In the beginning, a crisis appears and the Avengers team is called upon to save the planet. But the first problem is the Avengers are not a team. They have no unifying goal, no unifying purpose. They are just a collection of super-heroes trying to outshine each other. And until they actually came together as a team, they continued to be defeated by their enemies.
Your business may be just like this. You may have a collection of superheroes, but that doesn’t mean you have a team. Oh, sure, the people sitting around your senior leadership table probably call themselves a “team”. If you asked them if they are a team, of course they would say “yes” (what are they going to say?). The fact is they are probably not a team but a bunch of superheroes trying to outshine each other and look good in front of the boss. Just like the Avengers were.

You see, most organizations are not teams. They are just people sitting around a room, theoretically with a common interest (but in most cases not), calling themselves teams because that seems to be the rage these days.

Throughout the movie the Avengers suffered defeats and setbacks. But every time the Avengers suffered a setback, they came back stronger than before. And here is the really important part: The setback is what made them stronger. They learned how to defeat their enemy through the pain and agony of the setbacks. Had the setbacks not occurred, they would never have reached the strength to defeat the enemy in the end.

Your business will have setbacks. In fact, I would submit that you should welcome them. And if you learn from your setbacks, just like the Avengers did, you will be stronger for the next encounter with your enemy (otherwise known as the competition). If you don’t learn from them, or if you don’t use them to make you stronger, you will go down in permanent defeat (this is called Chapter 11).

The final lesson from the Avengers movie is this: As a collection of superheroes, they could not defeat a superior enemy. As a collection of superheroes they were incapable of prevailing. And not until nearly the end of the movie did they truly come together as a team. A team with one unifying goal, a team with one unifying purpose, and a team committed to just one goal-defeating the enemy. Only then did they become “The Avengers”

And this is what you have to do. Take your collection of superheroes and meld them truly into a team, with one unifying goal, with one unifying purpose-defeating your competition. Make them into “The Avengers”.

But Percy’s uncle took a liking to him and took him in, and he developed a special bond with him. Until he died when Percy was only seven.

And then Percy was forced to drop out of school in the fourth grade to support the family. And then his days were 14 hour work-a-thons at the spool mill.

And yet, in spite of all that, Percy taught himself math and science. He co-founded a defense contractor company. And he went on to invent the microwave.

In the book Succeeding When You’re Supposed To Fail, Rom Brafman examines the lives of people like Percy, and others, who had no reason to succeed, but in spite of all odds did. It is a fascinating look into the socio-psychological factors that cause people to be successful when they are supposed to fail.

This subject fascinates me. How is it two people, with the same socio-economic backgrounds can be so vastly different in the workplace? The airlines are a great example of this. I have been on many planes and seen 2 flight attendants on the same flight with vastly different attitudes. One has a terrific attitude, while the other is a “wombat in the air”. And yet they work for the same company, for the same supervisor, under the same working conditions, and probably for the same compensation.

But my analysis of this phenomenon is much more fundamental. By the time you or I get them as an employee-they are what they are.

But, as the title of this indicates, I am more concerned about people and companies that are supposed to succeed, but fail instead. Or you one of those?  Is everything just rosy with your company? Are you the darlings of the Inc. 500 set? Can you do no wrong? Well, you might be one of those companies that are about to fail, even though you are supposed to succeed-and indeed have been wildly successful.

Stone Equipment Company was just one of those companies. Starting from practically nothing, this privately held company in Honeyoe Falls, New York boostrapped its way to $55 M at its peak. And then it crashed and burned during the recession of 2009. Stone failed, when it was supposed to succeed.

Stone made all the right moves. An enlightened management team. An engaged Board. A thorough and comprehensive management succession plan. Self directed workforce. 100% employee owned through an ESOP. And yet they failed-and they weren’t supposed to.

Can this happen to your company? If it can happen to Stone, it can happen to any company. And it happened faster than anyone could have imagined-practically overnight. One minute $55M, the next and the banks are shutting you down.

So the point is-beware. Like an old friend of mine said, “just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean someone isn’t out to get you”.

Don’t misunderstand me, every organization needs policies. But for heaven’s sake, make sure they are grounded in the real world and serve the organization and the customer. Make sure they aren’t policies written by boneheads and administered by boneheads.

Case in point. I bought a $3K treadmill from Nordic Track and it hasn’t worked right since the day they delivered it. The delivery guys dropped it before they delivered it (and forgot to mention that to anyone), which caused all kinds of mechanical and electronic failures. And 3 months and 4 service calls later, it still wasn’t working.

About time for my money back or a brand-new unit, wouldn’t you say? Think again. Nordic Track has a bonehead policy that prohibits either one after 30 days of purchase. Never mind that I notified them of the problem 7 days after purchase. Never mind that they acknowledged a problem by sending out service and repair. Never mind that a good customer (this was my 3^rd Nordic Track purchase) had the product for 3 full months and it still was not working. The policy states that they will not refund or replace a unit after 30 days. Period.

I won’t bore you with the arguments I made with the boneheads at Nordic Track (including to the CEO of the company, who is the Chief Bonehead). But let me ask you this. Does that policy serve the customer? Of course not. Arguably you could say that policy serves the company, but it does not. I won’t ever buy another product from Nordic Track again. What’s the lifetime value of losing a fitness nut customer?

But I will also tell 10 of my best friends never to buy a product from Nordic Track. Each of them will tell 10 of their best friends…you get the picture. And in today’s instantly wired social media world, what happens if one of these stories goes viral? Instead of losing arguably 100 potential customers (10 x 10), it could be hundreds of thousands. If you do the math the cost of this stupid policy is nothing compared to the loss in future profit.

So if you’re smart, you’ll get rid of your boneheaded policies right now. Here’s where you start. Tell your team that they have 30 days to recommend the elimination of ½ the company policies. You don’t care which ½ they choose, but they must choose ½. They should include the financial (not just the cost, but the profit) and customer impact of eliminating these policies in their recommendations. And at the same time vigorously defend the policies they recommend keeping from a financial and customer perspective.

That will give you great insight into who the boneheads are, and which policies are bone-headed. And if you don’t know what to do next, you’re the bonehead.

Are you like that? Just because you are the President of your company, or the manager of your function, does that autoatically empower you with wisdom that no one else possesses? Hardly.

Every time I thought I had it down right, something comes along to humble me. Fortunately, those somethings have come along often enough to remind me that I don’t have all the answers. In fact, I don’t have most of them-and neither do you.

But your people and the marketplace do. Always look there for guidance and answers. Never be so arrogant that just because you are in charge makes you smarter than the planet. You’re not.

The other day I asked my executive assistant to send something out for me. Somewhat timidly, she told me she thought it was a really bad idea. I listened, and concluded she was right-it was a bad idea. She told me that I probably didn’t want her opinion (I hadn’t asked for it, but should have). I told her I always want her opinion and that as the CEO I had the power to make stupid decisions-but I rely on my team to keep me from making them. You should too.

An example we can all relate to is in a hotel. The problem with most hotels is no one “owns” the customer after the check-in. The front desk owns the customer while he is checking in, but afterwards no one seems to be responsible to be sure the guest is having an “I will use this hotel again and recommend it to my friends” experience.

Case in point: I was at a hotel recently when I had a leaking pipe in my room. So I called the front desk because I believe it owns the customer. The front desk told me they would notify maintenance-and they probably did. But an hour later the pipe was still leaking and still no maintenance. So I called the front desk again. They told me they had called maintenance before and would call them again. The front desk saw this as a maintenance problem. It was not. It was a customer experience problem, and in a hotel, the front desk should own it. All the front desk did that day was shift the problem to maintenance. And then they figured they had done their job and they were done. They weren’t.

The front desk should have asked maintenance for an estimate when they would arrive at my room to fix the problem. Then the front desk should have called me and gave me that estimate. And when the estimated time arrived, the front desk should have called me to see if maintenance had arrived. That is owning the customer. None of that happened. I had to call the front desk to tell them maintenance didn’t show up.

How often do your customers have to tell you when something is wrong with your product or service? I would bet every time. Do you think I was irritated because I had to call the front desk to tell them maintenance didn’t show up? You bet. Do you think your customers are irritated when they have to tell you your product didn’t work? You bet.

Who “owns” the customer experience in your company after the sale? Does anyone? Most companies think they are done after the sale unless they get a complaint. And they may be pretty good at fixing the problem (delivery, quality, wrong size, or whatever), but by then it is too late. The seeds of discontent have been sown.

The point is this: You should build in checkpoints along the post-sale process to proactively determine if the customer experience was excellent or not-and intervene to solve any problems before the customer complains. Don’t make them call you because by then the seeds of discontent have been sown- first because something isn’t right-and second because they had to take the time to call and tell you about it.

After the sale notify the customer when to expect delivery (Amazon does a great job at this) and a method for tracking the shipment. After the shipment date, ask the customer if they were satisfied with the purchase (this can be automated). And of course if it wasn’t, make it right promptly and then ask them again if you have fixed the problem to their satisfaction.

I know what you are saying. “My sales person owns the customer” The problem with that approach is most sales people are more interested in making the next sale than the care and feeding of the last one.. You’re probably better off letting your sales people sell and building in an automatic process to track the post-sale activity.

Always remember this: Beware the seeds of discontent. It’s a great way to lose customers.

Your business can be just like that. If you are not watching it closely, small problems set in. Maybe lead times slip a  little bit every year. Perhaps the margins erode just a little bit every year. Operating expenses creep up, product development slows down, and customer service starts slipping-just a little bit every year.

And then, seemingly overnight your business has lost customers, market share, and profits and is in serious trouble. Your business is in a crisis and you don’t know what to do.

Here is what to do-don’t let it get there to begin with. Get on the scale of your business and check it’s health every single day. Watch it like a hawk and when it slips, correct it immediately. Don’t be like Best Buy, a company that is going out of business slowly (read this link from Forbes.com  http://ow.ly/8BZVO).

When it was time to board the plane, it was delayed because the flight crew was late because of the rain. Now mind you, everyone was on time for the flight that night-everyone except the flight crew. Gee, shucks ladies and gentlemen, we are sorry we are late, but the rain and traffic, you know.

Now the flight crew flies out of Rio all the time. So they know what everybody else knows about Friday nights in Rio in the rain. Big time traffic jam. So they know it will take twice as long to get to the airport and if they don’t leave early, the flight will be delayed. They know this, but they still didn’t leave early. And this is not a one- time event. Whenever it is raining in Rio on a Friday night all the flight crews know the flight will be delayed if they don’t leave their hotel early. But they never do. Why? Because it doesn’t matter to them if the flight is delayed- they don’t have connections to make. And it would be inconvenient for them to have to leave their hotel early. You see, they don’t run their crew scheduling for your convenience. They run it for theirs. They do what they feel like- these are flight crews running amok.

The airlines spend hundreds of millions on new aircraft. And they let their flight crews decide whether to be on time for the flight or not. They spend millions on in-seat entertainment systems. And they let their flight crews inconvenience hundreds of passengers. They spend thousands on duvets and fine wines. And yet they let their flight crews run amok.

Imagine giving all your employees a pass on getting to work on time because it was raining. “Gee boss, we’re sorry. We know we should leave for work earlier when it’s raining but we don’t”. Or how about this one. “Gee Mr. Customer, we were late on your delivery because it was raining here. In fact we will always be late on your delivery whenever it’s raining here. Why? Because our employees are running amok”.

The airlines manage their operations for their convenience, not for the convenience of their customers. They run their flight schedules, food, beverage, and baggage service all for their own convenience-without a thought about what their customers would prefer. The airlines can get away with this nonsense because they are government subsidized monopolies. You can’t, but you could be guilty of the same thing.

Are you? Let’s find out. Do you produce your product according to when the customer wants you to, or at your convenience? Do you ship your product at a time and cost that is most convenient for you or when your customer would prefer it? If your customer has a question or issue at 2 in the morning do you answer it promptly, or is that too inconvenient for you? Have you designed your entire company to be efficient and effective according to what is best for you-or your customer?

Take a fresh look at this from your customer’s eyes. How would they prefer to do business with you? And don’t let your company run amok.

But most of the things you might do are expensive, and risky. You know the stuff I mean-big bets on technology, expensive marketing and sales campaigns, etc. That is not what you want and what will get you there. You need what I call The Ten Million Dollar Solution™. The Ten Million Dollar Solution™ is simple in concept but very difficult in practice. It takes kahonies. It takes the courage to tell your  human resource people to back off. Because they won’t like it. They won’t like it because it rocks the boat and has the potential for legal risk. But so does getting out of bed in the morning. If the human resource people  had their way, they would have you lie in bed with the blinds closed praying to God that no one would sue you today. Well, no one will if you do nothing all the time (well, maybe no one will).

But that is not how you leapfrog your competitors. That is not how you stand out in the crowd. That is not how you create super value. The steps to triple profits and create super value start with your balance sheet. I don’t mean your financial balance sheet. I mean your employee balance sheet. This is the foundation for everything else The Ten Million Dollar Solution™ offers you. If you don’t get the foundation right, you can’t build the house.

I worked for a guy once who told me “as a general manager, you only manage two things-people and assets”.  That is so true, but the problem is, most managers are very comfortable in managing punch presses, but not people. That is why your company probably has a bunch of toxic employees-because your supervisors don’t have the guts to do something about them.

If you want to triple profits, you have to lose the laggards and losers on the balance sheet and shore it up with heroes and jewels. Jewels like the maid I met not long ago at a Marriot Courtyard. As I was leaving the room she asked me if I was checking out. No surprise here, she needs to know if she can clean the room for the next guest. But here was the surprise-that is not why she was asking me. When I told her yes, she said something that startled me. She said “Well, Mr. Blue, we certainly enjoyed having you stay with us. I am sorry to see you leave and hope you’ll come back and see us again soon. Thank you for staying with us”. She told me she really enjoyed having me stay there, thanked me and said she hoped to see me again soon. Now that is the power of a jewel employee! What is an employee like that worth? I say Ten Million. What do you say?

And can you believe this? In an undifferentiated market (like the hotel industry where all the hotels along the row are exactly like one another), a “jewel” employee can differentiate your company. The next time I am in town, I will stay at this Courtyard, all because of the way the maid treated me upon check-out. Imagine that-just a few kind words from the maid were worth more to me than the millions the Courtyard spent on marble and mahogany.

You have to bookend the customer experience so the first and the last contact is with one of your jewels. But, like I said, if you clean up your balance sheet, you won’t have anything but jewels!!

In the coming months, we’ll explore the Ten Million Dollar Solution™.  I’ll bring you ideas and concepts that I have used to triple profits. But let’s explore this together. Tell me your thoughts and ideas on things you have done that have worked. Let’s make 2012 the year you triple your profits