Ouch!

1. Ouch!

2. “Data drawn from the real world attest to a fact that is beyond our control:Everything in existence tends to deteriorate.”—Norberto Odebrecht, Education Through Work

3. LONG Tom Peters’ Excellence! NOW! Foley & Lardner LLP/Annual Partners Meeting Chicago/15 September 2011 (Presentation/Presentation LONG @ tompeters.com)

4. NOTE:To appreciate this presentation [and ensure that it is not a mess], you need Microsoft fonts:“Showcard Gothic,”“Ravie,”“Chiller”and“Verdana”

5. “[This year’s] graduates are told [by commencement speakers] to pursue happiness and joy. But, of course, when you read a biography of someone you admire, it’s rarely the things that made them happy that compel our admiration. It’s the things they did to court unhappiness—the things they did that were arduous and miserable, which sometimes cost them friends and aroused hatred. It’s excellence, not happiness, that we admire most.”—David Brooks, “It’s Not About You,” op-ed, New York Times, 30 May 2011

6. Why in the World did you go to Siberia?

7. Enterprise* (*at its best):An emotional, vital, innovative, joyful, creative, entrepreneurial endeavor that elicits maximum concerted human potential in the wholehearted pursuit of EXCELLENCE in service of others.****Employees, Customers, Suppliers, Communities, Owners, Temporary partners

8. #1

9. “The doctor interrupts after …* *Source: Jerome Groopman, How Doctors Think

10. 18 …

11. 18 … seconds!

12. [An obsession with] Listening is ... the ultimate mark of Respect. Listening is ... the heart and soul of Engagement. Listening is ... the heart and soul of Kindness. Listening is ... the heart and soul of Thoughtfulness. Listening is ... the basis for true Collaboration. Listening is ... the basis for true Partnership. Listening is ... a Team Sport. Listening is ... a Developable Individual Skill.* (*Though women are far better at it than men.) Listening is ... the basis forCommunity. Listening is ... the bedrock of Joint Ventures that work. Listening is ... the bedrock of Joint Ventures thatgrow. Listening is ... the core of effective Cross-functional Communication* (*Which is in turn Attribute #1 of organizational effectiveness.) [cont.]

13. “I wasn’t bowled over by [David Boies] intelligence … What impressed me was that when he asked a question, he waited for an answer. He not only listened … he made me feel like I was the only person in the room.”—Lawyer Kevin _____, on his first, inadvertent meeting with renown attorney David Boies, from Marshall Goldsmith, “The One Skill That Separates,” Fast Company

14. **8 of 10 sales presentations fail**50% failed sales presentations … talking “at” before listening!—Susan Scott, “Let Silence Do the Heavy Listening,” chapter title, Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success at Work and in Life, One Conversation at a Time

15. Message: Listening is a … profession!

16. “Execution is strategy.”

17. Conrad Hilton …

18. Conrad Hilton, at a gala celebrating his career, was called to the podium and asked,“What were the most important lessons you learned in your long and distinguished career?”His answer …

19. “remember to tuck the shower curtain inside the bathtub.”

20. “Execution isstrategy.”—Fred Malek

21. “One of my superstitions had always been when I started to go anywhere or to do anything,not to turnback,or stop, until the thing intended was accomplished.”—Grant* *Ulysses Simpson Grant (U.S. Grant) was actually HiramUlysses Grant

22. “ARE YOU BEING REASONABLE? Most people are reasonable; that’s why they only do reasonably well.”Source: Paul Arden, Whatever You Think Think the Opposite

23. The greatest dangerfor most of usis not that our aim istoo highand we miss it,but that it istoo lowand we reach it.Michelangelo

24. “You miss 100% of the shots you never take.”—WayneGretzky

25. “This is so simple it sounds stupid, but it is amazing how few oil people really understand thatyou only find oil if you drill wells.You may think you’re finding it when you’re drawing maps and studying logs, but you have to drill.” Source: The Hunters, by John Masters, wildly successful Canadian Oil & Gas wildcatter

26. starts at home

27. “Being aware of yourself and how you affect everyone around you is what distinguishes a superior leader.”—Edie Seashore (Strategy + Business #45)

28. “How can a high-level leader like _____ be so out of touch with the truth about himself? It’s more common than you would imagine. In fact, the higher up the ladder a leader climbs, the less accurate his self-assessment is likely to be. The problem is an acute lack of feedback [especially on people issues].”—Daniel Goleman (et al.), The New Leaders

29. "Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself" - Leo Tolstoy

30. Listen to your grandmother!

31. “Courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest in the grateful and appreciating heart.”—Henry Clay,American Statesman (1777-1852)

32. K = R = PKindness = Repeat business = Profit.

33. Kindness = Repeat Business = Profit.

34. “I regard apologizing as the most magical, healing, restorative gesture human beings can make. It is the centerpiece of my work with executives who want to get better.”—Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful.

35. With a new and forthcoming policy on apologies …Toro, the lawn mower folks, reduced the average cost of settling a claim from $115,000 in 1991 to $35,000 in 2008—and the company hasn’t been to trial in the last 15 years! The VA hospital in Lexington, Massachusetts, developed an approach, totally uncharacteristic in healthcare, to apologizing for errors—even when no patient request or claim was made.In 2000, the systemic mean VA hospital malpractice settlement throughout the United States was $413,000; the Lexington VA hospital settlement number was $36,000—and there were far fewer per patient claims to begin with.) Source: John Kador, Effective Apology

36. Cross-border Conversations

37. Never waste a lunch!* *The sacred 220 Abs.

38. “I am hundreds of times better here[than in my prior hospital assignment] because of the support system. It’s like you were working in an organism; you are not a single cell when you are out there practicing.’” —quote from Dr. Nina Schwenk, in Chapter 3, “Practicing Team Medicine,” from Leonard Berry & Kent Seltman, from Management Lessons From Mayo Clinic

39. Observed closely: The use of “I” or “we” during a job interview. Source: Leonard Berry & Kent Seltman, chapter 6, “Hiring for Values,” Management Lessons From Mayo Clinic

40. “Allied commands depend on mutual confidence and this confidence is gained, above all through thedevelopment offriendships.” —General D.D. Eisenhower, Armchair General* *“Perhaps his most outstanding ability [at West Point] was the ease with which he made friends and earned the trust of fellow cadets who came from widely varied backgrounds; it was a quality that would pay great dividends during his future coalition command.”

41. Loser:“He’s such a suck-up!”Winner:“He’s such a suck-down.”

42. Which customers first?

43. “You have to treat your employees like customers.”—Herb Kelleher, upon being asked his “secret to success”Source: Joe Nocera, NYT, “Parting Words of an Airline Pioneer,” on the occasion of Herb Kelleher’s retirement after 37 years at Southwest Airlines (SWA’s pilots union took out a full-page ad in USA Today thanking HK for all he had done) ; across the way in Dallas, American Airlines’ pilots were picketingAA’s Annual Meeting)

44. … no less than Cathedralsin which the full and awesome power of the Imagination and Spirit and native Entrepreneurial flairof diverse individualsis unleashed in passionate pursuit of … Excellence.

45. The Memories That Matter.

46. The Memories That Matter The people you developed who went on to stellar accomplishments inside or outside the company. The (no more than) two or three people you developed who went on to create stellar institutions of their own. The long shots (people with “a certain something”) you bet on who surprised themselves—and your peers. The people of all stripes who 2/5/10/20 years later say “You made a difference in my life,” “Your belief in me changed everything.” The sort of/character of people you hired in general. (And the bad apples you chucked out despite some stellar traits.) A handful of projects (a half dozen at most) you doggedly pursued that still make you smile and which fundamentally changed the way things are done inside or outside the company/industry. The supercharged camaraderie of a handful of Great Teams aiming to “change the world.”

47. “The ONE Question”:“In the last year [3 years, current job], name the … three people … whose growth you’ve most contributed to. Please explain where they were at the beginning of the year, where they are today, and where they are heading in the next 12 months. Please explain … in painstaking detail … your development strategy in each case. Please tell me your biggest development disappointment—looking back, could you or would you have done anything differently? Please tell me about your greatest development triumph—and disaster—in the last five years. What are the ‘three big things’ you’ve learned about helping people grow along the way?”

48. Les Wexner: From sweaters to people!

49. AndrewCarnegie’s Tombstone Inscription …Here lies a manWho knew how to enlistIn his serviceBetter men than himself.Source: Peter Drucker, The Practice of Management

50. You are What You Eat