Those who can dominate decision makers' attention can dominate a business.
Sometimes the techniques used to control executives by managing their perceptions are surprisingly blunt and simple. In my own case, I saw an interesting example at an annual conference for partners and senior mangers of a "big five" management consulting firm that I once worked for.
The consulting firm had undertaken a variety of computer software development projects for its largest client, and a number of these were going less than swimmingly. The biggest project of all for this client had missed its deadlines repeatedly, and its budget was in the process of being exceeded by more than 100%. (Ultimately, the costs would reach more than a hundred million dollars.)
At the consulting firm's annual get-together, we were shown a videotaped interview with the CEO of our client company, who went on extravagantly about the superb performance of our firm on technical projects. Many of us who were assigned to this company's projects looked at one another in puzzlement. Then another video was played that showed the basis for the CEO's rhapsodizing.
Our firm had swapped out the desktop computers in the executive suite for newer ones. Although this task was a very simple one--certainly not in the same leagure with any of the software development projects we were engaged in--it was the thing that most directly touched the CEO and his cohorts, and was therefore the image that predominated in his perceptions. In this most visible of endeavors, highly-paid consultants performed tasks typically left to the most junior-grade employees. The project was scripted down to the smallest detail, and its execution was flawlees.
The net effect was to create an image of competence in the CEO's mind so potent that it more than counterbalanced our missing major project deadlines by more than a year and generating cost overruns in the tens of millions of dollars. As an icon, the executive PC-swapping project was our equivalent of the Marlboro Man.
(c) COPYRIGHT 1998 ROBERT WINTER. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
