A PERSONAL INTERVIEW ON WHAT HAS MATTERED MOST IN MY LIFE

The following interview was translated from Romanian. It reflects a conversation that I was fortunate to have with probably the most sensitive, thoughtful interviewer I ever experienced. Even though I had met her only that day, I felt that I had known her for years.

Once in a while you read an interview you have given and react feeling: this captures what I believe about as well as I can express it.

That is my reaction to this.

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The success and the dilemmas of a global CEO

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27 May 2015 | de Mihaela Popescu

John E. Pepper Jr.’s visit in Romania brought me face to face with one of the most admired global CEOs, a model of business leader that is not afraid to unveil the man behind the function, in an opened conversation about values in service of the business success and dilemmas managers deal with every day in their activity.

John Pepper began his speech at Inspiro – the leadership event organized by Progresiv magazine in Romania – with a story about the way he convinced his wife to marry him, confessing that it was the first time to tell this story to an audience outside his family. Then he told us how much his family means for him: “What I am most certain of in my life is the fact that my wife and our four children are and have always been my main and constant source of joy, energy, emotional stability and confidence. The time spent with my children and afterwards with my grandchildren represent the oxygen that helped me go further”.

“The second thing I am most certain of in my life is the duty I have to the people that shaped me, without who I wouldn’t have become what I am now. Approximately ten years ago I made a list with these people, I wrote on paper 10-15 names – starting with my parents, my teachers, the persons that gave me their trust and that made me want more from myself. Why am I telling you all this? Because you are, at your turn, on someone else’s list. You have no idea how much influence you have on other people”, Pepper added.

His belief is that trust and love are the most valuable gifts we can offer to other people. “I remember an extremely important moment for me, which happened 15 years before becoming the global CEO of Procter&Gamble: on the hallway of our office building I randomly ran into the CEO at that time and he put his hand on my shoulder, saying «John, take good care of yourself because one day you might run this company». His words had an extraordinary effect on me because at that time I wasn’t even dreaming at a promotion beyond the middle management level”.

Through his speech, John Pepper communicates trust, but also empathy: you have the impression that he looks, one by one, at each and every person listening quietly in the conference room. His face reads the joy of sharing his experiences and feelings with us, although 90% of those present in the audience are people he has never seen before in his life. His stories are about the people he has come accross in the 40 years spent at P&G, about the way he built united and performant teams relying mainly on trust.

“The quality of relationships between people is vital for any company and these relationships have to be built in a corporate culture based on integrity, wish to innovate and win, mutual trust, respect and affection”, synthesizes John Pepper.

With an enviable memory, he argues all his affirmations with examples of real situations from his professional life, some of them having happened 30-40 years ago. He confesses that he kept a diary for 40 years, which probably helped very much in writing the book “What Really Matters”, which was recently published in Romania, translated in the local language.

From John Pepper’s stories, in which we can all find ourselves to some extent, the voice of wisdom seems to echo, which also makes me admire his modesty: he doesn’t speak about his achievements, but of those of the people he has shaped. He also answers questions from the audience by approaching the persons who enter a dialogue with him.

Although he spent only a few days in Bucharest (and during this period he gathered hundreds of managers at the meetings and conferences with the local business environment, organized with the support of Wave Division company), John Pepper insisted to meet with students as well, so he visited two of the largest Universities in Romania.

He also granted an exclusive meeting to the business journalists, in which he gathered all the delegates around him, creating a round table in order to facilitate interaction with each and every one of us. This is how I found out about the success, as well as the dilemmas of a global CEO. The most interesting fact is that every story is serving as an example, and each of them is mainly about people and relationships between them.

Community power. The most powerful and successful companies are those where the employees have the feeling of belonging to a community. This is an extremely powerful motivational factor. “A former colleague that left P&G despite my pleads to remain with the company confessed, years after the departure, the reason he made that decision: he did not feel like home at P&G. His words made me think”, Pepper remembers. In his case, the fact that he always felt he had found his place at P&G is probably the reason why he remained loyal to the company for 40 years. “With many of my colleagues I have tied, over the years, very beautiful friendships, even now we visit each other’s families”, said the former CEO.

John Pepper also spoke about a moment in this carer when he was very close to leave P&G because he had received a very attractive job offer from another company. His wife then asked him three simple questions that made him decide to stay with the company: Do you like what you do? Do you feel good within the company? Do you feel that you have the possibility to further advance in your career?

His advice for those who want to grow within the company they work for is to constantly come up with new ideas and propose new work procedures or approaches that haven’t been tested before, as well as to invest in things that can make them even more useful for the business. “For example, in the US, even if they work for large or small organizations, people usually invest constantly in leadership courses or in developing new abilities, with their own resources”. Pepper also confessed that, over the years, he learned a lot about leadership by reading biographies of great men, not only from the business environment, but from politics and world history as well, being also passionate about history.

Every person counts. “We all count! All of us! And we all want to feel that we are important for the company we work for”, underlined John Pepper. He said that the moment he entered the top management team of P&G he took on the mission to give his best and to help other do the same. It was basically a mission of putting himself in the service of others: family, consumers, the community within the company and those outside it.

Where does the good instinct come from. A reality of current times is the fact that many companies don’t hire good people anymore, specialists in various fields with ages of +45-50 years, out of the simple reason they can’t afford to pay them, preferring to recruit young people or even students who are just a smaller cost for the organization and can be easily formed. “The companies that follow this strategy to replace senior managers with valuable experience in their fields with young people without working experience are taking on a great risk: that of compromising their future by concentrating on a short term cost reduction strategy. It is a mistake to underestimate the value of senior employees because the success of a company is about excellence in execution and a good business instinct, and these two can only come with experience”, said John Pepper.

His advice for employees over 50 years that feel in danger of losing their job because of this phenomenon is not to let the technological factor to destroy their career. “You need to invest in developing new abilities and get up to date with the new technologies in order to make yourselves more useful to the company”.

Balance between work and personal life. During his first mandate as General Manager in P&G group, the relocation to Italy together with his family was one of the greatest challenges for the entire family because of his very busy schedule. “I managed to make time for the real important things in my personal life by better organizing my office activities. One of the main objectives of every day was to get home in time for dinner with my family. My children have always appreciated this very much. I even remember deciding to give up golf when my first child was born. In this way, at that time I’ve earned 4-5 extra hours with my family during weekends”, John Pepper recalls.

He emphasized that every company has to respect the personal life of its employees and not to test their stress resistance too much. “I think that the technological advance made possible a lot of improvements: a lot of companies no longer present the «syndrome» of counting the hours of physical presence at the office, they have become more flexible by introducing paternity leave and the option to work from home one day a week”.

NELSON MANDELA'S "LONG ROAD TO FREEDOM"

I am posting an extraordinarily insightful and comprehensive review of Nelson Mandela's magnificent autobiography with one purpose in mind--to encourage all of you who read this to read this book in its entirety.

This review was written by a very good friend of mine, A P&G leader and native of South Africa, Lindsay Schmauss.

“The Long Road to Freedom”
gave me so much to think about – it really is a book to read and re-read.  It’s
more than a story or even a history - it’s a collection of fundamental lessons. 
Truly the breadth and depth of those 750 pages is awesome.  There are lessons on
leadership, on strategy, planning and flawless execution, on working together
with people, on resolving conflict, bridging differences, driving change,
mastering one’s self, practicing self-discipline and commitment to
self-improvement.  There are lessons on justice and injustice, on making a point
and arguing a point of view, on compromise, on forgiveness, on suffering and how
to alleviate the suffering of others.  There are lessons about family
commitment, love, loyalty, betrayal, the tension between “tradition” and
progress, the value of heritage, spirituality and independence.  Lessons on
courage, on mastering fear, on bluffing it, on seeking and giving support.  On
and on I could go.  Just to make this list takes me skipping back through those
pages, which come alive in my memory.  I know people learn in different ways,
and certainly I have always been someone who learns best from a story.  When I
can experience something even vicariously through telling, I find the lesson
takes root in my mind like a seed that proceeds to grow.  The “Long Walk”
planted a forest and the more I think about it and return to it, the forest
becomes a plantation!  It’s one of those moments where I think to myself, if I
can just internalize and apply a fraction of the knowledge I have been exposed
to here, what a difference it would make!  The cool thing about the way human
beings are created is that that process happens naturally. Of course we can seek
to be more INTENTIONAL about it, but the great thing about education is that it
changes you – once you know and understand, you do think and operate
differently.  Education can change the world, said Nelson

Mandela
☺

REFLECTIONS ON A VISIT TO SOUTH AFRICA

VISIT TO SOUTH AFRICA – SOME REFLECTIONS

Earlier this month, I had the privilege of visiting South Africa with my daughter-in-law Maggie, my P&G associates, Lindsay and Steffen Schmauss, Lindsay’s dad Daryl (who lives in Durban) and Matthew Willman, a young man who served as Nelson Mandela’s professional and closest photographer for ten years starting about 2003.

It was the experience of a lifetime.  In a period of 72 hours, we visited a succession of sites and were informed by testimony from Matthew that brought to life the courage, the fortitude and the values of Nelson Mandela’s life as we could have never otherwise experienced.  Our visits took us to:

·      The Nelson Mandela Center of Memory, where we met its founder Vern Harris.

·      Robben Island.  Matthew had spent 18 months coming to and from the island as part of his work with Mandela.

·      The Victor Verster Prison, the final imprisonment site for Nelson Mandela.  It was here that the negotiations were conducted with DeKlerk after 27 years of imprisonment and Mandela’s release finalized.  We had the special privilege there of talking with one of his wardens, Jack Swart.

·      The Nelson Mandela Capture Site outside Durban.  It features a remarkable exhibit profiling Mandela’s life.

This experience was informing, inspiring and humbling.  The bravery and determination of Mandela and his associates were palpable.  It brought to life for me in a far deeper way what I had learned from his magnificent biography, “Long Road to Freedom.”

No words of mine will do justice to this experience.  I’d urge all who can to make this visit.  I only hope it can be in the company of someone who can convey close to the insight we gained from Matthew Willman, Vern Harris and Jack Swart.

*****

I took a number of deep impressions from this visit; many uplifting, other presenting me with a personal challenge as I, together with so many others, work to pursue the mission of the Freedom Center.  Here I will present two of these impressions:

1.     The first is to say how glad I am that we were able to honor Nelson Mandela at our last International Freedom Conductor Award event and that his great-great-grandson, Luvuyo Mandela, joined us. 

I’m delighted that we have acquired Matthew Willman’s photographs as a foundation for sharing Nelson Mandela’s story at the Freedom Center, and beyond through a traveling exhibit.  I’m excited about other ideas that emerged from the trip which might enable us to become even more a repository for Nelson Mandela’s memory and values.

2.     I was deeply impressed by the similar progress that has been made in South Africa and the United States in overcoming some of the worst aspects of apartheid in South Africa and segregation in our country.  Yet, at the same time, I was impressed by the similar and enormous challenges our nations continue to face in overcoming the legacy of apartheid and slavery and on accepting each other as one.

While I am no expert on apartheid and how far it has been overcome, I was encouraged by some of what I saw.  To observe the inter-racial beaches at Durban, which not long ago were segregated into four separate blocks—White, Black, Colored and Indian—was encouraging.  I was moved by the congregation at Lindsay Schmauss’ father’s parish—The Anglican Parish of St. John the Baptist in Durban.  Its racially mixed congregation and group of ministers would be the envy of most churches in our nation.

Still, the history of apartheid rests heavily on South African today, just as the legacy of slavery rests on our country.  The history of South Africa is, in many regards, like our own.  I was reminded how the Whites legislated the Black Africans into “Homelands,” not surprisingly the most arid and least desirable lands in South Africa.  How alike in essence was this to what has happened in our country, as prejudice and the flawed execution of federal “fair housing” policy led to segregated neighborhoods and ghettos.

And within these shockingly disparate residential communities come the disparate schools, those for the poor, being dramatically inferior to those in the wealthiest suburbs, resulting in another cycle of increasing inequality.

On the positive side, I found it reinforcing to learn from Lindsay Schmauss’ sister-in-law, who is working in urban planning, that she is working with groups in major cities to bring together in a coordinated way government services in health, child development and education, recognizing that holistic improvement in neighborhood infrastructure is the only credible way to make significant and sustained progress.  How similar that is to the growing conviction in Cincinnati (and elsewhere) that we need integrated neighborhood-by-neighborhood support for individual families to break the back of poverty and the lack of opportunity which so many of our young people face.

My visit to South Africa and ever deepening awareness of the ravages of poverty in our own nation add great weight to my commitment to do all I can to overcome our failure to give every child the opportunity to develop his or her abilities.

We must garner our energy and determination to address this challenge.  The future of our nation depends on it.  There will be no total solution; we know that.  But the opportunity and need for major progress rests with us.

In closing, I share this challenge laid down by Nelson Mandela himself which I happened to read while I was on this visit: 

“Overcoming poverty is not a task of charity, it is an act of justice.  Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural.  It is man-made and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.  Sometimes it falls on a generation to be great.  YOU can be that generation.  Let your greatness blossom.”

“There is nothing I fear more than waking up without a program that will help me bring a little happiness to those with no resources; those who are poor, illiterate and ridden with terminal disease.”

"BECOMING STEVE JOBS"

BECOMING STEVE JOBS” BY BRENT SCHLENDER AND RICK TETZELI

 

This is a wonderful book which presents, I believe, a very balanced portrayal of Steve’s enormous strengths and the “flipsides” that came with them, those being rashness, rudeness and a  sometimes disrespect he felt for those who he believed were “bozos.”

 

It  makes a convincing case that Steve mellowed during the last decade of his life, influenced above all, I believe, by newly formed relationships with his wife Laurene, his children and with individuals, most prominently from my perspective, Jony Ive at Apple, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter at Pixar and Bob Iger at Disney, with whom he had developed tremendous trust, admiration and affection and a recognition of their extraordinary competence in areas critical to achieving the level of excellence he pursued in anything he did.

 

Steve was constantly adapting, as the authors rightly say, “following his nose, learning, trying out new directions.  He was constantly in the act of becoming.”

 

 

Pixar was a blessing to Steve Jobs in many ways.  Most importantly, in my view, in introducing him to the incredibly sound management of Ed Catmull and also the inspiration for and commitment to quality presented by John Lasseter.  It also brought to light his ability to “fight back in times of stress” and his ability to make the most of an innovation that put him ahead of anyone else in that field.  In other words, it taught him how to keep his head and fight back when cornered and how to run like the wind in the open field.  And that became the place where he really learned, albeit slowly and sometimes against his natural instincts, that sometimes the best management technique is to forego micro-management and give good, talented people the room the need to succeed." Pixar also helped him “rediscover his self-respect, made him a billionaire, and align(ed) him with people who would teach him more about management than anyone he had ever worked with.  Without the lessons he learned at Pixar, there would have been no great second act at Apple.”  

 

As John Lasseter put it:  “Watching our collaboration, seeing us make ourselves better by working together, I think that fueled Steve.  I think that was one of the key changes when he went back to Apple.  He was more open to the talent of others, to be inspired by and challenged by that talent, but also to the idea of inspiring them to do amazing things he knew he couldn’t do by himself.”

 

All of this brings to life for me, once again, that the most important things in life are founded in relationships.  

 

Still, it is interesting to note what Steve didn’t say.  As Ed Catmull noted, Steve never quite acknowledged how much he learned from him.  “The closest he got was that he said he valued what I did and knew it was very different from what he did.” For Steve, this was high praise indeed. 

 

Jobs took great pride in what Pixar represented.  “If you do your job right, what you create (a film) can last forever,” and indeed it will.  Movies like “Finding Nemo” and “Toy Story” will be with the world as long as the world exists, in my opinion, and that is a wonderful thing indeed. 

 

I was struck by what Steve did as he re-entered Apple.  He wanted to get an inspiring slogan.  From that came:  “Think Different.”  

Steve’s view of the purpose of a company, the singular role of “product” is striking.  Here is how he said it:  “The only purpose, for me, in building a company is so that that company can make products.  One is a means to another.  Over a period of time, we realize that building a very strong company and a very strong foundation of talent and culture in a company is essential to keep making great products.  The company is one of the most amazing inventions of humans, this abstract construct gets incredibly powerful.  Even so, it’s about the products.  It’s about working together with really fun, smart, creative people and making wonderful things.  It’s not about the money.  What a company is, then, is a group of people who can make more than just the next big thing.  It’s a talent.  It’s a capability.  It’s a culture.  It’s a point of view.  And it’s a way of working together to make the next thing, and the next one, and the next one.” No one has said it better than this. 

 

Jony Ive was a soulmate of Steve’s.  He was totally aligned with Steve on the importance of product:  “We trust if we do a good job, and the products do, people will like it.  And we trust that if they like it, they will buy it.  If we are competent operationally, we will make money.”  It was that simple and straightforward to Jony and Steve. 

 

Steve made this remark about creating the Apple stores.  It referenced Pixar.  “On almost every film they make, something turns out to be not quite right.  And they have an amazing willingness to turn around and do it again, until they do get it right.  It’s not about how fast you do something, it’s about doing your level best.”

 

Jim Collins identified one of the great characteristics of Steve or any great leader as a “deep restlessness.”  Collins believes this to be far more important than simple ambition or raw intelligence.  It is the foundation of resilience and self-motivation.  It is fueled by curiosity, the ache to build something meaningful, and a sense of purpose to make the most of one’s entire life.

 

Laurene Jobs’ remarks at Steve’s memorial were especially poignant.  She related how he “shaped how I came to view the world.  We were both strong-minded, but he had a fully formed aesthetic and I did not.  It is hard enough to see what is already there, to remove the many impediments to a clear view of reality, but Steve’s gift was even greater:  he saw clearly what was not there, what could be there, what had to be there.  His mind was never a tap to the reality.  Quite the contrary.  He imagined what reality lacked and he set out to remedy it.  His ideas were not arguments, but intuitions, born of a true inner freedom…Steve’s love of beauty, and his impatience with ugliness-- marked our lives….he was the most unfettered thinker I’ve ever known.  It was a deep pleasure, and a lot of fun, to think alongside him.”

 

She closed with this:  “Like my children, I lost my father when I was young.  It was not what I wanted for myself; it was not what I wanted for them.  But the sun with set and the sun will rise, and it will shine upon us tomorrow in our grief and our gratitude and we will continue to live with purpose, memory, passion, and love.”

 

*****

 

Steve Jobs’ story is an epic tribute to the power of passion, commitment to excellence, to never giving up, to following one’s nose and, in the end, it is testimony to the power of relationships, which allow one to accomplish far more than one could alone, no matter how strong and important that individual strength is, as it certainly was in the case of Steve Jobs.

 

It is also a reminder that the balance of strengths and weaknesses of individuals vary a lot;  that in the end, there is no one “style” that will accomplish great things.  In many ways, Steve Jobs is a lot like Winston Churchill.  Both made major missteps in their careers.   Both were supremely confident and  strongly opinionated.  Both could be rough on those they considered “fools” or, as Steve would say, “bozos.”  But they grew people, at least those that were strong, and in the end they learned that relationships and teamwork really did matter.  They learned from people who also were passionate about what they did and who had strengths he did not have, strengths and qualities he came to respect.  It’s a story of what makes life so interesting, especially if you are as privileged as I have been to have known people with such strong personalities, passions and character. 

 

 

SOME PERSONAL THOUGHTS ON THE ROLE OF BUSINESS ON SOCIAL AND MORAL ISSUES

THE FOLLOWING PRESENTS SOME PERSONAL THOUGHTS ON THE ROLE BUSINESS LEADERS AND CORPORATIONS SHOULD PLAY ON MORAL AND SOCIAL ISSUES

We were presented with a real drama in the States of Indiana and Arkansas, as legislation was adopted and then quickly modified which threatened to give license to business organizations to refuse service based on their religious principles to gays and lesbians.  A broad array of business and business leaders objected to this, including the nine leading businesses in Indiana, WalMart, Apple, and many others.  New legislation was quickly introduced (or that in Arkansas modified) to explicitly indicate that this “religious freedom” legislation could not be used to discriminate against marriage preference. 

During the same week, Starbuck’s CEO, Howard Schultz, passionately expressed  his and Starbuck’s recognition of same-sex marriage. He based his position primarily based on its being the right and fair action to take for his very diverse group of employees. His statement drew broad support but also criticism, with the latter usually  being couched in terms that said Starbucks should stick to serving coffee.  

This set of events raises some important questions.  To what extent do businesses have the right and indeed the obligation to voice their position on moral or ethical grounds to sway public policy?  How does business strike the right balance between its values and abiding with an existing social policy, imbedded in law and perhaps embraced by a large percentage of the population, including its employees or customers?

Getting down to cases, as CEO in 1998, I reached the position that Procter & Gamble should provide equal benefits to the dependents of individuals in a codified same-sex partnership.  We did this at a time when the majority of Ohioans opposed same-sex marriage.  We were not taking a position that these individuals were wrong in their belief.  We were taking the position that the same-sex partnership as it was codified made it right in the name of fairness to accord our employees in such a partnership the same benefits for their dependents  as a married couple would have.  This decision proved fairly controversial, but I was confident that it was right to do.  We were not making a moral pronouncement on same-sex marriage at this time.  We were saying that in the name of fairness there was no reason to deny individuals in this relationship same-sex benefits.

A related issue being debated at the moment relates to the “personhood” of a corporation.  Is a corporation a “person” or not?  Or, the question can be taken even further:  does a corporation have a “soul?”

Many, perhaps most, would say, no, a corporation is not a “person.”  As one columnist said cryptically, a corporation won’t be a “person” until it is capable of being executed in the State of Texas. 

Where do I stand on this issue?  It depends on what you mean by “person.”

I would say that business has a “responsibility” as part of society to advance and act on positions that are consistent with what as a corporate body (leaders, board of directors) represent correct moral values?  I say this because corporations play a major role in forming the cultural and value-based character of a society.

I do believe that corporations need to be humble and circumspect in taking on moral and social issues.  They have to recognize the need to balance the interests of those it serves -- its consumers, employees, shareholders and the community. 

To take an extreme example, consider a corporation's having to contemplate making a value-based decision that might severely weaken, maybe even destroy its current business. Would there ever be occasions where it would have to go this far, to almost literally have to go out of business?  I’d say yes, if its being in business meant threatening the life of consumers or anyone else. In a real sense, this consideration led to P&G’s withdrawing Rely tampons from the market decades ago.

When I say a corporation must be circumspect and humble, I mean that it must avoid becoming sanctimonious or in any way believing that it has a role of being a priest or prophet in its times.  It must speak judicially, and sometimes bravely, and it must avoid failing to do the good it can do at a given point in time because it cannot achieve perfection. 

Take the situation of Procter & Gamble in Saudi Arabia many years ago.  There was a social and perhaps even legal mandate that men and women could not work together in the same office.  P&G might have, given its commitment to gender equality, said that it would not do business in Saudi Arabia at all.  Or, I guess it could have taken the position it would violate the laws, though that would not have lasted long.  What did we do?  We set up separate office locations where women would work and where men would work and they would communicate by phone or other means between the two offices.  We did this on market research and brand work.  At the same time we advocated to change the social norms and the laws.  We believed that was right to do, not only morally (women deserved equal opportunity) but because we were certain it would be better for the business to have women and men working together in that way.  We felt advancing gender equality was right for the business and right morally.  We kept advancing this goal.

This raises another question:  is the test for a company taking a position on a moral or social issue whether it is relevant to the success of the business itself in the long-term?  Put differently, should businesses only weigh in on social and moral issues when they bear directly on having the right (and by “right” I include being morally correct) business and working environment long-term?  My answer is yes, though I’d underscore the importance of taking a long-term view.  For example, I believe the commitment to achieve a sustainable environment is one that businesses should advocate, even beyond the immediate benefit of that for the business itself.   Why?  Because I believe businesses should understand that having a world in which they or any other business could operate successfully long-term requires a sustainable environment.

Said differently, I believe that a business has social and moral obligations that go beyond simply making money in the short- or medium-term.