Anything is Possible When You Lead with Your Heart: 10 Proven Principles for Leadership Success

By Vic Pynn

In a prison setting, where the inmates outnumber the leaders who guard them, leadership traits like empathy matter. You're only a leader if people follow.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Carpenter's Son Publishing
• Release date: Jul 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9780984977130

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CHAPTER 1

Win, Win!

Chapter 1 takeaway: If both parties don’t feel

as if they’ve won, don’t do the deal.

What does winning mean to you?

From birth, humans are programmed to win. It starts in the schoolyard, as children compete in simple childhood games, or for the best seat in the cafeteria at lunchtime. It’s prevalent at home, with competitiveness among siblings vying for the time and attention of parents, and it continues on into young adulthood with sports. Attend any grade school sporting event and watch how animated and loud the parents get as they shout from the sidelines, urging their kids on to score! Early on, we are groomed to believe it: winning is everything.

But what, exactly, does it mean to win?

Years ago there was a business book that captured the win at all costs culture of the corporation during that era. It was titled, Swim with the Sharks but Don’t get Eaten Alive. The same author wrote another book called Beware the Naked Man Who Offers You His Shirt. Those books might have suggested to a young executive; watch your back. Beware. If you don’t, it’s over buddy.

It’s ironic to me that the concept of win-lose creates a mindset to watch your back! Win-win eliminates any risk, because you have already built a relationship based on trust.

What is a win, to you? Is it driving results? Making your quarterly numbers? Achieving success with a promotion in your company? Each one of us defines winning differently. A win to me is a mindset. Both people get what they want in the transaction. They feel good about doing business with each other, now and in the future.

In most aspects of corporate America, corporations promote a win-lose scenario. There are exceptions, but in my experience the procurement arena is centered on win-lose, go out and accumulate all of our company needs, and get us the best deal, fast! Go to the suppliers and beat those suppliers to death until you get the best deals. But that is not a strategy for winning long term.

As a leader in the sales arena, I have often seen aggressive selling tactics in people who have lost sight of the business. They’ve lost sight of relationships and partnerships because they are solely focused and rewarded on the concept of bringing the cheapest pencils and the cheapest erasers that they could get in the market place. It was interesting working for a smaller company and being subjected to these tactics from the larger companies we supplied.

There were times it really hurt our economics to the point where we either had to walk away from business, or where you can’t because you’re such a small company so you take the business, but you almost take it at a loss and risk driving yourself into bankruptcy. Smart procurement people are the ones who look and say, ‘Hey, I am building a win-win deal because I’m building a partner network to supply our company. And therefore that partner better be strong, healthy and wise.’

Perhaps you’ve been programmed to win at all costs. Maybe you come from that dog eat dog competitive corporate environment in which you had to fight to win, scrapping like a junk yard pit bull in order to keep your job. Under those high pressure circumstances, some people will do anything it takes to win. And unfortunately we’ve seen the outcome of that mentality. Leaders who drove results that way ultimately experienced tragic outcomes. Everyone remembers Enron, and the destruction of its legions of corporate chiefs and executives who compromised integrity to win. If anything good came out of the era of winning is everything, it’s that it created a new normal. Today, it’s no longer okay to compromise your morals and values to win. Sure, there are some companies that still do, but it’s not culturally acceptable to win at all costs anymore. We are becoming a more socially responsible, global economy. As companies are developing a conscience, they spend millions on diversity campaigns, GREEN environmental campaigns, giving back, orphans, United Way, disaster relief and the list goes on. If you work for one of these corporations, you’ve been asked to donate time and money to the community in some way. Today, it’s hip to care. Sure, corporations want to win. But the old days of Greed at all costs are gone.

But if Winning just isn’t everything anymore, what is?

It’s time to rewire the way we think about doing business and the role each one of us plays in the big picture. It’s time to lead without fear, and win without anyone losing.

I am a good example of someone with multiple career paths and my philosophy was always do something till it is not fun anymore and then do something else.

As a young boy my father passed away at six and my mom never remarried. I was the youngest of 8 kids. I remember starting off at eight years old working in the restaurant where I peeled potatoes three nights a week after school and did that just to get money for the family. From the age of 10 I remember working with my brothers to clean office buildings. I did this every night and full time through the summers. I did this through the age of 15 and then I worked at fast food joints nightly and summers until I finished high school. I think this is what gave me the win win hard work attitude. When you work hard at a young age you realize everyone is struggling.

When I left high school I left with a scholarship in music. I played jazz trumpet. This was my first passion and still is very important to me. I had to turn down the scholarship because mom was quite ill at the time and I had to get out and find a job to support both of us. I landed a job as a mail clerk at General Electric and did that for 6 months and realized that I was going no where without a college education. I had to do something different. I went into law enforcement in Toronto where I was a constable for 6 months. That’s one thing I learned along the way - the most interesting people are flexible and willing to take on new challenges when they need to. I now try to hire people who have those qualities.

I eventually decided to go back to college and get my Accounting and Finance diploma. It order to do this I had to find a part time job that paid very well to put myself through college while supporting my mother. This was a defining point in my life.

Using my past experience I ended up getting a job at the Toronto Jail prison working nights and going to college during the day. At the prison, I became a guard. Good training ground for the chaos of corporate America!

I finished college and then got into the workforce working for IBM where I continued my education for the next 6 years to obtain my Certified General Accountants designation.

As I evolved into the corporate arena, I started to care a lot more for everyone involved and began questioning myself. What am I taking from this deal, and what is that person losing? This extends to every human interaction that I have today in a business environment. It’s about giving versus taking. It is about putting yourself into someone else’s shoes. Winning comes at a cost. But great leaders ensure that cost is low.

Be careful how you treat the people as you climb that ladder, because if you go down that ladder, you might visit them on the way down. To me, it’s more about treating people well in general. In my industry, people tend to stay. That means you’ll see them a lot. Over and over. It’s more of a matrix than a ladder, because what I found out over my career being in the travel space is that the people don’t leave the travel industry. They change companies, change jobs, and go from a supplier to a buyer. But they’re in the industry, so you never know when or where you’re going to bump into them again, but you definitely will. So I’ve been very successful at making sure I don’t burn bridges. And that’s the concept I want to get across here to you, my friend. Do not burn any bridges with anyone, because people will pop up again.

Life’s too short, so don’t burn bridges because you never know when you will need that bridge. And why burn bridges anyways? A transaction is not a war. Don’t let someone walk away feeling as though they’ve lost a battle. It takes a lot of resentment for someone to not to want to do business with someone again. Don’t be that nasty person with the bad attitude.

Ask yourself; If this person has a choice to deal with me again in the future, will they deal with me? And if the answer is no, then I can guarantee that the deal is win-lose. If the answer is yes, that they would do business any day of the week, then it is win-win deal and you have been very successful. That is a question that I always ask myself.

If I’ve got to call on this person ever again in my career or if I lose my job, and I need to call on this person tomorrow, next week, next year, are they going to pick up the phone for me?

Lessons from behind bars

I have been a successful executive for decades and have been blessed to hold positions from sales, to Vice President, to COO to many other fun and unique roles. One of my earliest foundational jobs was as a prison guard. Looking back, it was my time working with maximum security prisoners that really set the stage for the things I’d face in corporate