The opportunities at Price keep on comin’, as former Southwest CEO Jim (James) Parker spoke to the first year MBA’s on Monday. Jim (and I use first names for people who prefer it in person) once again spoke to our group about leadership, and he knows a thing or two about leadership.

One of Jim’s favorite leadership theories is his “round world theory,” which basically equated to the saying “what goes around comes around.” He spoke of how the way a manager treats his/her employees isn’t just a one-way street, it can come back to negatively or positively affect the manager’s performance and career. His novel, “Do the Right Thing” (linked earlier), discusses creating an environment where people want to “do the right thing.” Jim ardently believe that one can’t make people do the right thing, but one can make them want to.

To illustrate this theory, Jim told us a story of a recent experience of his in a restaurant. While preparing to eat his meal, Jim dropped his spoon, but a nearby waiter was nearby and quickly offered Jim a new spoon from his apron. Curious as to why a waiter would carry spare spoons, Jim asked his waiter for an explanation. The waiter explained that the restaurant had recently hired a team of ivy league expert consultants to help the restaurant’s efficiency, and the consultants discovered that the most frequently dropped piece of silverware is the spoon. The time it takes for a waiter to go back to the kitchen for a spoon every time one is dropped can be avoided by carrying a spare in his apron and this is why the waiter had a spoon on hand. Soon after this, Jim noticed a waiter with a string on his pants’ zipper. After glancing around the dining room, Jim noticed that every waiter had this curious string attached to their zippers. Wanting an explanation, Jim pulled a waiter aside and asked about the odd string. The waiter explained how the restaurant had hired ivy league expert consultants to help the restaurant’s efficiency. The consultants discovered that the time each employee takes to wash his hands after using the restroom could be bypassed by attaching a string to each one’s zipper, allowing the waiters to unzip with the string, and have no need to wash their hands. While slightly disgusted by this discovery, Jim had one final question for the waiter. “But how do you tuck your shirts back into your pants after using the restroom if you’re not allowed to use your hands?” Jim asked. The waited responded “well we use the spoons!”

Okay, it wasn’t a true story that Jim told, but he had us going for awhile. The lesson is once again that a manager can’t make someone do the right thing, they have to make them want to do the right thing. I briefly had the opportunity to speak with Jim after his talk, and he couldn’t have been a nicer, more down-to-earth former CEO of such a large company (overlooking his being a fan of the University of Texas). Jim is retired now, and lives a peaceful life in Texas, and I really appreciated his coming out to speak with the MBA’s.

photo credit: Time Magazine

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The current situation in the Gulf of Mexico is incredibly disheartening. Environmental concerns are paramount to me as they affect not only humans, but other animals and plants as well. Not only that, but destroying the environment has long-term implications greater and more far-reaching than any other human-born plague (for lack of a better term). Seeing beaches closed in Louisiana doesn’t necessarily strike a strong cord within, as local residents whine about where they can work on their tan. But photos of destroyed wildlife (coral reefs, fish, birds) and my internal thoughts of the long-term implications frustrate, anger, and sadden me.

The media and the general public were quick to pounce on British Petroleum, making them the sole culprit of this tragedy. And at a very core level, that has it’s merit. It was their pipeline, and it was their cutting corners and possible falsehoods that led to the leak and lack of quick containment in the first place. BP should carry the brunt of the blame – and they’re willing to.

But I’ve been alerted to a couple of idiosyncrasies, and feel the need to point them out. The first is that the public appears to forget that this is probably the LAST thing BP would ever want to happen (aside from the rapid development of a cheap and expansive renewable energy source). The company is losing billions of dollars and could even go bankrupt because of the oil spill. Negligence may have led to the tragedy, but maybe the company’s getting a slightly worse rap than they deserve (on second thought, maybe not).

I know exactly where to place that leftover bit of blame and it deals with the second idiosyncrasy I discovered. That last bit of blame should be spread amongst all of mankind. BP isn’t drilling oil so they can burn it all and laugh maniacally as the environment goes to hell and the earth is destroyed piece by piece. They’re drilling because you and I and everyone in-between uses oil on a daily basis, fueling their business to incredible success and wealth.

We are not without blame.

Now, I understand that we all can’t flip a switch and live without oil. Solar panels for homes are expensive, as are electric cars. And there are all the factories and businesses that use incredible amounts of oil, which is completely out of our hands. But the first step of change is awareness. I hope everyone can at least knowledge that we’re all playing with the fire that burned us so badly and continues to do so in the Gulf of Mexico. To use another popular proverb, we want to have our cake and eat it too. We want to use oil for our personal gain, but when the source for that oil is tainted, we point our fingers and avoid personal blame at all costs.

All I ask is for everyone to realize how dangerous our dependence on such an environmentally hazardous material can be. Our energy sources need to be redefined, and while great strides are being made, especially in solar and wind energy, we need to keep pushing for change.

I hope to do my own part by marketing renewables for such a company once I obtain my MBA in December of 2011. Wish me luck!

photo credit: Igor Golubenkov of Marine Photo Bank

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A few weeks ago I was fortunate enough to sit next to Heinz’ Vice President Bill Simon (US Category Development & Sales Operations) for a meal. Bill got his start in the business doing marketing, but our conversation strayed and somehow he began to list some of Heinz’ non-condiment products, including Smart Ones (frozen “healthy” meals). He asked if I bought Smart Ones, as opposed to Healthy Choice (a competitor), and I replied “I get whatever’s on sale!” Now, I can’t remember the exact consumer-type name he called me, but it was in the realm of a “switcher” – as in a consumer who has no brand/product loyalty, but switches between varying products. I replied “well I like to think I’m a good customer” and we moved on to a different topic.

It got me thinking though, about how companies view customers. For the record, Bill was extremely nice and seemingly intelligent (we only had one meal, it’ s a best guess), and I can understand why Heinz does so well with people like him at the helm. That being said, I’m not entirely comfortable with lumping customers into either loyalists or switchers. Where’s the gray-zone?

While I may not care about Healthy Choice vs. Smart Ones, I’ll admit that I’ll usually buy Heinz ketchup in lieu of its competitors. They all taste the same to me, but that just goes to show you how well companies like Heinz and Kleenex market their prime products. I’m not going to get into how to increase brand loyalty (maybe another time), but as my mind meandered I tried to imagine how much cheaper a Heinz ketchup competitor would have to be in order to become a switcher instead of a loyalist. Would 10 cents do it? Probably not. 30 cents? Now I’m on the fence. 50 cents? Get me some of that Hunt’s!

So here’s your task: think of a few products which you always buy from the same company, then imagine how much less a competitor’s product would have to cost for you to become a switcher. (examples: Heinz vs Hunts ketchup, Healthy Choice vs Smart Ones, Coke vs Pepsi, name brand vs store brand, etc)

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I would almost guarantee you that Heinz has an idea of that percentage for most of their customers, which is why they try and improve packaging, labeling, taste, marketing, etc as much as possible to maximize your loyalty percentage.

If you’re selling a product, no matter it is, this loyalty percentage exists among your customers. Always be thinking about to how increase that percentage/brand loyalty, so that no matter what a competitor throws at your customers (discounts, etc), they remain loyalists to your brand. Just a novice tip from a novice guy.

photo credit: Emily Berezin

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