Tom Peters’ Key Arguments from … The Excellence Dividend :

1. Tom Peters’ Key Arguments from … The Excellence Dividend: Meeting the Tech Tide With Work That Wows and Jobs That Last 04 May 2018

3. Any/All Organizations People Serving People Leaders: People serving the People Who Serve the People

4. Given/Axiomatic …THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR NOT MAKING ANY ORGANIZATION OF ANY SIZE IN ANY BUSINESS A GREATPLACETOWORKEVERY LEADER HAS A MORAL OBLIGATION CIRCA 2018 TO DEVELOP PEOPLE SO THAT WHEN THEY LEAVE THEY ARE BETTER PREPARED FOR TOMORROW THAN THEY WERE WHEN THEY ARRIVED.

5. Note: WHILE I'VE BEEN ON THE EXCELLENCE DIVIDEND BOOK TOUR--MOSTLY PODCASTS--I'VE BEEN ASKED OVER AND OVER TO EXPLAIN MY “OBSESSION” WITH THE "PEOPLE STUFF." I USUALLY ANSWER, SNIPPILY, "WELL WHAT THE HELL ELSE IS THERE? ORGANIZATIONS, NO MATTER HOW MUCH TECHNOLOGY THEY USE, ARE NO MORE AND NO LESS THAN 'PEOPLE SERVING PEOPLE.’ AND AS A LEADER, YOUR JOB IS: SERVE THE PEOPLE WHO SERVE THE PEOPLE. (ONE LAST THING: THE PEOPLE WE SERVE ARE OUR EMLOYEES AND OUR CUSTOMERS AND OUR COMMUNITIES.)

6. “BUSINESS HAS TO GIVE PEOPLE ENRICHING, REWARDING LIVES … OR IT’S SIMPLY NOT WORTH DOING.” —Richard Branson (1/4,096) “[Business has the]responsibility to increase the sum of human well-being.”—Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Good Business

7. Read. (Please.)Reflect. (Please.)I pulled everything together into a 17-chapter, 4,096-slide PP a couple of years ago. Something had to be Slide #1 (of 4,096!). The Branson quote took pride of place. As I said, read and re-read (re-re-re-read “or-it’s-simply-not-worth-doing”) & reflect. (PLEASE.)Re the Csikszentmihalyi quote (he’s the father of “flow”), business is NOT “part of the community.” Business IS the community—i.e., where most adults spend most of their waking hours. Hence, the overall responsibility of business is … staggering.

8. “It may sound radical, unconventional, and bordering on being a crazy business idea. However— as ridiculous as it sounds—joy is the core belief of our workplace. Joy is the reason my company, Menlo Innovations, a customer software design and development firm in Ann Arbor, exists. It defines what we do and how we do it. It is the single shared belief of our entire team.” —Richard Sheridan, Joy, Inc.: How We Built a Workplace People Love

9. Only one thought: WHYNOT??(Buy and read and digest the book—and don’t dismiss the idea out of hand. PLEASE.)

10. Managing/Leading The Pinnacle of Human Achievement

11. MANAGING: AS A PAIN IN THE ASS. Somebody’s got to do it; punching bag for higher ups on one end, grouchy employees on the other; blame magnet if things go wrong, big bosses abscond with the credit if things go right. MANAGING: AS THE PINNACLE OF HUMAN ACHIEVEMENT. The greatest life opportunity one can have (literally). Mid- to long-term success is no more and no less than a function of one’s dedication to and effectiveness at helping team members grow and flourish as individuals and as contributing members to an energetic, self-renewing organization dedicated to the relentless pursuit of EXCELLENCE.

12. It’s simple, really. An “ordinary” manager (not a big company CEO) can profoundly re-direct more lives than the best of neurosurgeons. A manager—every day—has the opportunity to dramatically (no hyperbole) affect the life trajectory of every employee on her or his team or in her or his department.(And over a career this could add up to re-shaping the lives of hundreds [or more, even many more] of co-workers.)

13. “The role of the Director is to create a space where the actors and actresses canbecome more than they’ve ever been before, more than they’ve dreamed of being.” —Robert Altman, Oscar acceptance speech

14. This is beautiful language. WHY NOT EVERY* LEADER’S AGENDA ITEM No. 1???*Every = Every. Big firm or small. In fact, this applies to the leader of a disbursed project team that will be around for only, say, 4 to 6 months.(Please read this carefully:.“more than they have ever been before, more than they have dreamed of being.”) (Up for it???)

15. 36 Years/6 Words Hard is soft. Soft is hard.

16. Hard (numbers/plans) is Soft. Soft (relationships/culture) is Hard.

17. I’ve often said—and I mean it—that the last several decades of my professional life can be summarized in six words: HARD IS SOFT. SOFT IS HARD. That is the so-called “hard stuff” (e.g., the numbers, the plans, the org charts) are actually soft—easy to manipulate. The traditionally labeled “soft stuff” (e.g., people, relationships, culture) are the true “hard” stuff—the basis for lasting effectiveness. “Selling” this idea has so far taken 17 books and 3,000 speeches in 63 countries. Progress may have been made—but implementation is still spotty. Hence, I keep on keepin’ on …

18. “Far too many companies invest too little time and money in their soft-edge excellence. … The three main reasons for this mistake are: “1. The hard edge is easier to quantify. … 2. Successful hard-edge investment provides a faster return on investment. … 3. CEOs, CFO, chief operating officers, boards of directors, and shareholders speak the language of finance. …” Source: The Soft Edge, Rich Karlgaard

19. Soft-Edge Advantages 1. Soft-edge strength leads to greater brand recognition, higher profit margins, … [It] is the ticket out of Commodityville. “2. Companies strong in the soft edge are better prepared to survive a big strategic mistake or cataclysmic disruption … “3. Hard-edge strength is absolutely necessary to compete, but it provides only a fleeting advantage.” Source: The Soft Edge, Rich Karlgaard

20. Forbes publisher Rich Karlgaard’s book, The Soft Edge: Where Great Companies find Lasting Success, is a gem through and through. (Which is to say, I agree with pretty much every word.)(And what I doubly like is that Rich is a primo player in Silicon Valley—hence his long paean to “soft” is particularly surprising, and hence credible and powerful.)

21. Hard is soft. Soft is hard. Google’s Shocker++ (STEM comes in Last/ “B” Players Best “A” Players)

22. GOOGLE GETS A SURPRISE I“Project Aristotle [2017] further supports the importance of soft skills even in high-tech environments. Project Aristotle analyzes data on inventive and productive teams. Google takes pride in its A-teams, assembled with top scientists, each with the most specialized knowledge and able to throw down one cutting-edge idea after another. Its data analysis revealed, however, that the company’s most important and productive ideas come from B-teams comprised of employees that don’t always have to be the smartest people in the room. Project Aristotle shows that the best teams at Google exhibit a range of soft skills: equality, generosity, curiosity toward the ideas of your teammates, empathy and emotional intelligence. And topping the list: emotional safety. No bullying. …”(“[Tech] billionaire venture capitalist and ‘Shark Tank’ TV personality Mark Cuban looks for philosophy majors when he’s investing in sharks most likely to succeed.”)Source: Valerie Strauss, “The surprising thing Google learned about its employees—and what it means for today’s students” (Washington Post, 20 December 2017)

23. “Among the eight most important qualities of Google’s top employees, STEM[Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics]expertise comes in dead last. The seven top characteristics of success at Google are all soft skills …”I was literally staggered. Of course it is a message I have preached for decades (hard is …). But to see the extraordinary confirmation in the most unlikely of places was, yes … STAGGERING.

24. GOOGLE GETS A SURPRISE II“Project Oxygen [data from founding in 1998 to 2013] shocked everyone by concluding that, among the eight most important qualities of Google’s top employees, STEM[Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics]expertise comes in dead last. The seven top characteristics of success at Google are all soft skills: being a good coach; communicating and listening well; possessing insights into others (including others’ different values and points of view); having empathy toward and being supportive of one’s colleagues; being a good critical thinker and problem solver; and being able to make connections across complex ideas. Those traits sound more like what one gets as an English or theater major than as a programmer. …Source: Valerie Strauss, “The surprising thing Google learned about its employees—and what it means for today’s students” (Washington Post, 20 December 2017)

25. Ditto.Or perhaps even more extraordinary.Bless those “B” players who do all sorts of weird things such as … listen to one another.

26. AT GRADUATION: Business and professional degree holders in general (MBAs, engineers, lawyers, etc.) have higher interview and hire rates, and higher starting salaries, than new liberal arts grads. YEAR 20: Liberal arts grads have risen farther than their biz-professional degree holder peers. At one giant tech firm, 43 percent of liberal arts grads had made it to upper-middle management compared to 32 percent of engineering grads. At one giant financial services firm, 60 percent of the worst managers, according to company evaluations, had MBAs, while 60 percent of the best had only BAs. Source: Henry Mintzberg, Managers Not MBAs: A Hard Look at the Soft Practice of Managing and Management Development,

27. More/consistent with the Google findings. By year 20 following graduation …liberal arts grads have risen farther than their biz-professional degree holder peers.(The study from which this conclusion emerged is reported by Henry Mintzberg [there is no one in my arena whose work I more admire] in his book, Managers Not MBAs: A Hard Look at the Soft Practice of Managing and Management Development.)

28. “Psychology Beats Business Training When It Comes to Entrepreneurship”World Bank+, randomized controlled trial of 1,500 small enterprises on Togo over a 2.5 year period: control group vs. group given “conventional business training” in finance, marketing, etc. vs. group given psychology course on the likes of attributes required to succeed such as tenacity, dealing with feedback, dealing with setbacks, etc. Control group and “conventional business training” group no difference; psychology-trained group had 30% higher profit and 17% higher sales than the other twoSource: The Economist, 21 Sept 2017 (based on a report in Science magazine)

29. Hard is soft. Soft is hard. Culture First

30. “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” —Ed Schein/1986

31. WSJ/0910.13: “What matters most to a company over time? Strategy or culture? Dominic Barton, Managing Director, McKinsey & Co.:“Culture.”

32. Soon after the research for In Search of Excellence began, total war broke out between me and McKinsey. That, of course, is nonsense. But it is a fact that the McKinsey mantra at the time was “strategy first, second, third …” And what my research was telling me was that the “soft stuff”—people, culture, and the like—were the Pillars of Excellence. Well, times do change. To my selfish satisfaction, the Managing Director of McKinsey appears to be on board, per this 2013 quote. In fact “soft-stuff”- related work now constitutes a very significant share of McKinsey’s business.

33. “If I could have chosen not to tackle the IBM culture head-on, I probably wouldn’t have. My bias coming in was toward strategy, analysis and measurement. In comparison, changing the attitude and behaviors of hundreds of thousands of people is very, very hard.Yet I came to see in my time at IBM that culture isn’t just one aspect of the game—IT IS THE GAME.” —Lou Gerstner, Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance

34. Lou Gerstner was the captain of the good ship Strategy First in his McKinsey days and beyond. To his own apparent surprise, a different story emerged as he crafted his storied turnaround of IBM in the 1990s.“It is the Game.”Indeed it is!

35. CULTURE/CEO JOB #1/THE RULES: CULTURE COMES FIRST. CULTURE IS EXCEEDINGLY DIFFICULT TO CHANGE. CULURE CHANGE CANNOT BE/MUST NOT BE EVADED OR AVOIDED. CULTURE MAINTENANCE IS ABOUT AS DIFFICULT AS CULTURE CHANGE. CULTURE MAINTENANCE: ONE DAY/ONE HOUR/ ONE MINUTE AT A TIME. CULTURE CHANGE/MAINTENANCE MUST BECOME A CONSCIOUS/PERMANENT/PERSONAL AGENDA ITEM. CULTURE CHANGE = AN “OUTSIDE-THE OFFICE JOB” = MBWA (BIG TIME!) CULTURE CHANGE/MAINTENANCE IS MANIFEST IN “THE LITTLE THINGS” FAR MORE THAN IN THE BIG THINGS. REPEAT/CULTURE CHANGE/MAINTENANCE: ONE DAY/ONE HOUR/ONE MINUTE AT A TIME. FOREVER. AND EVER. AMEN.

36. Hard is soft. Soft is hard. Slow Down

37. Speed. NOT RELATIONSHIPS take time. RECRUITING ALLIES to your cause takes time. READING/STUDYING takes time. (REALLY) LISTENING takes time. PRACTICE & PREP takes time. MBWA takes time. SLACK in your schedule takes time. THOUGHTFULNESS/ SMALL GESTURES take time. “THE LAST 10%” takes time. EXCELLENCE takes time.

38. This is effectively derived from the “hard is soft/sot is hard” analysis above. “Everyone” says about the same thing in 2018: FASTER. FASTER. FASTER. …And I say that’s a load of crap!Hard is soft. Soft is hard. All the items that fall under the gamewinning heading of “soft is hard” take (LOTS OF) time.

39. X5

40. EXCELLENCE is not a “long-term” "aspiration.” EXCELLENCE is the ultimate short-term strategy. EXCELLENCE is … THE NEXT5MINUTES.* (*Or NOT.)

41. EXCELLENCE is not an "aspiration." EXCELLENCE is … THE NEXT FIVE MINUTES. EXCELLENCE is your next conversation. Or not. EXCELLENCE is your next meeting. Or not. EXCELLENCE is shutting up and listening—really listening. Or not. EXCELLENCE is your next customer contact. Or not. EXCELLENCE is saying “Thank you” for something “small.” Or not. EXCELLENCE is the next time you shoulder responsibility and apologize. Or not. EXCELLENCE is waaay over-reacting to a screw-up. Or not. EXCELLENCE is the flowers you brought to work today. Or not. EXCELLENCE is lending a hand to an “outsider” who’s fallen behind schedule. Or not. EXCELLENCE is bothering to learn the way folks in finance (or IS or HR) think. Or not. EXCELLENCE is waaay “over”-preparing for a 3-minute presentation. Or not. EXCELLENCE is turning “insignificant” tasks into models of … EXCELLENCE. Or not.

42. My book was almost titled: Excellence Is the Next Five Minutes. We wanted the title to be more timely, so chose The Excellence Dividend. Fact is, I would have been delighted with “next five minutes.” I’m not a Zen practitioner or the like, but I do passionately believe “it” (success/ excellence) is what you do (or fail to do) … RIGHT NOW.In the book I quote Linda Kaplan Thaler, who built from the ground up a huge ad agency—and has been inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame. She explains her success: “We never concentrated one minute on the future. We always focused on what can we do today. I always tell people don't spend one second thinking about a vision, forget about it. Don't dream your way to success. … We never thought about becoming too big or hugely successful, we just did the best we could every day.”As I said: EXCELLENCE = RIGHT NOW.(Or not.)

43. Excellence (or not): WHO YOU ARE/WHAT YOU CARE ABOUT IS FULLY REVEALED IN YOUR NEXT 5-LINE EMAIL!

44. Truth!Let me read that email. I contend that your entire personality and approach to life and leadership will be revealed in those five lines. Excellence?????? It’s either imbedded in those five lines.Or it’s not.