Action: Raise the Bar
“BioWorks is on everyone’s list of hot companies,” Ali began. I started a fresh section in my journal. “It’s an innovative, high-science organization committed to next-generation sustainable technologies. Over the years, it has focused on agriculture and energy, especially in the area of biofuels. The company’s work with biomass conversion points the way to energy sources that are totally renewable, carbon neutral, and biodegradable.”
Puzzled, I glanced over at Ali. I had no knowledge of this field and hadn’t understood a word he had just said.
“No greenhouse gases,” Ali explained. “No global warming. And no dependence on foreign oil. It’s big!” he added with a grin, making sure I saw the size of the frontier BioWorks was exploring.
“What you’re going to find really interesting, though, is the competitive edge BioWorks has gained in this new global market through its commitment to Serving Leadership.”
Arriving at a series of low-slung buildings, we were greeted at the door by Stephen Cray, one of the CEOs I had met the day before.
“Hi, guys!” he said. “Glad to see you again, Mike. Come on into my office.”
“Stephen,” I said, “you already know that I’m on a bit of a mission to understand the elements of being an effective Serving Leader. I have to confess, though, that I don’t know a lot about biotechnology.”
“I’m still learning myself,” he said, flashing an easy grin.
“Well,” I retorted, a bit nonplussed, “Ali’s description of your work suggests you’re at least a really fast learner.”
Stephen just laughed. He ushered us into his office, and his assistant provided us with our choice of bottled water or soda.
“What I’m interested in,” I pressed on, once we were all seated and served, “is how your company understands and practices leadership.”
Stephen laughed again. “I guess I’d have to say that I’m not really an expert on leadership, either. But let me tell you what we know.
“At BioWorks, we believe that the big key is selecting the right people to join the team, those with the right skills and values, those who embrace our purpose of creating energy and making a difference in our communities.”
I was listening intently, the hint of a question beginning to form behind the crease lines of my forehead.
“We’re extremely disciplined about selection because we operate at a very high standard here. Frankly, it’s hard to get into this company. We assess our recruits against a number of key competencies and values that have proven to be predictive of success in our organization. We do exhaustive interviews with candidates to see how they line up against those competencies and values. We push candidates to describe their specific behaviors and accomplishments in each of these areas. If they score well across all of them, they make it through our first screen.”
Stephen grinned again, clearly aware of the growing frown on my face and of how high a standard he was describing.
“After that,” he continued, unfazed, “candidates are interviewed by the people they’ll work with. The team takes this very seriously. The interview is low key, but they’re looking for the intangibles, candidates’ values and their ability to work on a team. We look to see if they can add something positive to the culture here. Finally, we do exhaustive checks of external references. Like I said, we’re picky.” He laughed again, disarming his tough message.
“Here’s a quote I keep on my desk,” he continued, handing me a plaque.
With all of his political duties—holding together the entire civilian and military war effort—he spent half of his time on placing people, finding the right person for a particular job at a particular time.
Peter F. Drucker, commenting on
General George C. Marshall
“I’ve got to ask you to hold up for a second, Stephen,” I finally interjected, unable to hold back my question any longer. “Ali just had me over at Aslan Industries, and I was hearing the very same thing there that I’m hearing from you. It’s paradoxical, isn’t it,” I pressed on, now quite animated, “for a Serving Leader to be so tough on selection and standards? It seems like a contradiction. Serving seems so soft and, well, loving. But all I heard from Harry Donohue at Aslan was a tough line—and now I’m hearing it again.”
Stephen gave me an emphatic nod of complete comprehension. “I know what you’re saying. And there’s surely no question whose son you are. Your dad is always talking about the paradoxes of effective Serving Leadership.
“Consider the term ‘Serving Leadership.’ Two apparently contradictory words used together to create something true.”
He had me there, and we smiled at each other. I may as well get used to these puzzles. Although I’ve been an explainer for a long time, maybe some of the good stuff isn’t so easy to explain.
“I’ll put it to you plainly,” Stephen went on. “In order to serve many people, the Serving Leader must first pick just a few other leaders to serve, people who can meet the Serving Leader standard. Think about it: a Serving Leader who wants to create a powerful churn of productivity needs a team that can put itself at the full service of others. These teams, in their own turn, will serve others by building them up, and the results will keep spiraling outward. It all starts with a Serving Leader who really raises the bar.”
I grabbed my notebook and quickly jotted down Stephen’s phrase “Raise the Bar” and what he had just said.
To serve the many, you first serve the few.
“The model used by Jesus of Nazareth is instructive here,” Stephen said. “He could have chosen from thousands of his eager followers, but he chose only twelve, spending the rest of his time relating to them, serving them, and preparing them to do the very same with others. And look at the multiplied results that today validate his methodology.”
“Okay, I see that,” I interrupted. My tone was more curt than I intended. The subject of religion makes me uncomfortable, though it wasn’t my intent to be rude. Ali and Stephen glanced at each other, noting my discomfort.
“Tell me more about this business of serving and developing the team to create success,” I said, deciding to just press on.
“Sure thing,” Stephen responded, undaunted by my boorishness. “We’ve got a saying around here that ‘activity is no substitute for results.’ In an organization like this, there is always more to do than can be done. We need to make choices, and we don’t reward people for the mere process of doing things.”
“Can you give me an example?”
“Sure. Even though we’re a high-tech company, we’re very skeptical about new technology. It’s possible to fall in love with all of the new tools in our business. No one gets credit here for playing with new toys. We push our researchers and managers to be sure that we use the technology to create results. Our technology vendors know that we’re a tough sell. We’re notoriously difficult. But they know if they sell something to us, they can use us as the best possible reference around the rest of the world. I want to get the very best tools to serve our people, not just lots of tools. We are relentless about this. Let me walk you into the labs.”
We were guided into an exotic-looking lab. A seven-person team greeted us.
“Say hello to Mike Wilson, everybody,” Stephen began. “Some of you know his father, Robert Wilson.”
The greetings became instantly warmer. My association with Dad clearly improved my standing.
“Mike is researching leadership in technology companies like ours. Why don’t you tell him a little bit about the way we do things.”
“Nice to have you with us, Mike,” said an attractive, white-coated woman sitting to my left. “My name’s Anna Park. I’m one of our software engineers. We help with the computer modeling that is always part of our early experimentation. I’ve had the pleasure of spending a little time with your dad,” she added warmly.
She had my full attention. Anna looked to be in her middle thirties. She had an inquisitive and bright face that transformed her attractive appearance into absolute radiance. Her more intimate comment about my dad also put me in a zone, I must add. She likes my dad, and I was getting some of that positive reflection.
“Leadership is key,” Anna continued, “but your dad helped us think about leadership in terms of achieving team results. We set high standards for performance and then constantly raise the bar for ourselves. We expect more and more all the time.”
“Would you tell me about that?” I asked.
“Okay, we meet daily to talk about the kinds of results we’ve gotten through the day’s experimentation and to work out how that might be a stepping-stone to an ultimate result.”
“You do that every day?” I asked.
“Every day!” she responded emphatically. “And then at the end of each week we line up each of those daily results on a whiteboard and see how they might be connected. We’re also linked to four other virtual teams around the globe. One in the UK, another in Boston, a third in downtown Philadelphia, and one in San Diego. We link them in on Internet2 and talk about the results of their week as well. Quarterly, we look at our success at hitting our goals and then raise the bar for our next quarter.”
“That is cool!” I exclaimed, a bit unprofessionally.
“Well, actually, it is,” Anna agreed, smiling at me broadly. “It used to be half the year before we would see each other and compare notes. Now we talk weekly.”
“Another question. Your ‘raise the bar’ comment reminds me: Stephen used the same concept before we came in here. He tells me this is a hard place to get into.”
“That’s right,” Anna replied firmly. I saw several of her colleagues nodding their heads with evident pride.
“Well, listen, I’m a little curious. What about the other side of the coin? Do Serving Leaders like you also push people out?” Quick glances were exchanged among the members of the team.
“It’s a serious subject,” Anna continued more soberly. “Think of how a hockey team works. There have been great young players who cannot play in the professional league. They show great potential but just don’t make it at the next level. If they stay, it’s a huge pitfall that can lead to mediocre team results. At BioWorks, when the rare situation occurs in which a person underperforms, we go into heavy coaching mode. If performance doesn’t improve over time, we help him or her get a position somewhere else. I know it sounds harsh, but it’s a very important process, and we work to honor everyone involved.”
“Thanks,” I said, shaking my head. I was amazed at the thought of the self- and group reflection that must go on here.
Back in Ali’s car, we reviewed the day. Ali said, “Let me hear what you learned from the two sites today.”
“Well,” I began, “I started out hearing all about serving others. On the napkin yesterday, you upended the pyramid. Dorothy exemplifies this by moving to the bottom of the pyramid and serving everyone in her organization.”
“And?”
“And then Harry strolled in, and we came over here and met Stephen and Anna, and all I’ve been hearing about since then is these high standards. I had written down Stephen’s expression, ‘Raise the Bar,’ and then Anna used it, too.”
“And what’s that about?” Ali asked, smiling. I knew that he knew and that he was enjoying watching me get up to speed.
“It’s about two things, I think,” I answered, content to play the role of good student. “First, it’s about being selective in choosing the leaders you’re going to work with. And second, it’s about continually raising the expectations for performance.
First, it’s about being selective in choosing the leaders you’re going to work with. And second, it’s about continually raising the expectations for performance.
“I must admit,” I plowed on, “that I was biased against a serving approach to leadership. I thought it would be soft. You’d just serve whoever shows up, like you’re ladling soup for the homeless.”
“A common misconception,” Ali said, the barest curve of a satisfied smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
“But it’s a paradox.” I flipped open to my note on this. I read, “To serve the many, you first serve the few.”
“Right! It’s about the multiplication of excellence.” I guess he was ready to stop playing Socrates. “To serve the many,” he continued, now showing his enthusiasm fully, the Serving Leader has to choose a few to focus on first, but through those few, you see, the team, the business, and then the community are all served.
“There is an exponential effect caused by the way a leader selects. Serving Leaders must be choosy. They must make the hard choice of whom to pour themselves into based on who can reproduce this powerful Serving Leader approach with others.”
“Okay,” I said, interrupting him again. “I’m set with the issue of selection. But would you explain how it is that raising performance expectations fits into being a Serving Leader? I can see how it’s good for the company. You get better results. But how is it good for the people, especially for the people who are struggling?”
“Both of these organizations are all about the people!” Ali retorted.
“I know that,” I replied, “and I could see on everyone’s face that it’s true. But I want to know how it works. Aslan is working with people who have really gotten some bad breaks, and Harry’s over there putting the hammer on them. You told me that I would get my question answered about this when we got to BioWorks.”
“So your question is?”
“How does being tough on people help them? It helps you get a better product, I can see, and it helps you build a better company. But how does it help the people?”
“It has to do with the way human beings are made,” Ali began. “We try to live up to what others expect of us. That’s true for the rich and the poor, people who have an easy life or a hard one. Expect little, and we live up to the expectation. Expect a lot, and we stretch and grow to meet the expectation.”
Ali paused to look at me, his face serious.
“I know some people who’ve grown up with everything you could ever want. Everything, that is, except high expectations and parental toughness. It isn’t pretty. And it’s the same for kids who suffer privation. If there’s no expectation and no toughness, it isn’t pretty.”
Ali and I just looked at each other. I’d seen it, too. I guess I was thinking that the poor should be treated a little more forgivingly. Maybe given a little more of a break.
“What kind of service is it,” Ali asked, as though he was reading my mind, “to deny a person the challenge to become really terrific? What kind of love would go soft and let a person come to no good? The best way to reach down to someone is to give that person a challenging reason to reach up.”
I wrote it down.
The best reach-down is a challenging reach-up.
“So that’s it,” I said. “People are people. Whatever their condition, you get greatness out of people by expecting it. That’s just the way it is, however kind or unkind that may seem.” I was in a reflective mood.
“That’s part of it, Mike,” Ali replied. “But just a part. Let’s save some for tomorrow, shall we? You’ll see that raising the bar isn’t all there is. There’s more that a Serving Leader needs to do than upend the pyramid and raise the bar.”
As we pulled back into my mom and dad’s driveway, I said, “I’m coming to the conclusion that I won’t learn about Serving Leadership through just watching. I think I have to become a Serving Leader if I want to understand what you guys are doing here. Do you think I can get more hands-on experience?”
Ali smiled. “Your dad was absolutely right about you. You’re the man we’ve been looking for. You’ll get your chance. I believe the right serving opportunity is closer than you realize.
“And, Mike,” Ali added as I was getting out of the car. “I’m so pleased that you joined us.”
“You joined us.” That’s what Ali said, though I can’t really say that I ever agreed to join them. I agreed to study them, yes! But as I sit here again tonight in my childhood bedroom, thumbing through old baseball cards and a forgotten coin collection, I know that he’s right. I have joined them. In helping them find words for these accomplishments, I am beginning to want to make them a part of my own life.
I’m the man they’ve been looking for!
With this thought, I settled into the task of writing up a quick review and update of the paradoxes I have noted—I know my dad will ask me about this, so I want to be ready for him!
Upend the Pyramid
You qualify to be first by putting other people first.
You’re in charge principally to charge up others.
Raise the Bar
To serve the many, you first serve the few.
The best reach-down is a challenging reach-up.
I decided to also update my drawing of the pyramid. These principles are beginning to connect and build upon one another. At the beginning, at the bottom of the model, the Serving Leader upends the pyramid, as Dorothy does, placing herself at the service of building up the team. But this work of building up cannot be achieved with softness. As Harry and Stephen and Anna described it, people are built up when the bar of expectation is raised high and when the key leaders are carefully selected so that the Serving Leader’s powerful actions are replicated throughout the organization.
These two actions strongly reinforce each other. The Serving Leader undergirds and supports the members of the team and also establishes a challenging standard for everyone to reach. In this way, the Serving Leader’s support is not soft and the Serving Leader’s high standards are not inhuman.
Here’s my new picture:
Sitting in this memory-filled room where I once had been so young and hopeful, it feels right to dream of the potential for places like Aslan and for an idea of leadership that is more than top-down command and control. It was in this room that I once lived with a sense of life’s possibilities. My hands were open, not clenched. Same with my heart.
But all of these ancient artifacts also remind me of the losses. On my desk sits a picture of me and my first mongrel dog. I could tell him anything—I could cry with him when I was a boy—and he just loved me. The day he was hit and killed by a car on our street was my first taste of terrible pain. What did I do with all that pain?
A picture of me with my old gang of buddies reminds me of all the jockeying to be first that went on in our group. I was in. I was out. I wanted to be accepted. I pretended I didn’t care. I would wake up on many of those distant summer days sure that the new day would be perfect. And often it wasn’t. So much of the time, I felt plain lost.
Finally growing up didn’t exactly fix the problem, either!
Now I’m facing Dad’s death and hanging out with a group of near strangers, and yet I feel in some small way less lost. I feel more found. It doesn’t figure. My fondest designs for my life are being torn away, and yet I’m feeling more at home and at peace. Another paradox.
While I’m noting stuff I can’t explain, I may as well address this matter directly. Dad’s gang is very spiritual. Like at BioWorks earlier in the day, I’ve tried to steer clear of their forays into this subject. I’m surprised because in all my business consultancy, I’ve never talked with any clients about things like this. I’m not opposed to it, and I think I’m even open to learn more here. I am very uncomfortable in this area, though.
Dad filled me in tonight about his condition. He had been losing steam for months but disregarded it. He was also losing weight and losing his appetite. Stubborn! When he finally listened to Mom and saw his doctor, he was sent immediately to Johns Hopkins. Wrong type of tumor for surgery—for what is called the “Whipple procedure.” Too large a tumor. And very bad results from nodal biopsies. All told, he’s got a worst-case scenario for what, under ideal circumstances, is a worst-case cancer diagnosis. The only debate now is about what to do for symptom relief.
I shudder to think of the ordeal he’s already endured. Colonoscopies, upper endoscopies, abdominal ultrasounds, CAT scans, MRIs, fecal fat and blood work, and more. All for the reward of receiving totally appalling news.