Monthly Archives: August 2007

I heard a priest speak in church today, standing in the aisle without notes, alternatively citing Thomas Aquinas, a court case of ten years ago, Einstein’s writings on the curvature of the universe, and the reasons to suspect that God just might exist. It was eight minutes of fascinating points underscored by examples, and several people remarked within my hearing that it was an excellent homily. (By the way, those are the elements of the perfect keynote speech, as well, a theme supported by several key points which are brought to life through examples and stories.)

The difficulty with so many consultants, large firm foot soldier to partner, as well as solo practioners and boutique firm principals, is that they are not very well rounded. They can talk about models and matrices, but they might mistake Erasmus for a neighborhood in New York and they believe that War Admiral is a naval rank.

Lawyers hold my personal record for being the narrowest of all professionals, though I readily grant the exceptions which prove my rule. Outside of the world of torts and Lexus-Nexus (or whatever that is) they aren’t able to glibly discuss many things, partly because their educational preparation is about as wide as the change slot in a candy machine, and partly because the rigors of the profession demand that they immerse themselves in little else. I guess I want such a lawyer defending me, but probably not befriending me.

Consultants need to avoid this diminished world view. If you agree with me for two seconds that this is a relationship business, then you had better be able to forge and nurture those relationships through the ability to discuss a variety of topics that are interesting to the other person!

It’s ironic that a globalized world with infinite stimulii drives many people to learn more and more about less and less. It’s nice to meet someone, I suppose, who knows all there is to know about team dynamics or the air routes to the islands. But unless they understand how teams relate to the general environment, or what my personal vacation objectives and disposition are, I don’t want them managing my people or my leisure time.

I remember an insurance professional who told me that the insurance he had in mind for me was a bargain at $35,000 per year in premiums. “Only an insurance guy could say that with a straight face,” I said. “Do you think I don’t mean it?” he protested. “No, you mean it,” I said, “but you’re not talking to an insurance guy. You’re talking to someone who wants to protect his family but who has a multiplicity of goals and interests. I don’t want to buy insurance, about which you’re an expert, but rather to balance my future prudently, about which you know nothing.”

He didn’t get the sale, and neither will you if you don’t take broader views of your client’s condition.

© Alan Weiss 2007. All rights reserved.

Today’s Wall Street Journal excerpted a piece from Time Magazine that’s frightening: “How High-IQ Kids Are Neglected in School” details how U.S. schools spend $8 billion annually on educating mentally retarded students, but only about $800 million on high-achieving students.

We spend one-tenth as much on our all-stars as we do on our poorest performers. What athletic team would do well in competition with that kind of training regimen?

The problem is that organizational America does exactly the same. Training programs are overwhelmingly aimed at remedial skills and most management attention is focused on the poor performers. Bizarre, egalitarian notions of everyone in the workplace being “equal” have tended to obscure rewards for truly outstanding performance. Just as some schools, in the face of political correctness and shrill “multiculturalism,” have abandoned the recognition and esteem historically bestowed on valedictorians and those qualifying for honor societies, business has fallen victim to “team rewards” and “giving everyone a chance.”

(See my current video in my Writing on the Wall series, “Press One for English, Press Two for Common Sense,” for an example of Pitney Bowes sending out a recorded voice mail to its customers from someone with English skills so heavily accented that she was not comprehensible. [http://www.summitconsulting.com])

“The best and the brightest” has become stigma, rather than stellar. There are performers who stand out in a company, and there are employees who lead the way. They deserve not only recognition, but further investment in their skills and potential. By investing in the top five percent of performers to improve their results by a few percentage points, organizations are making a better investment than attempting to bring the poorer performers to “average” or the average performers to slightly above average.

Of course, the pursuits are not mutually-exclusive nor should they be. Yet the 10:1 ratio in the schools is probably just as bad or even worse in business. Rewarding the top sales personnel with a trip to the Caymans is not the same as also investing in their further development. I asked one executive years ago if he would consider sending one of this top business unit leaders to the highly-regarded Harvard or INSEAD leadership programs. “Why should I?” he asked me, “he’s already at the top of his game.”

Consultants should beware not to fall victim to this remedial tropism. It should not require an epiphanic moment for an organization to invest in its most valuable resources. We have to help them understand the ROI.

We have apparently lost our way, and no longer recognize brilliance, achievement, and merit for fear of offending someone, somewhere, at some time. So long as we provide the opportunities to achieve for everyone, we’ve done our job. But if we continue to refuse to appropriately invest in the best then we will reap the whirlwind: Vast landscapes of mediocrity where no one is motivated to take risk or stand out.

We are dulling our competitive edge.

“Let it be understood that we cannot go outside of this alternative: liberty, inequality, survival of the fittest; not liberty, equality, survival of the unfittest. The former carries society forward and favors all its best members; the latter carries society downwards and favors all its worst members.”

— William Graham Sumner
“The Challenge of Facts and Other Essays”

© Alan Weiss 2007. All rights reserved.

I was staying at a Marriott where a client had placed me, in the middle of the country somewhere. The club floor was quite nice, and I was having some hors d’oeuvres and a drink when a fellow walked in obviously straight from the health club.

He was about 40, had on shorts and a tee-shirt, had a towel draped around his neck, and he was obviously very much into body building. Aside from the inappropriateness of this half-dressed, sweaty guy amidst the tempura shrimp and Caesar salad, he was hard not too look at. Huge, well-defined muscles rippled. He grabbed a couple of bottles of water and left, clearly very pleased with himself by his perspiring entrance and exit. He swaggered more than walked.

The next morning, at breakfast in the club, he was already there when I arrived. He had on a business suit, but you could still see the evidence of intense body work. His arms didn’t touch his sides, but hung next to him in slight arcs like a gunfighter in a shootout, and he walked with a peculiar gait. He didn’t so much move his head to look right and left as move his entire upper torso.

Then, at this Marriott, somewhere not far from the Mississippi, occurred one of my epiphanies. The guy was loading cereal into his bowl when he dropped the spoon. And, guess what? He couldn’t pick it up. He made a half-hearted attempt, as though knowing what the inevitable outcome would be, and then nudged the spoon with his foot under a table. He could not sufficiently bend or stoop. He had no flexibility.

He was muscle-bound. He was so “strong” that he couldn’t lift a spoon.

The strength we all need is the ability to forge success in our lives, work, and relationships. An excess in any one part of our lives is almost always going to be dysfunctional, in that it will limit other, important parts of our lives. It’s a shame so many colleges have abandoned liberal arts educations, because what we need is a liberal arts approach to our lives.

We need to be very good at a lot of things, not superb at one thing and mediocre at everything else. Of course, if you want to play first violin at the symphony, you had better be superb at it, but not at the cost of relationships and a holistic life. (Read the biographies of people who were superb in one, narrow field, such as Vince Lombardi in football, and you find lousy parents, insensitive mates, boring peers, and people who are never personally satisfied.)

Being “strong” means being able to do what’s necessary for success, not having the most muscles or the most profound profile. You have to be able to eat your own cereal.

© Alan Weiss 2007. All rights reserved.