You Gotta Know the Territory

"You Gotta Know the Territory" is a memorable line from the opening scene of The Music Man, a Broadway musical by Iowa native Meredith Willson.  It features a group of salesmen discussing the Music Man, Professor Harold Hill.   "He doesn't know the territory" was said of Hill.

Watch the opening scene here!

You have to know the territory, including your target audience.  You have to talk to your (prospective) customers to find out what they want.  We once employed a person with a technical background to do both sales and product design.  Soon after joining us, he asserted that he was not going to change a design just because some customers asked to have it another way.  "Jimmy will take what I give him" was his statement.  He later changed his mind.


You have to learn what the customers want and then provide it, whether it is physical features or ultimate benefits from purchasing your product or service.  Meeting the customer needs is a critical step in achieving success. 

That means talking to customers.  It means exhibiting at trade shows and listening to people.  It means taking phone calls from prospective customers to find out what they like and dislike about what you are offering.  It means monitoring and participating in internet forums.  Depending on your industry or market, it may mean being actively involved in social media.  It means studying the competition and finding out what features they are selling that customers like (and dislike).  It means studying the trends in your industry to discern what the unmet needs are now and what they are going to be in the future.

                                  You need big eyes and big ears to learn about your territory.

I still like to take phone calls from prospective customers.  And believe it or not, I like to take service calls too.  (Finding out what people don't like about your product and what is causing them problems is really important!)

Our company is fairly well known in our small segment of the agricultural industry.  Apparently being a recognized name makes the President inaccessible in some people's minds.  A couple of years ago, when I was President, there was a comment in an on-line chat room-forum which said that "Richway is a good company to deal with and when you call in, you might even get to talk to the President.  He takes calls!"

You Gotta Know the Territory!

Retirement

My son, Tony, who is our company president, said it well at a luncheon today when he said "I am proud to have three people who have liked working at Richway enough to stay here until retirement."  Bill, Walt, and John have a combined 32 years at Richway.  None of them retired early to "get away".  In fact they are all past "social security age".

We thank them for their informal leadership and many other contributions which they have provided over the years.  I have always felt that "seasoned" people are a big asset in helping younger ones learn "how to work."    Thanks Guys!!!

Fear or Respect??

Many years ago, while on a sales trip that took me into southeastern Kansas, I visited Con Livingston in Girard, KS.  Con had been my first boss after college graduation, when I became a staff engineer. Con was a great guy and I enjoyed working for him.  Con and Mary had invited me to stay for the night and we took a short drive to their lake property to relax and cook a little supper.  The property consisted of their lot with a two car garage sized shelter (not really a cabin)  and a dock.

We walked onto the dock and Con pointed to the right near shore and said "That is where the water moccasins live.  We don't go swimming over there."  Water moccasins are poisonous snakes and there would be no way I would going swimming anywhere in that lake!  I feared them.

Con, on the other hand, respected them and would not invade their territory, but he was comfortable in the rest of the lake. 

Fear and respect, so close together, yet so far apart.  It is important as a manager, whether managing a company, or your own children, to know the difference. You may want respect, but have fear on the part of those you are "leading'. That is not effective leadership.


Read this link and you might FEAR them too.

So maybe I was right to fear them and Con was potentially courting real danger by only "respecting" them!

Ethics Etcetera

Special       Double Post Day
Be sure to continue on and read about Anthony the ironworker in the second post

We once employed a salesperson (“Willy”) who was about to graduate from college.  In fact Willy’s application letter, written in March, said he had one course to complete and would graduate in May.   

Soon after hiring Willy, we learned he would not graduate in May after all and then later learned he actually had several courses to complete.  It was more than two years later before the graduation occurred. There were other disturbing ethics and truthfulness issues during the four year period that Willy was with us.

   

On one notable occasion, Willy found an obviously confidential intra-company document in a printer.  Instead of putting it back and not reading it, Willy read it completely and then told others about it, inviting them to read it too.  Most apparently chose not to read it.  When confronted, Willy defended the action by saying he was part of the company and therefore deserved to read whatever he chose to read!

 
Finally, after an apparent “improper conduct” issue occurred (unrelated), I confronted Willy and in the course of conversation brought up the falsified graduation expectation.  The response: “It does not make any difference.  I did get the degree.”  (He also again “justified” the document reading.)

 

Do you want that kind of person working for you in any capacity, but especially in a position of daily contact with customers?

I did not!
                         

The "Pinocchio Nose" on the stick figure is not an accident!

Read about Pinocchio here.
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Anthony the ironworker

Update:  After last week's posting about the Space Shuttle status, I continued my research when I talked to Anthony, an ironworker from Cocoa Beach (which adjoins Cape Canaveral).  I asked him about activity at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) where he usually works.  He responded that there are projects going on at the Space Center, keeping it up to date and preparing for more activity.  "It is not going to go away, though a lot of jobs have been lost" he commented.


 

I have known Anthony for about three years.  His parents live next door to a condo we visit in Cocoa Beach.  He and his family are there quite often.  He is outgoing, likeable, and articulate.  He has been a ironworker, mostly at the Space Center, for several years.  He has worked on both Space Shuttle pads and some of the other launch pads as well.  He has worked a lot in the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB).  Ironworkers are those people who put together the basic structure of buildings, bridges, and the like.  They are the guys up in the air!
 
We talked a little bit about his career as an ironworker.  "I love it!  I walked my first beam at 325 feet in the air.  I have been as high as 520 feet"   --   in the VAB.  Recently Anthony has been working on a project at Disney World in Orlando, a little over an hour from Cocoa Beach.  They are refurbishing the Space Mountain roller coaster.  Among other things, Anthony has been involved in creating a special stainless steel railing.  He told me he can't wait to take his family back and ride and say "I made that."

Wikipedia entry for the VAB here

See what Wikipedia says about ironworkers here.




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SPACE SHUTTLE UPDATE

We made an exploratory trip to the Canaveral National Seashore (CNS)  on Monday April 30, 2012.  The primary objective was to look at (from a distance) the two shuttle launch pads.  These and the "Vehicle Assembly Building" are visible from the road along the southern edge of the "CNS", though approximately two (Pad B) and three (Pad A) miles away.


Pad B, the northern-most, has officially been "cleaned", meaning that all fixed structure above ground associated with shuttle launches, has been removed.  It is ready for potential future mobile launch structures. Pad A is officially inactive, but most, if not all, of the structure remains in place.

                        Pad A is to the left and Pad B is to the right.    (April 30, 2012 Photo by Rich)

Ironically, the day of our trip was the first test firing of the nine engines powering the Space X privately funded rocket which will eventually carry people to the International Space Station (ISS).  On Monday May 12 it is scheduled to blast off from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (which adjoins the Kennedy Space Center) to deliver a 1000 pound load of supplies to the ISS.  As I started this paragraph, the two second full power test took place successfully.

Both the pads are officially inactive now.  The last shuttle launch from Pad B was in December 2006.  The last, and final shuttle launch from Pad A was July 8, 2011.  I was lucky to view it from the beach at Cocoa Beach, a distance of about 16-18 miles.  The beach was packed with onlookers, even though it was partly cloudy and the opportunity to view the rocket was limited.



It has been quite a ride since Sputnik was launched October 4, 1957!