Academik

We covered 3 Ps today and If i tried to include all my notes from
today you would be inundated…

Starting with Profit
We started with a film clip from the Passion of the Christ where Judas
receives the 30 gold pieces for betraying Jesus, and then later
repents and tries to give the money back. We talked about this at our
office that more money rarely means more happiness with employees (and
people in general). How often do we long for something which we think
is going to make our lives much better, only to receive it and
immediately start longing for something else… has this happened to
you in your life?

we talked about the idea of profit not as the reason for the business,
but the validation that what you’re providing is valuable. This had
profound impact on my vision for Wintermar’s HR department… thinking
that the number of people they had under them an indicator of profit
and validation that they were doing well. They worried about
maintaining crewing staff again, but we hammered home the point that
God’s resources are limitless, and when you’re acting in His will then
the resources will be provided.

I challenged Kiki and Martin that the profit they had in people should
be invested back into the community, not just in the form of money,
but also in terms of volunteering which improves employee morale along
with the reputation of the company.

We are blessed to be a blessing and money is like blood, if it doesn’t
move, then it’s not accomplishing its purpose. We asked clients to be
realistic in where they are, but faithful in where they could go with
God’s help.

We heard from Pak Suroso who is an architect and his vision for city
planning and development was changed by the training from a profit
centered model to a God centered model. This has allowed him to think
of the different elements that bring people together and closer to God
within a city. He challenged his office to begin paying for software
which they had previously pirated, and they began paying all taxes
that they owed. He thought that avoiding these costs was a
competitive advantage, but quickly realized that by doing such he was
acknowledging the weakness of God to make him successful by acting
rightly.

The second P of the day was planning - discussing three simple questions

• Where am I now?
• Where do I want to be?
• How am I going to get there?

Martin and Kiki explained to me that they’ve got lots of planning
built into their process:
- HR weekly meeting to discuss progress about what they’ve done, and
what’s to come
- 1 hour Friday afternoon
- Monthly meeting, each department has one, mgmt has meeting
- Discuss company management strategy
- Creation and how to implement
- MGMT measurement review every 3 months
- discuss the employee’s questionnaire
- discuss measurements of other department
- docking, vessel utilization, operational down time, etc.
- Planning & Development Department
- discuss non-conformity that we’ve found and how we’ll improve
- yearly - management measurement and review of all 4 quarters
- 6 month evaluations

Sounds like a lot of meetings! I’m glad I’ve only got 8 people who
are all within earshot : ) So planning was good and we’re just
working on how to make Martin more proactive as opposed to reactive.

The final P for the day was Partnering and this one brought about a
lot of dialogue and is going to require a big mind-shift for Wintermar.

When we talk about partnering we discuss the idea that 1+1 > 2… The
value and synergy of working together should increase that number to
more like 5 or 7. We encourage companies to start small, citing that
“he who is faithful with little, will be trusted with much” and that
each partner should be equally yoked. So Wal-Mart will never be a
good partner for smaller suppliers since it often becomes their only
customer and thus they are totally dependent on Wal-Mart, but Wal-Mart
could easily replace them. Good partners are people that are willing
to share your burdens and your successes. For us, our partner list is
quite long…

• employees & their families
• recruitment agencies
• government
• universities
• academies
• training organizers
• supppliers
• competitors who might share excess crew/boats in times of need

As I began to suggest that they might develop an internship program
with Universities and Maritime Academies I hit a break wall of secrecy
within the company. The idea of having a stranger come in was very
disconcerting because they could steal company secrets like their
salary list or procedure manual. I tried for about 20 minutes to
understand their concerns, and explain why they weren’t an issue (why
would an intern know the salaries of other employees? even if another
company had your manual, they wouldn’t be able to implement it with
the same character and heart as you). If you gave Michaelangelo and I
both the exact same painting materials - our output would be much
different. Eventually we pulled Errol into the discussion and he made
them realize that if other companies are stealing their materials,
then that means Wintermar is the leader in the industry. By the time
other companies are able to implement their procedures, Wintermar will
have already developed new ones, and be acting them out in a manner
which is consistent with their values and purpose - something other
companies can copy in text, but not in spirit. It was a very long
discussion and one that opened my eyes to a barrier that is holding
the company back.

This is something that we’ve discussed in my own company and we’ve
agreed that it’s much better to be open about what we do. If we
propose standards and procedures the increase the level of service and
quality in our industry then we’ve improved things for everyone (which
is good for all) and establishes our position as a leader in the
industry. It also forces us to continue to re-invent ourselves to
stay on top.

More thoughts to come….