Aubyn Hill
THE BEST and most accomplished entrepreneurs and managers are evangelists. People like Jack Welch, who led the American General Electric Company to become the most sustainable, profitable and growing conglomerate in the world; Sam Walton who built Wal-Mart, and J. R. D. Tata of India who established and led Indian Airlines to become the national carrier of India, established and built the Taj Group of Hotels, as well as one of the most respected business houses in India - the Tata Group - have all been business evangelists. In Jamaica, business leaders such as Michael Lee Chin, the majority shareholder and chairman of the NCB Group; Billy McConnell of the Lascelles and J. Wray and Nephew Group of Companies, and Las Chin of the Lasco Group are just as passionate evangelisers within and for the businesses that they lead as other internationally recognised successful business leaders. They all embody clarity of vision about what they want to achieve. Their relentless passion produces a quite unabashful testimony about the products and services of their companies. They are compelled to speak to most anyone inside and outside of their companies in the hope of winning another convert who will become a committed customer. Like it or not, when it comes to leading their businesses, these business people are just as committed and fervent in their proselytising as Billy Graham or the late John Paul II.
SHAMELESS COLD CALLERS
Consider the evangelist. He or she talks to people whom they have never met about a subject that very often is foreign to the hearer and one that the hearer might find objectionable because of his or her current beliefs and practices. Evangelists often have to travel to new and foreign places where their message can be expected to be at variance with local customs and practices, and as messengers to these strange and foreign places they are vilified, laughed at or rejected outright - at least at first. Evangelists then have to be a sort of human pachyderm with the toughest of skins and a belief which is so strong it will act as a shield against the verbal abuse, outrageous ridicule and sometimes even bullets. Luckily, for the most part, businessmen who act as evangelists for their companies do not have to suffer the kind of negative treatment that their religious counterparts have to face.
The business managers who act as evangelisers have some quite outstanding qualities. They have a resilience that is indomitable. They seem never to get discouraged. When doors close in their faces, somehow they have the tremendous aptitude and reservoir of optimism to find opportunities in a closing door; somehow they get around, over, under or behind that closing door to find the opportunity. When one country closes them out, they move to another and find opportunities, or work on the closed door in their existing country until they find an opening to new opportunities. They possess a belief in their company and their vision which propels them to one success after the other - even when they have to overcome obstacles and failures to reach those successes. These evangelising business leaders are the masters of the 'cold call'. Insurance agents have this legend about them, but these business leaders can and do make cold calls on people who have no idea they need their services and products. They even call on the competition and its customers and will come away from those cold calls with victorious sales and profits. They are always talking up their products and services to their clients and staff.
EVANGELISING INSIDE THEIR COMPANIES
Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ) president, Beverly Lopez, in discussion with Mr. William McConnell, Lascelles managing director and honorary secretary of PSOJ, at a luncheon in his honour at Knutsford Court Hotel in St. Andrew. The luncheon was held on Monday in recognition of Mr. McConnell's receipt of the Order of Jamaica award. - JUNIOR DOWIE/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Quite often the biggest challenge a manager faces is within his or her own company. Changing a long established procedure, establishing a new process, launching a new product or changing the business model of an organisation creates challenges that only people with the qualities of the best evangelist can hope to overcome. Many managers are far too laid back about their never-ending need to be and remain an evangelist to their staff and, of course, to their customers. There is endless and rich success that can be mined from within the ranks of a company's staff by committed, informed, insightful and relentless evangelistic managers. This is so for companies that operate 'for profit' in the private sector and those that are 'not for profit' but must deliver high quality services in the public sector. In the same way Billy Graham and John Paul II had to ensure that the doctrine and message of their organisations were solidly embedded in the minds and hearts of their bishops and associates, so too must the evangelising managers ensure that the ethos, vision and core values of their companies are embedded and reinforced in their colleagues and staff.
One of the best advertising media that managers can use is the combination of the staff and extended families. This is true in both the public and private sectors. Managers need to recognise that good communication within their organisations concerning the achievements of the company - and of particular individuals - can become a substantial advertising leverage. Staff should be encouraged to share relevant information on the company or institution at home among their family and friends and then for that whole group to become proselytisers to customers. Managers who communicate well with their staff and recruit each one to be part of the evangelising team tap into a great source of one of the most cost-efficient means of advertising and public relations. This is true in banks, insurance companies, the distributive trade, media companies, the police force, public utility institutions and, where the zeal has been lost or is waning, in churches and religious organisations. Effective business evangelising has to be, to the practitioner, the quintessence of success.
Aubyn Hill is the CEO of Corporate Strategies Ltd., a restructuring and financial advisory firm. Respond to: writerhill@gmail.com
