Giant Shoulders

Early on, feeling my heart beat in my throat, my ears start to heat up in shame, and wanting to slap myself for not being more prepared--provide an opinion or answer more succinct-were the physical responses to the emotions felt from being so far from the standards of those setting the standards.  Although I don't believe it was the intent of the torturer (how they seemed to me at the time) to create those emotions (or, maybe I'm wrong there), negative reinforcement is, in my case, somewhat effective.  For my money (and my job security), I made it my goal to live up to those standards; the relationships blossomed from there.

I had a Chinese Art professor in college (who seemingly hated Americans as we are all lazy, and don't treat our paint brushes with respect, unlike her perfect Chinese students who would carefully hang their clean brushes upside down, forming a perfect, dried tip to create accuracy and detail) while teaching a class on painting, habitually pounded the desk to punctuate this concept:  forrow the masta's; only then can you branch out and deverop your own sty-o (her Chinese accent). 

As in the case of Al Frink, while listening to his masterful product presentations, as a youngster I literally memorized his descriptions of how the product was built, the details of colors, using fabric samples as aids.  My intention in this was to become as good as possible, using his guidance as a tool, and hopefully make more money because of it.  Due of my willingness to take his direction and show success in the process, he followed with a shower of time and care-he became my mentor at a very young age.  A relationship like that is a very valuable thing to both parties.  The older, more experienced person gets the satisfaction of giving back and helping someone younger and struggling with the added benefit of, in this case because I worked for his company, a better performing sales person.  I won't waste the ink on explaining the value to the younger of the two.  However, the onus to build the relationship, which develops into a friendship, inevitably, is always on the mentee.  You all know that there are many in need of help, and few great mentors.  The relationship needs to be earned.

As I think back about those early years with Al, I have many memories about the initial pain of not living up to his standards, but many, many years of his care and investment in time in my career, along with positive affirmation in my development.  I have been blessed with another one.

I remember Royce Renfroe (my boss at the time) telling me a speech of mine ". . . . bordered on lifeless."  He really said that; I'll never forget it.  I'll also never forget he was right.  It was terrible.  It was one of my first at the company making it that much more painful to me.  His comment changed my approach to that facet of my business.  His honesty hurt sometimes; but, the further I moved up in the company, the less honesty I received from those around me.  He was honest whether I wanted it or not.  For him, I worked very hard.  Why?  Like Al, he was willing to give me so much for simply doing my job-for caring as much as I did.  You see, successful people, I believe, want to give back; however, they really don't want to waste their time because it's so precious:  "Time is the stuff of which life is made," says Ralph Waldo Emerson.  So, Royce gave me a piece of his life, taking on the daunting task of helping a successful salesperson develop into a sales leader, and then from that sales leader into someone, at some point, capable of filling his shoes. 

Many years ago he asked me what my aspirations were; I told him when he died or was fired, I wanted to be ready for his job.  After making a comment about how underpaid he was ("you need to research how F**#@'n underpaid a President in this industry is"), he laughed and slapped me on the knee. 

From that moment forward, he taught me to focus on risk/reward; he reinforced the need to be creative, and that revenue increases were not good enough-profits were the measure of my success.  He taught me by example that people follow courage; that failure is imperative and expected while making the same mistake twice is not; he taught me to be less naïve; but, again, by example, to identify those star performers and how to do some mentoring of my own.  Further, he taught me the importance of being lean, flexible, keeping others accountable to performance standards, the impact of operational excellence on the sales and marketing effort.  Most importantly, he taught me, through setting high standards, what it means to be on a winning team; how it feels; the constant change and focus on improvement.  He changed my world view on the differences between a player and a coach and how to hire, develop and incent other coaches.  As with others impacting my life in different ways, professionally, I wouldn't be where I am today without the piece of his life he passed along in return for me doing my job.

I can't imagine being successful without mentors like Al and Royce.  I'm sure there are those more sophisticated than I  who  have achieved great things on their own, but to steal a bit of Sir Isaac Newton's famous quotation, isn't it easier to stand on the shoulders of giants?  In the case of my great mentors, not only did they allow me a spot on their shoulders, but they encouraged me to climb up there and gave me a lift when I really needed it.