The Tobacco Plug

Sometimes we learn from the most unlikely of places. A number of years ago, I went to visit my grandmother, then 82 years old, in White Sulphur Springs W.Va. I didn’t visit her often, but since she was going to be alone that Thanksgiving Day, I thought the least I could do was to stop by for a long weekend. After a fine meal filled with wild stories of family members long passed, my grandmother announced that she wanted to pay a visit, over the mountains, to her sister Marge the next day. The plan was set; early after breakfast I would drive “Mama” over the mountains to Marge’s farm.

The trip began without event, with Mama strapped into the front passenger seat of my bright yellow 1976 Datsun B-210. Now, my car was a lot like most of my friends’ cars. It wasn’t much to look at but was filled with interesting distractions: cassette player, dart board, two or three bottles of beer, an old pair of Nike’s, and – maybe surprisingly – a small pouch of Levi Garrett chewing tobacco. Unfortunately, it was the tobacco that Mama spied first. Immediately she asked if it was mine. How can you lie to an 82-year-old grandmother? “Yes, Mama, it’s mine,” I replied sheepishly, not sure of what question was next. “Do you want a plug now?” was the next question out of Mama’s lips. I wasn’t sure what my response should be. I did indeed enjoy a little chew while driving in those days and we had a few hours to get to Aunt Marge’s farm so, hesitantly, I said yes!

What Mama then did was a mix of art, love and history. She proceeded to tell me that her father, William Bryson Hill (the namesake of my son Bryson), chewed tobacco every day of his life, and was very particular with how he liked his plug. With that, she began pulling leaves out of the pouch, pinching off the stems and butts and smoothing those tobacco leaves out in her soft leathery 82 year old hands. After nine or ten leaves, she tucked the ends and rolled the leaves into what looked like a small black cigar. “Just how he liked it,” she said, with the glint in her eye of a ten year old and in the voice of an old woman. With that she passed me the plug and said it would last all day.


Thinking back on that day, now 27 years past, I realize I had the chance to actually experience history. I never asked Mama the last time she had made a plug of tobacco for her father. Was it 1910? 1915? Certainly no later that 1919, when she went off to “Standard School” to become a teacher. Regardless of the exact date, I felt a powerful sense of the hand of my great grandfather, reaching across the decades and thanking his eleventh child, my grandmother, for a fresh plug.

Over the years I have tried to replicate the plug that Mama rolled that day. I have counted out the leaves, picked off the stems, even rolled and tucked the ends into a small plug. Even with practice, it’s never been the same. It’s often that way in the lessons of life. We must find a way to keep our eyes open in the here and now. Too often we are worrying about something that is looming in the future, or maybe ruminating over something that has happened in the past. This life of ours is happening “live,” right now in the present! We need to keep our eyes open, ever expectant to experience history, and possibly to receive a tobacco plug from another century.

Lens of Success

I’m not certain when it started. Sometime maybe ten years ago my wife, Jennie, and I were asked the question, “What do we aspire for our children?” At that time we had only my son, Bryson; Marie had not yet appeared on the scene. Without much hesitation, we responded that we hoped for him to be happy, healthy, self-sustaining, and a productive citizen. Jen and I hadn’t discussed it in detail. We hadn’t used any sort of analytical process to clarify priorities. I don’t even remember if I came up with some of the ideas, and Jen others. What I do know is that for the last ten years or so we have shared those four simple priorities numerous times and our conviction around them continues to grow.

Interestingly, as our children have grown, the questions from family and friends about our views of their future have become more and more pointed. Someone will hear Marie at the piano and ask whether we hope for her a musical future and career. Another person will see Bryson pitch at a little league game and ponder about his potential as a left-handed big league pitcher. Regardless of the vector of the question, we always respond with our four wishes, that whatever they choose to pursue, we aspire for them to be happy, healthy, self-sustaining, and productive citizens.

As often happens with parents who actually listen to things they say to/about their kids, I started to reflect on these four simple aspirations and wonder how they apply to me. Over the past 20+ years of my professional life, I have aspired to and achieved numerous goals. I have had the chance to lead large organizations, be accountable for large P&Ls, travel professionally all across the globe, and attend amazing world events. Additionally I have had the chance to work closely with a range of well-known individuals including numerous corporate CEOs and a former U.S. President. Regardless of the achievement associated with these experiences, did they drive me to be happy, healthy, self-sustaining, and a good citizen?

As I reflect not only on my life, but also on the world at large, I am reminded of the dangers and limits of certain definitions of success. In a recent conversation with an old friend, we compared notes on a worrisome phenomenon. Both of us had worked for major, publicly traded, Fortune 50 companies. In both, there was a tendency inside the culture to view senior executives in a different light than all other employees. My friend commented that in his company, “it seemed that if you were a Vice President or above, you weren’t just in a higher position than others, you were a better person than others.” When did the title of a job, define the character of a person? When did professional promotions recognize core human values? I have known numerous senior executives across my career whose characters couldn’t hold a candle to the associates within their organizations.

The past few years, with the worldwide economic challenges, must remind us that material achievement is not the highest calling of humanity. When did materialism and consumerism become the ultimate aspirations of humanity or America? We cannot allow ourselves to be tempted to think that one’s purchasing power actually defines one’s character. We must aspire for more, or maybe actually less. The following are a few touchstones that may make better aspirations for all of us than Gordon Gekko’s simplistic admonition that “greed is good.”


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
-- Declaration of Independence

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today!
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today!”
-- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “I Have a Dream” Speech


While these two points of inspiration may seem a challenge in the day-to-day routine of life, maybe we can all start by considering our own “lens” of success, and by aspiring for our kids, ourselves, our countries and our world to be:
happy, healthy, self-sustaining and good citizens.

"To whom much is given, much is expected"

Anyone who has ever known me, worked with me or even spent a half-hour over a cup of coffee with me knows that I’m an optimist. Maybe it comes from falling in love with the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life” as a boy, or maybe from losing my mother at a young age and realizing that life is a precious treasure. Regardless of origin, I try to view each day as an opportunity rather than a chore. And while I don’t completely believe that “practice makes perfect,” (I know nothing in human achievement that can be described as “perfect”), I do believe we have an infinite ability to make tomorrow better than yesterday.

To put it simply, I try to live on the sunny side of the street.

But things got a little cloudy the other day when I had lunch with an old friend. He is in his late 50’s, in good health, and retired a few years ago with a tidy nest egg in the high seven digit range. He dreamed of lots of golf and lots of time with grandkids...and appears to be enjoying both. But what dominated our conversation were not tales of birdies and babysitting, but the impact that the financial decline had on his precious nest egg. It became clear that the market contraction between 2007 and 2009 caused a similar contraction of his savings. This certainly had a significant impact on him, one that was dominating his thoughts and disturbing his dreams. Instead of trying to relate my blog story of “Anton Ego” I decided to take a different path.

Referring to World Bank data from 2008, I started to share the income facts of the world for with friend. I reminded him that the world has just over 6 billion residents, and that while it seemed hard to believe from our comfortable seats with lattes in hand, almost 1 billion people live on less that $1.00 perday. To make the point even harsher, almost half of the world – just shy of 3 billion men and women, boys and girls – live on less than $2.50 a day. Finally, I reminded him that more than 80% of the world, almost 5 billion souls, live on less than $10.00 each day.

I know it’s easy to get caught up in our worlds and our lives, with our issues and challenges. We all do it! While losing millions of dollars from your retirement savings is no small concern, remembering the millions that you still have may be the better place to start. I am not sure what my friend is going to do differently in his life, but I can promise you that the nature of our “coffee chat” changed dramatically.

Try to remember that we all have so much compared to most of the world. What can we offer at our local food banks and soup kitchens? What can we generously give to UNICEF, CARE, or other groups across the world? Whatever form it might take, we can all do more and the world is crying out now more than ever.

A recent report on world poverty paints a haunting picture.

According to UNICEF, 25,000 children die each day due to poverty. And they “die quietly in some of the poorest villages on earth, far removed from the scrutiny and the conscience of the world. Being meek and weak in life makes these dying multitudes even more invisible in death.”

Sure, it’s painful when our portfolio takes a hit. And maybe we can’t avoid a little rain on our side of the street. But how can that possibly compare to the plight of the rest of the world? With that message ringing in our ears, I am convinced that while I don’t think we can make tomorrow “perfect,” there is so much that we can all DO to make tomorrow better than yesterday…
EVERY tomorrow better than EVERY yesterday!

Execute, Build Skills, and Excel

As my final entry to complement the past three, I want to briefly cover a simple three-part concept that I have found helpful in my work personally and my work with clients. In “PBR,” the first of the past three, I focused on the need to slow down and take a moment to reflect on alternatives before engaging. Secondly, in the entry titled “Act with Intent,” I covered the idea that through solid planning, we can guide our actions for maximum impact. Finally, in “Act with Intent: Redux,” my focus was on the fact that our actions, not our intentions, are the testimony of our lives.
The three concepts are both simple to grasp and often difficult to bring to life. If we can find ways to keep the three ideas of “Execute, Build Skills, and Excel” fresh in our minds as we enter new roles, or face new challenges, we will find ourselves more and more successful over time.
First and foremost, we must focus on execution. Do the work that is required at the moment in whatever role you may have. As I discussed in the entry “Breaking the Ice,” regardless of the nature of the role, do it well. We have all faced situations in our personal and work lives when the best crafted strategies and plans fail on the rocks of poor execution. Stay focused on the requirements of the role you are in and “Execute” well!
The second idea is to always “Build Skills.” Whether you are early in your career or have been at it for decades, you always must be focused on learning new things and building your skills. At a recent lunch, a 66-year-old CEO friend shared with me a powerful story about how much he was learning TODAY as his company is working to expand into a new channel of trade. Not only was it inspiring for me to hear, I also could tell from his energy that this process of “building skills” was reinvigorating for him, even though he has run this company for more than a decade.
Finally, we should find areas of our work or personal lives where we can “Excel.” Look to find situations where you can bring your skills, experiences, and passions to bear and perform in a superior way. Not only will the organization benefit, but you will find yourself becoming a teacher to others in YOUR areas of excellence. As I covered in the entry “A teachable point of view,” the best leaders are the best teachers!
Again, easier said than done. Find ways to bring all three concepts to life as you think about your work. Focus on the “execution” needs facing you TODAY! Look to “build skills” EVERY DAY, regardless of your age or tenure in role. Finally, get in touch with the areas of your role where you can truly “excel” and find ways to become a practitioner and teacher in those areas.

Act with Intent: Redux

To extend the concept that I wrote about in the last entry, I wanted to explore and share a few more ideas on this subject.  This idea of “acting with intent,” working to be thoughtful and present in the actions in our lives, is relevant to young and old alike.  Regardless of whether we are students or professionals, children or parents, we are often faced with situations and challenges that call for a moment of consideration before diving into action. 

Recently I encouraged a dear friend to read Sun Tzu’s “Art of War” and watch the movie, “The Reader.”   Since seeing the film for the first time last year, I have continued to think about, and be challenged by, a number of its themes and messages.  While there are many concepts and issues brought to life, the film makes a dramatic statement about taking action.  More than halfway through the film, there is a very quick scene in which the young protagonist is having a private conversation with his law professor.  In an effort to gain advice, the student shares the details of a complex dilemma that he is facing.  His professor responds strongly:

 

“What we feel isn’t important, it’s utterly unimportant. 

The only question is what we do.”

 

While I can’t say that I believe all of our emotions, feeling and intentions are “unimportant,” the film makes an extremely strong point that we are all judged by our actions – or inactions – not our intentions and feelings.

As a final thought on this subject, I wanted to share a quote from President Obama’s eulogy for Senator Edward M. Kennedy:

“We cannot know for certain how long we have here. We cannot foresee the trials or misfortunes that will test us along the way. We cannot know what God's plan is for us.

What we can do is to live out our lives as best we can with purpose, and with love, and with joy. We can use each day to show those who are closest to us how much we care about them, and treat others with the kindness and respect that we wish for ourselves. We can learn from our mistakes and grow from our failures. And we can strive at all costs to make a better world, so that someday, if we are blessed with the chance to look back on our time here, we know that we spent it well; that we made a difference; that our fleeting presence had a lasting impact on the lives of others."

It should be all of our aspirations to work hard to make tomorrow better than yesterday.  To make mistakes, but not be derailed by them, ever looking forward to what we may do to make a “better world.”  To realize that while our time is “fleeting,” we CAN and DO have a “lasting impact” on those around us.

Act with intent

 

It has struck me over the past few weeks how often I have been talking to folks about the possible actions that lay ahead in their worlds; trying to play a role to help them think through the issues and possible alternatives that lie ahead of them.  Whether chatting with personal friends, or in discussions with consulting clients,  I have been interested in the number of common themes and situations.  There is typically an issue at hand, either business or personal (often mixed), and the intensity of the moment combined with a heavy dose of emotions leads to the desire to take action immediately.  Remembering the recent entry on "PBR", my first nudge is to try to slow down the entire situation.  Usually by asking a few innocent questions, i get the individual to describe the situation, the issue at hand, what actions brought the current situation to a head, etc.

 

While this technique usually slows down the "heat" of the moment, it also allows me to start understanding the situation, always looking for the "core issue" at hand.  In a training class that I attended more than ten years ago, we were trained to "ask why five times."  This idea helps one to dig into issues, and whether the right number is five, versus three or seven, the key is to dig. Once some sort of problem statement is clarified, I try to facilitate a discussion exploring alternatives.   By focusing on options "close-in" at first, the discussion usually flows freely.  Next by pushing to discuss radical, or "out of the box" options, the ideas can seem farcical and almost impossible to even discuss.  This "stretch" discussion opens the door to a third group of options, somewhere between "close-in" and "radical".  It's often in this section that actually the best options arise, the outgrowth of the conversation exploring the edges of possibilities.  Now we are ready to talk about the action plan ahead!

 

This rambling discussion is my way to say that all of us have issues and challenges at hand.  Whether in our work lives, or our personal worlds (or the confluence of those two streams),we all need to slow down a second and map out our situation and look at alternatives before diving impulsively into action.  After one of these conversations, I recently encouraged a friend of mine to track down  that  piece of fresh thinking, Art of War by Sun Tzu, from the 6th century B.C.  In thinking about it's core concepts, there is a fundamental belief that acting without planning is unwise and dangerous.  A great quote from the piece follows:

 

    Now the general who wins a battle makes many calculations in his temple ere the battle is fought. The general who loses a battle makes but few calculations beforehand.  Thus do many calculations lead to victory, and few calculations to defeat:      how much more no calculation at all!  It is by attention to this point that I can foresee who is likely to win or lose.

 

 Even if the situations we are facing seem daunting, we should slow down, try to understand the problem at hand, make our "many calculations", and act with intent!

 

"PBR"... Maybe not what you think!

I know, I know... an unlikely image for one of my blog entries!  Just to set the record straight, I have nothing against Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer.  In fact, i have enjoyed one or two (maybe a few more!) over the years and there is something special about drinking an ice cold "PBR" out of a 16 oz. "tallboy" can.     Very refreshing!

What I want to share today is how those letters, the easy to remember "PBR" have become an often used coaching tool in my vocabulary.  Through out my career, I have often found myself in the middle of some discussion, presentation or debate "chomping at the bit" to answer a question, refute a point, or clarify an issue.  I don't know about you, but especially early in my worklife there were moments when I wouldn't be able to stop myself from butting right in and responding.  I realized over time that if I could just slow down for a moment, listen more deeply to the discussion/debate, that I would understand the situation much more clearly and my response was able to be all the more impactful.  While not foolproof, I started to work on this idea and I co-opted the famous acronym ,"PBR", to help me remember to slow it down.  "PBR" started to mean to me to "Pause", "Breathe", and "Reconnect" .  The idea was that rather than quickly diving into an issue or a debate with a not very well thought through comment, my metal model was to try to slow down and "Pause", take a moment and "Breathe." Assess the situation, the landscape, the personalities, the politics, the body language, etc. Then and only then, "Reconnect" to the discussion/debate and bring a more thoughtful response to the issues at hand.

Over the past few months, this idea of "PBR", has become the center point in discussions with a number of friends and consulting clients.  I have found myself looking for logos, cans, 12packs, t-shirts, etc. all with the famous "PBR" logo, to use as helpful reminders.  The friends and clients have put them in their offices, into their notebooks, on the back of their blackberries, all trying to keep the idea of "Pause, Breathe, and Reconnect", front and center in their day to day environments.  What has been interesting to me is the feedback from these folks trying to use this simple idea.  Their comments have been that while it has been helpful in live interactions (where I personally needed the most help), many have found it very helpful in the midst of e-mail interactions.  How easy it is to shoot off a quick email or text message with out taking a moment to slow things down and consider the situation ...  another moment for "PBR"!

As you go about your day, keep "PBR" in mind.  Whether in live interactions, phone calls, or email/text communications, practice "Pausing, Breathing, and Reconnecting", and see how it might enhance and improve your communications.  As part of the process, if you need to drain a few cans or bottles to acquire the required "mnemonic triggers", please enjoy responsibly!