From Burger King to business strategies — on the road with the CEO
Editor’s Note: Neil is the Vice President of Work Place Services and Country General Manager for the United Kingdom at Agilent. This is his story of spending three full days with Agilent’s CEO, Mike McMullen, in the British countryside
I’m afraid lunch is either Burger King or Starbucks, I said to Mike as we charged across the British countryside. Over lunch (Whopper with cheese and a Coke Zero, since you ask), I pondered my good fortune at spending three days with the CEO of a $20B market cap company. This will be an MBA on speed; every management book you can think of condensed into three days of real-life access. So, what did I learn?
Right team
First stop is Oxford and dinner with the Cobalt management team, followed by a coffee talk and a product demo. A key theme of Mike’s talk is that too many CEOs focus on only on strategy and don’t spend enough time on the people. I see Mike walking the talk, switching ends at dinner, and talking to as many as people as he can while touring the site. Cobalt employees seem blown away that the CEO would take so much time to chat and visit; we’re blown away by their great products. Note to self — spend less time locked away in meetings and throw away the PowerPoint slides; more real-life and real-time dialog required.
Right environment
Next up, the manufacturing sites at Church Stretton and Craven Arms for a coffee talk and site tour. Mike talks about One Agilent — having an external focus, one company mindset, disciplined collaboration — and I notice throughout his visit that in almost every interaction Mike probes about sharing with the division, discussing with the field, always testing if we are fully focused on what the customer needs and acting as One Agilent.
Be prepared
Arriving into Manchester to rain, Mike whips out his mini Exec 2.0 self-propelling umbrella in presidential black. An effective CEO clearly plans ahead while I scramble to borrow an umbrella from the hotel. Mike seems always well prepared for his next visit and we muse in the car that there are too many meetings without a clear agenda or clear purpose, with materials provided so late it’s impossible for the meeting to be effective. Note to self — this is a business basic but a good reminder to up my game on meeting discipline.
Doing well while doing good
Dinner with some of the field team is followed by a coffee talk in Cheadle and a show and tell of local innovations and programs. Mike talks about how Agilent’s technologies are helping to detect cancers and treat orphan diseases.
He uses the concept of doing well as a company while doing good in the world. Who doesn’t want to work for a company that is “doing well while doing good”? I take a mental note to try this out on my family. We head for the train to London for two customer visits and then a drinks reception for employees based around the London area.
Two key question to always ask
1) What problem are you trying to solve? It seems our desire to innovate, automate and constantly create, results in solutions that are sometimes looking for a problem. I resolve to ask this question every time someone presents a new idea or opportunity.
2) Why are we having this meeting? Back to basic meeting etiquette.
Have fun
Seven investor visits, three coffee talks, two dinners, two customer visits and one drinks reception, in one week. I wonder how Mike does it. In a taxi to Heathrow airport we pass a giant billboard of Blade Runner 2049 and agree the need to watch a rerun of the 1982 movie first, and it occurs to me that a constant theme of the week is that Mike is as interested in activities outside of work as he is in work itself, whether it’s the Dragonboat race at Cobalt, Agilent’s European football tournament in Cheadle, families and vacations, the NFL in London, or some of our community programs. Work hard but play hard seems to be the secret of success. Doing well while doing good while having fun, anyone?
