Corporate Viagrar

Corporate Viagra�

Do You Need It? Can You Get It? Is It Fun?

CORPORATE VIAGRA �

IN A COMPANY LONG AGO

IN A BOARDROOM FAR AWAY

"FLACCID!!" Alice, the only female board member snapped out suddenly “LIMP!"

  The chairman choked off his presentation mid-word, his eyes bulging, his throat constricting into a gurgle. The others froze, looking straight ahead, catching no one's eye.

"NOT UP TO IT ANYMORE!! " Louder now. She slammed the table with her fist.

 Who was she referring to? Who was she taking to? Someone here? At her age... ? Who would..? Alice was glaring right at the chairman. Surely not Alice and Harry!

"IMPOTENT!!" Her face, normally pale, was now flushed. A hank of her steel gray bun had sprung high on her head, impelled by her vigor. She was pointing right at him. Jab! Jab! Jab! "IMPOTENT! LIMP! FLACCID!" A ghastly smile flickered across his numb face. He couldn't seem to control his mouth. Words were squeezing from his lips. "Well!... he! ... ah!.. he! ... Alice ... well, ah ... none of us, hm... are getting any ah... younger...er, ah..."

"PSCHA!!" Disgust oozed in her voice. They all cringed. Is there such a word? The chairman thought errantly, his mind still refusing to deal with this. The new director leafed through his papers, looking for a place to hide. " DON'T FLATTER YOURSELF!!" , she hissed. She was now impaling the report on the table with that sharp finger. They could see the yellow cover dent. Stab! Stab! Stab! "I'M TALKING ABOUT THE COMPANY!!" She grew quieter for a moment, breathing sharply through her nose, pushing her rampant gray hair back into place. "THE COMPANY! IT'S IMPOTENT!"

"It's a long time since I've seen any excitement in that company. Doesn't anyone want to penetrate a new market? God knows, this thing", she viciously stabbed the report again, "this thing, tells me there is a lot of market out there. And, let me tell YOU something, there's a lot of stiff competition out there doing something about it." Now she grew quiet, "Harry! This company is acting like it's in late middle age. It's only thirty-seven years old and ... and it can't hack it any more. Like some..." She pointedly refrained from finishing the rest of that sentence. The chairman steadfastly ignored a choking sound from somewhere to his left.

"If we don't DO something soon, the company is going to start dying. And the economy isn't helping either. " She paused a while. "What it needs, what it really needs", she was picking up speed again, "what the company really needs is a strong dose of VIAGRA�!"

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CORPORATE IMPOTENCE

All across the country, every month, directors and managers privately, quietly think such thoughts. Seldom voicing them and then only one-on-one. When they do, they use other images, other analogies. They never tell the CEO. The very person who should be the first to know is the last to be told.

Problems of drooping enthusiasm, softening drives, problems of corporate impotence, do exist. One way or another the problems must be addressed. As the likelihood of economic downturn grows, the urgency grows.

An extraordinary similarity exists between corporate and human male potency. Both are functions of psychology, vigor, energy, money, health, opportunity and age. For both man and company an early sign of sickness, depression, fear or age is impotence - partial, intermittent or persistent.

In both cases, impotence is seldom discussed. In males shame and embarrassment are often at the root of its denial, but it is mostly ignored. Though the recent advent of Viagra� is causing this condition in males to be raised more often, it is still a source of embarrassment.

In Corporate Impotence the reason for silence is blindness. This disorder has not received widespread recognition or a formal name, and often, even those most effected do not notice the condition. Companies, after all, seldom have partners who complain forcefully. Clients just quietly go elsewhere.

Once Corporate Impotence becomes late stage it will be noticed. But by then, the pathology is well advanced and impotence is overshadowed by other corporate diseases that are recognizable and have names. By the time everyone sees it, it is too late.

Corporate Impotence, especially the early stage, is the first indicator of deep-seated problems. Untreated problems will grow and fester in the darkness until brought to light by a crisis - the economy turning down, the market or the industry or technology changing, someone internally just making a mistake.

Corporate Impotence has many symptoms, many expressions, and many degrees of pathology. At its core is ineffectiveness, the inability to make things happen, and the inability to cause events to take place in the company and the marketplace.

In the early stages, symptoms can be intermittent, partial, and subtle and usually are explained away as something else. As the condition progresses the symptoms will become intense, constant and quiet unmistakable, and finally, inexcusable.

A few of the indicators or symptoms that we see quite often are shown above. For an even more comprehensive list just ask a middle manager casually what he thinks the symptoms of organizational ineffectiveness are. The presence of any or even all of the early-stage indicators is not definitive. Severity, duration, and a host of other factors also play a role. Sooner or later the early indicators turn into late stage symptoms. Even one symptom can be fatal, but you never find just one.

Two instruments can be used to take the guesswork out of early stage diagnosis. One is a short questionnaire for senior manager use to establish probable cause and make a preliminary diagnosis. The second is the Corporate Vitality Profile (CVP) which is quite extensive. The CVP addresses all the factors we mentioned above and many others. Some factors are obvious. Others are subtle. All are unique predictors/precursors of corporate impotence.

Every company has a unique vitality profile. Of the hundred plus factors the CVP addresses, we can never predict which will apply to any one company. What is known is that if early stage impotence is there, the company will show at least thirty symptoms. This CVP questionnaire has proven to be much more illuminating (and, of course, immensely more cost effective) then the most exhaustive interview of even all the senior management.

Such a comprehensive instrument as the CVP is used to enable management to prove conclusively to itself that the problem exists. Management, like individuals, can be unconsciously reluctant, even unwilling, to face uncomfortable and embarrassing realities unless there is overwhelming evidence and unless someone courageously holds the mirror. The comprehensive CVP is also used to define clearly and explicitly the underlying causes so that unambiguous and precise corrective actions can be taken.

In males, Viagra� works without improving the underlying physical conditions. It is a temporary relief of symptoms. The underlying problems continue to exist. The corporate equivalent works by healing the organization at a deep and central level. Its effect is not temporary - it is long term!

Corporate Viagra� works by renewing and revitalizing companies. It restores them to younger, healthier, more entrepreneurial, more aggressive, more creative, more potent states. It is quick. Results are evident in a matter of days. It is this renewal and regeneration that causes the surge in effectiveness and performance.

What is this Corporate Viagra�? It is a brief, intense process that is led by the CEO. This process, the Corporate Renewal Process, triggers an instinctive renewal response that is inherent in all organizations.

It has been known for more than eighty years that companies which "turnaround" from the brink of disaster, almost always under new management, undergo this innate renewal and revitalization response. They return to a younger more vibrant state. It shows almost immediately on their bottom lines.

What is not nearly so well known is that healthy, untroubled units within these companies, units which keep their management, also achieve the same inherent response, experience the same increase of potency and achieve the same, often better, profit surges. They do this from a position of strength rather than weakness, from ambition rather than desperation.

Our observation and research into this phenomenon led us to develop our Corporate Renewal Process. Simply put, these businesses had been touched and transformed at some fundamental level. Their very spirit, their essential core had been renewed and reignited. It was this renewed spirit that caused everything else to happen, and it happened almost effortlessly.

This is not the place for a philosophic discussion on the existence of the corporate spirit. (For a philosophic discussion refer to The Preemptive Turnaround and Fire in the Corporate Belly chapters for this.) For now, let us accept these facts. A company has a psyche, a spirit, an essential core. This spirit resides mostly in the relationships between the managers and the teams. Relationships under the right conditions can change easily. A change in spirit causes a change in the performance of the company. Many intuitive leaders feel these facts are axiomatic and behave accordingly.

Traditionally corporate transformations that retain existing management have relied on massive process and structural reengineering to work. These transformations cost a great deal in money and effort, take a long time, and are successful only a third of the time. But Corporate Viagra�, working directly with the spirit of the company, has no such limitations. Its success rate approaches one hundred percent.

For practical purposes it does not matter what constitutes the corporate spirit or where it is. What matters is that it can be addressed directly. Gather the CEO and the senior managers in a room and the spirit of the company is there. If this sounds mystical, hang in there. It may sound like magic and it may work like magic, but it is profoundly practical.

The senior managers are those who report directly to the CEO. They are those most responsible for conditions as they are. It is these senior managers who have to alter their behaviors if a corporate transformation is to happen.

Individuals find it difficult to change themselves in any significant way, at least not quickly, but under the right conditions relationships between people can change very easily and very quickly. Change relationships amongst managers at a deep level and the spirit changes. Change the corporate spirit and the performance of the company changes.

The Corporate Renewal Process because it triggers an instinctive response within a company is profoundly simple. The CEO/managing officer leads it. Senior management drives it and does all the work. While it is often best facilitated by a professional business catalyst who guides the process and triggers the changes, it can be done by the CEO.

Using the Corporate Renewal Process the CEO causes the essential core of the company to address frontally, and to reject cathartically the traits within that are causing the problems and to generate in their place the corporate attributes that are needed for corporate potency.

To begin the Corporate Renewal Process only one person needs to see and acknowledge the existence of corporate ineffectiveness and make the determination to begin. This person is the CEO or managing officer. Others may see the need, but unless the CEO commits nothing can happen. He must have the courage to start the process and lead his people. In fact, middle managers, who are first to see and complain (to each other) of the problem, are the last to volunteer to undertake the renewal process, to take their medicine. And, in a real sense, the renewal process is their medicine.

The process has just seven steps, transitions really. With the right intent and the right attitude on the part of the CEO, these transitions occur naturally.

1. The members of the management team (or what is supposed to be the management team) become in fact the spirit, the essential center of the company. The team becomes self-aware and believes in and acknowledges its authority as that spirit.
    
2. The management team, now a truly cohesive Team, sees and acknowledges the company as it is and themselves exactly as they are. They acknowledge the corporate and human (emotional) drivers of performance. They do this both as the spirit of the company and as individuals. The only preparation that is needed is the identification of the real issues that lie at the heart and belly of the organization and drive its performance. A comprehensive questionnaire, like the CVP, that addresses both the drivers of performance as well as the early warning signs of trouble is recommended.
    
3. The Team generates a real, visceral revulsion against those factors within the company that is causing the corporate impotence. Individuals share in this. A catharsis happens. Energy for change is released.
    
4. The Team defines for the company a new and detailed business blueprint. A blueprint that defines not just the usual strategies, tactics goals and objectives, but also defines and describes the spirit of the company.
    
5. From the energy of this catharsis, the Team creates within itself a powerful commitment to this new future described in the Blueprint. Detail by detail. Corporate and emotional driver by corporate and emotional driver.
    
6. With that same energy the Team commits both as the spirit of the company and as individuals to explicit actions to achieve each and every element of the business blueprint and to accept full accountability.
    
7. Implementation and follow-up begins immediately. No time is lost.

The mechanism is profoundly simple. The CEO and management team sit down and address the issues one by one. Address the issues not just intellectually, but also emotionally. As long as they do just three things, the rest will follow:

1. Confront all the real issues – even though they are embarrassing.
    
2. Keep in mind the transitions that are needed.
    
3. Demand direct bottom line impact from everything that is committed to.
    

Results begin to show immediately. Initially the results are seen within the emotional life of the team and the company. Then, systemically, they appear on the bottom line.

The first result is a palpable sense of relief. This happens within the first couple of hours.

The second result is the simplification of the politics of the company; there are no more secrets. As that happens corporate success becomes the real goal of the team and its individual members. Other complicating politics vanish as inconsequential and trivial. Managers are now helping each other.

The third result is the birth of the team as an empowered entity that can address any issue of the company or its own members and, with authority, causes the issue to be resolved.

There is growing enthusiasm, as the team, individually and collectively, defines its future in terms that make sense. Few people are motivated by numbers and most business plans are expressed that way.

The managers and the teams accept accountability and the expectation of being held accountable. The managers know, not just intellectually but viscerally, that changes can and are being made. Decisions get made with increasing speed and things start happening. The company is potent again.

Many, many more things also happen that depend on the unique condition and state of each company. Performance grows as things happen and are translated into actions that have positive bottom line impact. Often it surges.

The bottom line results that we have seen from this Corporate Renewal Process have been consistent, always significant and sometimes remarkable ranging into the millions of dollars. It appears that once the process is wholeheartedly driven by the CEO, it cannot fail to have the most positive results on the emotional life of the company, on its effectiveness, and on its performance.

While "Corporate Impotence" is not a term that is often used, every manager knows exactly what it feels like. Knows exactly its consequence to both company and people.

What has not been well understood is that there exists a Corporate Viagra�, a process of corporate renewal and revitalization that can be taken for this condition. It works rapidly and well. It works not only for companies in difficulties, but also works even better for companies that are healthy.

The only requirement for it to work is a CEO with the courage to make his managers look deep into the spirit of their company. And not run away.

Viagra� is a registered trademark of Pfizer Laboratories.