Page 240 - Executive Warfare

EXECUTIVE W ARF ARE

If the consequences of not making your numbers in any quarter, even
for good reasons, are awful, you may be tempted to do something
unethical to make them. And if you are caught, your career is simply
finished.

SHOW THAT YOU ARE NOT DIVORCED FROM REALITY
As you rise, you will begin to influence your own organizational culture.
I happen to think it’s extraordinarily important not to become a carica-
ture like the one Michael Douglas played in the movie Wall Street—the
calculator executive who only understands one tongue—the balance sheet.
Of course, the temptation is always there to be numbers-focused and
unforgiving, given the intense pressure on returns coming from Wall
Street analysts and private equity own-
ers. But you have to remember that the
IT’S EASY TO people who work for you—the ones
CREATE A CULTURE whose efforts help to determine those
OF FEAR. WHAT’S returns—are generally not there
REALLY HARD IS because they want to be. They’re there
CREATING A because they have to be.
CULTURE OF So, if you build a cold, harsh, humor-
OPENNESS WHERE less environment for them,you are doing
PEOPLE GIVE YOU no more than running a prison, albeit a
THEIR BEST minimum security prison with tennis
EFFORTS AND court and gym. Your employees will do
THEIR BEST IDEAS. the very least they can to get by, just
enough to avoid solitary and no more.
It’s easy to create a culture of fear, in my opinion. What’s really hard is
creating a culture of openness where people give you their best efforts and
their best ideas.
As I rose at John Hancock, there were many good things about the
existing culture that I just took advantage of, including the fact that it was

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