The Contented Cow Blog

Building Workplaces That Work

Earl Kitchings died this week at the age of 82. He was a legend here in Jacksonville, as a pioneering football coach – the head coach of Florida’s first African-American state championship team – that was back in 1958, when we had white teams and black teams.

During those years, Coach Kitchings helped groom the late Hall of Fame player Bob Hayes, at Matthew Gilbert High School.  Hayes, once known as the “World’s Fastest Man”, went on to win an Olympic Gold Medal, and to play for the Dallas Cowboys. He’s the only man to win both Olympic Gold and a Super Bowl ring.

But more than any of that, Earl Kitchings was simply a jewel of a man. It will never be possible to measure the positive influence he had on the young people of his community, for more than 50 years. Though he and his wife had only one child of their own, he was a father figure to hundreds for at least two generations.

And positive influence seems to run in the family. I had the great pleasure of working with Coach Kitchings’s wife, Elaine, back in the 70’s. I was in high school, and worked part-time at the local branch of the public library. Doesn’t sound like a great job, and in fact, the work wasn’t all that great. But some of the people were.  Elaine Kitchings was one of my favorites, and we managed to stay in touch for many years. She’s one of the classiest ladies I’ve ever known.

On this Easter weekend, one of the things I’m thankful for is people like Earl and Elaine Kitchings.

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and Bill are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.

George Zimmer, founder and CEO of Men’s Wearhouse, was featured in an October 27, 2008 story in USA Today. The story, part of the paper’s “Executive Suite” series, details Zimmer’s and his company’s history, in much the same way you’d expect it to. In other words, it was PR, not news. So the reader should read it with that filter. Having said that, what I picked up on was how Zimmer talked about values, and the importance of his employees doing meaningful work.

“It became clear”, the story says, “that what Men’s Wearhouse values most are its employees. Happy employees who believe their work is appreciated and has meaning beyond their paychecks keep customers satisfied and loyal, which pleases investors, he says.”

Where have we heard that before?

Then, quoting Zimmer, “The way you get high service at more than 1,000 locations is that people actually have to be inspired themselves to do that.”

A good lesson for us all, especially in perilous economic times.

Another of the excellent speakers we heard at the National Speakers Association convention in New York last week was Bill Strickland, President and CEO of Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild and Bidwell Training Center, Inc.

Talk about someone who does meaningful work! His story is much too long to detail in this blog, and I certainly can’t do him justice. Besides, he’s been written about in Inc, Fast Company, and tons of other publications, and you can read about him there.

In a nutshell, Bill Strickland is a social innovator who runs a company to train and give substantive (not empty) hope to poor inner-city kids, welfare mothers, and others in the Manchester area of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He’s taking his highly successful model, which educates people in the visual, culinary, and other arts, and replicating it across the country now.

Here’s just a little of what Strickland said, that stuck in my mind:

• “The only difference between rich people and poor people is that poor people don’t have any money.”
• “People’s behavior is a function of how they’re treated.” (Where have we heard that before?)
• “We have fresh flowers all over the center, because these people deserve to see fresh flowers.”
• When he had his center designed in Pittsburgh, he wanted it to be flooded with light. The people who learn there have lots of darkness in their lives. Strickland knew that light would change their outlook, and their behavior. It has.
• The walls of his center are covered in valuable art. Skeptics told him the art would be trashed within a month. In the 22 years since he started the practice, there’s never been an act of vandalism at the center. Reminds me of a point made by John Houseman in the classic training film, Brain Power, by Karl Albrecht, in which Houseman reminds us, “We get what we expect to get. What are you expecting?”

We heard lots of polished, eloquent speakers at the NSA convention. Bill Strickland was not one of them. It was, instead, his message, not his delivery, that blew me away.

Thanks, Bill Strickland, for being an Extra-Miler.

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and his co-author and business partner Bill Catlette, are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.

Bill Catlette and I have been at the annual convention of the National Speakers Association this week in New York City. One of the highlights of the convention was a town hall style session with 2 titans of the travel industry, Bill Marriott, CEO of Marriott Hotels, and Dave Barger, CEO of JetBlue Airways.

Bill and I often speak from the platform about these 2 companies, as exemplary companies to work for. Hearing their respective CEO’s speak made it easy to see why we do.

Some highlights, first from Marriott:

• Marriott’s parents, the hotel chain’s founders taught him “take good care of your employees, and they’ll take good care of your customers.”
• One key to the success of Marriott Hotels is training. Training represents an enormous proportion of the company’s time, attention, and money.
• Another key is providing opportunities for advancement. By far, most Marriott managers started in entry level positions in the chain’s hotels, and were motivated by the strong connection at Marriott between performance and promotion.
• Bill Marriott spends a huge amount of time circulating among his thousands of properties to see the people who work there. “I can’t make strategic decisions unless I know what’s going on, and I can’t do that if I’m not there.”

From JetBlue’s Barger:

• Barger recently took a 50% pay cut.  (He was asked about this, he didn’t bring it up. I know the person who asked the question, and he was not a plant.) “We’re going to be flying less, so our people will be earning less. So I should, too.”
• “This is not a fuel business. It’s a people business. What keeps me up at night is not the price of fuel. It’s how we motivate our people to deliver the best product, especially in these tough times.”
• “We don’t talk about ’survival’ at JetBlue; we talk about ‘winning’.”

As much as I was impressed by what these guys said, I was even more impressed by who they appeared to be. I left the session with the feeling that I had just spent 90 minutes in the presence of a couple of guys who were not only brilliant, but really nice, ordinary (though extremely wealthy, especially Marriott) folks.

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and his co-author and business partner Bill Catlette, are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.

The death this weekend of Tony Snow, former Fox News editor and White House Press Secretary, leaves another void, as did the recent death of Tim Russert, in the ranks of honorable American journalists.

Of course, the passing of Tony Snow, a Committed conservative, and former spokesperson for a highly unpopular president, will be mourned less audibly by the mainstream media than was that of his contemporary, Russert. In fact, I’ve been watching CNN on the plane all morning, and Snow’s death has not been mentioned. There are, after all, more important things to keep us apprised of, like the birth of Angelina Jolie’s twins.

Tony Snow had the ability to communicate, report, opine, and engage with others without the mean-spiritedness that we see in so many in the political and journalistic arenas. He was clearly George W. Bush’s best press secretary, and maybe the best holder of that job we’ve seen in a long time. With his death, and that of Tim Russert, we’re left with the likes of Wolf Blitzer, Bill O’Reilly, and David Gregory, to grind their axes in an ever decreasingly civil discourse.

I admired Tony Snow’s willingness to tell his boss he was wrong. A clip aired this weekend by Fox News, where they knew Snow best, and respected him most, showed the press secretary in a lively spar with President Bush. “I’m not going to say that,” he said to the president. “That’s BS.” The two laughed, and Snow prevailed.

We could all probably benefit from those we lead telling us when we’re full of it. So, here’s an assignment: Have a one-on-one with someone on your team. Challenge them to tell you something you’re absolutely wrong about. Something you think is golden, but that they know is bunk. Make sure they know they can tell you the truth safely, and then act on what you learn.

It would be a fitting tribute to Tony Snow.

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and his co-author and business partner Bill Catlette, are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.

When I first started my consulting business in 1989, a good friend gave me a Harvard Business Review reprint of what he described at the time as a classic article on time management: “Management Time: Who’s Got the Monkey?”, by William H. Oncken and Donald L. Wass. I enjoyed the 1974 article’s entertaining style and highly useful content, and it has had an influence on me for lo these many years. Since then, this one article has become HBR’s #1 best selling article reprint ever.

When Bill Catlette and I wrote our latest book, Contented Cows Moove Faster, last year, we assserted that a leader can’t hope to inspire Discretionary Effort (Oomph!) from people until that leader has first gotten himself or herself squared away, including learning to manage the priorities that demand time and attention. To that end, we included a recommendation in the book to get the article (re-released by HBR in 1999), read it, and apply it. Since then, both Bill and I have made that recommendation countless times from the speaking platform and in the training classroom. And I suggest that if you haven’t read it – do so. You can buy it online, from harvardbusinessonline.com for $6.50. From the home page, type “Management Time” in the search block. 

Several months ago, I was booked to speak for an organization called TEC (The Executive Committee) in Dallas. Over the past 10 years, I’ve spoken for dozens of TEC groups, made up of the CEO’s and senior executives of small to medium sized (and some larger) companies. About 2 years ago, TEC changed its name to Vistage, but a few groups (in Dallas, Florida, Wisconsin and other places) have retained the TEC brand. The chair of this particular TEC group in Dallas, I was told, was a fellow named Dr. Don Wass. Dr. Wass’s office made arrangements for the engagement, and yesterday, I flew to Dallas to make today’s presentation.

While I never forgot the classic “Monkey” article, frankly, I did forget the name of the alphabetically second-listed co-author. I always referred to the article, saying “by William H. Oncken.” As the alphabetically second-listed co-author of two books, I know these things happen.

So imagine my surprise this morning when I showed up to speak for this TEC group, met Don Wass, and discovered that this gentle, thoughtful, smart TEC chair, with a PhD in psychology, was half the duo who had penned this classic piece of management literature 34 years ago.

This evening, I had dinner with Don Wass and his wife Helen. I learned that, sadly, William Oncken died several years ago. But his friend and co-author, Don Wass is very much alive and well, and he and Helen, with whom he’s traveled to all 7 continents, are enjoying their adult children, their grandchildren, and Don’s life as a TEC chair in Dallas.

Who knew?

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and his co-author and business partner Bill Catlette, are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.

Tim Russert was not only a highly respected journalist, as a Vice President at NBC News, he was a manager, and a real leader. And by all accounts, he was the kind of leader who did a remarkable job of inspiring OOMPH! from those who called him “boss”.

During all this weekend’s tributes to Russert on his and competing networks, I’ve been struck by the descriptions of the man, not the journalist. He listened to the people entrusted to his leadership. He cared about them as human beings. He recognized that they had lives outside their work, because he had a life outside his work. And he spent time finding out about what was important to his employees.

When you’re gone, or retired, or have moved on to another phase in your career, will people talk more about the quality of the work you did? Or the quality of the person who did the work?

It has been less than a half-day since his passing, and the world is already a less friendly, less authentic, less informed place. Tim Russert will be missed by all who value decency, professionalism, and candor.

Memorial Day in the United States is, technically, the day set aside to honor those who gave their lives in military service. I’m also thinking a lot today about my father, Louie Hadden, and my father-in-law, Jim Prentice, who served in World War II, and, thankfully, survived into their 80’s.

My dad was a Motor Machinist Mate on a couple of supply ships in the South Pacific. Born in 1926, he was only 15 when the US entered World War II, but a year later, he fudged his age on the application, and joined the Navy. After the war, with the help of the mechanical training he received in the Navy, he became a typewriter repairman, and later ran his own office machine company until he retired.

My wife’s father was a Sergeant Major in the Gordon Highlanders, a Scottish regiment of the British Army. He was a tank commander, and fought for more than three years on the ground in Burma, the present-day Myanmar that we’ve heard so much about in recent weeks, since the May 2 cyclone devastated much of the country.

These are just two of the millions of people worldwide, who have served freedom-loving countries in modern times. Some of these were drafted, but their service is no less heroic or appreciated. Others, like my dad and Jim, volunteered, went above and beyond what was required, because they wanted to serve.

These two – the sailor and the soldier – are rarely out of my mind. I see and hear reminders of them all around me. But today, especially, I remember them, for what they chose to do in service of their respective countries. Take a minute and remember, and be thankful for, someone you know who’s done the same.

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and his co-author and business partner Bill Catlette, are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.

Yesterday, one of our favorite organizations, Prosperity Bank of St. Augustine, Florida (also our bank, and a valued client), held its fourth annual Prosperity Bank Foundation event, designed to raise funds for the bank’s charitable foundation. It was my honor to be one of the speakers at the event 2 years ago. This year, the featured speaker was Dr. Ben Carson, a noted pediatric neurosurgeon from Johns Hopkins, and author of Think Big!

As a speaker, I’m always eager to hear others speak from the platform, but, I have to admit, I often approach these things as a reviewer, ready to evaluate style, content, and the other things I pay attention to when I’m on the platform.

For the first few minutes of Dr. Carson’s presentation, I found myself in that mode. But I was quickly transformed into simply being a listener, receiving his simple, positive, straightforward message, and being inspired by what I heard.

His style was far from theatrical. No flash. The only time he strayed from simply having a conversation with the audience of 500+ was his rather amazing description of the neuromuscular processes involved in his asking us to raise our hands, and our doing it. With this exception, he didn’t say much I didn’t already know. His message wasn’t particularly prescriptive. In other words, I didn’t leave there with pages of notes of things I could go out and do differently right away that would make a difference.

And yet I left the presentation feeling like I had spent an hour or so with a really good man of admirable character, a genius, a doer, someone who shares my values but has done a better job than I of putting those values into action.

One simple piece of advice he did encourage us to enact was to simply “Be Nice”. I heeded his advice at every opportunity yesterday, and so far today. And I gotta tell you, I’ve felt better because of it.

It took a brain surgeon to remind me of that which I already knew but wasn’t practicing enough. The next time I listen to a speaker, I’m going to focus more on how I can benefit from that speaker’s message, and less on how “good” his or her performance is.

I’m really glad I heard Ben Carson, and I appreciate Prosperity Bank for giving me the opportunity.

Richard Hadden is a leadership speaker, author, and consultant who helps organizations improve their business results by creating a great place to work. He and his co-author and business partner Bill Catlette, are the authors of the new book Contented Cows MOOve Faster, as well as the acclaimed business classic Contented Cows Give Better Milk. Learn more about them and their work at ContentedCows.com.