Month: February 2012

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4 Ways to Be Happier – A Scientific Approach

I talk a lot about ways to keep your business from experiencing crises, how to manage your business during a crisis, and stories of those who went through crises and how we got them out the other side. But today I want to touch briefly on a topic that I’ll revisit from time to time because it’s very important as well: happiness.

Running a company or being a manager or whatever leadership capacity you inhabit that makes you read this blog (and I say thanks to all you readers and those who have subscribed recently) can be stressful. And a central topic of this blog is crisis, which is also particularly stressful for most people – that’s why I wrote my list of 5 Foolish Faux Pas of CEOs in Crisis (that result mostly due to stress they don’t know how to manage).

With all this potential stress, it’s important that you are happy. Sure, you can’t walk around with a smile on your face all day long, but you can be a happy – or happier – person and business leader. If you’re not, you should rethink your day job.

What I want to share with you was inspired by a quick blurb in a magazine I was recently reading. It’s 4 ways that studies and research show are scientifically proven to boost your happiness. Without further ado, here they are:

1. Do Good Deeds. We’ve talked about this a lot before – how you can use your time and work and energy to help others. If you want a refresher, check out my 7-Part Series, Giving Back During Tough Economic Times. Helping others, as long as it doesn’t become a repetitive activity, makes us feel happier.

2. Get Exercise. It’s been repeatedly shown that exercise doesn’t have to be intense or sustained to be effective. Just 30 minutes of walking a day is literally the single best thing you can do for your health. No joke! How can you do that in the office? Take your meetings while walking around the office or outside the office for some fresh air or vitamin D. You can also do your phone calls this way. Trust me, a little walk always clears the head, releases endorphins (if you get your heart rate up) and makes you happier.

3. Get Hugged. I don’t mean to be encouraging inappropriate office conduct, but people who get hugs are happier. We need basic human contact. Make sure you’re hugging your spouse or parents or whomever can provide you with this bit of happiness.

4. Get a Pet. This one isn’t for me, because I have allergies, but I love stopping by my kids’ place and seeing their pets. Pets are proven to lower stress and make us feel better.

All four of these ideas are great ways to increase your happiness and destress as you run a business – especially a business in crisis. Make sure that you’re doing the things that let you care for yourself and be happy. That happiness and self care will go a long way in its positive effects on your business and corporate culture.

If you haven’t subscribed yet to my blog, please note that it’s free to do so, and updates of my latest posts will come right to your inbox. Just subscribe by entering your email in the box at the top of the right hand column.

As usual, I welcome comments and questions below! I’d love to know which of the methods above helps you increase your happiness.

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How Not to Hire a Guy Like Me

I promised you after my speeches in Florida that I’d provide you with an audio file so that you could benefit from the advice and war stories just as the audience could. Well, here it is!

The speech is, “How Not to Hire a Guy Like Me,” and this one is from my talk with the CEO Council of Tampa Bay. I want to thank them for graciously allowing me to use this recording.

Click Here to Listen to “How Not to Hire a Guy Like Me”

Do you have any questions or comments? Please share below!

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Your Employees Always Know

Have you ever thought to yourself, my employees have no idea what I make, or they have no idea what our profit is on this or something similar? Well let me tell you something: you’re wrong.

There are no secrets in a company. Your employees know.

I once took over at a refrigerator warehouse company and began my job by dramatically slashing the owner’s salary, which was not simply too high for the owner of a failing company in need of a turnaround professional but too high for the owner of any company this size. Oh, and I also fired his grandmother whose salary was also a pretty penny too high.

Later that same afternoon I was surveying the warehouse which was a mile away from the offices and headquarters, and a forklift driver pulls up alongside me. He says, congratulations on firing grandma and reducing the boss’s salary – he should never have been making so much money.

Not only did this random employee already know that I’d done both of these things, but he knew that grandma was on the payroll and the boss was making way too much beforehand.

I’m telling you – your employees always know. There are no secrets.

That leads me to a few pieces of advice:

1. Ensure that all of your employees sign a non-compete/non-disclosure confidentiality agreement. All of them, no matter their position.

2. If you have things that truly must be kept secret, think longer and harder about who has access to that information, what computer(s) it resides on, etc. Despite the fact that everyone is working on or around it, I’m sure that the secret formula for Coca Cola is still secret.

3. Accept that certain information will be public, and use the knowledge of its publicity to your advantage.

What have you been surprised to learn that your employees know?

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The Other Time I Got Shot At

A while ago I was the CRO of Gulf State Steel in Gadston, Alabama.

We were in a board meeting debating the effects of imported Asian steel on our cost structure – the effects were bad – and we decided that in order to remain competitive we needed to reduce our 2500 person workforce by at least 20% while also reducing certain employee benefits.

The day before we’d discussed this with the union representative, and though nothing was official, the news was out.

BAM!! BAM!! BAM!! BAM!! BAM!!

All of a sudden 4 shotgun blasts hit the windows. I hit the floor.

The other directors and board members started laughing at me.

Apparently, they’d installed bulletproof windows in the board room twenty years ago, because shotgun blasts from the union were not an uncommon event.

Now, why did we get shot at?

You may say, because the union was comprised of disgruntled psychos. I wouldn’t fight you on that conclusion, but if this had been happening for twenty years, then obviously there was something else wrong here.

This steel company was in a crunch. It had a huge cash crisis, and it was knee-jerking. There were no more options to contain costs at this stage than a 20% reduction in the work force.

If the CEO had been proactive in keeping costs down 6-12 months prior, though, these kinds of cost reduction processes could have been adjusted more gradually and reasonably – and in ways that didn’t affect the union so dramatically. Asian steel didn’t just show up right before I got there. This was ongoing activity in his market-place and competitive space.

There were options before the crisis, but no one calls me before a crisis. They call me after, and at that point, it’s my job to save a company – not make a series of strategic moves to oust a stronger competitor.

Be proactive. If you have cost problem, an earlier enacted austerity program could keep you from getting shot at. Avoid knee-jerking, and solve your crises before they happen.

And I don’t care if the glass is bulletproof. When I hear unexpected shotgun blasts, I hit the deck.

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The First Time I Got Shot At

A few years ago I got a call at 2 a.m. and was told by my plant manager in Greensborough that there was a dangerous oil spill at our plant. Hoping to avoid a major catastrophe with the EPA, I jumped into my car and drove to Greensborough. I made it there in record time, hoping to contain the spill by 6 a.m.

As we got ready to enter the plant, two hundred rounds were fired at us from two different uzis.

After speaking with the police later, a member of the railroad crew that our company used came over, pulled his shades down to his nose and looked me in the eyes and said, “If my fellow union railroad members had meant to hurt you, you would be hurt. So, get back in your fancy car and get your ass back to Atlanta.”

So, why did I get shot at – but not killed? Let’s see if you can learn a lesson from my situation and avoid your own problems in the future.

This happened because the CEO of the oil company that I was turning around wasn’t watching its demurrage charges from the railroad. They got their oil off-loaded from the cars but the railroad workers who were supposed to move the cars weren’t moving them, and the charges kept adding up. The oil company had financial controls in place to be notified if certain expenses were growing at an unreasonable rate – and that’s great – but when they got the notices they ignored them for 18 months.

When I go there I started asking questions about hundreds of thousands of dollars of fees; the railroad investigated and found that the three employees who were supposed to be moving these cars out after we emptied them were actually goofing off, playing tennis, fishing and so forth. One was fired and two were suspended.

They retaliated against the oil company by breaking an external oil valve and releasing thousands of gallons of oil, which was heading towards a nearby stream – hello, EPA! – and that brought me there in the middle of the night.

And then the shooting began.

The lesson learned goes back to being proactive and having proper financial controls, but what good are financial controls if you ignore them. Put your policies in place and follow them.

Have you ever experienced extreme employee retaliation?

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Crazy Is As Crazy Does So Keep It Wrapped Up

Turnaround is a very high stress game. I don’t mean for me – it’s my job to stay calm, cool and level-headed and avoid letting the CEO do anything rash while he’s worried about losing his business and life.

But the CEO isn’t the only person at a company stressed out by a turnaround and with the ability to do something stupid. Every employee has the potential to set off and do something idiotic, embarrassing and detrimental to a company’s successful emergence from a crisis.

That’s why, as the CEO, president or leader, you have got to maintain your composure. Do not blow off steam publicly, do not be seen to publicly rant and rave and do not be an idiot in the light of day. Employees will follow your example. If you need to blow off steam go to the gym, get a punching bag, go to the driving range or the shooting range or join an underground fight club. Just keep it under wraps.

In times of no crisis, if employees see you taking cash from the register or inventory from the warehouse, they’ll think it’s okay to do the same. You’re the leader.

In times of crisis, when they see you lose your head and freak out, they will follow suit. At the very least, they’ll become disillusioned and less productive, which is the last thing that a company needs in crisis. While going through a crisis, a company needs to operate at the highest level, churning out the best widget at the fastest rate (pending the crisis isn’t in production) and doing its best to stay ahead.

And you don’t have to be a CEO to be a leader. If you’re a manager or just a regular employee, you can set an example as well. Though it’s hard to make your calm contagious the same way your panic might be, just maintaining your stability and work ethic will show others that this is the right course of action.

I’ve talked about crazy Charlie before, who tried to stab his mother in one of the more hostile corporate takeovers I’ve been involved with, and as a result of his crazy actions, the deal to sell the company fell through.

Crazy people doing crazy things – especially in crisis – is ruinous. Keep your head, lead by example and deal with problems immediately. You don’t need mutiny on a sinking ship if you’re hoping to stay afloat.

What’s the craziest thing you’ve seen an employee do?

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Sometimes Winning Isn’t as Important as This One Other Thing

I like winning. And learning that winning is not always the best outcome in a negotiation is one of the hardest lessons I’ve had to learn in my 30 years in business.

My father used to tell me that being successful in making deals is strongly tied to the ability to leave something on the table for your counterpart – even if you are in a position of power.

“But isn’t it always better to pay less for the same items or to make more money on a particular deal?” – you may ask. Not always, because the “buy low, sell high” principle fails to account for a crucial element in business: relationships.

Back in the day I used to be a very tough negotiator, and I wasn’t even aware of it. I was simply unwilling to settle for a deal that I thought could be more advantageous for me or my side. And I got the best deals. But what happens after you close a deal?

Life goes on and other negotiations and business opportunities come around. And, somewhat inevitably, some of these opportunities arise with folks who know you or have heard about you. Following what I considered to be successful deals at the beginning of my career, I was confronted with the ramifications of the experiences of those with whom I had previously negotiated.

That is when I began to truly understand the meaning of win-win solutions in business environments: the benefits of leaving something on the table so people enjoy working with me and feel like they’ve won, too.

Because of my reputation as a fair negotiator for the past few decades, business partners often seek me out even if the deal with me is slightly less financially advantageous for them. Most negotiation counterparts also come to me with fair deals to start (as opposed to starting at extreme positions) which cuts down the negotiation time and leads to more efficient business deals. Saving time and minimizing stress in business situations is often overlooked when evaluating the process of getting to a solution in a case.

Due to the many good relationships I developed in my industry and other fields, business partners trust me. And trust is one of the most valuable assets you can have in business.

Is my “always leave something on the table” advice applicable to all cases and situations? Of course not. You must know when to focus on a mutually advantageous outcome, and when getting the absolute best price or deal is the only objective. But don’t forget, you may not be seeing the last of the person on the other side of the table.

Do you believe in win-win solutions in business? Do you find them challenging to achieve? Share your story in the comments below.