A New Career Path

A New Career Path

In January of 1964 we were blessed with a second beautiful daughter Patricia. Patti as she is known. This event set into motion some serious thought about work verses family. I came to realize that the last two years I was not there for the development of my children or the personal support I should be providing them and my wife. I began to start searching for a new career.

This led me to taking a position as sales trainee for Xerox Corporation. At this time in the history of Xerox they had only one desktop copier. In the brief two years that I worked for Xerox three new duplicator products were released. The first thirty days of my career with Xerox was spent in training. For the first week I learned product information and demonstration techniques. I then spent the next few weeks with a very interesting mentor in the field. My mentor and field trainer was the top salesman in the branch. Interestingly he was the son of the secretary of the original founder and developer of the Xerox copier company. He brought the Haloids photo coping process into the broad commercial market. Bill’s mother agreed to work for stock instead of salary for the first year of the company and of course became a millionaire.

Bill had great instinctive sales skills and I learned a lot. We would put the domo copier in our car and take it to prospective customers. The technique was the old dog food trick. We would wheel in the system and try to get an audience with the boss. In many cases we ended up dealing with the receptionist or the bosses secretary. In any case we would offer the leave the system for them to use for a day or two and then return to get their reaction. Our success rate with this approach was over 40%. Obviously the dogs loved the dog food. It was then fairly easy to justify the cost verses carbon paper or typing multiple copies.

I learned several valuable lessons from Bill about selling.

I was then given my own territory, which consisted of an area of small businesses in southwest Columbus and then two counties southeast of Columbus. It was relatively virgin territory so I had plenty of opportunity for success. I was able to achieve enough success to get the attention of our branch manager. I along with my mentor Bill were two of the first salespeople in our branch to be selected to go to a national training school in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida for the companies new 2400 ‘copier/duplicator system. Here we learned professional selling techniques and office systems philosophies.

When we returned I was made Marketing Team Manager with 5 salespeople reporting to me. I held this position for 6 months. Bill helped me a lot with my new team, even though he was not part of my team. He was always interested in how it was going and had great advice. I recall one episode in particular. I had a new salesman who was fantastic in training and very polished but had not closed an order in the first month of his territory assignment. I asked Bill for his advice and he suggested traveling with my new salesman for a day or two and observing his sales technique. I called Bill after the first day and said he performed great but was still not able to close. Bill gave me another lesson in closing a sale.

Ask for the order and shut up!!! I light went off in my head and I realized that my new salesman could not stop talking. The next day I instructed him to do his sales presentation, ask for the order, and not say another word until I spoke. On the first call after about a minute of silence, the prospect said no because he was going on vacation and did not want to start anything new until he returned. We waited for about 3 minutes in silence while the prospect carried out his own internal conversation and finally said yes. It seemed like an eternity. With great joy I said thank you, told him we would deliver the equipment and train his staff in the next 48 hours and we left. After that experience my new salesman became a star and eventually ended up on the national Xerox training staff.

This first 7 months led to another great opportunity and a challenge, both of which I will talk about in the next chapter. I should also mention that Bill continued to be interested in my career progress even after I left Xerox.

Lessons learned,

1. Become an expert in your products or systems as soon as possible.

2. The principles of good selling work. Get their attention, solve a problem, describe your products benefits in the customer’s terms, help make it the prospects decision, and ask for the order. Then shut up.

3. A negative answer to a question is an opportunity to develop a better understanding of your products benefits.

4. The cold calling process helps you learn what works and what does not work in developing real opportunities.

5. How to identify and find the real decision maker.

6. How to motivate sales people.

7. The value of having a cheerleader at home when things are not going well.

My introduction to the Fashion World

My introduction to the Fashion World

This was a very exciting time in my life. I was now immersed into the very basics of the fashion world. In order to be successful we had to know not only fashion design but also the fabrics used to make the fashions. Of course a good part of the excitement was traveling to New York every three weeks. I remember staying in a hotel that is now closed but was located about a block from Time Square and only a few blocks from the majority of my market and the Associated Merchandising Corporation Buying offices. AMC was a buying group that negotiated prices based on the total needs of all of its members. Most of these products were of a staple verses fashion nature. They also assisted us in making appointments, hotel reservations, printed a fashion update, and published a list of all buyers who were in the market each week. They were also our contact point for incoming calls and assistance on anything from travel plans to doctors if necessary. I also served on their fabric buying committee because we were one of the top two volume purchasers of staple fabrics like cotton broadcloth and basic woolens.

Now the nature of my mentors was quite different. The people I mentioned in the previous chapter helped me learn how to manage a retail business. The people who helped me understand the fashion world were not part of my organization but part of the fabric markets. They were a native New Yorker, Abe, who taught me how to work the markets. He owned a cotton fabric manufacturing company. He showed me where to go and how to buy. It was Abe who introduced me to the downtown fabric market. There were three or four merchants on lower Broadway who seemed to be able to get inventories of very popular brand name fabrics for about 20% of the normal wholesale price. I would spend one day each week in market shopping this market and about ever other trip would find some fantastic bargains. This would allow me to mix this inventory with my full priced inventory and when I had sales I was able to mark the fabrics down significantly without impacting my margins.

Frequently other buyers and myself would end our day in Abe’s bar at the back of his showroom and discuss the day’s successes and failures. Abe had never been West of the Hudson River and never had a driver’s license or owned a car. We became so close, that Abe wanted to see my store and he took his first trip, by train to Ohio, to see me. I was very excited to see him in my store.

I also remember another experience, with another New York mentor. The owner of a world-renowned woolen fabric house. When you were in the market you were expected to visit his establishment and have lunch with him and other buyers at Shakespeare’s Tavern, which was across the street from his showrooms. Here you had the opportunity to mingle with buyers from all over the world and trade ideas and experiences. Mostly I listened and learned a lot.

Part of the fun of the market was the time I would spend in the high fashion show rooms. After abut three months in the business I began to hear the seamstresses who used our department for their clients talk about wanting more high fashion fabrics. My lunches at Shakespeare’s tavern lead me to several very expensive high fashion fabric houses. In visits to these show rooms fabrics were not just on display but were made into garments and modeled for our viewing. This not only showed the fabric well but also gave us ideas to pass on to our customers. This also led me to using real models at least once a week instead of just mannequins. We also began to participate in the stores fashion shows.

One of the most successful fabric houses specialized in very stylish cotton print. It was a French Company Bouclé Fabrics. They had an annual contest to select the models they would use for their world tour. Because of the volume we did with them we were selected as one of the tour stops in the US. What a great event for us. The show was on a Saturday and the models and their entourage arrived on Wednesday. They modeled on our floor twice a day and then had a two-hour fashion show on Saturday morning. This event not only sold a lot of Bouclé fabrics but also boosted the sales of all our fabrics.

Since the fabric business was primarily a Spring, Summer and Fall business, my boss asked me to take on the Trim-A-Tree business which required one trip to New York to find new and unique Holiday items and then open five shops in the store from November to January with a final sale in January. My last two holiday seasons in retailing, I was at the store from 8:00AM until 7:00PM five days a week and 10:00 PM two days a week.

In addition to this experience during my last year we opened the first branch in our history. We were all frightened that this new branch idea would erode our volumes and the main store. It did not while I was there but probably did as more and more branches were added.

Lessons learned:

1. Mentors are not always obvious, be alert to anyone who is interested in you.

2. The best mentors are not assigned.

3. The people who are on the front lines dong the work and facing the customer always know more than you about your business.

4. Listen to your customer with an open mind.

5. Try new approaches to old processes often.

6. Seek out and learn from peers and suppliers.

7. Don’t forget your family. (More about that later)

My First Business Management Experience

My First Business Management Experience

Before I get into my first management experience, there is a life experience that was both an important lesson and helped me put a better perspective on family verses career.

It was the event of the birth of our first child. Janet was two months early and gave birth to twins. Mark and Michelle. Mark only lived for 4 days. Michelle was in an incubator for 40 days. Needless to say this was a difficult time for us. Not only was it a sad and very tense, it presented us with a huge financial obligation.

To this day I do not know how Mr. Lazarus learned about our situation, but one day, I was summoned to his office. He asked me about my family and how we were doing. By then we had Michelle home and were learning to become parents and getting past the tragedy of losing a son. So, I said we were doing fine. He told me he knew all about the situation and understood our stress and wanted to help. He told me the Lazarus Employee Trust Fund was paying all my hospital bills and I would have no further obligation to the company or the hospital. Please just go home and take care of your family was his parting comment. I am tearing up a bit just writing about this meeting. What a blessing!

Not long after that meeting, I was promoted to Department Manager of the Fashion Fabrics Department. Wow, at the ripe age of 23, I was responsible for managing a $1.3 million a year business producing a net profit of about $150,000. Over the next four years we were able to grow it to almost $2 million and over $300,000 in net profit. In addition, I after the first year, I was given responsibility for the management of the 5 “Trim – A –Tree” shops in our store. This was a seasonal business that operated from October through December with clearance sales in January. My responsibility in both of these departments was merchandising, display, advertising, buying, sales management, hiring & firing, inventory control and the bottom line.

Thankfully, I inherited a very experienced staff of sales clerks and a very capable assistant manager, Barry. He went on to become the CEO of a national chain of Fabric Stores.

There were three women who were very helpful to me. One was an elderly lady, who was a holocaust survivor. Sophie taught me how to deal with the private seamstresses who came in looking for fabrics for their clients. She often called in sick because of the aftereffects of experimental surgeries performed on her in the concentration camps. She was 70 plus years old and we were just grateful to have her when we could. She was also not afraid to tell me when I was making mistakes.

The second woman was the most experienced salesperson in our department and became a very valuable advisor to me in the area of customer service, basic fabric selections and seemed to know what our customers wanted.

Finally there was our seamstress. She made clothes for our mannequins and live models. She also helped our live models dress and prepare for shows.

Lessons learned:

1. The importance of family.

2. The value of taking care of your employees.

3. The value of listening to the experience of fellow workers.

4. How to have the courage to tell the boss he or she is wrong.

5. The value of listening to customers.

6. How to manage a business to achieve real financial results.

Graduate School

Graduate School

My year in graduate school was invaluable. This experience provided me with not only an advanced education but also exposure to real business managers and a great lead for my first job after graduation.

There were four reasons this experience was so valuable.

First, 90% of our classes were based on the discussion of cases relating to reading assignments. Not, lectures.

Second, over 50% of my fellow students were either active in business or on leave from a business that was paying for their education.

Third, most of our professors were business consultants.

Fourth, I met a lifetime friend who was always there when I needed a friend to talk to and always gave me great advice.

It was one of those professors who suggested I interview with the F & R Lazarus Company in Columbus, Ohio. I got an attractive offer and started my business career as a retailer.

Interestingly Bill, one of my wife’s associates at her work, also went to work for F & R Lazarus and became a great lifetime friend of ours. Even though Bill was in the school for correspondence, he made a lifetime career in Retailing. As he married, had children, moved from Columbus to Dallas, to Alabama, Cleveland, Long Island and eventually Delaware, we never lost track of each other, our families and our careers.

Lessons learned:

1. Business management in the real world.

2. Advanced marketing techniques.

3. Business economics in application.

4. Business law.

5. How to interact with business executives.

6. The application of logistics principles to the business world.

Later College Years

In my senior year of college I decided to move out of the fraternity house into an apartment with an old high school buddy and one other fraternity brother. After about six months, I decided to propose to Jan, who I had been dating since I was a sophomore. We got married just before my last semester of college. Jan is not only great support throughout my entire career, but was mother of our daughters. That was also when I decided to go to graduate school. I applied and was accepted at the Indiana University. I promised Jan, if she would work to support me during graduate school, she would never have to work again. Fortunately, I was able to keep my promise.

It was also at about that time my old fraternity roommate, a good friend, Ted, had a great suggestion. He had been working for his father's company two days a week, and was about to go on to graduate school, also at Indiana University. His father's company was the Gibson guitar company. He introduced me to his father as an applicant for his position, which was an internal company truck driver. I got the job. Because it was only two days a week, I could schedule classes the other three days and the pay was more than my pay as a full time night janitor.

It was through this work experience that I learned a different type of mentoring from a union steward who was my partner on the truck. Our responsibility was to deliver parts from warehouses to factory locations and then finally at the end of the day take the ashes from the incinerators to the local dump. My partner taught me how to get along with other workers at the company and in and in particular how to follow the rules of the Steelworkers union culture. I learned a lot about how the hourly worker thinks, what concerns them, and most important how to motivate them. Probably the most important thing I learned was how important good communications, listening skills, and empathy are to the morale of workers.

Lessons learned:

1. The importance of good communications.

2. How to really listen.

3. How to empathize with all types of people in a variety of circumstances.

4. The importance of good morale in an organization.

College Years

The Initial Independent Years

In my sophomore year in college after a very difficult freshman year my dad came to my rescue again. The company he worked for, The Upjohn company, had a program for the sons of employees who were willing to work nights as a janitor. It was a form of scholarship. They offered us a full-time job, accommodated our studying needs and paid us well, as long as our grades were a B. average or better. I held this job for about a year and a half and although I had to go to work every day 5:30 PM and didn’t finish 12:30 AM, but it was worth it. We really only had about two hours of work to do, and the ability to use all the office facilities and equipment for our homework and we had weekends off to enjoy college life with everyone else.

This job helped in several ways. It probably kept me out of trouble. But more importantly it provided me with enough income to join a fraternity, and move into the fraternity house I was a TKE. Now, I was beginning to become an independent adult.

I would be remiss if I did not mention that even though I moved out of the house mom insisted that I bring my dirty clothes home to let her wash them and I spent most Sundays at home with mom and dad and we always visited Grandma and Grandpa with all the other children, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandchildren every Sunday. These experiences always kept me centered and recognizing the value of family and everything that we do. As I recall the experiences with our large family there were several mentors who in their own way helped me realize my successes and failures in life.

Joining the fraternity provided me with another experience that would be valuable in later life. When I joined the fraternity we were living in a very old wood frame home that was condemned. Fortunately the fraternity had paid off its mortgage and had enough money saved for a down payment on a beautiful historical Mansion. When we moved into that beautiful I was elected House manager and pledge trainer. Now I was beginning to understand the value of becoming a good mentor. I not only had to make sure that our house will was kept financially sound but also was responsible for making sure the property was maintained properly, and all of our brothers had adequate housing and food. In addition, I had the responsibility, to our brotherhood, to develop the new pledges that were invited to join our organization.

Lessons learned:

1.The importance of family.

2. How to manage a household.

3. How to mentor young men.

4. How to recognize the many mentors that came from family and friends.

More of the Early Days

While I was still a teenager but a little older I was able to get a job as a bus boy and a very large upscale cafeteria in our town. During my high school years, I was able to work at this job on the weekends and in the off-season was when I was not playing football or basketball I could work during the week. Here I began to learn the value of individual and team performance. My first job was that of just a busboy and there I learned to clear a table of four in one minute or less. I also began to develop a system that would allow me to clear that table and closer to 30 seconds. This was important because during busy times there was a customer with a full tray of food leaving the cafeteria line looking for a clean table every 30 seconds. Our goal was to be able to accommodate all of those customers immediately.

Here again a good mentor was introduced to me, it was the manager of this restaurant, Joe. He not only noticed what I had achieved as a bus boy but also began to sense that I had some leadership skills and started to encourage them.

Eventually I became good enough that I was asked to supervise and train other busboys. Now I was beginning to learn how to manage and motivate and develop other people. I also began to understand the concept of teamwork. Eventually I became the head floor manager and was asked to come in early to help set up the food system and make sure all was ready in the restaurant prior to opening the doors. I held this job and a great relationship with the owner and his son until I began my college years.

Lessons learned;

1. Doing more than the job requires.

2. Recognizing the need to support the entire enterprise, not just my own job.

3. The value of developing a good team.

4. The ability to see all the parts of an enterprise.

5. How to work with a good mentor.

6. How and why it is important to become a good mentor.