These brief notes are from the presentation made by Mike Harris at The Chairman’s Network Event held on 15 April 2010
Mike, as you may know, built and directed as CEO three billion dollar companies including the telephone bank First Direct, the internet bank Egg, and was CEO of Mercury Communications, then the main competitor to BT. He was also chairman of mobile phone company Mercury One-2-One which was bought by T-mobile for $10 billion in 1999. Mike has been credited with transforming the financial service landscape worldwide and has a passion to bring to fruition revolutionary ideas in business.
Mike is currently chairman and co-founder of digital identity experts Garlik – a company which was created in 2005 in order to give individuals and their families more power over the way their information is used in the digital world. Tim Berners-Lee, creator of the World Wide Web is on its advisory board. Mike has also worked with Bill Gates and many other globally-recognized business people. He was also (part-time) chairman of innovation at the Royal Bank of Scotland from 2005-2009. His latest endeavour is a company called The Difference Engine that provides Workshops, Master Classes, Seminars , Coaching, Mentoring and implementation support to companies (from start-ups to large corporations) which want to be a remarkable example of what’s possible in business.
Mike shared his experiences of attempting to make small dents in the Universe at First Direct, Mercury and Egg: what he was attempting to do, what worked and what didn’t and how he is using those experiences in his work presently. He made the following points:
Management guru Warren Bennis once stated that nothing worthwhile had ever been created by an individual; that everything worthwhile required a great team and building such a team was the leaders’ real job. Mike concurs and finds that there is a popular myth about the ‘great leader’ in business. It is great teams, said Bennis, not great leaders who set out to create a dent in the universe – to change the course of events and make something new and different happen, something which simply wouldn’t have happened without them.
Denting the universe is greatly aided by thinking like an iconic brand (you don’t actually have to be one); to do this there are two questions you need absolute clarity on : 1. What do you want to be known for and 2. how do you want to leave people
You then thoughtfully design a consistent brand experience based on the answers to those two questions – an experience that is infectious and irresistible
Thoughtful design means carefully thinking through all of the pieces you need and how you put them together. Try and design your brand experience like a Ferrari would be designed. If you don’t pay this attention you may end up with a Reliant Regal with Trotter’s Independent Traders written on the side.
The next step is to ensure the execution of the brand experience is as flawless as possible – Mike used the analogy of a surgical team or a championship sports team.
If the brand experience is what we do day to day then we also need to know where we are going with it – what exactly is this dent we are seeking to create . This requires definition of a 3 to 5 year strategy which Mike called a game worth playing.
Finally Mike referred to what has become known as the Stockdale paradox (after Admiral James Stockdale) – you must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end (which you can never afford to lose) with the discipline to confront the facts of your current reality – however grim. Mike said this is the best piece of advice he has ever seen for leaders who are engaged in denting the universe.
Date: 15 April 2010