About me and People as a Business

First, a little about me.  Why I'm writing and where this comes from.  (part 1 of 4)

 Although born in the Midwest, I grew up in the Northwest hiking, boating, fishing, running and water skiing. I started playing baseball, the violin, chess and poker at 4.  I also played a lot of neighborhood basketball and football as I grew up.  I took up golf when I tried out for the high school golf team.  The coach and team took pity on me, making me the first alternate (# 6 on a 5 person team) and I continued playing into college.  I also boxed in college, but quit in my early twenties because I had difficulty finding a coach….creeping up a weight category and getting pounded a few times may have also contributed.  It might also answer why I got into HR – I like punishment?!   I switched from the violin to the guitar as a teenager and still play.   As time allows, I still play ball, golf, fly fish and fish. 

I am one half of a pair of 2 sets of brothers born 20 years apart to the same parents.   We had a fearless supporting protective stay at home mother and our father was the National Director of Personnel (Human Resources) and Industrial and Labor Relations for Todd Shipyards and retired during the ship building industry collapse of the ‘80s and ‘90s. He chaired a dozen large Benefit Trusts into his 90s.

For utter lack of good sense, as mentioned previously, I somewhat backed into Human Resources and the Talent and People business.  As silly as it may sound, I never considered this following my father’s footsteps.  However, because of this, some say I have an HR pedigree.  I would like to think I acquired or inherited my father’s gift for never ending curiosity, a genuine interest in business and almost everyone, relating and communicating with people from every walk of life, an easy sense of humor, a genuinely happy disposition coupled with laser like legal and business sense, wit and a burning passion for championing people.  I know I inherited his unusually intense people as a business outlook.  So…I can only hope it is a pedigree. 

I fix things:  cars, toasters, washing machines, clocks, boats, outboards, fishing reels, houses, holes, decks, slivers, burns, cuts …. I believe most things are fixable, not disposable. I have been doing this since I was 4 when I took apart a wind up alarm clock and put it back together.  To my mother’s amazement, it worked…even though a part was left over! I remember the incident and wasn’t surprised it worked! (I must have been very busy in my 4^th year.) I did the same with my first automobile engine at 16, with a part or two left over, it ran perfectly! 

People I have worked with describe me as a real thinker.  Are there fake thinkers?  They will also tell you I never give up and I can fix anything.  I agree.  I feel the same about business and people; they are fixable, not disposable… except, I can’t fix people (like a psychologist or fixing a broken clock).  I can only give them the tools.

I also fix companies.  I have help found, developed from scratch, grown, merged, acquired, transitioned, turned around, sold and gone through 5 IPOs, 8 public to private transitions with 50+ successful M&As.   I design, develop, fix, retrofit or overlay cultures, policies, procedures, brands, HR, Talent, People Services, recruiting/acquisition, manufacturing, flow, processes, profits, sales, shipping, warehousing, HRMS, POS, ICS, supply, logistics…but, I can’t fix top leaders.  I can show, tell and demonstrate what owners, C-levels and boards need to do to demonstrate trustworthiness to their employees to get their people engaged, productive, happy (well relatively, it is just a job to many), aware, valued, trusted, team oriented, cheer leading, profit oriented and motivated.   But, unless leaders are people motivated and oriented and/or truly want to change to people as their business, the changes will be cosmetic not structural… I can’t fix leadership….

I like to win but don’t love winning to the exclusion of enjoying the game.  I’m not saying I like to lose either.  I simply admire and appreciate a job well done, a strategy well designed and played, even when out maneuvered, out played or beaten.  It becomes a life lesson. However, I am very hard on myself when my own mistakes cause a loss! Since I have made a lot of mistakes one could say I am full of life lessons.

I became and still am a Human Resources/Talent and People Exec. Along the way I added retail store operations and management, hotel hospitality, cruise lines, consumer manufacturing, a diversified array of electronics, industry, services, real estate development and the warehousing, logistics, distribution and fulfillment supporting large retail.  During this journey I have been so very fortunate to have worked with the very best. 

As a result I have a unique insight into how the not so very best, to the terrible, actually appear.   When compared to the accomplishments of great companies, inspiring great trust and attracting and developing great people, poor work cultures are actually disconnected from the supportive people culture that drives sales, profits, develops longevity and retains the repeat customer.   In fact these poor cultures reinforce lack of engagement, poor performance, bad morale and bad management. The worst part is they just don’t know it or, more tragic, don't care!

Next installment:  Why we have employment laws and where we have gone.