Simple, eloquent, practical--author Bo Burlingham inspires with six precepts for great businesses

by Gale E. Martin, Director of Marketing, S. Dale High Center for Family Business

Someone once relayed an anecdote about a well-respected navy admirable, much admired for his military acumen, for his courage, but above all, for his leadership. What was the secret to his success, he was asked.

The admirable relayed the following story: Every day, he goes to his personal safe, takes out a piece of paper, unfolds it and reads this message:

Port-left. Starboard-right.

So, there you have it. Simple precepts reinforced daily made this navy man one of the most admired leaders in our modern day.

In the same way, Bo Burlingham, author of Small Giants: Companies Who Choose to Be Great Instead of Big, identified a half-dozen qualities common to the great businesses he studied. He shared them with his signature blend of credible enthusiasm during his presentation to the S. Dale High Center membership yesterday at a breakfast seminar at the Lancaster Marriott.

Were the guiding principles that Bo shared unwieldy and complex? Were they radically different messages for seasoned business leaders? Frankly, they could not have been more simple. Most likely, many of them have already been intuited by business leaders who have enjoyed a measure of success.

Yet, according to member evaluations, they found Bo's simple message compelling and reaffirming. Basically, Bo said that the businesses he explored for Small Giants all had an off-the-charts kind of "mojo," or business charisma, resulting from the synergy of six factors:

1. The leader factor--owners and leaders know who they are, what they want out of business and why
2. The community factor--the companies are rooted in the communities in which they do business.
3. The customer/supplier factor--the companies enjoy close personal relationships with their customers and suppliers.
4. The employee factor--the customers come second. Employees come first.
5. The (missing) margin factor--the companies have a sound business model and protect their gross margins.
6. The passion factor--the owners and leaders are in love with what their companies do.

None of those precepts is complex though I'll admit one of them is provocative. I'd never heard the counsel to put employees before customers though it is apparently the central premise of the book Nuts: Southwest Airlines' Crazy Recipe for Business and Personal Success by Kevin Freiberg and Jackie Freiberg.

By embodying the six factors Bo identified, the small giants he studied surmounted incredible odds and obstacles felling other good and near-great businesses--challenges such as competition from giant corporations, the humblest of humbling beginnings, and crushing debt, to name a few. 

Following Bo's talk, in response to the question, "What did you find most valuable about the presentation?" attendees said things like:

• A great perspective on the importance of culture in making a great company;
• Bo's confirmation of the importance for community involvement;
• He reinforced the need to maintain and grow company culture; and
• After listening to Bo, he made me feel as though I can move forward as a leader in a small family business as an employee not family member.

More than a few guests mentioned the practical wisdom of Bo's presentation.

Sometimes, keeping your family business on course to success, to realizing its potential, can be as simple as reminding yourself daily of what's truly important: Employees. Community. Customers/Suppliers. Leadership. Passion.

Leading a family firm might simply be a case of telling yourself "port-left; starboard-right" more often than you think anyone needs to hear it.

For slides of Bo's presentation from the S. Dale High Center website, click here. For a link to another great summary of Bo's presentation by Scott Heintzelman, "The Exuberant Accountant," click here.

Quote of the week

“Bo Burlingham reminds us of a vital truth: big does not equal great, and great does not equal big.”
--Jim Collins, coauthor of Built to Last and author of Good to Great.

Book pic: Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big

The Washington Post writes about Small Giants, “Bo Burlingham’s done for private companies what Jim Collins did for public companies in Good to Great.” Bo Burlingham has succeeded in drawing a blueprint for businesses that choose to be great instead of big.

One of Burlingham’s favorite leadership concepts is called “The Mona Lisa Effect.” In a wonderful story about the ups and downs of Buffalo, New York, an underdog city that was revitalized by a quirky local business, Burlingham asserts that all great companies are rooted in their communities. Their communities shape them, and they shape their communities.

This quality is illusive and hard to define, says Burlingham, who is also the editor of Inc. Magazine, but it’s like the Mona Lisa. If the painting were framed in a different way, hung in a different way and lit in another way, it wouldn’t be the same work of art. Likewise, great businesses flourish in a particular “context” in a particular way. Take them out of the context and they cease to be great.

Walmart or even Whole Foods, according to Burlingham, can’t be great because they’re not rooted in their communities. He cites other companies that are synonymous with their cities, Zingerman’s and Ann Arbor, Anchor Brewing and San Francisco, ECCO and Boise, and O.C. Tanner and Salt Lake City.
This suggests great things about family businesses. Most family firms are deeply rooted in their communities, especially in our region!

Sum and substance: Don’t forget that Bo Burlingham is coming to the Center for Family Business on September 23rd for our Fifteenth-Year Celebration. His Small Giants is about you!