In order to know when good enough is good enough and have the right perspective and mindset, he says you need to make sure you know your mission and where you fit into it.
Ask yourself: Are you demanding perfection to make the company better or just to make yourself look good? Is the return on perfection worth the additional cost to your team and the company, especially when perfection is not necessary?
Remain calm in the worst storm
Ranger school also taught Ouellette to be at his best when situations are at their worst, which he says takes practice. And that’s also true in business.
As the leader of the organization, everyone is watching you — you don’t want to disappoint them or let others control your attitude, he says.
When everything goes to pieces, try not to transfer your fears to others. Don’t make yourself the center of attention.
“When this happens, what I suggest is keeping your head when everyone around you is losing theirs,” Ouellette says. “You should marshal the power of your team when hope sometimes seems forlorn.”
Take responsibility for your actions
When Ouellette was a cadet at West Point, he learned there are four answers to any question: “yes, sir,” “no sir,” “no excuse, sir” and “sir, I do not understand.”
Ouellette believes that “no excuse” is something that needs to be applied in business.
When somebody makes a mistake, the reasons why aren’t always important. Think about when an associate makes a mistake in your organization, he says. Do you really want to go through a bunch of questions and answers about it?
Instead, own up to what you’ve done, because bad news doesn’t get better if you wait.
“Others respect you when you stand up in the storm,” Ouellette says. “Being honest builds trust with those whom you work and your self-confidence.”
He also believes that you need to be clear in letting people know where you’re going.
“Have a vision of where you want to move the company,” he says. “And if a particular tenet of that is innovative products, then it must be known.”
Then set up a process by which to review and measure your progress toward that goal.
The current CEO of American Textile is a master at this, Ouellette says, and it really gets results. It’s not mysterious, but it takes practice.
Ouellette’s thoughts on …
What he’s most proud of from his 39 years at American Textile➜ I’m proud of, certainly, the growth our company has had, and the idea behind that is — and I say this sincerely — it’s never one person. It’s always a team getting things done.
Retirement➜ I’m still chairman of the company, but I no longer have any operating responsibilities.
I’m on three outside boards. I have been volunteering at Duquesne University’s (John F. Donahue) Graduate School of Business. I’ve been doing a little bit of work with the Allegheny Conference (on Community Development). And I’m trying to become more expert at goofing off.
What it’s like to help other business leaders➜ It is very interesting. A majority of the issues are very similar to what I’ve experienced at American Textile, but it’s different when you’re not the one responsible for making a decision. It gives you a little bit more freedom to think.
It is not as much pressure, although the intensity of thought remains. The burden of responsibility is lifted, and that is a big burden.
The social responsibility of business➜ When we were a much smaller company, it was more difficult to get involved in the community. But as our company has grown, we’ve had those resources, and then the question is: How do you apply resources?
It’s a matter of the frame of mind that you have with your business. And if you feel that your business is part of the community, and that the community has helped you make your business better, it implies that you might want to take on some responsibility for that.
The reason I’m interested in the Allegheny Conference is they want to make Pittsburgh a better place to live and work. I think it’s an admirable goal, and one that I would love to see our company associated with.
The behavioral patterns he’s observed when mentoring today➜ There are a couple of challenges that they face. They want constant feedback on how they’re doing, and sometimes are not as process-oriented when solving problems as I feel they should be. They’ll gather facts and put all of the facts out without having the courage to say: “The answer is” or “My recommendation is.”
I’ve advised some of these companies to get more precise and more organized when they go to attack a problem.
Often a problem has several tentacles to it, and you can’t just talk about the disparate parts that form the whole problem. You need a real clear thinker.
Sometimes you can get thrown off from where you really want to go because you’re putting out fires. There’s a principle that I’ve found to be very good. You can identify your issues as:
- Important and urgent.
- Important, not urgent.
- Unimportant but urgent.
- Unimportant, not urgent.
When those unimportant urgent things pull us off track, you need people to be able to clarify where you said you wanted to go and what steps you’re taking to get there.
When incidents come up, ask yourself: Is this important and urgent, or unimportant and urgent? When you have a road map, often it makes it a little easier to make that distinction.
