Good enough never is

There’s a good reason why Debbi Fields of cookie fame is so successful, and she summed it up in an aphorism I’ll never forget: “Good enough never is.”

Debbi told me how she coined that phrase after she visited one of her first stores. She walked in unannounced and saw a large crowd of customers in line. The problem was she noticed the most recent batch of cookies was overcooked, and she didn’t want those cookies sold. When she confronted the manager he said, “They are good enough.” Debbi responded with her now famous line, “Good enough never is.” And she threw the entire batch in the trash and made the staff start over. She went through the line explaining what had happened. After apologizing to everyone, she said their orders would be free, if they came back and gave them another chance to show they were the best cookies in the world.

I can attest to how good they are because Debbi made a batch for my wife and me when we visited her at her Aspen home. What a cookie, and what a lesson!

I also learned another valuable lesson from Debbi. She started cooking at an early age because her mother’s cooking was just “good enough,” and Debbi wanted better. Initially her mother was not in favor of Debbi starting her cookie business because she thought it would fail.

That made Debbi realize that there are two sides of life. There is the negative side that points out the risks and wants to rain on your parade. Then there is the positive side that cheers you on and roots for your success. It’s up to you to determine the best path.

Fortunately, Debbi Fields chose the positive side, as the company now has 400 franchised and licensed locations throughout the United States and in 33 other countries since she opened her first store in 1977.

Giving 100 percent in everything you do is so important. According to statistics compiled by the Communications Division of Insight, Syncrude Canada Ltd., if 99.9 percent were good enough, then:

• 107 incorrect medical procedures will be performed by the end of the day today.
• Two million documents will be lost by the IRS this year.
• 22,000 transactions will be deducted from the wrong bank accounts in the next 60 minutes.
• 1,314 phone calls will be misplaced by telecommunication services every minute.
• 268,500 defective tires will be shipped this year.
• 14,208 defective PCs will be shipped this year.
• 103,260 income tax returns will be processed incorrectly this year.
• 5,517,200 cases of soft drinks produced in the next 12 months will be flatter than a bad tire.
• 3,065 copies of tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal will be missing one of the three sections.
• 18,322 pieces of mail will be mishandled in the next hour.
• 291 pacemaker operations will be performed incorrectly this year.
• 880,000 credit cards in circulation will turn out to have incorrect cardholder information on their magnetic strips.
• $9,690 will be spent today, tomorrow, next Thursday, and every day in the future on defective, often unsafe sporting equipment.
• 55 malfunctioning automatic teller machines will be installed in the next 12 months.
• 20,000 incorrect drug prescriptions will be written in the next 12 months.
• 114,500 mismatched pairs of shoes will be shipped this year.
• 315 entries in Webster’s Third New International Dictionary of the English Language will turn out to be misspelled.
• Two plane landings daily at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago will be unsafe.
• 12 babies will be given to the wrong parents each day.

Given statistics like those, does a pan of overbaked cookies seem like such a big deal? It is, if your standards are as high as they should be. And never stop trying to exceed those standards.

Take it from Orison Swett Marden, founder of SUCCESS magazine, “The quality of your work will have a great deal to do with the quality of your life.”

Here’s a work/life example that illustrates his point.

In ancient Rome, when the scaffolding was removed from a completed Roman arch, the law read that the Roman engineer who built the arch had to stand beneath it. The point was that if the arch came crashing down, he would experience the responsibility first hand. As a result, the Roman engineer knew that the quality of his work was crucial and would have a direct personal impact on his life.

Do it right the first time

I’ve often extolled the virtues of learning from your mistakes. Don’t be afraid to make them, I’ve advised, but be sure not to make the same mistake two or three times.

At the same time, however, I’m a huge proponent of trying to do things right the first time. Mistakes are fine, if they’re on your own time. Otherwise, you will be staring down financial and customer relations problems that could have been avoided with a little care.

Let me share my neighbor’s experience. These folks decided it was time to replace an aging kitchen floor. Theirs is an older house, the kind we refer to as “solid.” They chose the new floor and arranged for installation. The contractor arrived on time, set to work, and at the end of the day, invited the homeowners to inspect his masterpiece.

The floor looked great, but why did he shave off an inch from the bottom of the door into the kitchen?

“Oh, that. I was going to raise the threshold, but then decided to re-do the floor underneath. Don’t worry. I can add some wood to the bottom of that door and it will look just fine.”

No, my neighbor said, you must put another door on there. The original door was not pieced together, and this is not acceptable.

Several months, several dozen phone calls and several thousand dollars later, a new custom-made door sports the welcome sign. The contractor paid more for the replacement door than the original floor job was worth.

What’s worse than his losing money on this job, though, is that he will never work in this neighborhood again. He could probably have retired off the contracts he would have picked up around there.

It would have been so simple to take the time to do it right the first time.

Stanley Marcus’s father, the founder of Neiman-Marcus, was constantly seeking ways to improve his store’s merchandise. He wanted to offer his customers only perfect products, because after all, his reputation was at stake. Shortly after the first store opened in 1907, he established an inspection department, a concept unheard of in the retail business at the time. Every single piece of clothing was tried on a model form and inspected for flaws in the cut of the garment, the fabric, or any other defects on close inspection.

Quality control to the extreme, you think? Maybe so, but as a customer, I would be grateful to Mr. Marcus and loyal to his store. He took the time to do it right the first time.

Most companies would be fairly content with a 95 percent customer satisfaction rating. But during World War II, parachute packers had to do better. Their record was unacceptable: only 19 out of 20 parachutes opened. The manager decided to let the packers test their work by jumping from a plane. You guessed it—quality quickly rose to 100 percent.

Doing it right involves a commitment of not only a little more time but often a little more money—at the outset, anyway. Sometimes doing things that make the bean-counters cringe turns out to be the golden bricks that are the foundation of a company’s reputation.

For example, Maytag, with the motto of “ten years’ trouble-free operation,” has built its entire advertising campaign around the lonely repairman. Maytag appliances are not the cheapest models available, but customers swear by them because they value the dependability and quality. Maytag remains a leader in the field because they do it right the first time.

A quality operation is not an accident. It is a commitment from the top that extends to the newest hires. Only when every level demonstrates a superior commitment to doing a job, making a product, or performing a service does the concept of doing it right the first time really work.

At MackayMitchell Envelope Company, our goal is to be in business forever. Doing jobs right the first time is the first and probably most important step. You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression.

Values determine who we are

In Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s famous novel, The Little Prince, a fox becomes the best friend of the young royal on a fictitious planet. When the fox must depart from the prince forever, he offers to tell him the world’s most wonderful secret if the prince meets certain conditions. The little prince agrees, does what is expected, and then asks to be told the greatest secret.

“Only that which is invisible is essential,” the fox replies.

The most valuable things in life cannot be seen with the naked eye: love, friendship, hope, integrity, trust, compassion, and values.

You can’t see values, touch them, taste them, or smell them. Yet they are critical, intangible essentials that bring continuity and meaning to life. And they are every bit as important for organizations as they are for individuals.

“It’s not hard to make decisions, once you know what your values are,” said Roy E. Disney. Roy Disney was the partner and co-founder, along with his younger brother Walt Disney, of Walt Disney Productions, since renamed The Walt Disney Company. The Walt Disney Company is the epitome of a values-driven organization. While it may be overshadowed by its retail prowess, its primary product is happiness. Their “Disney courtesy” concept is based on four key values: safety, courtesy, show, and efficiency. Every one of their performance standards is based on these encompassing beliefs. Customer service is a lifestyle for all Disney employees. Employees are expected to think, walk, talk, and breathe safety, courtesy, show, and efficiency. This lifestyle creates happiness for their guests.

Defining your values is not just an academic exercise. “Clarifying your values is the essential first step toward a richer, fuller, more productive life,” said Carl Rogers, an American psychologist and a founder of the humanistic approach (or client-centered approach) to psychology. Rogers is widely considered to be one of the founding fathers of psychotherapy research and was widely honored for his pioneering research.

If you want to clarify your own values, ask yourself these questions:

• What do I believe in?
• In what guiding principles can I become constructively obsessed?
• What governs my life?
• What do I stand for?
• What puts meaning in my life?
• What qualities are important for my life to be complete?

Hey—I never said this was easy! This is not a quick-and-dirty exercise. Values are not a spur-of-the-moment action. They are non-negotiable principles that guide your everyday life. Your personal convictions, not those of others, determine how you live. You cannot separate personal value from personally held values.

Nor can you separate corporate value from corporate values. Customers and competitors should be able to see your values in action every day. Honesty, fairness, respect, and trustworthiness are among values that should be front and center with every transaction.

The often-quoted Chinese philosopher Confucius, who lived in the fifth century B.C., wrote: “The rule of life is to be found within yourself. Ask yourself constantly, ‘What is the right thing to do?’ Beware of doing that which you are likely, sooner or later, to repent of having done.”

When you are in a position of having to repent, do it quickly and sincerely. That is another value that is essential to a good life: being able to admit mistakes and correcting them.

I will never forget when my good friend Lou Holtz was coaching Notre Dame in the 1989 Fiesta Bowl against West Virginia. His players learned a valuable lesson about their coach’s values that day, which resulted in a national championship.

Notre Dame was penalized on two consecutive plays for “taunting” the opposition. Despite knowing that his actions would bring another penalty, Holtz ran out on the field and asked the referee which of his players were doing the taunting, since this was before referees identified players by numbers. Then Holtz—with a national TV audience watching—grabbed the player and told him what was expected of him.

Holtz has always believed strongly in his players, but he demands that they follow his three simple values:

1. Do what is right. Be on time, polite, honest, remain free from drugs, and if you have any questions, get out your Bible.
2. Do everything to the best of your ability in the time allotted. Mediocrity is unacceptable when you are capable of doing better.
3. Show people you care.