PEAK AVAILABLE ON AUDIO

I’m thrilled to announce that PEAK is now available in an audio version…unabridged and read by “yours truly.” Visit AUDIBLE.COM for details.

Enjoy!

Add comment July 9th, 2008

WANT TO CREATE CHANGE? TELL A STORY.

I was a freshly-minted adult when I graduated from Stanford Business School half a lifetime ago (23 years to be exact). Along with my classmate Seth Godin who was also a youngster when he graduated, I found all the theory that filled the biz school classrooms to be rather stale. Seth and I were so bored that we created our own independent studies course where we interviewed interesting businesspeople and asked them to share their rules for success (the result, “Business Rules of Thumb,” was the first book for us both…good luck finding a copy). We found these corporate leadership stories to be much more compelling than any decision tree or manufacturing bottleneck analysis. Two years ago, Seth even wrote a book on storytelling called “All Marketers are Liars,” in which he suggested that successful marketers don’t talk about features or benefits, they just tell great stories.

Since then, I’ve read a lot of great books on storytelling but I’ve yet to read one that so systematically and convincingly explains the steps for creating the drama and landscape for storytelling as the one I’ve just finished. Authors Richard Maxwell and Robert Dickman, who are consultants in the entertainment industry (if there ever was an industry based on spinning a tale, that’s it), have written The Elements of Persuasion which came out a few months ago. They suggest that all successful stories have five basic components: the PASSION with which the story is told, a HERO who leads us through the story and allows us to see it through his or her eyes, an ANTAGONIST or obstacle that the hero must overcome, a moment of AWARENESS that allows the hero to prevail, and the TRANSFORMATION in the hero and in the world that naturally results. Sounds a like a Hollywood hit to me. But, reading this book, I became convinced that great leaders are also able to express their reality and vision using this arc to define their story.

I was reminded of this last week while giving a presentation about my book PEAK: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo From Maslow. I was speaking to this group, not knowing that the wife of one of our employees was in the audience. For those of you who’ve read PEAK, you know this is a tale of how I launched my impractically-named company (Joie de Vivre Hotels) more than 20 years ago because of the passion I felt for the hospitality business’ approach to making customers feel good. I talked about how I was burnt out at the age of 25 having spent my first two years out of biz school getting pummeled in the rough-and-tumble world of commercial real estate development and construction. Starting Joie de Vivre (mindful of the company’s mission statement – defined by our name: “joy of life”) and growing it to be one of largest boutique hotel companies in the world was exhilarating. But, in our fifteenth year, we experienced the worst hotel downturn since World War II and Joie de Vivre was particularly exposed since all of our hotels were in the same region, the San Francisco Bay Area. Having all of our eggs in one geographic basket led me to not take a salary for three and a half years, during which time I became a real Abraham Maslow nut reading all kinds of books by this mid-20th century psychologist. I then applied his self-actualization-driven Hierarchy of Needs theory to how we created deeper relationships with our employees, customers, and investors. In the end, Joie de Vivre flourished during a difficult time and a new psychology of business was sprouted, which I applied to the company and came to realize was being used – in various forms – in other peak-performing companies.

So, I was telling this story on my book tour and the employee’s wife I mentioned came up to me after I spoke. She said she’d told my tale to probably 50 people because it was like describing a Jimmy Stewart film in which the good guy wins in the end. As she was describing my story back to me, I realized she was following that arc of PASSION – HERO – ANTAGONIST – AWARENESS – TRANSFORMATION that “The Elements of Persuasion” speaks of. So, I asked her, “Why do you keep telling this story?” And, she responded, “All of us need the inspiration to believe that if you persevere with your passion, you will one day succeed. Your story gives people strength.” While I don’t recommend going through the fire the way my company did, it is more than gratifying to know that our story is now inspiring others.

So, the next time you’re trying to persuade your colleagues about a particular strategy or idea, consider telling a story. Maybe tell a true story of someone who’s tale might mirror what you’re trying to articulate. If it’s your own story, all the better. Or possibly tell a future story that describes the positive, transformative outcome of what might happen if your team pursued your path. Facts and figures can help rationalize your story, but it’s the raw emotion that will draw people in and help them to remember just what you had in mind. Change happens when people are inspired.

Add comment October 22nd, 2007

ADAM SMITH AND ABE MASLOW: CONSCIOUS CAPITALISTS

If you’ve been following my musings, you know I’ve got a healthy appetite for readin’ and writin’ (not as big of a fan of ‘rithmetic). I particularly appreciate off-beat books that look at business or the world from a unique perspective. That would be a good way to describe Saving Adam Smith: A Tale of Wealth, Transformation, and Virtue, written by doctoral student Jonathan Wight a few years ago. Quite often, the Gordon Geccos (remember Michael Douglas in the movie WALL STREET) of the world use Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” of capitalism to describe the benefits of laissez-faire capitalism. There’s an underlying message that is somehow attributed to Smith – who many see as the father of capitalism: “greed is good” and selfishness helps everyone live up to their true potential and get what they need.

Well, Jonathan Wight did his doctoral studies on Adam Smith and found him to be much more Maslovian in his world view. Consider this passage: “Smith’s model is based upon notions that are intuitive to any parent – that children are driven first by the basic instinct for survival, and beyond that, the basic instinct for approval. Smith takes this one step further, arguing that adults as well as children desire not only pats of encouragement and approval, they desire to be worthy of that approval. People want to be virtuous.” In other words, Wight suggests that Smith believed markets and morals go hand-in-hand and he uses a first person narrator – a fictional economics grad student – who travels across the country with Adam Smith to get his points across.

Here’s an example of a verbal exchange from the book as these two characters meet a third person who describes life in Silicon Valley (while overlooking Big Sur cliffs):

1. “No question, people work hard when their contributions are recognized and rewarded. Stock options are important. But you’ll miss something momentous if you stop there…The secret is this: People work harder when they appreciate themselves for what they have done. When the goal of the enterprise is worthy of their highest aspirations…when you touch someplace deep inside, by having them buy into a dream bigger than themselves. That unleashes the creative spirit, and the mind and heart are integrated. So the company becomes, in a sense, the vehicle for the aspirations of the workers as integrated human beings.”

2. “I thought the company was a vehicle for making profit,” I said remembering Milton Friedman’s and Adam Smith’s injunctions against “do-goodism.”

3. “It has potential for much more than that…when people accept a bigger dream, there’s a remarkable transformation. The workplace becomes alive, dynamic, charged with energy. Profit is the by-product of achieving that higher aspiration.”

So, according to Jonathan Wight, Adam Smith was a “conscious capitalist” just like Abe Maslow. Having written a book about applying Maslow’s “hierarchy of needs” to the workplace and distilling down his five levels of the pyramid to three (survival, success, and transformation), I find it fascinating to read these because #1 basically suggests that employees have base compensation needs (survival) which then move on to their social/esteem needs of recognition (success). But, it’s the meaning/aspirational needs at the top of the pyramid (transformation) that create what Adam Smith might have called an “integrated human being” and what Maslow called a “self-actualized person.”

The next time someone cites Adam Smith as their foundation for why they believe capitalism is based upon the positive virtues of selfishness, please direct them to Saving Adam Smith as Wight passionately pleads for a more compassionate and aspirational perspective on human nature, one that corresponds well with the theories I’ve espoused in PEAK.

Add comment August 12th, 2007

WHY I WRITE

I long to be anti-social. It’s not that I don’t enjoy people. Next to dogs, people are just about the best species ever created. Certainly better than toads. No, my anti-social longing comes from people overload. Being a hospitality honcho means lots of pressing the flesh, not in that vacant politician sort of way….more in that smiling, nodding, empathizing, problem solving kind of way. There’s no doubt I get great meaning out of my connection to other humans. But, it can be a little like eating that second banana split. It felt so good until it felt so bad.

So, I retreat. Rather than calling it anti-social behavior, let’s just call it pro-cocooning. After a long week of having my external antennae maxed out, it’s such a relief to get in touch with my internal antennae to understand what kind of weather is occurring on planet Chip. Most of us are a little intimidated by writing - especially if it’s in a personal journal - as if we’re being asked to communicate in a foreign language. But, it’s really quite a simple equation. Take a brain, add a heart, and a willingness to slow down enough to observe life - subtract out that voice of your 2nd grade brutally critical school teacher - and you might just write a few lines that could strike a chord (maybe a truly out of key chord, but at least some kind of chord).

Most of us are willing to live chord-less lives. Or we think we need to read before we can write. There are lots of great books about writing out there in the world. Some of my favorites are Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones , Brenda Ueland’s If You Want To Write , and Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird . But, let’s be honest, all these books basically say the same thing. Write as if no one’s watching and, by the way, do it naked…or at least expose yourself to yourself in all your glory. I find that I write my best passages (in whose opinion my internal critic asks?) when I have no idea where I’m going….when I’m scriptless and full of curiosity. Sort of like the carefree driving my partner Donald and I did in the English Cotswolds countryside last week….even better, we were driving on the wrong side of the road. My best writing happens when I’m thinking on the wrong side of the road.

I guess it helps that as a kid I was an introvert and wanted to be a writer when I grew up (an idea that was rather blasphemous to my sensible father). Well, now I’m grown up and I am a writer. The reality is I always was one but I had to try out a few odd identities along the way like real estate developer, political activist, philanthropist, and hotelier. Those clothes fit fine, but when I’m home alone, I’ve got to tell ya that I love being the naked writer. (I suppose the fact I’m sharing this with you makes me a bit of an exhibitionist.)

OK, let me clean this up and tell you how I got on this stream of consciousness. I was interviewed by a journalist this week who asked me how I could juggle being a very public hospitality CEO with being a very private “prolific writer” (his words). Out of nowhere, I said something like “most ambitious real estate execs are awfully focused on the here and now - not in a zen sort of way, but more as a form of instant gratification - yet winning a transaction-driven negotiation to buy a property gives you a high that lasts a few days. Strong earnings or profits might last a few quarters and make you a few bucks, but that’s awfully transitory. Bricks and mortar - the legacy that an evolved real estate developer creates for a community - lasts a few generations. Strangely enough, it’s words and thoughts that have the potential to last a few eternities.” I’m a big Thoreau fan - he died nearly 150 years ago - and I also pull out my Marcus Aurelius when I’m looking for a little insight (he left the planet more than 1,800 years ago).

I write. Birds fly. We do it to transport ourselves. My hope is that my form of flying just might make a difference for someone else out there - maybe even 100 years from now. If I write with that kind of forced posterity, it will be stale from the moment that synapse of inspiration flows straight through this keyboard. So, instead, I just fly and hope like hell I have a good time and don’t have to flap too hard. That’s what it was like writing PEAK . Sure, it was grueling working a 60-hour CEO Monday through Friday existence bookended by marathon writing sessions on weekends. No sane human would do this if they didn’t enjoy it. Writing PEAK was my form of self-actualization. I lost track of time. I lost track of eating. I lost track of me. I lost my mind, yet I found my spirit…that enduring spirit that felt like it was channeling old Abe Maslow more than 35 years after his death.

I write to connect…to connect with myself as well as to connect with some sort of ethereal consciousness (as if I’m grasping inspiration out of thin air). But, strangely enough, I write to connect with others. To connect with like-minded souls who will resonate with my moments of clarity and my moments of darkness. To connect with leaders who will feel emboldened to influence their workplace in a new way.

Maybe I’m not so anti-social after all.

Add comment August 4th, 2007

WANTS VS NEEDS

One of my favorite pastimes is traveling. While this isn’t unusual for most Americans, I have to say that one of the primary reasons I enjoy traveling is because it means uninterrupted reading time on cramped planes. And, what a stroke of luck it is when your destination and your reading material crescendo into a “Eureka” moment.

I’m writing this particular musing as I travel on a cramped plane to London after a week in Prague and Budapest having devoured Gregg Easterbrook’s The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse . Easterbrook successfully dissects an issue that I address in my upcoming book, “Peak”: the fact that the Western world is increasingly more prosperous, yet shows no more happiness associated with this affluence (in concert with Martin Seligman’s Authentic Happiness and Darrin McMahon’s Happiness: A History , I’ve had a curious appetite for understanding the ephemeral pursuit that our founding fathers articulated in the Declaration of Independence). The punchline from each of these books seems to suggest an old Henny Youngman joke: “What good is happiness? It can’t buy money.”

I’d love to join Gregg Easterbrook at a spirited dinner table with a good Hungarian bottle of wine because his thoughtful arguments (80% of which I agree with) are perfectly suited to a verbal jousting match. But, what I found most interesting was his dozen page recital of how the study of psychology, which had its origins in the Enlightenment period of world history, moved from a desire to elevate the mind to the Freudian/Behaviorist perspective of the last century that psychology’s purpose was to understand malady (as opposed to sanity, or for that matter, happiness). Imagine if business leaders focused on “worst practices” as opposed to “best practices” in trying to understand how to improve their operating performance. A “Freudian financier” could tell you all the ways he could lose money, but wouldn’t have a clue how to make a buck.

This part of the book also outlines how the positive psychology community (a movement that sprouted out of Abraham Maslow’s humanist psychology writings) is proving that happiness has an awful lot to do with distinguishing between one’s wants and one’s needs. He writes, “The blurring of needs and wants is important here because needs can be satisfied. A person needs food, clothing, shelter, medical care, education, and transportation; once attained, these needs are fulfilled. Wants, by contrast, can never be satisfied. The more you want, the more likely you are to feel disgruntled; the more you acquire, the more likely you are to feel controlled by your own possessions.”

This quandary of affluence is at the root of why modern man can become more prosperous, yet still be “wanting.” It seems that wants are truly personal and individualistic, while needs are more universal to man. Paris Hilton or Dick Cheney’s “hierarchy of wants” might be quite different from my own, but our “hierarchy of needs” (credit Dr. Maslow) might be uniformly common. Easterbrook quotes George Will who has written that today’s need “is defined, in contemporary America, as a 48-hour-old want.” The result is a “blurring of needs and wants,” which leads to a “tyranny of the unnecessary.” My biz school classmate and the co-author of our first books together, Seth Godin , should also be added to that dinner table conversation with Gregg Easterbrook as he and I once started an engaged email conversation about wants versus needs that still needs to be finished (while we’re at it, please make it a table of four as let’s add George Will to the dinner party, too).

One other key point, which Easterbrook makes, that resonated with me and the Relationship Truths pyramid I’ve outlined in my book “Peak” is the idea that happiness comes from transcending the base of the pyramid. The idea that we aspire to something greater and more full of meaning is a basic precept of both individuals as well as employees in the workplace. He writes, “A transition from material want to meaning want is in progress on an historically unprecedented scale involving hundreds of millions of people and may eventually be recognized as a principal cultural development of our age.” He continues, “Ultimately, the reason that possessions and their attendant stress are so alluring is that acquiring possessions is a simpler challenge than acquiring a fulfilling philosophy of life. Western society has concentrated intently on producing a vast output of material goods in part because this was an empirical, tangible goal – we knew we could do it. Now we face a task about which we are less confident, the search for meaning.”

Viktor Frankl’s stunning account of his time in a concentration camp Man’s Search For Meaning is worth reading if you want to explore an argument for the importance of meaning in one’s life that is both intellectually-rigorous while emotionally-wrenching. From the perspective of the workplace, I think that companies as diverse as Southwest Airlines, Harley-Davidson, Whole Foods Market, Medtronic, and Joie de Vivre Hospitality have proven that elevating employees’ perspective on their work from a job to a career to a calling has proven to result in peak performance. Unfortunately, most company leaders (and even HR departments) have a tin ear for meaning. And, our capitalistic society (whether we’re the producer or consumer) tends to get a little too enamored with elements that are lower on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs pyramid.

Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn once wrote about the U.S. and Europe by saying these places “were full of choice, unfortunately most of the choices are mundane.” Having just spent a week in two former Soviet block countries – the Czech Republic and Hungary – I was struck with the dramatic difference in spirit and perspective (dare I say happiness) that existed between two of the star cities in the democratizing Central Europe: Prague and Budapest. In Prague, we found a positive enterprising philosophy in the people we met that matched the pristine and unique architecture. As one Czech said to us, “The past is behind us and the future is bright.” In contrast, many of Budapest’s buildings, while historically majestic, were falling down and so seemed to be the spirit of the people. After having chosen the wrong side in the first two World Wars and having been occupied by the Nazis and then the Soviets, most Hungarians seemed to have lost their meaning or hope in life.

Even the historical sightseeing tributes (or, more accurately, the accounting of the assaults) that both cities have created suggest a difference in perspective. Prague has a Museum of Communism that is ironically upstairs from a McDonald’s and next door to a casino and shopping mall. This Museum is quaint, almost a little haphazard, and has a bit of a sense of humor (where else would you find a mock Soviet poster with a collection of smiling but stern mid-20th century women under the heading “Like their sisters in the West, they would’ve burnt their bras, if there were any in the shops”) in the telling of the tale of how the Czech Republic suffered under the yoke of communism. Budapest’s House of Terror is quite a different place albeit with the same intent in its storytelling. Ironically, while Budapest is clearly behind Prague in its modernization and prosperity, a small fortune and quite a bit of ingenuity have gone into telling the story of how the Hungarian people have persevered while being occupied for nearly a half-century by hostile powers. Unlike the Czechs who seemed to have moved on from their tragic past, the Hungarian’s impressive House of Terror museum suggested that tyranny wasn’t a distant memory and was still deeply-rooted into the population’s psyche.

Of course, some of the collective psychology of these two places has to do with their respective economies (the Czech Republic is on fire while Hungary is waded in debt…similarly, Prague has proven to be a more captivating tourist destination than Budapest). One could make the argument that it’s a strong argument for a free market economy as the Czechs have embraced capitalism more than the Hungarians. But, there seem to be other factors at work here also – some of them potentially very historical in nature while others purely a function of the needs and wants of the people.

One particular conversation with a Hungarian summed it up for me. He said, “We see our fellow Soviet block folks like the Czechs and Croatians evolve into happier and prosperous people. It seems like they are getting everything they want, but we here in Hungary are barely able to get what we need.” The moral of the story: focus on your needs first and foremost and only then will you have the luxury of striving for those elusive wants. (Just as an aside: my partner Donald and I actually preferred Budapest for its impressive bathing culture and monumental architecture as we found Prague tilting too much toward tourist trinkets.)

Add comment July 25th, 2007

Job, Career, Calling

Are there times when your life just feels out of control?  I’ve been feeling that way lately – given all the travel, the fast growing company, and all the preparation for the launch of another book.  Fortunately, this weekend I went back to a practice that my good friend Jon Staub and I have been enjoying for years and years (but one I’ve neglected too often lately).  Each season, Jon and I would come up to his mountaintop ranch in Sonoma and do a three and a half day organic grape juice fast interspersed with meandering hikes, long steam baths, and the occasional nap.  It’s amazing how a fast can slow you down and put you back in touch with what’s essential in who you are.

While up here, I’ve been reading a fascinating book by Darrin McMahon called HAPPINESS: A HISTORY .  McMahon charts the history of that ephemeral concept called happiness and how it has morphed through time.  My favorite philosopher that he’s been quoting is Jean-Jacques Rousseau who wrote in the mid-1700’s.  On a fast, how can I not be drawn to writing that suggests our happiness can be “nothing external to us, nothing apart from ourselves and our existence”?  He made the point that happiness is not pleasure.  He went on to write, “The happiness for which my soul longs is not made up of fleeting moments (of pleasure), but of a single and lasting state.”  Rousseau questioned the era of Enlightenment with its modern concepts and new age of aesthetics.  He pondered, “What if the advance of modern civilization was the cause of this conflict, leading human beings not closer to their intended end but farther away, farther away from themselves?”

There’s something about Rousseau, Thoreau, and Maslow – beyond the fact that these three scholars have names that rhyme – that suggests the true purpose in life is to strip away the non-essential crap that tends to weigh us down (although they didn’t put it in those terms). Rousseau wrote, “Let us begin by re-becoming ourselves, by concentrating our attention upon ourselves, by circumscribing our soul with the same boundaries and limits that nature has given to our being; let us begin, in a word, by gathering ourselves here where we are.”  McMahan, in the book, suggests that “this language, with its suggestion of self-exploration and retrieval – finding the self, collecting the self, returning the self – is so common to our modern vocabulary that it is easy to miss both the novelty and the essential strangeness of Rousseau’s words.”  Rousseau – more than a quarter-millennium ago (yes, that’s more than 250 years) – wrote a very Maslovian statement when he penned, “As soon as man’s needs exceed his faculties and the objects of his desire expand and multiply, he must either remain eternally unhappy or seek a new form of being from which he can draw the resources he no longer finds in himself.”  This is the dilemma of modern man – constantly striving for things just beyond our reach (that typically have some external motivation).  Strangely, we pursue happiness when, in fact, we should settle into happiness as oppose to chasing it. 

Such are the meandering thoughts of a writer/CEO/overworked American who hasn’t had solid food in nearly 70 hours (yes, I do remember my last meal very well…but don’t get me started as I’ve done a phenomenal job of not thinking about all my favorite San Francisco restaurants).  On a fast, one has the time to do some serious self-reflection beyond how many inches will I lose from my waist.  What’s most been on my mind is something I write about in the last chapter of PEAK: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo from Maslow.  It’s the idea that we have one of three relationships with our work or how we make a living.  As with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory, the goal is to transcend the tangible base of the pyramid to find what’s more essential and personal at the intangible peak of the pyramid.

People with JOBS focus on the financial rewards of working more than the pleasure or fulfillment of what they’re doing.  Many of these folks may find their true enjoyment outside of their 9-to-5 existence.  Those with CAREERS focus primarily on growing their talent and advancement.  While they may gain quite a bit of satisfaction in their work, it is often associated with the esteem that comes from external sources (like recognition or raises).  The lucky few who pursue a CALLING find their work fulfilling in its own right, without regard for money or advancement.  Those pursuing their calling would recognize Maslow’s statement in their own life: “One must respond to one’s fate or one’s destiny or pay a heavy price.  One must yield to it; one must surrender to it.  One must permit one’s self to be chosen.”

Each of these three approaches to work correspond to a different level of what I call the Transformation Pyramid (Sustain / Succeed / Transform) or the Employee Pyramid (Money / Recognition / Meaning) – to learn more about those, buy PEAK when it comes out in September.

How do you know which level you, your friends, family, or work associates would be placed on this pyramid?  Based upon my fast and the reading I’ve been doing, it’s clear to me that happiness takes hold of us when we turn off the external antenna and tap into the internal.  The fact is, a spirit greater than you may be calling to a particular path in life but you and I put up such a collection of distractions and excuses that we can’t even hear the whispers of this calling in our ear.  Personally, that whisper has become a shout for me lately as the mud-wrestling between my career and my calling has been entertaining (if you’re the observer) but grueling. 

Given that this talk of job, career, calling, and just the basics of happiness have the risk of being vague, I created a test in PEAK for the reader to try and understand where they are in their life.  Feel free to take the following test, although beware that your answers will be influenced by your current state of mind, which means you may want to take the test twice, at least one week apart, to really gauge your accurate score.  Read each of the following statements and place a check next to the five that best describe your relationship with your current work.  Be careful, as it’s easy to think broadly about how certain statements SHOULD reflect your work life. What we’re looking for here are the statements that actually reflect your work life today:

1.  While I enjoy what I do at work and am very good at it, I often feel like I’ve “topped-out” and I have to look elsewhere – my home, my spiritual life, my friends, my hobbies, my community service – for inspiration or fulfillment.

2.  I tend to lose myself in my work.  I just feel like I’m in the “flow” and I lose all sense of time.

3.  I like what I do, but I don’t expect a lot from my work.  It just provides me what I need to do the other more important things in my life.  I enjoy my leisure life more than my work life.

4.  My work truly makes a difference in the world.

5.  The greatest experience I have at work is when I’m truly recognized by others for what I’ve accomplished.

6.  If I had to choose between receiving a 10% raise at work or finding a new best friend at work, I would probably choose the raise.

7.  I quite often feel like the work I’m doing is coming from some source bigger than me.  I’m just channeling this energy or this talent and I’m quite often amazed by its power.

8. I’m often not that excited to go to work on Monday morning.

9.  My goal in life is to rise to the top of my field.

10.  There are moments when I think to myself, “If I were independently wealthy, I’d probably still be doing this work.”  I do what I do because I just love it.

11.  I’ve thought pretty deeply about where my work will take me the next ten years and what I need to do to excel in this field.

12.  I’m pretty conscious to use my vacation time and sick days off so that I can create more  balance and  ensure that work doesn’t dominate my life.

13.  I often feel like my work allows me to show the “real me.”  My work lets me use my deepest creative gifts. 

14.  I think work is overrated when you consider what percentage of our lives we spend working as compared to enjoying life.  I don’t think much about work when I’m not there.

15.  I will do what it takes to become a success in my work.

Okay, I know that wasn’t easy. You may have had either a hard time trimming down to just five, or you may have found it difficult finding five statements that represent your perspective on your work.  Here’s how we’ll score them.  The following statements reflect someone who has a “job” perspective: 3, 6, 8, 12, and 14.  The “career” statements are: 1, 5, 9, 11, and 15.  And, the “calling” statements are: 2, 4, 7, 10, and 13.

How many did you have in each category?  Your dominant category will tell you a lot about your relationship with your current work.  If your dominant category wasn’t “calling,” don’t be alarmed, as most people find their calling outside of their work—whether it’s as a Girl Scout leader, a gardener, a tri-athlete, a devoted friend, or an ardent political activist.  The big question you need to ask yourself – and you don’t have to go on a half-week fast to figure this out (and credit to poet Mary Oliver for a portion of my phrasing) – is “Left to your own choice with no external influences, what would you do with this one precious life you’ve been given?”  Or think even bigger, “What’s the legacy you’ll leave long after you’re gone?”

With those audacious questions hanging in the air, I’m off to pursue my calling of this very moment: a deep-tissue detox massage.

Add comment June 17th, 2007

Mellow Musings on Maslow

You’re catching me in the midst of a peak experience. Woke up this Sunday morning to the call of a rooster at 5:45 am, sauntered down a cliffside trail–with the crescendo-ing crash of the surf to my right–to find myself alone in a shoulder deep sulphur-infused mineral bath perched precariously above a rocky Big Sur beach. Yes, I’ve made the trek to the Esalen Institute for a one-night getaway with my partner-in-curiosity and best friend, Vanda. Forty-five years ago, myth has it that Abraham Maslow and his wife just happened upon this burgeoning little community just as Maslow was becoming a superstar in the yet-to-be-named human potential movement. The Maslows were a little lost having survived the twists and turns of Highway One’s adrenaline-inducing path. When they innocently dropped in on Esalen looking for a place to stay, they were welcomed like the second coming in a Baptist revival tent. This turned out to be the first of many excursions for Abe to what became known as the most famous spot in the world for personal growth workshops and exploration. Strange irony that I was put in a room in the Maslow building and that there was a workshop on self-actualization going on in the slightly-too-noisy room right next door.

I will have an odd segue later today as I join my YPO (Young President’s Organization) mates in Carmel Valley for a two-day retreat of CEO navel-gazing. Similarly, here’s on odd segue for Esalen: I’m probably the only one down here who brought a Fortune magazine. Of course, I don’t read it in public, but as I was safely ensconced in my bed last night, I was reading the editor’s notes on their annual Fortune 500 issue. Geoff Colvin’s headline was “The 500 Gets Religion: Why Big Companies are in the Business of Solving the World’s Woes.” He starts his editor’s note with my favorite Peter Drucker question, “What business are you in?” (which starts one of the chapters in my new book PEAK, which comes out in September). He goes on to write that America’s biggest companies are remaking themselves, as they used to be in the business of solving people’s problems but now they’re in the business of solving the world’s problems. Colvin ultimately says these companies are doing this partly because the world needs these big solutions, but also because – while he doesn’t exactly quote Maslow – we are transcending the bottom of the human needs pyramid as we’ve become more affluent.

He writes, “Companies definitely aren’t solving society’s problems by taking care of employees the way they used to; we all know the trends in job security, pay, pensions, and health care coverage. But employers are trying to attract and hold employees in a new way that exactly parallels the change in how they’re appealing to consumers; by giving more meaning to their lives. That’s a deep shift in the way companies are managed.” Pinch me. No, harder. Has this Fortune magazine been scrubbed clean by the Esalen “meaning” police?….has the Gestalt Gestapo seized any capitalist reading material and sanitized it with a healthy dollop of Maslow’s meaning musings? Colvin goes on to cite GE’s CEO Jeffrey Immelt as an example of the new kind of business leader who’s as concerned about his employee’s meaning needs as he is about their basic pay package. Colvin writes, “An old-school cynic would respond that such a purpose doesn’t put groceries on the table, and that’s what employees need. But that kind of thinking doesn’t apply as broadly as it used to.”

Fortune meets Esalen….ten years ago, it was unimaginable, but today the new age has gotten practical and 21st century youthful entrepreneurs – who might have been soaking in a hot tub a generation ago – are using the capitalist system to make a difference and make a buck. In other words, they’re making a fortune with the an Esalen mindset. Similarly, the Fortune 500 realize that this socially responsible train is leaving the station and they best not be left behind. I guess it’s not surprising that the subconscious tune I’ve been humming for the past 24 hours has been “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” A place like Esalen just makes you feel idealistic in that Dorothy on a Kansas farm kind of way (especially when one – that one being me – is tapping on his laptop in the middle of an abundant organic garden overlooking the grand Pacific with a cloudless sun beating upon my back). We’ve come quite a way…exampled by this CEO humming that famous tune…while reading Fortune magazine.

Add comment May 7th, 2007

Can your company be a “BEST PLACE TO WORK” and be Results-Oriented at the same Time?

This past week, Joie de Vivre was honored as one of the 100 Best Companies to Work for in the Bay Area (including the full East Bay and Silicon Valley). We earned the honor of coming in 7th place for companies with 500-3,000 employees after having come in 6th place two years ago (we didn’t compete in 2006). This award is based upon a very thorough survey of a large sampling of the employees for the nearly 500 companies that compete. So, being a well-liked employer is an essential part of how a company makes the grade.

Yet, I was full of cognitive dissonance this week. Sadly, I had to abruptly terminate the contract of an outside PR company that wasn’t meeting the needs of one of our hotels, and, I also had to tell the landscape designer who was planning an overhaul of my backyard that this relationship wasn’t working either. Can you be a nice guy and get what you want in life? And, how does that principal apply to companies?

For nearly a decade, Joie de Vivre has been measuring our managers’ performance on a grid that shows RESULTS on one axis and RELATIONSHIPS on another axis. We rate our managers on a 1-4 scale (1 being outstanding, 4 being poor) on both Results and Relationships, which leads to four quadrants and sixteen boxes that a manager could find themselves in (for more info, take a look at my book The Rebel Rules , which talks more about this method of performance evaluation). We don’t promote managers who aren’t in quadrant one (being either a 1 or 2 in both Results and Relationships).

But, more recently, I’ve heard people within JdV make comments that might suggest our culture is favoring relationships over results. In other words, we’re a “great place to work” because we create a positive, recognition-driven culture that makes people feel good. There’s nothing wrong with that as long as the company is very focused and entrepreneurial in executing on its business plan. There are lots of “good vibe” companies that faced big challenges because they got a little too distracted with just being nice and friendly. Anita Roddick’s The Body Shop was socially responsible both externally and internally but they had a faulty business plan and poor execution in many ways and their performance suffered a nosedive. While Levi Strauss has more recently made some positive strides, a decade ago they were in a deadly downward spiral due to the complacent culture that had developed from their positive-spirited, yet results-blind environment.

My Executive Committee has heard me recently thumping the bible of results and accountability as we’ve seen a few of our hotels not perform as well as we would expect. Fortunately, the majority of our hotels are still gaining market share, but four years ago, 80% of our hotels were gaining market share during the biggest drop in American hotel revenues since World War II. We executed effectively when our back was up against the wall. Does that mean that fear needs to be the primary motivator in the business world? I don’t think so, but a healthy mix of fear, clarity of roles and responsibilities, and a reconnection with what makes us great will help almost any business start to right some of its performance metrics problems.

What do I mean by a “reconnection with what makes us great”? There are two parts to this. First, there’s just the basic business plan which, if it’s well thought through, can prove to be a trusty roadmap for success. It’s amazing how many companies deviate from their well-tested business plan because they just stopped executing properly (quite often, due to complacency or a new regime that didn’t recognize the importance of the business plan).

But, the other component of “what makes us great” is the part that takes us back to my title for this musing. Great companies have great purposes. Southwest Airlines is about the freedom to travel. Whole Foods Market is about nourishing the body whole. Apple is about creating technologies that serves and delight you in a truly unique way. Joie de Vivre is about creating joy. Companies that execute well engage their employees in a way that makes the employees feel a deep sense of mission and meaning in what they do. The National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago just published a study this month which showed that the professions with the highest job satisfaction ratings and general happiness were those where the employees look at their occupation as a calling. The top three professions were the clergy, physical therapists, and firefighters with the common theme being that these folks feel a deep sense of calling in what they do every day and they know their “results” – whether it’s ministering to someone in need, providing physical therapy to someone who is frail or injured, or putting out a fire at a family home – make a big difference to those they are serving.

So, one of the secrets to being a great place to work is to create that sense of mission or calling as employees’ performance skyrockets when they see what they’re doing is more than just a job or career. What happens to those employees who aren’t clearly pursuing their calling or have performance challenges? Even great places to work occasionally have to terminate poor performers, usually after giving the employee sufficient attention and tools to help turn things around. While Joie de Vivre is a very relationship-driven place, it hasn’t stopped us from ending someone’s employment if we see that the results that the business (and their co-workers) needs aren’t forthcoming from the employee or manager. It’s no fun telling someone they must leave (or, in some instances, finding them alternative employment within the company), but a company that doesn’t demand both results and relationships is putting all of its employees at risk in the very competitive business world we live in.

The founders of Hewlett-Packard proved decades ago that a great place to work can also be results-driven. I think it was Dave Packard who said “being a business leader is all about knowing when to be soft-hearted and when to be hard-headed.” That’s the kind of wise advice that’s helping me negotiate my way through the balancing act of creating both harmony and prosperity.

Add comment April 30th, 2007

Recommended books…

I’ve long been a fan of Peter Senge, author of The 5th Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization . On my recent trip to the Caribbean, I enjoyed his latest book, Presence: An Exploration of Profound Change in People, Organizations, and Society . Peter has also written the foreword to another thought-provoking book by Fred Kofman, Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values .

Add comment December 20th, 2006

My new book is out…

Marketing That Matters: 10 Practices to Profit Your Business and Change the World has just hit bookstores.

This is the third book from the Social Venture Network in their series on socially responsible business.

Add comment October 16th, 2006