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INNOVATION
& DESIGN Home Page Architecture Brand Equity Auto Design Game Room SMALLBIZ Smart Answers Success Stories Today's Tip INVESTING Investing: Europe Annual Reports BW 50 S&P Picks & Pans Stock Screeners Free S&P Stock Report SCOREBOARDS Hot Growth 100 Mutual Funds Info Tech 100 S&P 500 B-SCHOOLS Undergrad Programs MBA Blogs MBA Profiles MBA Rankings Who's Hiring Grads | | OCTOBER 9, 2000 BOOK EXCERPT Turning Around the Inevitable Failure Soul Food: Fifty-Two Principles for Black Entrepreneurial Success -- Part 2
THE RELUCTANT PROGRAMMER Wayne Simmons spent years studying to become a top-notch Web engineer and developer. He paid attention to every detail of his education and career path from the schools he attended to the technical experiences he added to his repertoire of projects. He won his first computer in a competition at his high school. It turned out to be more of a toy than the high-tech machines he dealt with today. Wayne's reputation for professionalism, creativity, honesty, and trustworthiness was an asset in the Internet and information-technology consulting fields. Although many of his peers and competitors routinely cut corners, Wayne remained steadfast in always doing what was right and best for his clients. Because of his reputation, Wayne found it easy to maintain a pipeline of contracts and business opportunities for himself and his growing consulting firm. One such opportunity took him to south Florida to oversee a major Web development project for Mantchell, Inc., a multibillion-dollar corporation. This was the first such effort initiated by the company; thus the project was expected to receive close scrutiny from senior executives as well as from outsiders in the industry. Phyllis Wyles, Mantchell's vice-president in charge of the project and the company's chief technology officer, had worked with Wayne years before when he was a manager at Bell Laboratories. Even then she was impressed with his intelligence and trustworthiness and was comfortable working with him. As the work at Bell Labs reached completion, Phyllis terminated her contract with Bell to accept a position at Mantchell. She promised Wayne she would keep in touch and would bring him into bigger and even more exciting technical opportunities when she became situated. True to her word, Phyllis kept in touch with Wayne no matter where he relocated. Finally, the two had connected on the opportunity to work together on the Florida project. Wayne was assigned to be the project manager for a team of five Web programmers. Their work for Mantchell was actually being primed by another company out of Chicago, and Wayne as a subcontractor was required to send his team's billable hours to the prime's accounting department every two weeks. The accounting department would then compile all of the labor hours and submit one integrated invoice to the client. None of these details mattered to Wayne at the time because he was focused on the team's project. In fact, he rarely glanced at the hours being billed. However, his lack of attention to these details would soon come back to haunt him. Wayne's work was progressing so well that the client requested that Wayne, his manager, and a representative from the programming staff fly to Chicago to give a briefing. Without hesitation the trio booked flights on the next Monday morning shuttle. Feeling confident and eager to discuss the project, Wayne put the finishing touches on his presentation in his hotel room that evening. He rehearsed his part of the next day's meeting over and over and considered several scenarios. As he pondered the multiple possibilities, he soon dozed off into much-needed sleep. The next morning, feeling vibrant and full of energy, Wayne met up with Craig Ramos, his manager, and Susan Nguyen, his Web programmer, and they made their way to the fifteenth-floor offices of the client's lakeside offices. As Wayne and Susan set up their laptops for their presentation, the client and his team entered the room and took their assigned seats. Craig readied the data sheets per the agenda. They were ready to start. Mantchell, Inc. was impressive. It projected a showy image with its exotic African and Asian artwork and statuary. Even the conference room was designed as an amphitheater with state-of-the-art equipment. Wayne surveyed the setup approvingly; it was sure to showcase his presentation in the most positive light. His mood darkened, however, when he perused the financials distributed by the client. Moments passed like hours as he rechecked the project synopsis. He was shocked to discover a mistake in the workload report that made the presentation results questionable. His presentation would reflect three programmers, but the report (which showed actual billed hours) clearly listed five programmers plus Wayne, which made six on the payroll. Wayne knew the revenues had been reported incorrectly. They had been overbilling the client since the project started, and Wayne had never realized it until today. Wayne faced a major dilemma. If he told the client that, yes, he had six programmers on the project, he would be lying. If he admitted the truth, he would immediately lose all of the credibility he had spent so much time building. Finally, Wayne looked across the table at the client and in a calm and direct voice explained the error. Wayne hoped his admission would be met with understanding. It wasn't. "Wayne, I'm really disappointed in this. It will take months to fix this fiscally," Phyllis barked at him. She was obviously embarrassed, since she had acted as the liaison. Wayne couldn't blame her. Gordon Hilliman, one of the executive officers, rose from his chair. He spoke with great haughtiness. "We have no time for this type of mistake. As such, your presentation is moot, and this meeting is moot." With that, the executives filed out the door. Only Phyllis turned around. "Wayne, call me about this later, okay?" He nodded. Wayne was unable to speak from that moment until he returned to his hotel room. This was his first real failure. He hadn't correctly managed an important facet of the job, and it would almost certainly cost him future business. Tomorrow he would need to formulate a plan to rectify the problem and learn from his failure. Wisdom to Take Away • Business statistics indicate that, on average, entrepreneurs fail between five and seven times in business before they stumble into ventures that ultimately lead them to success. Failure is an integral part of the process of becoming successful. You cannot achieve true success until you have experienced some level of failure. Fortunately, each failure provides an opportunity for you to learn more about your character insufficiencies, strategic and tactical flaws, and adequacy of work execution. Once the weaknesses are identified, the plan to remedy the situation can be put in motion. • Failure makes successes more enjoyable. Tasting the embarrassment and pain of failure makes the sunshine of success brighter. • When faced with failure, as all successful entrepreneurs ultimately are, you must decide whether to allow the failure to destroy you or use it instead to motivate and empower. Remember that failure is neutral. It can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Which companion do you want it to be?  Excerpted from the book, Soul Food, Fifty-two Principles for Black Entrepreneurial Success. Copyright August, 2000, by Robert L. Wallace. Reprinted with permission of Perseus Publishing. All rights reserved." Available from online retailers, local bookstores, or by calling 800 386-5656  | | |
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