Business Is a Team Sport: Everybody Is Worthy of Being Respected
This book was written with one objective in mind: to impart observations and lessons I’ve learned over the years, and the logic behind decisions I reached, to help create awareness for all of the dimensions that I believe could, over time, give you a competitive advantage so as to help you advance your career.
To adhere to my objective and singular purpose, I have offered a blunt and pragmatic picture of the state of the business world as I see it. I suggested that mediocrity reigns; the 80-20 Rule always applies; and pedestrian thinkers, incompetence, superficial thinking, and much more afflict business and are widespread.
I stand by all I have said, but please understand the context. My perspective is a pure, logical assessment of the talents and capabilities you will find out there, completely devoid of any other considerations. I said nothing about the quality of the people as individuals and as team players. I said nothing about their contributions in many other aspects to the quality of what is accomplished out there, day in and day out. I said nothing about the interpersonal dynamics that are part of it all, and the important role they play. I said nothing about it, because it wasn’t as relevant in the context of this book’s objective. However, I do not wish to overlook a very important observation: Although mediocrity is widespread, it is a relative term, and much competence does exist in the workplace. Also, the human aspects, although not addressed in this book, are important. This should always stay front and center in your mind.
The way I have thought this through is analogous to that of a coach of a sports team. The coach’s job is to logically assess, in an unbiased way, all the strengths and weaknesses of the team as well as of the opponent. When the coach prepares a game plan, they will certainly focus on the weaknesses of the other team and how to take advantage of those weaknesses in order to win the game. It is a singularly, logically driven perspective. That doesn’t mean the opponent is lacking in skill or that the skills they possess are unimportant. They are just not the purpose of the immediate conversation.
By way of example, take a basketball team. The coach may call out a player on the opposing team who is physically short and how that may be taken advantage of. However, that player may be a consummate leader, one who binds his team together. He may motivate the team and raise its performance. Yet, the coach will not mention a single thing about the player’s positive aspects in the game plan, but rather just focus on the player’s weaknesses. The focus may appear to be one-sided and negative. It doesn’t mean that the coach doesn’t have a great deal of respect for this player. So please consider all I have said in this book from the perspective of having a game-plan discussion before a game.
I said earlier never to look down at anybody. Everybody has something to offer. Respect and listen carefully to everybody. Most importantly, keep in mind that the short basketball player in our example may bring some weaknesses and will definitely need some tall teammates to win games. But it takes a team to win. No single individual can win the game. A single individual who doesn’t know how to leverage the team will not consistently win games, regardless of their talent—not even Michael Jordan, one of the greatest basketball players ever to play the game.
Remember: The business world is a team effort. No single individual is indispensable, and no single individual can do well without a team. You must know how to be an effective team player and how to leverage the team. It starts with respect for them. It starts by recognizing that you are one of them. It starts by believing that you are equal to them, not better. Perhaps your role may be more important or less important, but that doesn’t make you better and definitely not more important than the team as a whole.
There is one other point that is worth mentioning in this context. It is not a requirement that the coach has to be a former all-star player; in fact, he could have been a mediocre player. How he played may not necessarily correlate to how well he can teach, or coach. There is a difference between the power to observe and guide versus the power to execute.
There are many out there in the business world who will fall into this category. They may not be able to effectively execute, but they can have a great power of observation and a great ability to guide. They can be very helpful in many different ways. This particularly may apply to your boss.
Your boss may not be able to execute as well as you can, but they may be able to guide you and give you great advice. Many of my mentors who contributed to my understanding, insightfulness, knowledge, and guidance might not have been as capable as me in some respects. But I wouldn’t have succeeded in business without them.
Additionally, and a completely different point, many people at work may not be as capable as you, but many could be great people in their own right. I would rather have them as friends than some of the more talented ones. Many such people come to mind, but two specifically stand out as great examples to demonstrate it all.
Early on in my career, when it appeared that I was on a sure path to significant success, a great hardship befell me. I lost my job and all my money within a single week. I was looking for a job and couldn’t find any for two years. There was a recession and jobs were nowhere to be found. I was desperate and despondent. I saw my career and future success evaporate. I was helpless. I had reached bottom.
One of the senior partners at Booz Allen, who liked me a lot and was my mentor, coincidentally left the firm and joined one of the largest executive search firms, Korn Ferry International. He became a senior partner at the firm and headed up its Chicago office. I had lunch with him one day, and when he learned about my situation, he made me an offer to join his firm as an executive search person. I thought he was just trying to help me with my unfortunate financial distress. I appreciated his kind gesture very much. But with my heavy accent, lack of fluency in English, and somewhat poor interpersonal skills, I didn’t think I could be effective and repay his kindness with worthwhile performance. I told him so. He surprised me with a wonderfully sensitive and thoughtful response.
He said that he was not offering me a job out of kindness. He believed that I would make a great executive search person, and that I may want to consider it as a career option. I asked him how I could possibly compete with others, those who were fluent in English and were much more polished with stronger interpersonal skills. He said to me, “None has your experience and knowledge. None can evaluate candidates for competency the way you can. You can also help companies truly understand what their business challenges and needs are, and direct them to the kind of talent they could benefit from. David, you’ll be a superstar in this business. You’ll make a lot of money, since we work on commissions.” He encouraged me to give it a try.
I had nothing to lose, so I accepted. But I told him that I may leave his firm upon finding another attractive opportunity. He agreed, and I became an executive search professional. He was absolutely right. We won practically every proposal we submitted. Our clients came to understand that I could deeply and accurately assess a candidate’s competencies and provide a service superior to our competitors, who offered a surface assessment of a candidate based on resume details and interview performance. I became exceptionally successful at it, in spite of my language barrier. I worked for the firm for about nine months before I found a different opportunity that changed my life. I owe this opportunity to another very special person.
As I mentioned previously, the massive AT&T monopoly was broken up and seven Baby Bells became fully operational companies overnight. The Baby Bell in the Midwest was called Ameritech. Before the breakup, all the personnel who subsequently comprised Ameritech were only responsible for running the communications networks in the Midwest for AT&T. They operated mostly as network engineers and plant managers, but suddenly they were transformed into a fully operational company—Ameritech. The managers’ responsibilities changed along with it. They were no longer plant managers, but rather top executives of a very large corporation, which needed to compete effectively in a new marketplace. None of them had the requisite experience or qualifications. They would need to learn on the job.
Ameritech created a new group that would be responsible for making venture investments in start-up communication companies. An internal team comprised of lower- to middle-level managers was assembled, and this team was put in charge of this new activity. The team knew the technology aspects extremely well, but knew nothing of competitive dynamics and would have a hard time evaluating whether a new start-up had the wherewithal to become successful in a competitive marketplace. So, some hiring was done from outside the company to bring in lower- to mid-level managers with a strong understanding of competitive dynamics. That’s when somebody referred me to Jim, the president.
I met Jim and loved what he had to say about the opportunity and playing a role in venture investments. I had hoped to get into the emerging venture capital field but couldn’t find an opportunity for various reasons. After my interview, Jim said that although they were looking to hire lower- to mid-level professionals, he would be willing to offer me the title of a vice president, given my experience and background. I was ready to accept the job on the spot. He asked me for my current salary. I told him. He went completely pale.
Jim proceeded to tell me that, under the AT&T monopoly, benefits were great, but salaries were very low. There was no way he could even come close to matching what I made at the time. He noted that even the chairman of the company didn’t make that kind of money.
I told him that I didn’t care much about the salary. He told me what the salary would be. The salary was identical to the offer I had received at Booz Allen when I started there, seven years earlier. I was making more than six times that amount at the time. I made a quick assessment of the situation. I may have found an opportunity to enter an emerging industry, which I somehow was unable to do before. I understood that, in the longer term, the venture capital industry presented the best fit with my profile and my strengths and weaknesses. My strengths would serve me very well, while my weaknesses wouldn’t be a factor any longer. I understood that if I, as a venture capitalist, would hand out money, nobody would care about my lack of fluency in English, imperfect interpersonal skills, or any other weaknesses. They would only care about whether I was able to make wise investments. I decided to accept the offer for the salary he was able to pay. Jim said that he needed to think about it.
He called me the next day and told me he decided against extending the offer. I was devastated. I asked him why. His response was, “You are a senior, experienced person who is worth a lot of money in the marketplace. I can’t, in good faith, offer you such a low salary, so I decided against making the offer.” I told him that I didn’t mind at all, that the salary was not that important to me. He said, “I understand your motivation. I know that this might be a good way for you to enter the venture industry. You will leave us as soon as you find a more lucrative replacement. It would not serve me all that well.”
I told him, “Jim, I’ll make a promise to you that I will keep. I will stay at least three years with your company. I’ll help set up the group, hire the right people, and train them. Three years is more than plenty for that. You’ll get the full benefits of hiring me before I will ever consider leaving you.” Jim promised to think about it some more, but said that he still felt very uncomfortable because it was not a fair offer from his perspective.
Over the next two months, I must have had at least six conversations with him. He was still unable to overcome his sense of extending an unfair offer, in spite of me pointing out the obvious—that it was for me to decide whether it was fair or not. It wasn’t his responsibility to worry about it. He was just a very decent human being who felt that he might be taking advantage of me, and felt very uncomfortable doing so.
I kept trying. I called him regularly to try to convince him. I sensed that he truly liked me and my experience, but somehow was unable to internally resolve the issue of the unfair offer. During one conversation, he told me that he had another vice president who was managing the group and that he wanted me to meet with him. I’m sure he offered it just to relieve the pressure on himself. I called the vice president, and we agreed to meet for lunch. I met the most wonderful person anyone could ever meet.
His name was John, a longtime employee of AT&T, a mid-level manager who was offered a vice president’s title to acknowledge he would help head up this group. We talked for almost three hours. He was very attentive and wanted to hear all about my experience and how I could help them. We had a productive conversation. He asked me about the salary issue. I repeated my feelings about the irrelevancy of the salary. He told me that Jim had real misgivings about it. I explained that he shouldn’t.
I will never forget what he told me before we parted. In fact, tears are coming into my eyes now as I’m recalling this incident. He said, “David, you are one of the most impressive people I’ve met. You can help us a lot. It would be stupid not to hire you. I plan to tell Jim that he would be an idiot not to hire you immediately.”
It wasn’t lost on me that he decided to make a recommendation to bring somebody on board to be at the same level he was—to be a competitor of his. Very few people would have done so, particularly if they could easily avoid it. Jim called the next day to offer me the job. I was ecstatic. I told him that it was the best birthday present he could have given me. (It actually was my birthday.)
Within six months, I caught the attention of all the senior executives of Ameritech. I had knowledge about competitive dynamics that none of them had. I was an experienced consultant; I knew how to counsel them. I became known in the organization as the most influential person with the top management team. I helped in many ways, many more than my responsibilities called for. I became an informal personal advisor to the chairman. I got his full confidence. I was running high. Within six months, I was running my group. John, who was presumably more senior to me when I joined, was now informally reporting to me. Three months later, there was a formal organizational change, and I became his boss. About a month before I formally became his boss, we sat down for a heart-to-heart talk at my request.
I told him that we needed to replace some of the people working in our group. They were not of the caliber we needed if we wanted to do well. He said he had no issue with it. I then had one of the toughest messages I’ve ever had to deliver to a coworker. I told him that we would need to increase the pay scale of everybody in our group, and substantially so, in order to attract the necessary experience and quality of people. It would be equivalent in salary to some of the more senior executives at Ameritech.
I said I believed I would be able to convince the chairman to authorize it by explaining that we were investing tens and potentially hundreds of millions of dollars and needed the best talent and experience money could buy. We were in need of ex-consultants, who are expensive to bring onboard. Their salaries would pale, however, relative to the money we stood to lose without them, or could gain with them. I then told him that I had only one problem that stood in my way. I would not immediately be able to have the chairman authorize that kind of a salary increase for John or any other ex-AT&T employee within our group, though I told him that over time I was fairly certain I could.
I felt terrible; I was concerned that he would get insulted and view my explanation as a way to benefit myself at his expense. But he looked at me and very calmly said, “David, I don’t mind; go ahead and give it a try. I will not subsequently mind if you are unable to increase my salary. Your plan makes a lot of sense to me. It is best for the company. I am all for it.” John agreed with much style, grace, class, and integrity—no bitterness whatsoever.
The chairman approved my plan. I started hiring and my team grew from six people to over twenty. I was assigned additional responsibilities. I became responsible not just for venture investments, but for all business transactions, mergers and acquisitions, and partnerships on behalf of Ameritech. Two months later, organizational changes formalized it. I became the Vice President of Merger, Acquisitions, and Venture Investments. Within exactly one year from my starting with Ameritech, my salary was adjusted to reflect market value. I was back on top of the world, doing superbly well. Six months later, John received the first in a series of raises to his salary. Two years later, he was making four times the salary he had when I had the heart-to-heart talk with him. We both benefited immensely. But that is not the end of the story.
About a year later, the CFO of Ameritech somehow learned that John was making a lot of money. He thought of John as a mid-level manager. He was suddenly making as much money as top-level managers in other parts of the company, including presidents of some of the divisions. He relayed this to the chairman. I was called to the chairman’s office.
The chairman told me that the situation with John’s salary was unacceptable and would demoralize other executives. He told me to fire John. I told him that I understood the dilemma, and would do so, but in good time. This was not a good time for my organization to let John go. We hired great consultants who knew how to evaluate companies and competitive dynamics. But they didn’t possess the technical knowledge required in the communications industry. John was used as a resource for that. He was invaluable in that role and at that juncture. I said I would fire him when that situation changed, and his value became less critical. The chairman looked at me and said, “Okay, but make it sooner rather than later.” I nodded my head in assent, but I had no intention of firing John. I owed him that much.
Over the next couple of years, the chairman asked me at least ten times if I had fired John. My answer was the same. I will, but the time is not right. About two years from the initial request, the chairman asked me yet again, and my answer was the same. The chairman looked at me and asked, “David, do you ever intend to do so?” I replied, “Not really.” He looked at me and said, “I just finally figured it out.” He never brought the topic up again. John learned from indirect sources what I had done for him for the previous two years. He came to my office, acknowledged what he learned, and thanked me profusely. I got up from my chair, walked over to him, hugged him, and said, “No, I need to thank you. Without you and your class act, I would never be here now.”
Don’t let success get too much to your head. Never, ever look down on people. Never, ever disrespect people. None of us is indispensable. We are all dependent on each other!