I recently spent several amazing days at the Procter & Gamble Alumni Reunion Conference in Cincinnati. As many people are aware, P&G sets the gold standard when it comes to marketing, innovation and leadership. Their industry-leading brands include Tide, Gillette, Crest, Charmin, Febreze, Head & Shoulders, and Pampers.
This biennial event is only open to former employees of P&G. Since I had the good fortune of spending some of my more formative years on the team, I decided to invest in participating. I’m glad I did, because the attendees — many of whom have moved on to create and run extremely successful companies — openly shared their ideas and insights.
Over my next few blogs, I’m going to summarize some of what I learned from the many speeches, roundtables and breakout sessions at the P&G Alumni Reunion Conference Center.
Let’s start with a panel discussion that included these four titans of industry:
- A.G. Lafley (Retired CEO and Chairman of P&G)
- Scott Cook (Founder and Chairman of Intuit)
- Jim McNerney (Former CEO of 3M and Boeing)
- Meg Whitman (CEO of HP and Former CEO of eBay)
Here are highlights from these top CEOs on important issues facing companies and business leaders everywhere.
Consumer Shifts
- Forty-two percent of people use an assistant like Alexa or Siri. We need to learn how to compete in that market so those assistants recommend our brands.
- Habit formation favors the popular well-known brands because we can only keep so many things in our minds. With all the choices available to us, we end up listening to less diverse options because we want simpler, more convenient habits.
- Artificial intelligence is allowing us to market products directly to people (e.g. toothbrush that will tell us — via app on phone — where we missed brushing and which toothpaste to buy).
Talent
- Make sure your company excels in these two areas:
- Attract exceptional people by being a great company for a first job.
- Keep top performers by eliminating the two biggest reasons why good people leave: they dislike their boss and they don’t feel stimulated by their work.
- The most vulnerable time frame for employees is after six to seven years. Build in systems to keep them engaged or you’ll lose them. It’s okay for people to leave after 15-20 years to become CEO at another company, as that’s a sign that you brought in top shelf talent.
- Talent today is different. They care about solving real social challenges, so they want to see how their work has an impact. They are less patient about paying their dues and following a traditional career path. Pay them well and keep them challenged if you want to retain them.
Staying in Touch with the Market
- Spend the majority of your time with customers and those on your team who are closest to your customers.
- Meet with people who buy nothing from your company to learn why and what makes them tick.
- Talk to your sales reps to find out what is happening inside and outside of the company. Three to four times a week, pick up the phone and call them unannounced to ask them what they’re hearing and what they’re thinking.
- Surveys can be good but it’s better to get involved with working sessions with your people. Mark Zuckerberg spends five hours per day doing product reviews with his Facebook teams.
- Be approachable and really listen when people talk. How you carry yourself makes the difference between gathering a little of what someone knows vs. getting it all.
- Watch out for the “saying vs. doing” trap. Pay more attention to what people are actually doing vs. what they are telling you. An example was at Tide where the packaging was rated good (“saying”) but some consumers had to use screwdrivers to open the box (“doing”). When they realized the packaging wasn’t that good, it led to new innovations.
- Selectively choose what you will focus on. There’s a lot you don’t have to do, so delegate so you can concentrate on the things that matter most.
I’m always looking for new ways to look at and approach the challenges that face leaders. These four CEOs — Lafley, McNerney, Cook and Whitman — delivered powerful and unfiltered insights at the P&G Alumni Reunion Conference that can help anyone get a leg up at work.