The Driving Force: Extraordinary Results with Ordinary People

What makes a company great here in the current business environment? After all, management trends come and go. Economic conditions fluctuate and market demands shift. Corporations re-structure and new owners take over. The one constant, the one enduring truth, is that people define the character of a company. They always have and always will. Motivated, passionate people make the difference between ho-hum mediocrity and extraordinary performance. Figure out how to access that motivation and ignite that passion and, boys and girls, you've got yourself a winner.

That's the message from Peter W. Schutz, former CEO of Porsche AG and author of the new book The Driving Force: Extraordinary Results with Ordinary People
(2005, ISBN: 0-9771289-0-3, $24.95).

"People are the heart and soul of any business," says Schutz, now a mentor who advises leaders from companies of all sizes. "Give them something they can share to rally around and nurture the driving force that separates ordinary work from extraordinary work and you can reap a culture of excellence. This is true whether you have five employees or five thousand. It's not a new idea, but it's one that too many leaders consistently forget. And in the new millennium, forgetting this fundamental truth can be fatal."

In The Driving Force, Schutz shares a wealth of insights he learned throughout his career--from his first post-college job as an engineer with Caterpillar to his stint with Cummins Engine Company to his seven years at Porsche--that relate to the successful management of people.

The book takes a plainspoken, commonsense tone that reveals the down-to-earth personality of its author. (Schutz admits in the intro he is more mechanic than philosopher.) That accessibility is what gives The Driving Force
its power--well, that and the wealth of colorful stories about Porsche racing victories, German business practices, and the amazing people Schutz has encountered and learned from throughout his career.

So how can you stoke the driving force at your own company? Schutz offers the following tips and insights:

Remove the glass panes between people.
A customer of Cummins Engine Company, a western truck fleet, was experiencing frequent engine failures. Evidence suggested that the drivers were abusing engines, and that such abuse was occurring shortly after the vehicles left the company's home terminal. When Cummins investigated, it discovered that the dispatchers, hidden safely behind a large glass pane, were taking their own sweet time compiling the drivers' trip tickets. Furious about this seemingly deliberate foot-dragging, the drivers would storm out of the dispatch room and vent their frustrations on the trucks. The solution? The company removed the glass pane in the dispatch room. It totally transformed the relationship between drivers and dispatchers. "Often invisible barriers between people are the root cause of performance problems in business," writes Schutz. "The driving force is stifled."

Four of the most powerful words in the world are I need your help.
Leo Brewer, a friend of Schutz, bought a Cummins distributorship in St. Louis, Missouri. He needed to make significant improvements, though, and was out of money. Together with Schutz, he cooked up a plan. He went back to the filthy and neglected facility, gathered his crew in the shop area, and told them that he, his wife, and his children were coming in on Saturday morning to clean, and that anyone who wanted to could show up and pitch in. To make a long story short, they did. Then, the next weekend, they joined together to repaint. "The camaraderie of those two weekends resulted in more than just a clean shop," writes Schutz. "It established the basis of a new culture, a new relationship between management and labor, and the company took off to new heights of performance."

Company icons are powerful. Don't underestimate that power.
When Schutz joined Porsche in 1981, the company was planning to discontinue the Porsche 911. Although there were practical reasons to put it on the chopping block--it was hard to drive and had an engine that could barely meet upcoming noise and emissions regulations--the decision was harming morale. A deep sense of loss and grief pervaded the entire company. Schutz describes the "moment of decision" when Porsche reversed its plan. "I noticed a chart on the wall of Professor Bott's office," he writes.

"It depicted the ongoing development schedules for the three primary Porsche product lines: 944, 928, and 911. Two of them stretched far into the future, but the 911 program stopped at the end of 1981. I remember rising from my chair, walking over to the chart, taking a black marker pen and extending the 911 program bar clean off the end of the chart . . . The Porsche 911, the company icon, had been saved, and I believe the company was saved with it."

Don't give your customers what they say they want. Instead, redefine customer expectations.
That's right. You cannot do good proactive marketing or new product development by listening to your customers. There was no customer demand for the transducer, the airplane, the automobile, the microwave oven, the Internet. No one asked Steve Jobs to invent the personal computer. You must use your imagination and vision to decide what customer expectations are likely to be after change has occurred. A prime example is the Porsche 911 Cabriolet (discussed above). "Instead of responding to the customer request for a less costly and more trouble-free car, we built a convertible with a price approximately 20 percent higher than the contemporary coupe," Schutz writes. "Dealers and customers loved it."

Pursue excellence, not success.
Managers focused on success, particularly short-term success, will frequently fail to mobilize the real driving force, the committed passion of people that can result in extraordinary performance. Success must come quickly and may be fleeting and fickle. Those who are obsessed with success will often compromise their values and principles. On the other hand, excellence is lasting and dependable. Managers striving for excellence and quality tend to be patient because their focus is on the longer term. They lead with a quiet confidence because they know they will win in the long run.

Build credibility.
This may require that you put yourself in a vulnerable position. Law mandates that a German AG must hold meetings with all its people, a Betriebsversammlung, several times each year. Schutz describes the meetings he had with the 8,500 employees of Porsche, during which anyone could ask any question. It was a way of ensuring that the CEO and other members of management were accountable to employees. Though he admits that at the first such meeting he was "scared out of my mind," he lauds these events as a great way to achieve credibility--and suggests that U.S. organizations find ways to achieve the same effect. "One way or another, managers must put themselves into a position where they are vulnerable," he writes. "This cannot be done with a newsletter, video communication, or bulletin board announcement. No form of one-way communication can get this job done effectively."

Decide like a democracy.

Implement like a dictatorship.
Most managers tend to do the opposite: they make decisions and then get stuck with democratic implementation. Obviously, trying to accommodate the diverse interests of many people in a competitive operating environment can be a disaster. Implementation is a time to do, not to talk. (Imagine trying to negotiate a tire change in a race pit.) Therefore, says Schutz, you must include all relevant people and groups in the decision-making process, even if it takes months to produce a flawed decision. The reason is simple. A flawed decision that people support can be implemented quickly, while a high-quality dictatorial decision may end up not getting implemented at all.

Implement fundamentals like Vince Lombardi: make sure Tony understands.
The Green Bay Packers, the champions of their era, were known not for their brilliant play concepts, but for brilliant, flawless execution of the fundamentals. When Vince Lombardi would gather the team in the locker room to diagram plays on the blackboard, he would always make sure Tony--a large but not overly bright player--understood. If he got a blank look from Tony, he would scrap the play. "After the Green Bay Packers had won the world championship, there would be a team meeting at the beginning of the following season," writes Schutz. "Vince Lombardi would walk into the meeting holding a football. The meeting and the new season would begin with, Gentlemen, this is a football. For Lombardi and his winning team it was all about fundamentals and flawless execution. If you do not have 'Tony' on board, understanding and supporting the decision, do not pull the trigger to initiate implementation."

Make sure your people are building a temple for customers,
not busting rocks for a living. It is not the activity that defines a job, but how someone sees their activity in the context of an organization's culture and style that matters. If people are working together to build a temple, the hammers are not as heavy, the rocks are not as hard, and the days are not as long. It is no longer the same task. It is up to management to define the temple. If management cannot (or will not) communicate what sort of a temple the organization is building, the work ethic can easily become: How can I bust fewer rocks for more money?

Make sure your business culture is defined, in large measure, by what people must notdo.
Think about the Ten Commandments in the Bible. Only two of the ten actually command us to do anything. The other eight are prohibitions. Likewise, the documented culture of a business is most effective if it is about 80 percent prohibitions: Thou shalt nots.

"The implications for leaders are clear: We must stop telling people what to do," writes Schutz. "Instead make sure that they know what not to do and then allow them to proceed on that basis to apply their ingenuity and formulate solutions. It is the most effective way I have found to get people to use their ingenuity."

"I love people," says Schutz. "I believe any effective leader has
to. I also believe most people have an innate drive to create something exciting and extraordinary. We want to feel passionate and to be useful, to contribute to something larger than ourselves. It's part of being human. Leaders must create structures and processes that allow the natural driving force to emerge, then nurture it and let it find its own momentum. It's our only job. If we do it well, there is no limit to how fast or how far we can go."

About the Author:

Peter W. Schutz
(retired CEO of Porsche AG Worldwide) & Sheila Harris formed Harris & Schutz, Inc. in 1991 to facilitate the exchange of knowledge between Peter and business people all over the world. Peter's background in engineering--coupled with his experience in marketing and management--gives him a unique perspective on business today.

Born in Berlin, Germany, in 1930, Peter moved to Chicago when he was 11 years old. Several years later, Peter attended the Illinois Institute of Technology. Caterpillar Tractor in Peoria, Illinois, was his workplace for 15 years, serving in various engineering positions. Peter also ran a flying school and taught engineering at Bradley University in Peoria. He then spent 11 years at Cummins Engine Company, Inc: 3 years in corporate strategic planning and 8 years as vice president responsible for sales and services of truck engines in the United States and Canada.

1978 brought a move to Cologne, Germany, where Peter assumed responsibility for the Deutz Engine Division of Kloeckner-Humboldt-Deutz, AG. This included engineering, manufacturing, and world-wide sales and service. Revenues grew to exceed DM 1 billion per year.

While in Germany, he accepted the job as CEO of Porsche AG, based in Stuttgart. Porsche was in the midst of its first money-losing year in 1980. During the Schutz tenure, Porsche worldwide sales grew from 28,000 units in 1980-81 to a peak of 53,000 units in 1986. Revenues went from DM 850 million to over DM 3.7 billion.

Peter received the "Outstanding Achievement Award" from his alma mater, the Illinois Institute of Technology, in 1983, and was honored with the "Henry Heald Award" in 1987. This award is given to honor those who have exemplified exceptional ethics and business practices in their field. Other recipients of this award include: Mees van der Rohe, Edward Teller, Ted Turner, Bill Hewlett, Buckminster Fuller, and Jonas Salk.

His appearances include association conventions and conferences as well as in-company consulting and seminars. He speaks at a variety of meetings including sales, strategic planning, and team-building. The Executive Committee, an organization of CEOs, named Peter "Resource of the Year" in 1985. (Peter has spoken to more than 700 TEC meetings world-wide.)

About the Book:

The Driving Force: Extraordinary Results with Ordinary People (2005, ISBN: 0-9771289-0-3, $24.95) is available at bookstores nationwide and major online booksellers.

For more information, please visit harrisandschutzinc.com.