CHAPTER

6

Food Fights:
You Are Not the Referee

The war between R&D and Sales &
Marketing was vivid and alive in every
discussion and every moment. The pot
shots, the digs, the opportunities to take
advantage or to prove a point among the
top executives—all this is very real.

—Ginger Graham

Back in my high-tech corporate days representing Quality Assurance, I sat in meetings that included people from R&D and Sales & Marketing. The groups didn’t like each other. Someone would make a snide comment, then another. In several meetings, it escalated to shoving and chair throwing. Clearly something much deeper was going on here besides surface discussion about, say, delaying the release date of a new software upgrade. All this anger and resentment had the feeling of a schoolyard brawl. I knew people like this in junior high and high school.

For example, in high school there was a group of kids—mostly boys—who were in the math club. They were armed with slide rules on their belts (back in my day), wore glasses and didn’t have dates on Saturday night. Guess what happened to them? They got PhDs and ended up in corporate R&D departments.

Then there was another group of boys. Good looking, socially at ease, jocks, and class officers. They were cool. They got all the good looking girls. Guess what happened to them? They earned MBAs and ended up in corporate sales and marketing departments.

Now these two groups found themselves sitting across the table trying to work together on some new product release. They didn’t like each other in junior high and high school, and they still don’t. I heard comments like: “Those people in marketing don’t have a clue how this stuff works. They just play golf and go to lunch with clients.” Or, conversely, “Nothing happens until somebody sells something. These R&D geeks couldn’t talk to a customer if you put a gun to their head.” And so it went.

It is just this kind of deep-seated suspicion of people from other functional groups that can cause a food fight to erupt for no apparent reason. You get 10 people around a table who are all strong-willed, extremely bright, and have a huge depth of knowledge in their particular area, and they start jockeying for position: money, power, turf, resources. Pretty soon a full blown food fight erupts over something that has nothing to do with what you’re presenting.

Here, the role of the CEO is like the teacher in the schoolyard—get these kids to play cooperatively together. As Ginger Graham noted, “These are two different operating styles. We need both the analytic and passionate views, and a good management team will have both.” Getting them to work together is the real trick.

Without direct power or authority over these people, your role is to listen, attempt to refocus the group, and failing that, enlist your sponsor’s help. In our next challenge, the Food Fight, Brent Bloom, Senior Director, KLA-Tencor, had to deal with people yelling at each other about issues completely unrelated to his presentation. Arguments erupted about the money being spent on training and the assertion that training can never be a profit center. It went on and on. Brent simply was not prepared for it.

Brent Bloom started his career at KLA-Tencor in 1986. He initially worked in engineering-related jobs focusing on hardware and software support. He was soon promoted to management roles that gave him exposure to the senior executives. He moved on to leadership positions in training and development. Brent frequently presents to KLA-Tencor’s top-level executives.

Brent’s objective was to get funding for a “media management tool.” He anticipated that the meeting would include all the top leadership of the company, and the topic could prove contentious. Additionally, he knew that with limited funds there would be tough questions asked about how this project fit into the bigger picture.

“As with any organization, the leaders are fighting for resources for all kinds of projects, so there may be some discussion around where this project falls in importance compared to some of the other projects that are up for funding,” Brent said before the presentation. “You always hope that things go calmly but you never know. This is definitely something that will create some dialogue and passionate debate, so I need to be prepared for that.”

Brent had barely established the timeframe for the presentation and its subject matter when the heated discussion he had anticipated erupted into a rip-roaring executive food fight. As the executives verbally assaulted each other in an apparent turf war, Brent made a couple of feeble attempts to refocus the group, but to no avail. He could barely get a word in edgewise.

As the verbal battle escalated, Corinne Nevinny, loudly asserted, “This is about revenue enhancement, not cost containment!” Then Robert Drolet shot back at her, “This is just another of Dan’s pet projects,” and it went downhill from there.

“What the hell do I do now?” Brent wondered. Despite being well prepared even to the point of anticipating a volatile reaction, he had lost control. Finally he just gave up. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he looked from one side of the conference table to the other like a spectator watching a tennis match.

“That didn’t go like I’d planned,” he said afterwards. “I had a short presentation that laid out the key points and next thing I know, it’s out of control, and they’re going all over the place with the conversation. It seemed like I was in a hole and they kept shoveling dirt in on top of me. It felt like a death spiral.”

Brent’s sponsor did not come to his aid, and Brent’s lack of engagement with the executives hurt him. “A lot of presentation success comes down to the way you keep the flow, the style, and the interpersonal dynamics of the presentation on the right track,” said Bryan Lamkin. Brent failed on that front.

Executive Advice

You don’t want to get into a fight between the C-levels. You’re not going to win that.

—Mike Lyons

If the sponsor doesn’t step in and save it, then the presenter is at a loss.

—Robert Drolet

What you don’t want to do is for both you and your sponsor to sit back and let it happen.

—Steve Kirsch

The food fight is definitely a tricky business. Timing is important. The presenter must try to regain focus, but not interrupt too soon. When Brent saw the discussion was getting overheated, very lengthy, and off track, he needed to assert himself and take action, but instead he backed away from the table and looked timid. It was up to him and/or his sponsor to grab hold of a specific concern voiced in the group and address it before the executives started going at each other. That way, at least the fight would have been focused around Brent’s agenda.

As Mike Lyons commented, “If heat is coming because C-level executives don’t agree with each other, then all you can do is try to accurately reflect the positions you hear being expressed, make a recommendation, then stand back and let them decide.”

Contributing to the Process

After getting advice from the executives about how to manage a food fight, Brent did a dry run of his presentation in front of his sponsor. His sponsor peppered him with some of the challenging questions he could expect. Brent also made sure he was clear on the various viewpoints held by individual executives and how they might react to his proposal. He got assurance that he could count on his sponsor’s support in the meeting. As Brent observed, “My sponsor has a lot more credibility with this group than I do.”

These preparations were critical. During his do-over, Brent was ready for whatever direction the questions might take depending on what the executives started to talk about. So he was able to focus on the concerns voiced by the various executives before honing in on one that seemed most pertinent. By addressing a particular concern in detail, he stopped the food fight before it got going and demonstrated that he knew what he was talking about. That proved the difference between success and failure.

After his second presentation Brent commented, “It felt good to have a deep discussion with the executive team. It made me feel like I was making a contribution to their decision process.” (Recall Cindy Skrivanek’s “I’m a tool of management” quote, Chapter 2, p. 22.)

The executives were most impressed with his bearing. He could connect with them because he had “executive presence” (see Chapter 2). He was well-dressed, held his ground, and was forceful without being too aggressive in handling questions. Robert Drolet liked how he “stepped up to the table and plugged into the conversation.” Dan Eilers commented, “Your demeanor was perfect. You stood your ground and you did it with a pleasant, likable temperament.” In a word, Brent’s executive presence made all the difference.

Summary

To avoid the traps of a Food Fight:

• Present with executive presence

• Listen for the issues

• Move toward the group

• Handle objections

• Do a process check

• If all else fails, engage your sponsor