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 2007 Hopkins and Company, LLC
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Sweat
Some executives seem to work so hard
that one can imagine them sweating, while others make their jobs seem
effortless. Certain executives are the first to arrive at a workplace, and
the last to leave. Other executives cause observers to ask where they are and
what they actually do. Our thesis is that it is the attitude and personality
of the executive rather than the demands of the role that create these images
of executive work. The best fit comes when there’s alignment between the way
a person likes to work and a workplace there that approach is recognized and
rewarded. This issue presents a few examples of different work styles and
attitudes about work. As you think about these situations, consider whether
your work style and attitude match your organization. Reflect on whether
you’ve become a positive or a negative role model for the behavior your
organization recognizes and rewards.
Fifteen new
books are rated in this issue, beginning on page 5. Two books received highly
recommended four-star ratings; twelve books are rated three-stars, and one
book eked out a one-star rating. At least five of this month’s selections
represent an author’s debut, and are likely to be unfamiliar authors. Test
out your interest by reading the excerpts contained in our reviews. Visit our
current bookshelf at http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/2007books.html and see the rating table explained as
well as explore links to all 492 books read or those being considered this
year, including 39 that were added to the list in August. If there’s
something missing from the bookshelf that you think we should be considering
or if there’s a book lingering on the Shelf of Possibility that you think we
should read and review sooner rather than later, let us know by sending a
message to books@hopkinsandcompany.com.
You can also check out all 2,190 books we’ve ever listed at http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/All
Books.html.
Ambrosia
“The sweat of hard
work is not to be displayed. It is much more graceful to appear favored by
the gods.” (Maxine Hogg Kingston, The Woman Warrior, 1976). One graceful
executive who never seems to display the sweat of hard work is Richard Parsons, CEO of Time Warner. Joe Nocera reported (http://select.nytimes.com/2007/08/25/business/media/25nocera.html)
in his “Talking Business” column in The
New York Times on 8/25 on a dinner interview he had at a Manhattan restaurant “to drink Mr.
Parsons’s wine. In addition to his day job as chief executive of Time Warner,
Mr. Parsons owns a small vineyard in Italy called Il Palazzone, which
makes a high- quality Brunello di Montalcino. He acquired his taste for wine,
he told me, back when he worked for Nelson
Rockefeller.” This
context provided a backdrop for descriptions about Parsons’ approach to work.
“…Dick
Parsons would prefer that you never see him busting his chops. All his
professional life, he’s wanted to be seen as someone who never seems to break
a sweat. … when he first took over the company, he performed nothing short of
a miracle, rescuing it from the single worst deal in modern business history,
the AOL-Time Warner merger. … Parsons is a listener, a persuader, a diplomat
— and those qualities made all the difference. … ‘I want my legacy to be
simple: I left the place in good shape and in good hands. … I think of myself
as a professional manager. I am not trying to build a dynasty or create a
monument. I know this comment will upset some people, but this is my job.
It’s not my life. I don’t define myself by this.’” At the end of the interview, Parsons
said, ‘“We
haven’t talked enough about wine. Do you know what I like about that?’ he
asked, pointing to the empty Brunello bottle on the table. ‘Some time ago,
those were grapes. We picked them, we fermented them, we bottled them. There
is something to show for your effort. We have a product.’ Rumors abound about
what Mr. Parsons will do when he leaves Time Warner, the loudest being that
he will run for mayor of New York,
something he staunchly denies. But I can guarantee he’ll be spending more
time at his winery — and doing all the other things he enjoys doing. He’ll
live well.” Whether he
decides to bust his chops or not, we’re not likely to see him break a sweat.
Are you more likely to be seen busting
your chops, or do you come across at all times as calm and collected? When
you think about your legacy to your organization, how do you want to be
remembered? Is that likely? What will show for your effort?
Sleeves
“Hard work spotlights
the character of people: some turn up their sleeves, some turn up their
noses, and some don't turn up at all.” (Sam
Ervin) We read in the August 27 issue of Business Week (http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_34/b4047046.htm)
that Robert L. Nardelli, the new
head of Chrysler said, “I can’t
wait to roll my sleeves up and get to work.” What that will mean for the
managers and employees at Chrysler remains to be seen. According to Business Week, “Nardelli will have to
boost quality and increase lagging productivity at Chrysler's factories. He
must bring discipline to a sales strategy of frequent deep discounts to move
the metal. And he's likely to shake up management, adding new talent in
product development, marketing, and design. … At Chrysler, Nardelli's challenge
will be to find the kind of revenue gains he made at GE without creating the problems he caused at Home Depot. His military management
style led to 100% turnover among his top 170 managers by the time he left the
retailer in January. … Nardelli says
he won't revamp Chrysler's fix-it plan but hints he might speed it up: ‘If we
can do it faster and more efficiently, that's what we're going to do.’
Chrysler has trimmed nearly 13,000 workers and closed a factory, but if sales
don't bounce back, more cuts could follow. Big changes may be in store for
the design and engineering groups, too. Chrysler once was hailed as Detroit's most
innovative automaker. But executives say chief designer Trevor Creed and product development boss Frank Klegon now are on the hot seat.” After meeting Nardelli, we expect that
Chrysler executives will choose one of the three paths in the Sam Ervin quote
above. The seat cools fast when it’s vacant.
After you roll your sleeves up, what follows? How much change
can your organization process as an outcome of your active engagement? What
would happen if 100% of your top managers turned over?
Dogged
“Real success
is finding your lifework in the work that you love.” (David McCullough) Bob Nardelli’s boss is Cerberus Capital Management’s chief Stephen Feinberg, who is profiled in the 8/20 issue (http://money.cnn.com/2007/08/03/news/companies/cerberus.fortune/index.htm)
of Fortune. Here’s what Nardelli
can expect from his new boss, “Feinberg is an anti-celebrity,
man-of-the-people guy who just happens to be a centimillionaire. The
47-year-old son of a steel salesman from Spring Valley,
N.Y., he lives in a Manhattan
apartment that is modest by Master-of-the-Universe standards and an even more
modest house in Stamford,
Conn. He drives a Dodge pickup,
loves guns and motorcycles, and wears off-the-rack suits. The firm's Park Avenue offices may be the tattiest in the private
equity business. Walk down the narrow corridors on threadbare, coffee-stained
carpets and you'll see a warren of bare cubicles and rows of gray-steel
filing cabinets. The walls are institutional beige or gray, adorned with
cheap framed prints that would suit an inner-city nursing home. The overall
effect is that of a ministry of finance in a former Soviet satellite state.
And that seems to suit Feinberg just fine. If you're doing business with him,
expect to be neither wined nor dined, ever. ‘Invariably Feinberg and I would
eat sandwiches out of boxes while we worked,’ says Robert Milton, CEO of Cerberus-controlled ACE Aviation Holdings, parent of Air Canada. … Colleagues today say he breaks from work only for
hunger, and if he leaves the office at 9 p.m. he'll continue working from
home. He expects everyone on his staff to be available 24/7, as he is. To see
what Feinberg does care about, observe him in his weekly deal meeting, which
all 280 employees are expected to attend in person or by phone. … The questioning
is nonstop, and participants are amazed by Feinberg's memory for numbers. ‘He
fires off granular questions about cash flow from specific divisions over the
trailing 12 months, and you'd better have that answer or get it quickly,’
says one witness to a Feinberg grilling. ‘The questions are insightful.
There's no bullshit, no wasting time. His capacity to recall financial
details on all the companies they have an interest in, and at the same time
have a big picture in mind, is just astonishing. The people at Cerberus say
this guy can see through walls.’ … As Cerberus takes its place in the top
rank of buyout firms and as a force in U.S. business, it may yet emerge
from the shadows. But that will be a struggle. Teach for America recently honored Feinberg for his fundraising
efforts, naming him guest of honor at its latest gala. But even in the Waldorf-Astoria ballroom, he was a
ghost. Goldman Sachs president Jon Winkelried praised him in a long
speech, but when it came time to invite Feinberg to the mike to say a few
words, Winkelried instead said thank you and good night. Feinberg didn't
budge from his table. Attendees were stunned. It's hard to think of anyone
else too diffident even to stand up at a dinner being given for him.” Stay tuned to see how Nardelli answers
Feinberg’s questions.
How does your personal style convey
what you care about? Do you love working so much that the only time you take
a break is when you’re hungry? At meetings, do you waste anyone’s time?
Excess
“In order that people may be happy in
their work, these three things are needed: They must be fit for it. They must
not do too much of it. And they must have a sense of success in it.” (John Ruskin Pre-Raphaelitism, 1850). Some executives don’t know how to take a break. We read in
Carol Hymowitz’s “In The Lead” column (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118756266967002302.html)
in the 8/20 issue of The Wall Street Journal that, “The president of a small manufacturing company in
Cleveland told his top marketing manager that he wasn't going to be reachable
during a recent weeklong safari in Africa. But midway through the week, the
manager received a voice-mail message from his boss inquiring whether he had
completed a particular assignment - and telling him which task to tackle
next. ‘I felt he didn't trust that I knew how to do my job,’ the marketing
manager says. ‘When he got back from vacation and I asked how he'd managed to
get a cellphone signal in the jungle, he confessed he'd programmed the
voice-mail message to me before he left.’ Fed up with being micromanaged, the
manager quit shortly afterward, taking a new job. … ‘The most successful
executives presume that employees will act in the best interests of their company
and to their full potentials - and don't need to check in with them all the
time,’ says Michael Mankins, a
partner at consultant Bain & Co.
‘Those who can't step away and trust that decisions can be made without them never
get the best work out of subordinates.’” Given their roles,
many executives shouldn’t totally disengage, but there’s a big difference
between being available and accessible if something critical comes up, and
acting as if one hasn’t left the building.
Are your direct reports prepared to make decisions in your
absence? Are you prepared to trust their decisions? Are you working to
excess?
Follow-up
Here’s an
update on stories covered in prior issues of Executive
Times:
Ø
In
the April
2004 issue of Executive Times
we noted the flood of business press coverage about Michael Eisner and his travails at the end of his career at Walt Disney Company. We read in the
current (9/3) issue of Business Week
(http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_36/b4048046.htm)
that he’s been busy recasting himself as a power player. “… he’s got 40 years
of entertainment contacts, collected more than $1 billion from cashed-in
Disney options, and, most important, still has the hunger to prove wrong the
critics who hounded him out of his job in 2005.” One of his current deals, the purchase
of Topps goes to shareholder vote
on August 30. Whether that deal gets done or not, Business Week says people still want to hear what Eisner has to
say. “…he
is drawing six-figure fees on the lecture circuit. One recent topic:
‘Leadership: Success by Failing and Other Paradoxes.’”
Ø
In
the July
2004 issue of Executive Times,
we asked readers to stay tuned to see if corporate social responsibility
would rise or fall, as measured by participation in
the UN Global Compact initiative.
New studies by Goldman Sachs and McKinsey released at a July summit show
growing involvement. See http://www.unglobalcompact.org/NewsAndEvents/news_archives/2007_07_05d.html
for details.
Legacy
Personification
When a company
becomes identified with an individual executive, there can be great success
or monumental failure. In the case of Leona
Helmsley and the Helmsley
hotel chain, both happened. Following an aggressive ad campaign in the early
1980s featuring company president Ms. Helmsley and the high standards she set
for the Harley Hotel,
ads for the Helmsley
Palace referred to her
as the queen for a decade. Occupancy rates soared. Thanks to this ad campaign,
an impersonal hotel now had personality. Guests were led to expect high
levels of service because the queen was on guard to be sure that would
happen. Problems began to arise in the late 1980s as that personality became
better known. In the late 1980s, she was involved in a jewelry scheme to
evade paying sales tax on purchases. Also in the late 1980s, she and her
husband, Harry, were indicted on
multiple charges of federal tax evasion. A hotel housekeeper testified at the
trial that Ms. Helmsley once told her that, “Only the little people pay
taxes.” We read (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/21/nyregion/21helmsley.html)
in The New York Times that, “a series of
prosecution witnesses described a spiteful, extravagant, foul-mouthed woman
who terrified her underlings. … Mrs. Helmsley’s lawyer, Gerald A. Feffer, did not deny the truth of such testimony but
told jurors not to hold her personality against her, saying, ‘I don’t believe
Mrs. Helmsley is charged in the indictment with being a bitch.’” She was convicted of tax evasion and
spent eighteen months in prison. According to the Times, “She
was barred from executive involvement in the Helmsley Hotel organization and
was supposed to perform 750 hours of community service during the next three
years. The sentence was later increased by 150 hours when a federal judge
determined that employees had performed some of her service. They had not
done it out of kindness. Mrs. Helmsley had difficulties getting along with
her employees for most of her career.” Ever
after, she was referred to as “the Queen of mean” and became a symbol of the
arrogance and greed that marked some quarters in the 1980s. Leona Helmsley
died in late August at age 87. Thanks to her, many companies have become very
cautious about becoming too closely identified with a single personality.
Latest
Books Read and Reviewed:
(Note: readers of the web version of Executive Times can click on the book covers to
order copies directly from amazon.com.
When you order through these links, Hopkins & Company receives a
small payment from amazon.com. Click
on the title to read the review or visit our 2007 bookshelf at http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/2007books.html).
|
Title (Link to
Review)
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Author
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Rating
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Review Summary
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Purchase
|
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Twenty
Grand
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Curtis,
Rebecca
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***
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Characters. Debut collection of 13 short stories
featuring complex characters, mostly young women leading bleak lives,
displays skilled literary talent.
|
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Richistan: A Journey Through the American Wealth Boom
and the Lives of the New Rich
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Frank,
Robert
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***
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Boom.
Wall Street Journal columnist writes an informative and entertaining examination
of the lives of the wealthy in America, including the
challenges and opportunities of the haves and the have-mores.
|
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The
Dangerous Book for Boys
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Iggulden, Conn and Hal Iggulden
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***
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Reference. Great book for fathers and sons to
let boys take risks and grow up. Includes loads of how-to’s, heroic
stories, illustrations, and even grammar lessons.
|
|
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No
One Belongs Here More Than You
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July,
Miranda
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***
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Extremes.
Debut collection of
sixteen stories in which the characters leap to extremes in a quest for
love and acceptance. Conversational and quirky storytelling.
|
|
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Little
Heathens
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Kalish,
Mildred Armstrong
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***
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Formative. Finely written memoir about growing
up on an Iowa
farm during the Depression, with insights for all readers on the formation
of sound character.
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|
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Consequences
|
Lively,
Penelope
|
****
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Accidents. Fine prose with deep and rich
multigenerational characters who explore what life is all about, and
conclude that it’s mostly accidental, with one thing leading to another.
|
|
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Writing
in an Age of Silence
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Paretsky,
Sara
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***
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Courage. Novelist’s memoir minces no words,
and exudes with passion for social justice and for not standing by when our
liberties are placed in jeopardy. Along the way, she tells her own story.
|
|
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The Manny
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Peterson,
Holly
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***
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Romance.
Aggressively
promoted debut novel by billionaire’s daughter provided more entertainment
than expected. Hard to have empathy for any of the characters, but the
story came across as a sweet romance, something like the printed version of
a chick flick.
|
|
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From
the Bottom Up: One Man's Crusade to Clean America's Rivers
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Pregracke, Chad and Jeff Barrow
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****
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Mission. Inspiring and exciting story of how
a teenager decided to clean up the garbage in the Mississippi
River, and did it. Throw out Who Moved My Cheese and have your team read this tale of hard
work, accountability, teamwork, and persistence.
|
|
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The
Long Road Home: A Story of War and Family
|
Raddatz,
Martha
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***
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One. TV reporter writes about one 2004
battle in Iraq
and what it meant for the soldiers and their families. Descriptive,
detailed and teary story of sacrifice.
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Harry
Potter and the Deathly Hallows
|
Rowling,
J.K.
|
***
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Finished. The last book in the series contains
784 pages, almost half of which would not be missed. Be part of the global cultural
experience and read it now, or wait for the movie.
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The
Secret Servant
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Silva, Daniel
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***
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Intense. Israeli spy and art restorer Gabriel
Allon returns for the seventh novel in this series. Non-stop heroic action
to foil the bad guys, and sidebar preaching to hammer the messages home
leaves no time for art restoration this time around.
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Blind
Faith: The Unholy Alliance of Religion and Medicine
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Sloan,
Richard P.
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***
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Systematic. Logical and factual support of the
premise that the efforts to link religion and health are not good science,
not good medicine and not good religion.
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Mergers
and Acquisitions
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Vachon,
Dana
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*
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Vacuous. Debut novel by author who worked at
JP Morgan after his 2002 Duke graduation features interns at investment
banking firm and their relationships. Unimpressive writing, weak and
undeveloped characters and some humor.
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Restitution
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Vance,
Lee
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***
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Faithfulness. Fast-paced and well-written thriller
novel in which a husband suspected of his wife’s murder races to find the
real killer. Complicated plot, complex characters and motifs that hold
together throughout this debut novel.
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