"If It Was Easy, Anyone Could Do It"

One of the lessons of The Challenge Dividend is that pressure forces improvement, and the lack of pressure or challenge can lead to failure.  An interesting case study is currently playing out for the Sony Corporation, and its turnaround CEO, Howard Stringer.  Sony is one of my favorite topics, as blogged previous here, here and here.

A recent article in Fortune highlights an interesting personal story from Stringer's efforts to make change.  He tells of reading the autobiography of former IBM CEO, Louis Gerstner, who turned that sleepy bureaucracy around.  Stringer found that "I have struck the word 'IBM' and replaced it with 'Sony',' and it still reads well."  He called Gerstner and enlisted his help as a mentor.

Early on in Stringer's tenure, Sony's Bravia line of liquid-crystal-display TV sets were launched and quickly rose to share leadership.  While Stringer celebrated, Gerstner warned him:

"Success that comes too easily will make the job of transforming Sony more difficult.  Sony's problems go well beyond short-term business problems.  The cultural issues, as I found at IBM, are the most fundamental, the most difficult."

In other words, celebration at these early results might have led Stringer and the rest of his organization to relax.  Constant pressure and an eye on the bigger problems were needed to continue a real turnaround.  Instead of toasting TV sales, Stringer should be focusing his organization on the more troubling numbers that encompass the entire company.  For example, the fact that Sony made a mere $1.6 billion profit on $63.9 billion in sales - and only $25MM in profit from selling actual products. The remaining 98% of profit came from a life insurance firm and a bank; not exactly Sony's sweet spot.

One of my favorite managers and mentors, Brian McNamara, always used to say, "If it was easy, anyone could do it."  Now I repeat this to myself and my team all the time.  This short phrase captures the insight that challenge leads to improvement, and helps ensure that we stay hungry even during successes.