Friends at Work?

Here’s a big tip – if you are having trouble at work, maybe it’s not the job. Perhaps you need to have friends.
A Toronto lawyer who left his job (or was given a polite push off his perch by the partners) wrote about his experience in an entertaining article in Toronto Life. Mr. Scott confessed he was relieved to get shoved out of a career in law. He described the cold pit in the stomach as he read all the horrible emails he got first thing in the morning or the shock of having a warm, cuddly chat with another firm’s lawyer and then receiving a nasty letter just hours later with an absolute 180 degree turn in tone. Hmmm. Maybe this fellow Scott did not watch enough LA Law but that seems pretty well par for the course. Aren’t lawyers paid to be the pit bulls so that we don’t have to be?
Sure lawyers earn great money to be cruel; Mr Scott mentioned - $100,000 and up - but if you’ve been following the Toronto city employee salaries stories in the papers, you will know there are talented subway ticket collectors cashing in pay cheques of a similar amount. Maybe Scott has a point.
But I digress.
Perhaps what Mr. Scott lacked were work friends, not his artsy friends so easily appalled by the harshness of Bay Street (can you see them with their hands clasped to cheeks like Edvard Munch's famous painting "The Scream?) What about other lawyer friends who truly understood the pressures of the job. They could share a quick laugh about who has the worse letter from that particular lawyer and sooth the pain. Maybe they could have come up with a nickname – Shark, Jaws, Billy Bob or Bob Rae are all good.

Friends at work can help you through the dark spots. As the song goes, that's what friends are for. Research by Tim Rath of the Gallup organization confirms that those with a good friend at work tend to better engage with the client, contribute more creative ideas, and stay on the job longer. In other words, friends at work are a predictor of job satisfaction.Rath's study labels the different categories of friends at work. There's the navigator, who shows you the way; the encourager, pushing you to shine; the collaborator, who brings out your best skills, and so on. Each type of friend brings a different contribution, and you cannot expect one to fulfill all your needs.

Mr Scott’s firm was trying.

They had a formal mentorship program which sounds great when the management consultant goes through the PowerPoint stats showing how productivity goes up, but in the cold light of reality, it almost never works that way.

The pressures of billing hours described by Mr Scott’s meant that his mentor did not have the time or personal benefit to take Scott under her wing and teach him. People do what gets measured and in law, again, billable hours pay for uber-expensive offices on Bay Street so billable hours are what get measured. Every hour has to count. If you want to spend more time with the family or on mentoring, there are cheaper offices north of the 401 and many excellent law firms operate from those geographic locations in exactly that way. There is less pressure to pay the landlord each month and more time to give on mentorship or to life outside of work.
Each type of friend brings different abilities and you can not expect one friend to fulfill all your needs.
It seems calculating to analyse the features of relationships but sensible.
Friendships take work on your part too. What do you want? How could you make it more enjoyable for the other person?
A human resources person handling confidential information became friends with the corporate lawyer who also worked with confidential information.
If you are going eyeball to eyeball with lawyers, have a friend who goes through something similar.
Scott would have been better off probing his mentor or identifying his own Navigator and asking how they managed to deal with the harshness of the career. He may have been surprised to learn that perhaps his mentor was one of the many, many lawyers who are writers like himself and spend Saturday mornings honing their novel writing skills at the Humber College Writer’s Circle.
I know many lawyers who are warm, humorous and great family people. A range of careers require a similar time sacrifice but minus the mega salaries of lawyers. Most lawyers do drift away from Bay Street firms though to work at a level that suits their own needs.
Scott does talk to other lawyers but to confirm his view, that working downtown is spending long hours in the devil’s workshop. These lawyers probably do not want to tell Scott, “Yeah I work long hours but I do enjoy the satisfaction of doing a great job for my client. It’s not all about the money. Plus I am paying for the lifestyle I want.”
Reading Mr Scott’s article surmise he is in his early thirties so probably thought law office would be more like Ally McBeal where the lawyers all spent an odd amount of time in the co-ed loo, sharing their deepest feelings and then meeting up later at a bar to karaoke the night away. The phrase “billable hours” was never mentioned, all the more time to give screen time to Ally’s latest love unravelling.
Sharing such lurid details of your lovelife over a bucket of icecream is probably not the way to go with a work friendship but sharing daily battles and disappointments over a coffee with a work friend definitely helps.

Family Day Hurts Business Owners

The Liberals’ gift of a brand new Family Day holiday in February was the first action taken by the newly re-elected government and why not? Work-Life balance is to be encouraged and after all, aren’t we a wealthy country that can afford holidays? Well done politicians for giving families the support they deserve and a day for people to linger in bed, perhaps even to add to the population’s statistics in which we seem to be lagging.
Whoa right there! Do you honestly believe politicians thought fondly about families gathered around bountiful fare on the dining room table? Did the conversation in the Ontario Cabinet planning room go, “Those poor, tired, Ontario families need time off to snuggle up and watch Disney Movies together and have time to be…well, families.”
No, the conversation probably went, “Imagine if we kick off our re-election campaign with the promise to voters of candy.”
That would get the heads all nodding.
“What about candy with no cost to the government? And guys…business can pay the holiday salaries but we get the credit. Cool.” Even more heads nodding and, without more ado, Family Day Holiday got its stamp of approval.
Except that candy does come at a cost.
Lost revenue – GDP - from the 6.6 million full time workers eligible for Ontario’s Family Day is $2 billion. Big deal say Human Resource experts such as Wendy Poirier, managing principal at Towers Perrin, who believe that a day off in a freezing month will boost employees and “add to their productivity and engagement in their work." OK. Let’s run with that. Perhaps workers will make up for lost productivity and, at worst, the cost is half – only $500 million of revenue from business owners.
If you are thinking, “Why worry? It’s employers who are picking up the tab. Business owners are whining about one day, for heaven’s sake. What’s the big deal?” here’s a question for you. Do you have an RRSP? If it is a respectable and balanced portfolio, it’s guaranteed that you own shares in an Ontario business. That makes you a business owner and that means you will be picking up the tab for loss of one day’s revenue too. Maybe you think that’s OK and you can afford to be generous to your fellow Ontarians.
Then analyze Canada’s long-term competitive position for businesses. A day off comes at a difficult time in Ontario’s economic development – our business ranking is slipping, not rising, against other countries. Roger Martin, Dean of Rotman, comments, “Canada is stuck in neutral when it comes to creating a competitive economy.”
Business has lost the advantage of a weak dollar to give them a competitive edge. American companies cannot count on Canada to be a cheaper place to manufacture and are looking to Mexico, El Salvador and India, never mind the giant, China. As Ian Howland, head of the Canadian Manufacturing Association, asks, “Are those countries having Family Day Holidays?” The Canadian Venture Capital Association is also raising the alarm with a statement expressing shock that the elections did not even touch on the declining investment in Canadian businesses.
People - be smart about political spin. Sure, politicians are swell guys for thinking about the family, but be very clear: they are not the ones paying. You are. Whether you are an employee, a shareholder of an Ontario business or a Canadian hoping the future viability of our economy will continue at the same level for your younger family members as it has these past forty years. The “Peaceful Rise” of China and the business draw of India, El Salvador and Mexico in sectors that Canada used to have means that it is no longer business as usual.
But, gosh, that candy from the politicians sure is difficult to turn down. As the poet Ogden Nash said, “Candy is dandy, liquor is quicker.” So perhaps a free bottle of wine from the Liquor Control Board of Ontario would be a better bribe for us all!

Is ‘Giving’ Against Free Enterprise?

We are all creatures of the times we live in and how we experienced life as we grew up. Our attitudes to giving reflect those experiences.
I live in an age which has seen the end of the British Empire, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and now, perhaps the decline of America, like a giant air balloon slowly deflating. In the meantime, the ‘peaceful rise’ of a dynamic China and other Asian countries, matched with the rise in our own overambitious government entitlement programs, creates a new level of expectation for our citizens.
When I went to McGill University, a slice of pizza at Gertrude’s on a Friday would be my one treat – otherwise I lived on peanut butter, tuna sandwiches and beans on toast (yes, I like bread). I rarely bought a pre-made meal which is why I was jolted by a blog written in response to Karen Selick’s comments on Food Banks. This student was horrified at the thought of another student not being able to buy a cafeteria item. What’s wrong, I wondered, with the cheaper option of packing a cheese sandwich and an apple for lunch?
The end goal of helping the poor is desirable but the debate rages around “how” we give. Selick points out that there are better ways to achieve the same goal – temporarily feeding a person in dire straits. The use of supermarkets as the location to pick up goods seems a no brainer. Business owner, Graeme Jewett of Marsan Foods, tells me his company makes various President’s Choice frozen dinners but also a 97¢ frozen dinner, which has some meat and is preservative-free, for Giant Tiger stores. Can the Food Bank really beat the operating cost of getting an equivalent item onto Food Bank shelves? Could the savings pay for that 97¢ meal?
The Food Bank style of charity - giving to ease symptoms - is not to be confused with venture giving – philanthropy - which targets the underpinnings of society, asks why poverty occurs and seeks to level access to opportunities.
Andrew Squire used to stay up all night doing his music, and longed to own his own sound studio in Toronto. Then, he benefited from the philanthropy of the Canadian Youth Business Foundation (CYBF) which redistributes money toward loans for high risk entrepreneurs.
Andrew says, “It’s private companies like CYBF who taught me the skills to be an independent business owner by providing me with $1,000 a month for a year and giving me a mentor. CYBF insisted that I write business plans, make financial projections and answer questions about the revenues and strategy of my business. By transferring their entrepreneurial skills, CYBF encouraged my passion for music into a business. I won the sound contract for a Sprite commercial and now I have my own studio – King Squire Audio. Of the 20 people in my CYBF program, more than half are now hiring other people. The cost - $240,000- is peanuts compared to what the government is spending on big conglomerates.”
Andrew agrees with Selick, that how skills or how resources are given increases the impact of levelling the playing field. “The CYBF model should be exploited as it is entrepreneurs who are running the program. Letting government ‘do the giving’ would be inefficient. It was private business people who taught me how to raise money and who gave me the right ideas about the tough world of business and this came through CYBF.”
“I think a lot about our Canadian identity,” says Andrew. He believes, “The government is a dominant player in the economy but it is made up of non business people and this is probably one of the reasons for the high level of antipathy toward entrepreneurs in our country.”
“Government programs seem more suited to our historic position as a resource colony fuelling other nations. What about our entrepreneurs who provide over half of Ontario’s jobs? We’re ignored. I thank the philanthropy of business people who gave me a chance, because deep down they understand me.”
The Food Bank is well meaning with its belief in the redistribution of wealth but I believe in the redistribution of skills to people like Andrew Squire, who has shed his dreadlock image and projects a quiet confidence. The Food Bank tips the pendulum toward socialism. I nudge the pendulum toward free enterprise. The totality of resources is never sufficient to meet all goals at the same time. Life is dialectic – private enterprise versus public duty. But effective giving is something we can all have the courage and honesty to face.

Canada’s Health

Canada is not a nation of entrepreneurs.
Take a tour of our history: we used to be great at operating businesses and embracing risk but then we fell into the tender trap of remaining a country of primary industry with government and educational systems to match. And living in Nova Scotia is no excuse. Microsoft and Starbucks bloomed in once sleepy cities. We are showing that we can have our RIMs, Cirques du Soleil, Imax and La Senzas that are attractive to the world. We also have private equity companies in the class of Onex to fund the growth of such world class businesses. What’s the problem? Truthfully? It is how much value we put in entrepreneurs and business.
In Quebec, the government is trying to encourage real Venture Capital activity and is moving in the direction of free enterprise by providing tax credits and reviewing its regulations. The Charest Government set up a Venture Capital Summit in Québec City and flew in top investors from Boston, New York and Silicon Valley as well as from across Canada. Before the convention began, the investors were invited to take a tour of the magnificent city of Quebec. A Quebecois youth stood at the front of the bus with his microphone and highlighted the architecture but then proudly told this busload of investors, fresh in from the frosty frontiers of free enterprise, his number one fact, making Quebec the best place in the world -- 60% of Quebeckers work for the government!
And that, in a nut shell, is the problem for the entrepreneurs of our country, along with the venture capital and private equity community.
This lack of empathy toward business is alarmingly endemic.
Entrepreneurial spirit begins with children and we need to ask what values we are passing along to the next generation? Is it a distrust of business and assertiveness often labelled as ‘American’? What do we value and who do we celebrate? Do we give our Canadian version of Bill Gates a platform on which to speak to others, or do we pull him down?
Private equity money is invested by entrepreneurs who take on an enormous risk highly aware that they could end up with zip for their efforts. Would you invest millions of your investment portfolio in a company developing an unknown power source or would you prefer to stash it in real estate?
Yet private equity people push past the timid and safe wallflowers in order to get up and dance, rather than wait to be asked. It is the visionaries like Michael Brown, co-founder of Ventures West Capital, who sink their money into emerging businesses with little track record of success. Brown invested seed capital into a start-up company working on a new power source and continued to assist in the growth capital. Today, this business, known as Ballard Power, is the world’s first and most successful fuel cell development corporation. It exists because Michael Brown had the guts to finance those entrepreneurs who believed Ballard could be global right from the start. Big rewards need big risks, but are Canadians too culturally anti-business, which frankly puts an alarming brake on how we keep a spot on the world’s dance card?
But moxy glows in the hearts of many Canadian business owners and through special partnership with private equity, it will thrive. “Entrepreneurs and the investors who finance them are cut from the same cloth,” says Dean Carol Stephenson, Richard Ivey School of Business. “They share a unique talent for seeing business opportunities where most of us see insurmountable obstacles, and they have the passion and drive to risk the climb. Essential to each other, together they are vital to economic growth, productivity, and job creation in Canada.”
Happy New Year to all you entrepreneurs out there!

The One Thing to Do For Your Health

Do yourself a favour and get an annual medical check-up. And don’t be like some people and treat it as a game of hide and seek, leaving it up to your doctor to flush out your problems.
If you own your business, your family will thank you for taking care of your health. In her early forties, an entrepreneur thought about her fifties – what if she fell ill? How could she make sure the business would survive? She realized that keeping 100% ownership was a huge risk, tantamount to putting all her financial eggs in one basket. After some research, she invited in a Private-Equity partner who paid her for 40% ownership. This allowed her to take cash off the table to invest in a range of stocks, including RIM which scorched up the stock exchange. When, in her mid forties, she was diagnosed with cancer, she was able to take the time out to recover because the private equity partners took over the management. What a relief not to have the business entirely on her shoulders so as to be able to concentrate on her good health.
An ounce of prevention is worth its weight too – and we’re not just talking about an apple a day. Recent studies show that communal activities such as singing are good for you. During the tense closing of a financial deal, a Bay Street lawyer announced to her clients that at 7.00pm she needed to go to her weekly choir practice. She returned at 9:00pm refreshed and happily hammered out the contract by midnight. Telling your client you’re off for a song break might bring you a frosty reception but maybe we could all take a leaf out of the song book of the USA Presidential races. Oprah and Obama lead the crowd in a song and dance, Mike Huckabee strummed a mighty fine tune on his guitar and then there’s that grey-haired veteran of charmers, Bill Clinton, and his sax (OK – let’s not go there.) Perhaps Stephen Harper, on a special occasion, should give his pipes a blast and get Michaëlle Jean to sing along too – for the health of the nation.
There’s something, too, about having a network of people who know you (and not just superficially or merely agree with you to keep you happy) but keep you real. A happy you translates into dollars for your business revenues. Over the past year, Britney Spears was estranged from her mother (your mom will tell you the things you don’t want to hear but should), divorced her husband (who wouldn’t) and fired her long-term management team (big mistake). Then her network became Paris Hilton and the Boom Boom Room crowd and has now moved on to the lock-down medical team at Cedars-Sinai. As Warren Buffet says, the secret to his success is who he has around him. You are who you hang with; choose your network wisely.
It’s astonishing to realise that modern medicine has advanced exponentially over the past ten years, maybe not as much as foreseen by Arthur C Clarke’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. We do not in fact have a space station with a large computer called Hal going postal but we do have women doing so on a monthly basis. Ladies, help is available. Ask your doctor about the research. If you think it should be illegal to have a cheerful and bouncy musical called Menopause and that Apocalypse Now would be a far more suitable description, then you are due to call your doctor. No need to scare your staff every month with your Linda Blair imitation.Doctors have their list of Seven Worst Things for a Patient to Do during a medical visit and at the top is chatting away about Michael Moore’s Sicko movie, and then at the door on the way out mentioning a lump, “But it’s probably nothing.” Make a list. Your doctor will appreciate that you want to be a partner