MONEY

FOLLOWS
EXCELLENCE
BILL LAMB
BUTLER BOOKS
LOUISVILLE
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Copyright 2012 by Bill Lamb
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying
or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the author or his assigns.
ISBN 978-1-935497-58-5
Printed in the United States of America
published by
Butler Books
P.O. Box 7311
Louisville, KY 40257
phone: (502) 897-9393
fax: (502) 897-9797
www.butlerbooks.com
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Contents
Introduction 1
1 Money Follows Excellence 3
Mrs. Fields Cookies 7
2 Create the Right Culture 11
Becoming an Employer of Choice 20
What It Means to Work Here 27
3 Hire the Right People and Do It Now 33
4 Forget About Being #1. Just Be the Best. 43
5 Dont Tolerate Situational Integrity 53
6 No Excuses 59
7 Pay Attention to What Is Important 67
8 Accept Responsibility 75
The Other Type of Responsibility 81
9 40 + 20 Hours 87
10 Change the GameChange the Rules 95
11 The Value of Teamwork 109
12 Out-Prepare And Outsell Your Competition
Dont Out-Price Them 117
13 Practice Creativity 127
The Morning Mix 128
14 Make Room for Mistakes 141
Thomas Alva Edison 145
Abraham Lincoln 147
15 Carve Out Time to Think 151
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VI contents
16 Be a TeacherRepay Your Mentor 157
17 Dont Get a Job and Dont Go to Work 163
18 Deliver Stunning Customer Service 169
Make Your Customers Feel Special 180
Identify and Kill Arrogance in Your Organization 181
Problems Can Create Opportunities 184
19 Dont Listen Too Closely to Your Customers 191
Holiday Inn 196
Classic Prime Time Television 198
Wrap-Up 203
Bibliography 205
Authors Bio 207
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2
Create the
right Culture
Every company has a culture. Culture is the way people think
and act. The question each leader must ask is quite simple: is it a
positive culture worth keeping and nurturing, or is it a toxic culture
that stands in its own way of success? Every culturewhether it is
wonderful, toxic, or something in betweenhas a direct bearing on
the success of the company. No business can truly be a world-class
organization if the culture isnt right.
There is a tendency any time leadership changes for the new
leader to toss out much of what the previous manager built and
created. Ego has to be put aside long enough to recognize that
the previous leader may have done a few things right, may have
created a culture with good values, and parts of that culture should
be retained. If you inherit a positive, vibrant culture, you have to
protect it and enhance it, and many of the practices involved with
changing a toxic culture can be applied to make a very good one
better. But if you walk into a bad situation, you have to fix it.
I did not find a positive culture when I first joined two TV
stations, WDRB-TV and WFTE-TV (now WMYO-TV), in Louisville,
Kentucky, in 2002. I was immediately faced with an interesting
challenge. The television stations in our company operate fairly
independently without a great deal of corporate oversight.
Broadcast is a small part of Block Communications, Inc.s overall
portfolio, and frankly, more attention was paid to the newspapers
and the cable systems.
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12 Money Follows excellence
In Louisville, the television stations our company owned
generated good revenue, yet our profit margin was zero. The
previous manager and his team simply spent every dollar coming
into the company. Because Allan Block, the CEO, was frustrated
that he could not get the local managers to reduce expenses, he
decided to change managers. I was fortunate to be the one he chose
to rectify the problem.
His first directive, and one he made over and over was, You
must change the culture at the stations. They have a culture of
entitlement. Every manager feels entitled to spend, but no one feels
compelled to return a profit to the company. You must change the
culture, but it wont be easy because this culture of entitlement has
been in place for a long time.
I wont kid you. Changing a culture is heavy lifting and it wont
be done overnight. But there are some logical and progressive
actions that can be taken which, if implemented properly, will lead
to significant culture change in a shorter period of time than you
might think. Culture change cannot be delegated. The leader must
be the primary change agent, but must also gain support from his
or her managers because the leader cannot do it alone.
The first step in culture change is to determine what kind of
culture you want to have, and that is driven by the end results you
hope to achieve.
Being new to the station and the company, I didnt know exactly
what was wrong with the present culture. I just knew some of the
symptoms: too much spending, lax financial controls, too many
managers running their own shops with little concern for the
overall health of the stations, and a general lethargy.
An initial outline of ideals needed to be created that would
foster behavior quite the opposite of what I could see happening. It
was an idealized set of behaviors and objectives certainly, but it was
a starting point. I wanted to create a culture where:
our people trust each other and trust their managers;
we pull for each others success;
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 13
we focus our energy against our competition rather than
expending it internally against each other;
we work hard toward common goals;
we share sacrifices when sacrifices are necessary;
we appreciate that our corporate shareholders are entitled
to a profit; and
we understand that we are the people who must make that
happen.
The next step in changing the culture was for me to meet with
all my managers.
This initial meeting was important because even at this early
stage I wanted to be as clear as I possibly could be about what
change would look like. Lack of clarity can stop progress in its
tracks because no one is confident about what they should do
next or what their role is during this culture change. We needed
to quickly move from the general, i.e. We need to change the
culture, to the specifics of what that change might look like.
As you can imagine, I was not brought here to maintain the
status quo and I promise you that the old status quo is gone forever,
I said. We have an obligation to return a profit to the shareholders
of this company and we will do that.
We then discussed in some detail where we appeared to be at
the present time and what the new culture might look like.
Some people were excited about the new direction because they
saw opportunity for themselves in the change I was promising.
Some were afraid because change can be unnerving and could signal
an end to their power base within the company. And others simply
rolled their eyes and made it clear they could wait me out because
theyd heard it all before and this just sounded like another flavor
of the day for them. Those with the rolling eyeballs didnt know it
yet, but it was soon going to be moving day for them.
Accountability is a core principle of a healthy culture. And
nothing creates accountability better than a clear plan, laid
out logically and confidently. With clarity, people know what is
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14 Money Follows excellence
expected of them. Without it, they dont see a sustainable plan
worth expending their energy to support and they quickly revert
to their own agendas, not the companys. I told them that I was
going to be much more hands-on than my predecessor and they
would all be much more accountable than they had been in the
past.
When you take over an operation that requires a change
of culture, I believe you have to let everyone know that you are
going to be holding the reins very tightlythat youre going to be
involved in every decision for a while. They need to know that you
are engaged and serious about managing change.
Our business is small enough that I was able to tell them I
would personally be approving every single expense over $200
whether it was budgeted or not. I wanted to approve all hires or ter-
minations and interview all finalists for every position they were
hiring, as well as approve the compensation packages they were
offering. Several budgeted expenses were not approved that could
be considered discretionary and therefore not vital. They needed to
know that I was deadly serious about cutting expenses.
There was a need for a greater sense of urgency from them and
their departments. We couldnt afford for our journey to be a polite
carriage ride on a sweet Sunday morning in the spring. It needed to
be more like sitting atop a runaway stagecoach, racing frantically to
stay ahead of the bad guys.
Then, we had a lunch (or dinner, depending on shift schedules)
with every department or group of people in the station so I could
communicate directly with every employee. Each was a similar
meeting where expectations were made clear, but where we also got
to know each other better. We would go around the table and each
person would tell me a little bit about themselves, their interests,
and their job. It was a valuable exercise to help me get to know
people faster, but it was also important to listen closely for what
they were reluctant to tell me. Then we talked about philosophy
much of which can be found in this book.
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 15
I told them that together we were going to return our two
stations to profitability, but it was going to take discipline,
planning, and stringent attention to detail. It would
require change and a different way of conducting business.
Change can be difficult for some people, so I told them to
be prepared.
We were going to tear walls down between departments.
No longer would each department operate like its
own fiefdom, but would fully cooperate to help other
departments reach their goals. Fiefdoms are not unique
to the television business, by any means. Most businesses
have them, but they are a mainstay in television stations.
Almost every station has them, so tearing them down is
difficult, and it doesnt happen very often.
We would improve internal communications. Every
employee would be better informed about how the company
was doing and what steps we were taking to return to
profitability. We would start a bi-weekly newsletter and a
suggestion program so we could exchange information on
a regular basis.
An employee-of-the-month program would be initiated for
top performers. It would be more than a title, too. There
would tangible rewards that went with the award. I wanted
this to mean something to the employees and for it to be
something they would actively strive for.
Every employee was invited to come see me any time and
ask me anything they felt they needed to know. In return,
I promised to answer any question they asked except those
pertaining to other peoples compensation. I even offered
to be so transparent as to share with them our monthly
financial statement if they asked. Doing so fosters inclu-
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16 Money Follows excellence
siveness, which leads to buy-in. Besides, why should the
financial health of our company be a big, dark secret?
Finally, I told them that some of them might not accept
all of this because it was going to be different and tough.
They were assured this was not a flavor of the week, but a
sea change. Only those who get it and buy in would have
long-term employment with us. For those who felt the need
to leave, we would help them find new jobs by providing
letters of recommendation. We would even make personal
phone calls to potential new employers, but we needed
everyone who worked at the stations to be all in.
It was an honest and fair exchange. When you lay out the ground
rules clearly and emphatically, you have to monitor compliance
and be prepared to enforce the rules. This will sound cold and
calculated, but sometimes you need one highly visible employee to
resist you early on so you can send a very clear message to everyone
else. If you conduct a very visible public execution, you may be
able to save a hundred more.
Our general sales manager (GSM) was that person. He had
been the number two person in the building for years. Many people
figured he pretty much ran the stations anyway. He was considered
by many to be fire proof.
I zeroed in on him pretty quickly since my background is sales
and I knew what an effective GSM should be doing. He was what I
call R.O.A.D., which stands for retired on active duty. He delegated
everything and spent a good deal of his day perusing the Wall Street
Journal. When asked for a report, he would email the request to a
subordinate, get the report back and simply forward her work on to
me. He didnt even pretend that he had done any work on it. He also
made it clear that he didnt really like having to answer so many
of my questions. The previous general manager didnt have a sales
background, so this guy could pretty much run his own show any
way he pleased. I was making him uncomfortable. He was sending
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 17
me a signal that he was going to continue to operate his department
as a fiefdom on his own terms. He was definitely enjoying his buggy
ride in the country, and he wasnt interested in the exhilaration of
riding on my runaway stagecoach.
One of the most important tasks a general sales manager has is
managing the commercial inventory. If you price it too cheaply, you
can oversell it, which is not good. If you price it too high, you can
leave a bunch of it unsold. A pricing mistake either way will cost a
station tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars every month. I
asked the GSM to show me what tools and systems he had in place to
price the inventory. He called his national sales manager and local
sales manager into the office because he had delegated the function
to them. The problem was, he hadnt trained them to do itbecause
he didnt really know how to manage inventory himselfand they
were not doing it well. It wasnt their fault either.
It became clear a change had to be made quickly, but with that
decision came an opportunity. This was a chance to show publicly
the entire staff that no one was going to be successful resisting our
cultural change. No one was going to be above our mission. And
no one was going to be able to keep their fiefdom alive in this new
culture.
When word spread that he had been let go, it sent shock waves
through the building. At that moment, I really had everyones
attention and they knew I was very, very serious about changing
the culture in the company.
Not everyone got it immediately though. Our chief engineer
was another guy who fought fiercely to maintain his personal
empire. One way he did that was by withholding information.
He was undeniably smart, but he believed his job security rested
on being the only person in possession of certain knowledge. He
wouldnt teach his subordinates and seldom let them observe how
he was fixing a technical problem. He didnt like answering my
questions and getting things approved. He thought he should be
able to continue to operate independently and continue to purchase
whatever he thought was necessary. He was a very smart, competent
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18 Money Follows excellence
guy and we had many discussions as I tried to turn him around and
get him on the team because he could have been a big part of our
future, but he was very stubborn.
One day, a couple of us were leaving the building for lunch and
the chief engineer and his crew were out trimming an overgrown
tree in our water garden area. I stopped for a moment to exchange
pleasantries and then went on my way. When we returned an
hour later, the entire tree was gone! Our chief engineer had made a
unilateral decision that a healthy tree, in a downtown urban area,
needed to be chopped down and disposed of. He didnt get approval
from the city first, nor did he ask me. It was his way of telling his
staff that he was still making the rules, and the old culture was
alive and well.
His dismissal, swift and sure, was another eye-opener to our
employees. If they werent sure before, they were certain now that
the culture was going to change. They would either get on board
with it or they could take their old culture to another station.
While it is never pleasant to have to let someone go, I do
subscribe to Jim Collinss philosophy in his book Good to Great.
You absolutely must get the wrong people off the bus, get the right
people on the bus, and get the people in the right seats. Then you
can really get things done.
Its discouraging to good employees when they have to sit next
to someone who is not able or willing to perform their job at a
high enough level or who brings a lousy attitude to work every day.
Whats even more discouraging is when the good employee feels
management is tolerating subpar performance or attitudes. We owe
it to our best and brightest to surround them with other people of
the same caliber. Thats an integral element in changing a culture.
In Walter Isaacsons biography of Apple founder Steve Jobs, it is
clear Jobs saw a real danger to the culture in allowing people who
were doing less than excellent work to continue to hang around.
Its too easy, as a team grows, to put up with a few B players,
and they then attract a few more B players, and soon you will even
have some C players, Jobs said. The Macintosh experience taught
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 19
me that A players like to work only with other A players, which
means you cant indulge B players.
I dont completely embrace the Jack Welch theory of identifying
the bottom 10 percent of your workforce and targeting them for
elimination every year through the employee appraisal process.
After some time that becomes an unworkable and unsustainable
strategy, but I do believe in replacing your weakest employees with
better ones until you have no weak ones left. And in telling them
up front you are going to do that.
At a station-wide staff meeting a few years ago, I cautioned every
employee not to allow themselves to become the weakest link in
their department because to do so will leave you very vulnerable. If
someone from the outside applies for work here and they are clearly
superior to you, I am going to give them your job. Being the weakest
link (or not) is something almost all of you can control, so if you let
it happen I will still care for you as a person, but Im not going to
protect your job if you havent.
Good employees actually appreciate straight talk that lays out
the expectations as directly as that.
When we let the first person go and replaced her with a very
competent outsider, the expected backlash didnt happen. I actually
saw morale improve and it happened for all the reasons I had hoped.
If a highly skilled person (lets call her Jane) is sitting next to
an underperforming co-worker, Jane is probably spending a good
part of her time and energy helping the weaker personsometimes
even correcting or redoing the persons work. If that continues for
long after the initial training and orientation period, it can be very
discouraging for Jane. But when the weak employee is replaced
with someone as good as Jane is, she can now focus completely on
her own work and her productivity goes up. If the new employee is
better than Jane is, he or she can push Jane to be even better than
she was before. Thats what we saw happen. Our employees got
what we were doing and saw the value in it. And thats why morale
actually improved.
An effective leader must be aware of the culture that exists
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20 Money Follows excellence
within his or her company. Competently managing that culture is
vital to being an effective leader because your culture is going to
have a tremendous impact on your business. Either it will have a
positive impact helping to create the results you desire, or it will be
a toxic influence always blocking your success.
BECoMI ng an EMPloyEr oF ChoICE
An employer of choice is a company that competitors
employees desire to join and where employees desire to stay. Yes, its
a place where the salaries and benefits are competitive, but its much
more than that. It is a company well known in town or even within
the industry where people are treated with respect, challenged,
and recognized for their hard work. It is an organization where the
best people serve as a magnet to attract more of the best people.
Enthusiasm is contagious and everyone catches it at an employer
of choice. Turnover is lower and positions are filled quicker at an
employer of choice because there are people lined up to work there.
We made a decision early on that we were going to become
an employer of choice which, when accomplished, would not only
indicate that we had been successful in changing the culture, but
would serve as a competitive advantage as well. An employer of
choice has a clear and dynamic culture that employees can feel and
articulate. Everyone feels like they are rowing in the same direction
with a were-in-this-thing-together attitude.
There are at least 15 things a company must be, have, or
accomplish to be considered a true employer of choice.
1. Expectations of high performance and a universal
rejection of good enough. People want to feel that they
are working on something special at an elite level (or are
at least moving toward that goal). Like so many things,
this attitude begins at the top, but it must go all the way
through the organization.
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 21
2. Strong formal and informal communication channels
reduce the need for rumors and gossip because employees
have real information. Strong communication can take
many forms, including a regularly published newsletter,
open and honestly shared information in staff meetings,
management by walking around (MBWA) as business
guru Tom Peters espouses, a suggestion program, regularly
scheduled evaluations, and an open door policy.
3. Attention to inclusiveness. Strong and constant com-
munication as cited above helps employees feel included
and key to the success of the company, because they are in
the know. You have many great thinkers in your company
and it benefits you to include as many people as possible
in the thinking and planning process. When you do, it
brings great satisfaction to your employees, too. And when
employees feel included in the planning process, they will
give you a lot more buy-in to make it work.
4. Attract and hire the best people. This is a constant
process where the tough decisions to upgrade to better,
more competent people are never deferred. Good people
do not want to have to cover for or do the work for weaker
people. Special emphasis has to be placed on the types of
people you hire and whether or not they fit your culture
(or the one you aspire to). Good people attract more good
people. More on that in later in the chapter.
5. Emphasis on work/life balance. Employers of choice
understand that work is only a part of a persons life and
balance between work and family is essential for a happy
employee. Some companies allow/encourage job sharing,
others let employees work from home, while still others
offer childcare at work.
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22 Money Follows excellence
6. Strong foundation of ethics and trust. Employees need
to know that their boss is ethically sound and completely
trustworthy. If you have a talented but somewhat slippery
manager working for you, you will never sit at the helm of a
company that is truly an employer of choice. Likewise, you
cannot tolerate deception or dishonesty from any employee
regardless of how indispensible they may otherwise
happen to be. Someone with situational ethics will destroy
trust throughout the organization.
7. Focus on creativity and innovation allows people to
stretch and dream. It creates an environment where they
can freely what if with each other and bust the conven-
tional walls down. It encourages them to think differently,
to find unusual solutions to difficult problems. It gives
them a whole new dimension of job satisfaction that they
may not be able to get anywhere else.
8. Growth and development opportunities must be
present so employees know they are never working at a
dead-end job. If they do well, if they develop as you hope
and demand, and if they produce as you believe they can,
the quid pro quo is that they must have an opportunity to
grow and develop their skills. If they desire more respon-
sibilities and promotions, you must provide an avenue for
them to achieve those goals.
9. Coaching and mentoring are essential. Real achievers
never want to stop learning, and you must make sure they
never do. You can provide formal training (either internal or
external), frequent evaluations and performance reviews,
role-playing, or ride-alongs.
10. Teamwork. Businesses are made up of many departments
often responsible for diverse tasks, and although they all
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 23
may be working for a vague positive end result, the tasks
may be so different individuals may not always see how
the pieces fit together. There are few things that can boost
moral better than to have everyone working on a very
challenging task at the same time and seeing a positive
result. In Chapter 11 of this book, I talk about our common
task of pulling off Thunder Over Louisville, the single biggest
telecast by a local TV station in the history of American
television.
11. Transferable training must be part of the deal at an
employer of choice. Employees must know that if they
should ever leave, they will take excellent training with
them provided by smart, talented mentors. They must also
know that the training they are receiving in one department
will somehow benefit them in securing a promotion within
the company at the appropriate time.
12. Recognition and rewards are relatively inexpensive in
cost but priceless in their value. Everyone likes to be singled
out from time to time whether its just to be told they have
done a good job, or to be held up in front of their peers
as an example of living, breathing excellence. Financial
rewards from spiffs to bonuses can and should be available
to those who meet certain predetermined goals to help the
company. There are a hundred ways to provide recognition
or rewards. Its important to pick a few and do them.
13. Competitive, yet sensible pay system. If you are meeting
the intrinsic needs of your employees, and youve created an
environment where they can grow both intellectually and
experientially, you wont have to pay the highest wages to
retain the best people. But you shouldnt and probably cant
be the cheapest either. Intrinsic motivation and quality of
job life for your employees will take them a long way, but
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24 Money Follows excellence
good people do expect to make a fair wage. Money is still
one of the key ways to keep score.
14. People challenge each other on a peer-to-peer level in
ways that management simply cant. Peer pressure is a
powerful force and it doesnt stop in junior high school. Ive
told my employees it is very important for them to watch
those around them. We sometimes think were just corks
bobbing along wherever the tide takes us in this economy.
We may think they may lay us off and we have no say in it.
But every one of us can control our destiny to some extent.
We do that by making sure everyone around us is working
hard and smart. If we see someone slacking off, they could
be putting our job (and our familys income) in jeopardy, so
it is appropriate to tell them to step it up. We dont have
to accept it. Its not about employees spying on each other,
but about watching for the obvious and nudging others
to stay on their toes. I believe that we can all do our jobs
so well that we can create more than the natural demand
for our product. That alone can create job security. If we
are successful, we have provided our best personal defense
against layoffs and disruption of business, families, and
careers.
15. People are having fun! Employees at an employer of
choice simply have less artificial stress, are having more
successes to enjoy, and find ways to make work fun. Debbi
Fields, founder of Mrs. Fields Cookies, says, We combine
intense work with spontaneous wackiness that keeps
everybody loose and relaxed in the middle of tension.
I believe we met the challenge our CEO put out there when he
said, You must change the culture.
It didnt happen overnight, but today we do have a dynamic
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creAte tHe rIGHt culture 25
culture. We have very little turnover. We have talented, happy
employees who want to be here and who want to contribute to
something special. The term happy employees is subjective, but
while we believed it was probably true, we tried to quantify that
happiness with an anonymous employee survey in the fall of 2010.
We asked our employees a series of questions, and they were given the
choice to strongly agree, agree, disagree, or strongly disagree.
To the question, Based on what I know about all television stations
in this market, WDRB is the best place to work, 93 percent of our
employees either agreed or strongly agreed.
A more substantive survey was sponsored by the Kentucky
Chamber of Commerce and Kentucky Society for Human Resource
Management, and was conducted by the law firm of Fisher &
Phillips LLP in late 2011. The Fisher & Phillips website explains the
project is an initiative dedicated to identifying and recognizing
Kentuckys best employers. The selection process is based on an
assessment of a companys employee policies and procedures and
the results of an internal employee survey. Yes, they asked every
one of our employees to complete an extensive (and anonymous)
online survey asking how satisfied he or she was working for us. In
January of 2012, the Kentucky Chamber announced their recipients
and WDRB/WMYO was the only media company named one of
The Best Places to Work in Kentucky. In fact, in their notification
to us of this award, they stated, This achievement confirms that
you are indeed an employer of choice.
A culture like this must be fiercely protected, beginning with
the interview process. You do not want to let the wrong kind of
person slip into the company and unravel part of that culture. It is
important during the interview to see if the prospective employees
skill sets and philosophies match the needs and culture of the
company. At the same time, it is equally important for applicants
to interview their prospective company to see if the organization
matches up well with sensibilities and philosophies before they
hire their next employer.
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26 Money Follows excellence
Many times when a real star walks through the door looking for
employment, an employer can become enamored with the obvious
qualities evident in the prospect. Often these stars will have more
than one offer to choose from so, in an effort to be appealing to the
prospect, the interviewer can have a well-meaning but dangerous
tendency to twist or bend the true culture of the company to make
the company appear to be a perfect fit with the prospect. When the
prospect joins the company, they soon find that it was not exactly
what they thought it was and the fit is not perfect at all. This dis-
appointment can lead to an unhappy employee and eventually to
more turnover as the employee leaves to seek the right cultural fit.
Younger workers in their twenties are especially fickle and have
less hesitation than any generation before them to cut the line and
move on to another opportunity if the current one isnt working for
them. So, what can an employer do to try to minimize this cultural
misunderstanding and attract the right people who will embrace
and contribute to the corporate culture?
During the interview process, when we find an applicant who
we think has strong potential and to whom we may ultimately
extend an offer, we give them a paper titled What It Means to
Work Here. We try to establish from the outset who we are, the
kind of company we are, what we aspire to be, and in short, the
culture that is WDRB-TV and WMYO-TV. We want to establish
from the beginning that we already have a culture we like, we are
not interested in changing the culture that is working well for us,
and the applicant needs to match up well with it or needs to know
they dont so they can move on to a company with a culture that
better suits them. It is infinitely better to stop a hiring mistake
dead in its tracks before it becomes a problem than to discover your
mistake two or three months down the road and have to deal with
it then. The following is the paper we give prospective employees.
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