Ten Business Lessons Learned Along the Way

35 Years and Still Learning

Dr. Mike Schoultz

Lesson 1

Always put your people first

The Disney Culture

“You can design and create, and build the

most wonderful place in the world. But it takes

people to make the dream a reality”

- Walt Disney

“You have to treat your employees like customers.”

—Herb Kelleher, complete answer, upon being asked his “secrets to success”

Source: Joe Nocera, NYT, “Parting Words of an Airline Pioneer”

Lesson 2

Be a talent hound and put

priority on finding the best

people

“Development can help great people be even better

but if I had a dollar to spend, I’d spend 70 cents getting the

right person in the door.”

—Paul Russell, Director, Leadership &

Development, Google

Message: Some people are better than other people.

Some people are a helluva lot better than other

people.

Lesson 3

Build on your strengths … work

around your

weaknesses

“ Honor individual differences. Take

people as they are. Don’t attempt to

change or manipulate them to

be like or to be someone else”

- Warren Bennis

“…effective executives do not start out by looking at weaknesses. You cannot build performance on weaknesses. You can build only on strengths. Make weaknesses irrelevant.”

- Peter Drucker

The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.

-Michelangelo

Lesson 4

Keep it simple in everything you do

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”

- Steve Jobs

Making the simple complicated is commonplace;

making the complicated simple,

awesomely simple... That’s creativity!

Lesson 5

Be a change agent … anticipate and embrace change

When the winds of change are blowing,

you can either build a shelter or a windmill.

Re-invent constantly … lifetime learning

"I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may

learn how to do it."

- Pablo Picasso

The Importance of Continuous Learning

The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that today’s learner will have 10-14 jobs …

by the age of 38!

“It is not the STRONGEST OF THE SPECIES that survives,

NOR THE MOST INTELLIGENT,

but the one MOST RESPONSIVE TO CHANGE”

- CHARLES DARWIN

Lesson 6

Make listening your core competence

It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret. He gained

respect by giving it. He talked and listened to the fourth-

grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same way

he talked and listened to a bishop or a college president.

He was seriously interested in who you were and what you had to say.”

Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect

Lesson 7

Relationships are what count

Why does a customer choose you instead of your

competitor?

1. Trust

2. Confidence

3. Strength of relationship

“The key is to be part of peoples lives.

People will always prefer to do business with friends”

- Marty Kohr

Lesson 8

Be different to stand out and be heard

Lesson 9

Live your passion

“People want to be part of something larger than

themselves. They want to be part of

something they’re really proud of, that

they’ll fight for, sacrifice for , trust.”

—Howard Schultz, Starbucks

Lesson 10

Don’t fear failure

“ You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take"

- Wayne Gretsky

To avoid situations in which you might make mistakes

may be the biggest mistake of all.

-Peter McWilliams

We learn from our failures. Period.

Failure to acknowledge failure is a fatal disease.

Treating failure like a disease is a fatal disease.

- Tom Peters

Explore …

“ Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out

how far one can go .”

- t. s. elliot

In the new era of business and social,

playing it safe is the riskiest choice of all.

FINAL THOUGHTS

“ Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you

didn’t do than by the ones you did do.

So throw off the bow line. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds

in your sail.

Explore. Dream. Discover.”- Mark Twain

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Steve Jobs

About Dr. Schoultz

Dr. Schoultz has thirty five years of business development, marketing, technology, and business operations experience.

He served as VP / President of Distribution Technologies, a company he helped to found and grow to a 700 M + / year market leader.

Dr. Schoultz Ph. D. is from the University of Virginia.

Thank You