I love the Apprentice TV series hosted by Donald Trump. In a recent season, Donald recruited a cast of 18 celebrities, competing against one another on various business tasks. Each week the winning team leader is awarded a sizeable check to donate to their favorite charity.
A very interesting thing happened in one episode. In fact, from my perspective, what happened on this show was ground breaking in terms of the business culture. Two teams of four competed in selling carriage rides through New York’s Central Park. While on occasion, a business expert involved in the focus of a given competition will select the winning team based on qualitative measures, Donald’s typical criteria for winning is—the team that brings in the most money.
One team, we’ll call Team A, has been plagued by bitter infighting, largely due to the personality of one of its members. This member is a strong producer and gets results for his team, but he is also very arrogant, nasty, and rude to his fellow team members. In fact, two members have already opted out. One quit the show; the other asked to join Team B.
At the end of this particular episode, a bitter squabble began in the boardroom between members of Team A. Before reviewing the results of the competition, Mr. Trump commented if Team A lost this task, it would make his job of firing someone relatively easy. Ironically, when the results were reviewed, it turned out that Team A had in fact won again! They left the boardroom and Mr. Trump had to make the difficult decision as to whom to fire on Team B.
The Team B leader had stated early in the meeting that his team had functioned seamlessly and that he was very happy with their results. Not only had they made a good deal of sales, they truly enjoyed working with one another.
Mr. Trump asked the leader, “While everyone worked well on this team, who do you feel was not quite as effective as the rest.” The leader considered the question, and then responded, “Well Mr. Trump, everyone on this team gave it there all so I can’t answer that question.”
Visibly uncomfortable, Mr. Trump then asked the leader if he’d be willing to resign since he was the leader of the “losing” team. He responded with something to this effect, “No. I truly enjoy this experience and feel inspired, not only by the opportunity to support great causes but also by the opportunity to work with my fellow team members.”
Mr. Trump then decided to do something he’d never done in the history of the show. He didn’t fire anyone! He made a statement to the effect that he would be charitable toward this team since this particular season is about charity.
Here we are facing one of the world’s wealthiest men, who has up until now defined success almost exclusively in terms of “the bottom line.” Only two weeks earlier one of the players on the chopping block claimed to enjoy competing in her world of sports where everyone was giving their best, but could not function in a world where people were competing by trying to bring others down. Before firing her he said, “I like your world better than this one. This world is not very good at times. Go back to doing what you love and we love watching you do so well.” Then concluded with, “You’re fired.”
What lessons can we glean from these profound interchanges?
As facilitators and group leaders, we often work with businesses, helping them to expand their thinking. We help them to consider not only the tasks at hand, but also the processes and relationships involved in accomplishing these tasks.
When the vast majority of us have been schooled to understand that business is about the bottom line and that the bottom line is only about money, it’s easy to mistake the symptoms of a problem for its source. In other words, the problem of a backbiting sales staff failing to meet quotas may not be so much about poor sales performance as a deficit in teamwork.
It’s time we deliberately consider a bigger bottom line that embraces individual, collective, and planetary strength necessary for long term sustainability. I believe that the recent actions taken on national TV by Donald Trump, one of the world’s most notorious icons of the business world is a sign that perhaps this world is beginning to awaken to a more expansive worldview, one that encompasses a bigger bottom line.
Action
We’d like to open a dialogue around this question of embracing a bigger bottom line in business. To begin, here are some questions for you to consider.
What value is there in making more money, solving a problem, getting something done when by the time it’s over, the people who make it happen don’t ever want to see one another again?
If these individuals must continue to work in the same company, what kind of position is this company in to tackle future complex problems and projects?
What value is there in making increasing revenues, market share, etc. when the process used to get there exploit resources, material and human, to the point that we are collectively diminished?
What elements would you like to see included in a more holistic bottom line for the corporate engine that powers modern culture? Please share your questions, feedback, or experience in the comments section below.
Thank you for your articles. They have provided a great deal of insight not only to me but my staff and training groups I have worked with for years. This particular article was as good as the morning sunshine today. Our workplace has become difficult, largely due to a few people from another agency and the stress level is higher than ever before. My team has struggled under the burden. We all talk about the ‘good ol’ days’ where our jobs were enjoyable and the major part of our day was spent feeling like we did good things with good people. I believe that is our bottom line especially as we work in government positions trying to help others who are in crisis. I pray for the day we can get back to the “good ol’ days” or maybe just away from those who pull us down, beat us up. There are days I could opt out, walk away from; but instea, I just wait for the day when our “Mr. Trump” says, “YOU’RE FIRED”! Inspite of the economy and a house payment that needs to be made, that will be some morning sunshine.
Great questions Steve! One of the challenges is that people at work often behave according to the reward mechanisms in place. So if sales performance is the main measure of success, people will compete to ensure they are the one with the highest figure. No team based reward, means no reason to co-operate with colleagues. It’s a further challenge because metrics for things like helping others, overall happiness or job satisfaction are incredibly hard to define – how do we measure what “feels” successful or satisfying? Personally I have also enjoyed the Apprentice series, but once I realised that it further promotes the Me Me financial measure only theme, I found it disappointing that the human achievements were not also celebrated. It is therefore promoting a non-progressive way of measuring business results, which is a bit limiting in these times.
I commend to one and all, “Thunder Below” by Admiral Eugene B Fluckey, a highly decorated submarine commander of WW II. War being very bottom line oriented and a submarine being a truly; we’re all in it together, Admiral Fluckey’s comments on leadership are interesting. In terms of results Admiral Fluckey would say there’s little to chose between between team A and team B, but in terms of who wants to reup, there is the whole world of difference! No one ever wanted to leave his command and went to great lengths, sometimes lying to stay on board his sub. To me that’s true servant leadership; the followers see that they are better off with him! His secret? “I believe in you.” His goal, reciprocal trust. His greatest pride; no one in his command got a purple heart for geing wounded in combat. Nor did anyone in his command die from combat. He was a hard trainer and a tough task master. Another saying; “lead others, drive yourself”. By the way, he earned four (4) Navy Crosses and the Congressional Medal of Honor in combat with the Barb (his sub) and the sub won a Presidental Unit Citation.
While I agree that there are systemic problems that need addressing, there is also personal, professional performance, regardless of the system.
Great points, Steve – it’s interesting to see how this show has progressed into something a bit different. Now, if The Donald wants to be real courageous, I’d love to see an entire series about people competing with a dual or triple bottom line. I work with business owners who really struggle with that – they’d love to really promote the values other than just profit, but they don’t feel like their bosses or investors will let them do it. “Only in the non-profit world”, they think.
But there’s a growing trend of people who are serious about doing good in the world through successful businesses.
I enjoyed your article and some of your questions hit home regarding the importance of the bottom line. I just separated from a small business that would regularly proclaim in the company values that people, relationships and customers were more important than the bottom line. The owners said work was supposed to be fun and when that changes we need to close our doors. When I joined this company almost 10 years ago that was true. For many years I was so happy and proud to be part of this team which was so different that the typical large, impersonal organization. We made countless decisions over the years that may have given us a little less money in our pockets but that honored those values of providing the best we could for our customers and employees to create win-win situations and lasting working relationships. All the employees, customers and vendor partners enjoyed close friendly relationships.
In the last few years with the downturn of economics and a change of leadership, the decision-makers began making increasing decisions based on fear rather than staying true to our values. We hired and overrworked certain lower cost resources, in-fighting began among employees, wages of loyal employees and consultants were lowered, unreasonable expectations were being set with customers, more was being expected from our resouces than they could sometimes meet and then we also played the blame game. There was always plenty of that to go around. I would often challenge my colleagues about certain choices, the behavior we were modeling and the way were interacting with our resources and our customers. I tried to make many alternative suggestions.. but noticed I was being heard less and less. This is a company I helped build and I felt I was in a safe environment to voice my opinion; it was a second family for me, but as I was let go last week without explanation (something mumbled about difficult finances), I realized it was only about the bottom line. And oh by the way, I hit 60 in May. I feel terribly sad to have lost the culture, the job and my 2nd family …and I hope the almighty bottom line allows them enjoy the new culture they have created.
I feel encouraged by how those in healthcare are embracing the triple bottom lines of people, the environment and profit. It is possible to have all three.