2019 Reflections on Leading at the (Metaphorical) Edge

Over the holidays, a friend sent me the book Leading at the Edge by Denis Perkins. The book shares the journey of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s 1916 Antarctic expedition as an analogy to guide leaders in times of great change and adversity.  While most of us will never lead through such extreme life and death conditions, I found a deep connection to Shackleton’s story and the 10 leadership insights in the book with my own experiences leading a team at The Edge—or as Perkins describes, “the highest possible limits of performance". 

For the past couple years, I had the privilege to lead a remarkable team tasked with an epic journey by modern business standards: quickly and inventively refocusing a multi-billion dollar business to seize a growing market opportunity. Here’s a small peep into what it took, and some of the lessons on “leading at the edge” that stood out to me. 

Expedition Ahead of Us 

Divesting a business is hard. Turning a stagnant business back to growth is hard. Incubating new industry-defining innovations is hard. Doing all three at once in a year seemed daunting, if not impossible, especially at the size, scale and speed at which we operated. That was the mission we set out on in our IBM Watson Customer Engagement team. We were a microcosm of IBM.

In 2019, we divested over $2 billion of collaboration, marketing and commerce software and SaaS applications. We modernized and launched new capabilities for IBM Sterling Supply Chain software, drove new client adoption, doubled the scale of some existing clients, and performed at record levels for global retailers during the holiday season.  We incubated and delivered new innovations infusing AI, machine learning, and blockchain around order fulfillment optimization, anomaly detection in business networks, and a shared visibility ledger for partner trust.  We grew the business. We accomplished all of this in 15 months. The most interesting piece is how we made it happen.  Like the explorers on the great Trans-Antarctic expedition, we worked together, with passion and vigor, as an extraordinary team. 

Vision & Quick Victories 

The first strategy shared in the book is about the critical role that both big-picture vision, and quick steps and victories along the way played in the long journey. For us, the first step was making the big decisions and never losing sight of the ultimate goal for IBM, IBMers, and IBM Clients. Our bet was clear - RedHat, Cloud and Cognitive Enterprise.

In any journey, the clarity of defining what winning looks like means letting go of old missions and dreams. For our Watson Customer Engagement business unit, it meant focusing on the future of intelligent supply chains, and deselecting marketing and commerce application markets.  We had to re-frame with an open mindset the possibility of a different future and find a new mark.  It was a combination of making data-driven decisions, ensuring strategic alignment to IBM’s overall goals and placing future bets. Letting go and adapting to changing demand requires candid and difficult discussions about strategy, people, customers, partners and money.  

We recognized quickly that we would need to be flexible and continuously ready to evolve our team and how we worked together. We never lost sight of our ultimate goal and channeled our energy on short term objectives to sustain our momentum.  We applied agile to every part of the business from divestiture project teams and deal room negotiations to engineering innovation and delivery to be manically focused on outcomes. We balanced numerous elements and decisions based on our beliefs about our company’s future, our people, our clients, and our partners’ visions about their future. 

Optimism, Stamina & Reality  

The second biggest element of our success was sustaining positive momentum over a long and hard journey.  The leadership teams across the multiple businesses did an exceptional job of instilling optimism and confidence while staying grounded in reality.  We were simultaneously operating three businesses - quickly working to build up one business while orchestrating splits of two businesses. Every one of us went through moments of internal self-dialogues to override voices of doubt. A particular quote from Shackleton’s diary included similar confessions to those I thought many times along the journey:

“I confess that I felt the burden of responsibility sit heavily on my shoulders; but on the other hand, I was stimulated and cheered by the attitude of the men [and women].”  

The complexity of the challenges we navigated daily required a combination of high stress tolerance, strong work ethic, unwavering follow-through, and agility to make micro-decisions daily.  We relied on a team connection balanced in IQ and EQ that enabled knowing when to tag-in or out, when to give and where to find encouraging words, and how to recognize and work together quickly on mistakes.  Several leaders played multiple positions tactically as unexpected gaps became known. One of the decisions we made early on was to run a program to teach mindfulness exercises daily. Over a thousand people globally participated on video regularly together. We also made a commitment to frequent and honest communication for all managers, employees, and clients. We shared what we knew while acknowledging the unknowns and time boxing them as best as possible.

Conflict & Values

Trust and transparency are buzz words that many leaders use, but not all have the courage to truly operate with them at the core.  To do so means being willing to hear the things you may not want to hear and address conflicts head-on.  In reflecting back, a big element of our success was how we approached unexpected issues as a team.  I believe that all conflicts and issues should be raised but not all rise to the point that they need to be solved.  The team’s cultural environment has to be inclusive and inviting in order for people to share what’s on their mind – from barriers and obstacles, to anxieties and fear. Emotions married with intellect make us human and uniquely qualified for the roles we have.

We minimized status differences, organization structures, and insisted on respect through daily behavior and some creative programs we applied. Once an issue was raised, we worked together to categorize it and make difficult judgements through the lens of outcome and time. This discourse to evaluate options, risks and opportunities, then delegate decisions and work while providing calm assurance grounded in reality, had immeasurable impact on the team.  There are moments in any negotiation with a partner, client, colleague and even with friends and family that are deal breakers. The right judgement for action requires balancing values, risks, and consequences through the frame of time and shared beliefs.

I’ve come to realize that the hardest part of leadership is making a decision when two things you value are in conflict with each other. My team and I held replay sessions throughout the journey—discussing highs and lows, as well as areas of improvement.  There were many moments of intensity, comedy, anxiety, and resolve. We argued, learned and grew closer together. The strong team bonds created during the journey meant more than the results we achieved.

Gratitude

In reflecting on the numerous memories, the overwhelming feeling I have is gratitude to have gone through the journey with the people that made the journey so enriching. There were many sacrifices made by so many people because of the shared purpose and strong bonds. Big “Thank You” to everyone - the current and past executives, the WCE and Sterling leadership teams, the divestiture teams, our partners at HCL & CenterBridge Partners and Acoustic, and our clients who gave us their trust during this transition.  

2020 is a new year, a new decade, and at IBM marks a new CEO. My encouragement to everyone is forge strong team bonds, take the big risk, and be tenaciously creative.