that are short of revolutionary. They start us off with a fundamental point: Business is part of nature, and so it must work like nature with its diversity, collaborative/competitive processes, death and rebirth.
The authors — who have visited a Costa Rican rainforest and who have tried skydiving in order to use two illuminating metaphors — offer seven lessons that must be clear enough to executives like you and me.
The first lesson: Use limit to create value — close the loop. Setting off with the premise that even the rainforest has limits, the authors noted that nature has a way of preserving itself in a give and take universe (a loop). Business, they say, must also find ways to close the loop — meaning, a recovery system, where wastes are re-used in a self-nuturing cycle. The book cites the case of Coors, makers of beer, who gave birth to many other businesses because it learned from the rainforest.
The second lesson: Replace physical resources with information — and learn to do more with less. “Information has a curious quality,” the authors say. “If I give you a physical resource, then you have it, and I don’t. But if I give you information, then you have it, and so do I.” (Actually, Hilarion Henares said basically the same thing when he criticized the Philippines’ export policy almost a decade ago. He said, if I may recall, that the reason we lose in the international trade game is we confine our exports to something physical like bananas and sugar, while the Japanese and other advanced countries export technology. He pointed out that if we sell bananas, we lose the bananas; but if the Japanese sell technology, they don’t lose such knowhow!)
An article in Fortune magazine many issues ago compared the cost of producing a Ford automobile prototype and a Microsoft software — saying that the profit from software is far far heftier than that from a car. The book is illuminating: “Information can be expensive to create, but it is cheap to reproduce and distribute.” The errors of Xerox and Apple are also discussed here, principally for basing their business models “on the illusion that the value was in the hardware rather than the software.”
Five more lessons from nature are offered by the book — from creating a whole new way to profit to inventing an entirely new economy consistent with the ways of nature; from creating diversity of products to knowing the “four seasons of business” — namely innovation, growth, improvement and release. The book recommends that we must also be sensitive to signals when a certain enterprise is at its death’s throes and must, therefore, “release.” Because, they are quick to add, release will be followed by a “rebirth.”
Are these authors offering unrealistic policies, born of their rich imagination? Certainly not. Their observations are rooted in a study of the world’s 20 leading companies who have discovered that they could maximize their business performance “as they become like nature, a complex and dynamic living system.”
The assembly line was once the icon of the industrial age. We thought the microchip is the apt trademark of the information age. Read this book when it reaches the book stores — and you will conclude that the verdant, lush rainforest is the better icon for the first century. After all, we have already gone full circle. We are all going back to nature!
Sunday, April 07, 2002
Recruit top guns, then shoot for No. 1
“The War for Talent”
Ed Michaels, Helen Handfield-Jones
And Beth Axelrod
Harvard Business School Press, 2001
On the need to prevent another Enron-like collapse, my friend Glendon Rowell of Boyden Global Executive Search pointed out that “more professionalism in recruitment is more important than tighter regulation and governance.”
(Enron, erstwhile much-admired corporation in Maerica, suddenly collapsed, throwing thousands out of a job, sending shock waves to markets around the world, and prompting government regulators to look for other organizations or practice to blame.)
What Mr. Rowell is saying is that executive talent is a very important factor in defining and directing an organization’s future, and in making it adhere to ethical principles.
An organization’s executive pool also influences a firm’s competitiveness – and therefore, viability.
The book, “The War for Talent,” declares: “Talent is now a critical driver of corporate performance.”
Based on extensive research and case studies from 1997 to 2001, the authors – all from McKinsey & Company – summarizes their findings thus: “What distinguished the high-performing companies from the average-performing was not better HR, but the fundamental belief in the importance of talent.”
Are there leadership gaps in your organization that adversely affect its performance? Are you constrained by the policy of “promoting from within,” giving more premium to seniority than outstanding performance?
Read about an overworked executive who witnessed the plunge of his company from a glorious history – because he settled for mediocre executives. And then follow him, after he heeded the advice of Jack Welch of General Electric and Wayne Callaway (then of Pepsi Co) – including Stephen Spielberg. What gospel truth did he stumble on?
They told him that they spend half of their time on people: recruiting new talent, picking the right people for particular positions, grooming young stars, developing global managers, dealing with underperformers and reviewing the entire talent pool.
The guy is Les Wexner, CEO of The Limited who built a retailing and marketing marvel which included “Victoria’s Secret,” Bath and Body Works, et al. In 1990, his stocks plunged.
But after three years hiring and using top guns, the company’s profits have grown from $285 million to $445 million, and his stock price has almost doubled.
A “new business reality” has entered the corporate scene, says the book. What happened? The authors observe that companies’ reliance on talent increased dramatically over the last century. In 1900, only 17 percent of all jobs required knowledge workers; not over 60 percent do.
The book quotes Cisco CEO John Chambers, who put it this way: “A world- class engineer with five peers can outproduce 200 regular engineers.”
What “business reality” is staring us in the face? For one, the book says, we had the belief in the past that “people need companies.” Today, “companies need people.”
Two structural forces are fueling the war, the book says. First, the power has shifted from the corporation to the individual. Second, excellent talent management has become a crucial source of competitive advantage.
In the past, executives looked at a 30-year horizon, good salary and retirement package. Now, their horizon is only five years, and retirement is remote possibility.
The old recruiting strategy of advertising for job hunters has given way to the aggressive effort to tap passive candidates. “We now reach people who are not looking.”
Something else is also happening in companies in more developed economies. They are now breaking away form the traditional “hire-from-within policy.” Even if the failure rates of senior external hires hover around 30 percent, companies still think it’s well worth the risk.
“The War for Talent” is a useful resource book, not only for CEOs needing to infuse new blood – and, perhaps, new energy in their firms – but also for all leaders who want to keep the best, train those with great potential – and deal with mediocre performers “with an iron hand and a velvet glove.”
The book also reveals the emergence of a new profession. It’s public knowledge that today’s intermediaries for recruitment are executive search professionals. Now enter “talent agents” – who are not any different from agents of superstars.
Close on the heels of the collapse of Enron (which, curiously is featured glowingly in the book – probably to the regret of the authors), Boyden’s Rowell volunteers that – aside from vision and superior strategy – organizations need leaders of integrity.
The headhunter’s comment enriches, not contradicts, the book’s thesis that the right (from ethical and precision standpoint) executives talent truly drives organization well into the future.
Ed Michaels, Helen Handfield-Jones
And Beth Axelrod
Harvard Business School Press, 2001
On the need to prevent another Enron-like collapse, my friend Glendon Rowell of Boyden Global Executive Search pointed out that “more professionalism in recruitment is more important than tighter regulation and governance.”
(Enron, erstwhile much-admired corporation in Maerica, suddenly collapsed, throwing thousands out of a job, sending shock waves to markets around the world, and prompting government regulators to look for other organizations or practice to blame.)
What Mr. Rowell is saying is that executive talent is a very important factor in defining and directing an organization’s future, and in making it adhere to ethical principles.
An organization’s executive pool also influences a firm’s competitiveness – and therefore, viability.
The book, “The War for Talent,” declares: “Talent is now a critical driver of corporate performance.”
Based on extensive research and case studies from 1997 to 2001, the authors – all from McKinsey & Company – summarizes their findings thus: “What distinguished the high-performing companies from the average-performing was not better HR, but the fundamental belief in the importance of talent.”
Are there leadership gaps in your organization that adversely affect its performance? Are you constrained by the policy of “promoting from within,” giving more premium to seniority than outstanding performance?
Read about an overworked executive who witnessed the plunge of his company from a glorious history – because he settled for mediocre executives. And then follow him, after he heeded the advice of Jack Welch of General Electric and Wayne Callaway (then of Pepsi Co) – including Stephen Spielberg. What gospel truth did he stumble on?
They told him that they spend half of their time on people: recruiting new talent, picking the right people for particular positions, grooming young stars, developing global managers, dealing with underperformers and reviewing the entire talent pool.
The guy is Les Wexner, CEO of The Limited who built a retailing and marketing marvel which included “Victoria’s Secret,” Bath and Body Works, et al. In 1990, his stocks plunged.
But after three years hiring and using top guns, the company’s profits have grown from $285 million to $445 million, and his stock price has almost doubled.
A “new business reality” has entered the corporate scene, says the book. What happened? The authors observe that companies’ reliance on talent increased dramatically over the last century. In 1900, only 17 percent of all jobs required knowledge workers; not over 60 percent do.
The book quotes Cisco CEO John Chambers, who put it this way: “A world- class engineer with five peers can outproduce 200 regular engineers.”
What “business reality” is staring us in the face? For one, the book says, we had the belief in the past that “people need companies.” Today, “companies need people.”
Two structural forces are fueling the war, the book says. First, the power has shifted from the corporation to the individual. Second, excellent talent management has become a crucial source of competitive advantage.
In the past, executives looked at a 30-year horizon, good salary and retirement package. Now, their horizon is only five years, and retirement is remote possibility.
The old recruiting strategy of advertising for job hunters has given way to the aggressive effort to tap passive candidates. “We now reach people who are not looking.”
Something else is also happening in companies in more developed economies. They are now breaking away form the traditional “hire-from-within policy.” Even if the failure rates of senior external hires hover around 30 percent, companies still think it’s well worth the risk.
“The War for Talent” is a useful resource book, not only for CEOs needing to infuse new blood – and, perhaps, new energy in their firms – but also for all leaders who want to keep the best, train those with great potential – and deal with mediocre performers “with an iron hand and a velvet glove.”
The book also reveals the emergence of a new profession. It’s public knowledge that today’s intermediaries for recruitment are executive search professionals. Now enter “talent agents” – who are not any different from agents of superstars.
Close on the heels of the collapse of Enron (which, curiously is featured glowingly in the book – probably to the regret of the authors), Boyden’s Rowell volunteers that – aside from vision and superior strategy – organizations need leaders of integrity.
The headhunter’s comment enriches, not contradicts, the book’s thesis that the right (from ethical and precision standpoint) executives talent truly drives organization well into the future.
Sunday, March 10, 2002
Don’t Just Survive, go and dominate
“The Agenda”
By Michael Hammer
Crown Business, 2001
Reflecting — after reading this new book of Michael Hammer, author of the famous “Reengineering the Corporation” — I recall this announcement rendered into a poetic line by Matthew Arnold in his famous poem Dover Beach: “The world is different now,” a lament that the old world of sure cures and “balm for pain” was passing, and his generation must, therefore, be “true to one another.”
What Matthew Arnold did in his generation, after a traumatic and bruising world war - and seeing a new world emerging - is what Hammer is telling executives that the entire business world has also changed dramatically – and the old bag of tricks no longer suffice. He thus issues a call to consider new formulas for “dominating,” not surviving, the market – principal of which is to trust one another (addressed to suppliers and other partners) as collaborators for success.
The author of “reengineering” – that has now become a buzzword even among those who barely knows its implications – is now saying that reengineering is not a cure-all after all.
His new book, “The Agenda,” is his way of making up for the unintended effect when people viewed reengineering as a simple recipe for success. “While I did not claim that reengineering was all that companies needed to do to defeat their competitors, the success of the concept led some to see it as panacea, which in turn encouraged others to promote their favorite silver bullets” (the surefire weapon of the Lone Ranger). “Perhaps,” he says, “part of my atonement for this unintentional transgression has been to write The Agenda.”
As it turned out, The Agenda, is an eye-opener. To those of us who approach running business as a chancy game, Hammer – noting the fall of many famous firms (and he had no inkling yet about the collapse of giant Enron) – gives us a reality check: “Get serious about business again.”
His argument is forceful – and breathless: “If managing were simple, why do even companies that become successful stay that way for such short periods of time? Why did Pan Am go out of business, why is Xerox near bankruptcy, why did Digital Equipment fall victim to acquisition? Why have such former industry titans as Lucent and General Motors, Levi Strauss and Rubbermaid, become mere shadows of their former selves?”
Hammer thus proceeds to bring back the basics – and then astonish us with whole new insights. The next chapter, “Run Your Business for Your Customers,” seems old hat at first until Hammer discusses his six-letter formula: ETDBW, meaning, “easy-to-do-business-with.” And then he exposes companies who have succeeded in making it most difficult for customers to deal with – throwing every obstacle and every bureaucratic scheme to leave the customer bothered, bewildered and frustrated.
The author goes on advising us to give MVA – yes, more value added – to our customers. Is this now? It is now in this sense: “You give the customer more, perhaps much more, than you ever have before.” Take the viewpoint of the customer” is an advice that isn’t also new. But this story dramatizes it: He quoted a chairman who shocked his shareholders in a company that controls 90 percent of the drill market: “I have some bad news for you. Nobody wants our drills (!) What they want is holes.”
What Michael Hammer achieves is to make sound business fundamentals more pronounced, more insightful and – more urgent. For example, he stresses the need to put processes first. He rues the fact that many companies are not really inclined to perfect a process to satisfy a customer. His definition drives the point home: “Process is an organized group of related activities that together create a result of value to customers.”
His chapter on “Create Order Where Chaos Reigns” first acknowledges that chaos indeed is in even the best organizations. Then, he says, “product champions” emerge as heroes in these companies to get a product produced and sold. And then he concludes that a company cannot long survive relying on champions who use wizardry and persuasion to get things done.
He points out: “Both heroic sales rep and the product champion try to compensate for organizational disorder by personally harnessing uncoordinated activities into a purposeful whole. They are substitutes for discipline and process, but in the long run, they can’t succeed.”
His prescription: Discipline. “Discipline does not eliminate the need for creativity. On the contrary, it actually encourages them by providing a frame for individual work. Structure ensures that the parts come together as a whole.”
Hammer has more to offer in this book. He criticizes measurement as purely a financial report after the fact. Using these measures, he says, it “like trying to manage a baseball game today by using last year’s win-loss record to tell you whether to call a hit or a bunt.”
In effect, Hammer wants the company liberated from suffocating procedures and structures so that it can concentrate on the most important factor in business: the customer. Of course, that is easier said than done, and a facile interpretation may mislead us to wrong conclusions. All he wants to say, though, is couched in his own inimitable style: “Pierce the veil that separates you from your customers.”
This requires leadership resolve to make changes, even fire people who don’t believe in your initiatives. You’ve got a choice: make your company dominant or be extinct. He has made it so clear what your choice should be.
By Michael Hammer
Crown Business, 2001
Reflecting — after reading this new book of Michael Hammer, author of the famous “Reengineering the Corporation” — I recall this announcement rendered into a poetic line by Matthew Arnold in his famous poem Dover Beach: “The world is different now,” a lament that the old world of sure cures and “balm for pain” was passing, and his generation must, therefore, be “true to one another.”
What Matthew Arnold did in his generation, after a traumatic and bruising world war - and seeing a new world emerging - is what Hammer is telling executives that the entire business world has also changed dramatically – and the old bag of tricks no longer suffice. He thus issues a call to consider new formulas for “dominating,” not surviving, the market – principal of which is to trust one another (addressed to suppliers and other partners) as collaborators for success.
The author of “reengineering” – that has now become a buzzword even among those who barely knows its implications – is now saying that reengineering is not a cure-all after all.
His new book, “The Agenda,” is his way of making up for the unintended effect when people viewed reengineering as a simple recipe for success. “While I did not claim that reengineering was all that companies needed to do to defeat their competitors, the success of the concept led some to see it as panacea, which in turn encouraged others to promote their favorite silver bullets” (the surefire weapon of the Lone Ranger). “Perhaps,” he says, “part of my atonement for this unintentional transgression has been to write The Agenda.”
As it turned out, The Agenda, is an eye-opener. To those of us who approach running business as a chancy game, Hammer – noting the fall of many famous firms (and he had no inkling yet about the collapse of giant Enron) – gives us a reality check: “Get serious about business again.”
His argument is forceful – and breathless: “If managing were simple, why do even companies that become successful stay that way for such short periods of time? Why did Pan Am go out of business, why is Xerox near bankruptcy, why did Digital Equipment fall victim to acquisition? Why have such former industry titans as Lucent and General Motors, Levi Strauss and Rubbermaid, become mere shadows of their former selves?”
Hammer thus proceeds to bring back the basics – and then astonish us with whole new insights. The next chapter, “Run Your Business for Your Customers,” seems old hat at first until Hammer discusses his six-letter formula: ETDBW, meaning, “easy-to-do-business-with.” And then he exposes companies who have succeeded in making it most difficult for customers to deal with – throwing every obstacle and every bureaucratic scheme to leave the customer bothered, bewildered and frustrated.
The author goes on advising us to give MVA – yes, more value added – to our customers. Is this now? It is now in this sense: “You give the customer more, perhaps much more, than you ever have before.” Take the viewpoint of the customer” is an advice that isn’t also new. But this story dramatizes it: He quoted a chairman who shocked his shareholders in a company that controls 90 percent of the drill market: “I have some bad news for you. Nobody wants our drills (!) What they want is holes.”
What Michael Hammer achieves is to make sound business fundamentals more pronounced, more insightful and – more urgent. For example, he stresses the need to put processes first. He rues the fact that many companies are not really inclined to perfect a process to satisfy a customer. His definition drives the point home: “Process is an organized group of related activities that together create a result of value to customers.”
His chapter on “Create Order Where Chaos Reigns” first acknowledges that chaos indeed is in even the best organizations. Then, he says, “product champions” emerge as heroes in these companies to get a product produced and sold. And then he concludes that a company cannot long survive relying on champions who use wizardry and persuasion to get things done.
He points out: “Both heroic sales rep and the product champion try to compensate for organizational disorder by personally harnessing uncoordinated activities into a purposeful whole. They are substitutes for discipline and process, but in the long run, they can’t succeed.”
His prescription: Discipline. “Discipline does not eliminate the need for creativity. On the contrary, it actually encourages them by providing a frame for individual work. Structure ensures that the parts come together as a whole.”
Hammer has more to offer in this book. He criticizes measurement as purely a financial report after the fact. Using these measures, he says, it “like trying to manage a baseball game today by using last year’s win-loss record to tell you whether to call a hit or a bunt.”
In effect, Hammer wants the company liberated from suffocating procedures and structures so that it can concentrate on the most important factor in business: the customer. Of course, that is easier said than done, and a facile interpretation may mislead us to wrong conclusions. All he wants to say, though, is couched in his own inimitable style: “Pierce the veil that separates you from your customers.”
This requires leadership resolve to make changes, even fire people who don’t believe in your initiatives. You’ve got a choice: make your company dominant or be extinct. He has made it so clear what your choice should be.
Sunday, February 24, 2002
Are You Programmed To Lick Adversity?
“Adversity Quotient @ Work”
By Paul G. Stoltz, Ph.D.
Harper Collins Publishers, 2000
Intelligence quotient is something we have known since many years back. Emotional quotient is relatively recent, presenting a type of intelligence that puts premium on emotional maturity over intellectual superiority. Now comes “Adversity Quotient.” It is a measure of how well you or your team currently responds to adversity.
Adversity is definitely on the rise. The book, “Adversity Quotient @ Work,” reveals that individuals face an average of 23 adversities each day. In a fast-paced world, the individual is faced with many hurdles – deal with complexity and deliver in speed.
Here is a book that illuminates what we have been observing so far among our colleagues or friends.
You have dealt with basically two types of people. We simplistically call the positive-minded type as an optimist. It is he, as been said many times, who sees that the glass is “half-full.” So, too, we simplistically enough call the negative minded a pessimist, who sees the glass as “half empty.”
We have seen them at work and at play. One individual receives news of a problem, and he responds: “This comes with the territory; so we might as well face up to it.” Another would exclaim: “Woe to me; this problem will grow so big that I won’t be able to handle it.”
The book says that the first individual has a high AQ, and the second one has a low AQ. But the author is not only putting some labels. He has expanded his theory into a book with scientific findings. And he uses a language that appeals to computer literate people like most of us.
For example, he underscores the need to be re-trained to deal with adversity better, and so he says: “You must upgrade your human operating system to remain viable and strong.”
One enlightening part of the book is his discussion of the CORE dimensions of your Adversity Quotient – which include Control, Ownership, Reach and Endurance. What makes the discussion interesting is his addition of new goals, for example, for training. He adds to the skills of problem solving and decision-making the goal of “team resilience.”
Prof. Stoltz draws from his varied experience with many companies as he explains why “most people communicate and behave poorly when adversity strikes.” A person loses clarity, focus, direction and perspective, he says. Many people have been given to “unproductive outbursts,” he points out.
We need to be “rewired,” he suggests, theorizing that we have been “hardwired” when we were younger. The way we respond is influenced by the way people we saw in our early years responded to adversity – and “we somehow acquired a pattern.”
The appeal of using Adversity Quotient as a motivator and a liberating system stems from many findings that AQ is a good “predictor of sales performance,” Stoltz says.
The entire human body responds as one brain to adversity. The author demolishes the “myth of the human machine.” We are a “highly networked system,” he declares. “The brain does not exist just in our head. Ever have a gut feeling or butterflies in your stomach? Dr. Michael Gershon states that we have 100 billion neurons in the gut (the same number as in the brain) that signal stress and influence health.”
The book has chapters and sections for individuals and for team leaders who wish to lead their teams toward having better “response-ability,” meaning better control of their responses.
The discussion on AQ’s CORE dimensions will prove most helpful.
For instance, in discussing the first dimension, Control, the author simply asks the questions: “To what extent are you able to positively influence a situation? To what extent can you control your own response to a situation.” He debunks viewpoints that “control” is exploitative. On the contrary, he says, “Control is a very precise and powerful source of freedom, not oppression or constraint.”
The second dimension, Ownership, asks to what extent you take it upon yourself to improve the situation, regardless of its cause. He correctly points out that “blame-throwing” is unproductive. He elaborates: “Blame occurs when people get caught up in assigning fault rather than learning from the behavior and moving on.”
Reach, the third dimension, simply advises the individual to limit the impact of the problem or any situation. Stoltz cautions readers against the tendency to “catastrophize,” meaning exaggerating a problem to catastrophic proportions! Sounds familiar to many people?
The fourth dimension, Endurance, asks how long one perceives the adversity to endure. He advises that one should have a realistic grip of a problem. It is always useful to say that such a problem will “come to pass.”
The book, despite its forbidding title (to those who hate Math 101) about “quotients” has a surprise for the readers. It speaks to both heart and mind. To both individual and team leader. To the solitary entrepreneur and the CEO of a big corporation. One thing we all share: Adversity comes our way everyday. Therefore, make time for this book. It will liberate you from worries and imagined catastrophes.
By Paul G. Stoltz, Ph.D.
Harper Collins Publishers, 2000
Intelligence quotient is something we have known since many years back. Emotional quotient is relatively recent, presenting a type of intelligence that puts premium on emotional maturity over intellectual superiority. Now comes “Adversity Quotient.” It is a measure of how well you or your team currently responds to adversity.
Adversity is definitely on the rise. The book, “Adversity Quotient @ Work,” reveals that individuals face an average of 23 adversities each day. In a fast-paced world, the individual is faced with many hurdles – deal with complexity and deliver in speed.
Here is a book that illuminates what we have been observing so far among our colleagues or friends.
You have dealt with basically two types of people. We simplistically call the positive-minded type as an optimist. It is he, as been said many times, who sees that the glass is “half-full.” So, too, we simplistically enough call the negative minded a pessimist, who sees the glass as “half empty.”
We have seen them at work and at play. One individual receives news of a problem, and he responds: “This comes with the territory; so we might as well face up to it.” Another would exclaim: “Woe to me; this problem will grow so big that I won’t be able to handle it.”
The book says that the first individual has a high AQ, and the second one has a low AQ. But the author is not only putting some labels. He has expanded his theory into a book with scientific findings. And he uses a language that appeals to computer literate people like most of us.
For example, he underscores the need to be re-trained to deal with adversity better, and so he says: “You must upgrade your human operating system to remain viable and strong.”
One enlightening part of the book is his discussion of the CORE dimensions of your Adversity Quotient – which include Control, Ownership, Reach and Endurance. What makes the discussion interesting is his addition of new goals, for example, for training. He adds to the skills of problem solving and decision-making the goal of “team resilience.”
Prof. Stoltz draws from his varied experience with many companies as he explains why “most people communicate and behave poorly when adversity strikes.” A person loses clarity, focus, direction and perspective, he says. Many people have been given to “unproductive outbursts,” he points out.
We need to be “rewired,” he suggests, theorizing that we have been “hardwired” when we were younger. The way we respond is influenced by the way people we saw in our early years responded to adversity – and “we somehow acquired a pattern.”
The appeal of using Adversity Quotient as a motivator and a liberating system stems from many findings that AQ is a good “predictor of sales performance,” Stoltz says.
The entire human body responds as one brain to adversity. The author demolishes the “myth of the human machine.” We are a “highly networked system,” he declares. “The brain does not exist just in our head. Ever have a gut feeling or butterflies in your stomach? Dr. Michael Gershon states that we have 100 billion neurons in the gut (the same number as in the brain) that signal stress and influence health.”
The book has chapters and sections for individuals and for team leaders who wish to lead their teams toward having better “response-ability,” meaning better control of their responses.
The discussion on AQ’s CORE dimensions will prove most helpful.
For instance, in discussing the first dimension, Control, the author simply asks the questions: “To what extent are you able to positively influence a situation? To what extent can you control your own response to a situation.” He debunks viewpoints that “control” is exploitative. On the contrary, he says, “Control is a very precise and powerful source of freedom, not oppression or constraint.”
The second dimension, Ownership, asks to what extent you take it upon yourself to improve the situation, regardless of its cause. He correctly points out that “blame-throwing” is unproductive. He elaborates: “Blame occurs when people get caught up in assigning fault rather than learning from the behavior and moving on.”
Reach, the third dimension, simply advises the individual to limit the impact of the problem or any situation. Stoltz cautions readers against the tendency to “catastrophize,” meaning exaggerating a problem to catastrophic proportions! Sounds familiar to many people?
The fourth dimension, Endurance, asks how long one perceives the adversity to endure. He advises that one should have a realistic grip of a problem. It is always useful to say that such a problem will “come to pass.”
The book, despite its forbidding title (to those who hate Math 101) about “quotients” has a surprise for the readers. It speaks to both heart and mind. To both individual and team leader. To the solitary entrepreneur and the CEO of a big corporation. One thing we all share: Adversity comes our way everyday. Therefore, make time for this book. It will liberate you from worries and imagined catastrophes.
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