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Wayne Gretzky: The Great One, Also the Nice One

Wayne Gretzky: The Great One is also the Nice One

“It’s so easy being nice.” – Wayne Gretzky.
You know what else is easy? This simple concept: we have the power–so much power— to help each other.

We have so much power to heal one another; to build each other up, to support good things and good people.

It’s so easy to help. All we have to do is try. It’s a decision.
Or we can choose not to.

We can choose to accuse, divide, hurt, harm, disparage, disrespect and violate.
And because we often do, we also have so much power to harm.

Clearly we see this play out in our national politics but we also see it play out in City Halls and Commission Chambers and on social media platforms all across the world.
Leaders have the extraordinary power and opportunity to harm or heal. It’s their choice.

With every email they send, with every comment they make they can uplift or they can deflate.
Right about now at this point in the column, some of you are getting a cavity from all this “sweetness.” I feel you.

And I know what you’re thinking: what about accountability? What about people who deserve a good rebuke?
Well glad you asked. Because accountability is tied closely to emotional intelligence and to kindness.

If mistakes are made—and they will be– they give us teachable moments. But most of the time, the people and organizations who can use the education don’t deserve to be obliterated. They need to be taught and while instilling fear and bullying may be your preferred method, it isn’t sustainable. Oh you’ll get short term results and when you’re gone or not looking you’ll be ignored, forgotten or mocked.
Bullies don’t age well.

Narcissists inflict lots of damage. But they don’t transform or uplift. They are too busy tearing down others so they can feel better about themselves.

True accountability occurs when learning and growth happens. You can only grow in an environment that values personal dignity and respect. The best teams, the best platoons, the best organizations build their success around chemistry, respect, love, kindness and education. The best teams root for each other. Caring becomes your DNA.
As a baseball fan, I love the story of Kyle Schwarber, the Cubs slugger who came back for The World Series after suffering a devastating knee injury at the beginning of the baseball season.
Schwarber was befriended by a 10 year old boy in Arizona who is suffering from a debilitating physical condition. The boy is very sick but he’s comforting the ballplayer and Schwarber was quickly able to put his disappointing but temporary knee problems into perspective.
The two friends exchange letters and encouragement. They inspire each other through simple acts of kindness: text messages, small gifts, kind words. When Kyle gave his friend a bat, the boy asked if he could auction off the memorabilia so other sick children could benefit from better care.

Isn’t that powerful? Isn’t it moving?

Kindness is strength.
We all know stories of unspeakable horror so there’s no need to relate them here. But it’s the every day bruises that some dole out that can take a toll and can leave a mark as well.
The snide email that insults a volunteer, the insensitive attack based on cooked up info, the attempt to bully those who don’t agree with you.
Leaders build, bullies deflate and harass.

Bullies need to be confronted and when that happens they tend to do two things: deflect (it’s not my fault, you are bullying me, how dare you) and shrink.

Because once revealed, a bully is seen as small, petty, mean and insecure. Exactly the opposite of a leader.
Wayne Gretzky was my favorite hockey player. He is also said to be a nice guy.

Being nice is indeed a choice. And yes; it is easy.

I’m a big fan of Fred Wilson.

He’s a highly regarded NYC based venture capitalist who writes a fascinating blog on investing and technology.

This time of year, he’s spending his time in board meetings planning for the upcoming year.

When you are involved in a successful enterprise, board meetings are exciting. It’s fun to talk about growth and expanding market share. But when you are in struggling enterprise, board meetings can be very challenging and often stressful.

Wilson believes the keys to success are having a strategy and building a winning team. Here’s what he has to say:

“You have to get the strategy right and you have to have a team that can execute it without your day to day involvement. The CEOs that I work with that are struggling are usually running into issues with their team and/or their strategy. And the CEOs that I work with that are doing great generally have gotten the strategy set and have built a strong executive team underneath them.

This sounds so simple. But it is not.

Most of the companies I work with didn’t really start out with a strategy. They started out with an idea that turned into a great product that found a fit with a market. And they jumped on that and used it to build a company. Most of them wake up at some point and realize that a single product in a single market is not a strategy and they need to come up with a plan to get a lot bigger and build a sustainable and defensible business. I like to think that this is one place where a good investor group can help. If we are doing our job, we push our portfolio companies to work on their long term strategy and refine it to the point where it makes sense and is executable. But an investor group cannot give a company a strategy. It has to come from the founder/CEO and a small group of senior leaders. The smaller the group that is working on strategy, the better. Strategy is not something that can be done by committee.

The second thing, building an executive team that can execute the plan without day to day involvement of the CEO, is even harder. Most of the companies I work with go through a lot of hiring mistakes on the way to building this team. Some hire too junior. Some hire too senior. Some hire bad cultural fits. Some hire people that are nothing but cultural fit. And an investor or investor group can help with this but I believe that founders/CEOs need to learn how to do this themselves and make these mistakes. The best thing an investor group can do is to help a founder/CEO to understand when they have the wrong person in the job. Or help them understand that more quickly.

These are both areas where experience is huge. The CEOs I work with who have done the job multiple times get these two things right much more quickly. But even they can take a year or two to get these right. First time CEOs often take three or four years to get these things right. But sticking with founders who are first time CEOs through this process is usually worth it because they have a connection to the initial vision and mission that a hired CEO has a hard time replicating. There is not a good rule of thumb on this issue (who should run the company). Facts and circumstances on the ground will generally determine how that should go.

My final point on this is that once you have the strategy and team locked down, you should step back and let the machine do its thing. I like to say that CEOs should do only three things; recruit and retain the team, build and evolve the long term strategy and communicate it effectively and broadly in the organization and externally, and make sure the company doesn’t run out of money. When those are the only things you are doing, you are doing the job right. Very few CEOs get to focus on only these three things all of the time. Things break and you have to fix them. But when the machine is working and you can step back and watch it hum, it is a thing of beauty.”

Amen.

This blog likes to focus on cities and there is a real parallel between what Wilson is talking about and building a successful community. And there are some differences.

First, strategy can be substituted for a community vision and while for business Wilson recommends a small group be involved in crafting strategy, in a city it helps if you have as many stakeholders involved as possible. It’s the job of elected leadership to prioritize, hone and drive the vision and it’s the job of city staff to implement in a timely and efficient manner.

But cities get in trouble when there is no strategy, vision or plan. And they get in trouble when egotistical leaders decide to keep their own counsel and cut themselves off from input or debate.

They also get in trouble when they decide to micromanage and delve into the day to day operations of the city. If you find that you are doing this, you need to stop. If you find that you need to do this because your staff can’t or won’t execute, you need to get new staff. But elected officials need to stay in their policymaking box (which is plenty big) and allow staff to do their jobs. Ideally, you should try to create a culture of experimentation and innovation not fear.

If staff can feel confident enough to think outside the box and solve problems legally, ethically and efficiently you will succeed. If they feel bullied, micromanaged and or afraid to make a mistake you have created a culture that will fail to solve problems or seize opportunities. Your best talent will flee, you will not be able to attract top tier talent and you will turn lemonade into a lemon.

I happen to believe in outcomes over process. That does not mean that process is not important or that you shouldn’t have a process. But it does mean that outcomes are more important— as long as you act legally, ethically and morally.

It shouldn’t take three weeks to type a basic building permit. It shouldn’t take a year to approve a mixed use development. It shouldn’t require an act of Congress or a deity to get a parking agreement and or a developer agreement. If it does, you got a problem.

Strategy and team; you need them both. One doesn’t work without the other. And if you are deficient with either or both, you have major problems and you cannot succeed.

Be Nice

Strategy + Team=Success