I have been catching up lately on my blog reading (I use Bloglines) and  found a couple of posts which got me thinking about how to survive an economic downturn.

My take away from these thought-provoking reads is that the keys to surviving the recession are three very important ideas:

1. Creating and maintaining “we” relationships with our customers.
2. Striving for those magnificent performances with every encounter (customer experience).
3. Leading in a way that allows the greatness of every “mind” in your orchestra to give you their absolute best talents everyday.

See if you get the same thing after reading these two posts.

Guest blogger Steve Yastrow, with his post The Downturn is a Rounding Error, emphasizes the “we” and importance of focusing on relationships in a difficult economy. He challenges us to think with two questions:

1. What percentage of customers are giving you all of the business they possible can?
2. What percentage of your referral sources are giving you all the referrals they reasonably can? 

He goes on to say, “Chances are the untapped profit in our exisiting customer relationships is much bigger than any economic downturn …

Point made. Treating our cutomers (members) like they are in a “We” relationship will give you more share of wallet and more loyalty (versus “Us and Them”).

Then I saw this post over at our friends’ blog at Verasage, written by Ed Kless and sent from his friend, Steve Orleow (also with Verasage), who found it on Fast Company.tv. (This is a perfect example of the power of the blogosphere!)  Here are some lessons on how to build and nurture those “We” relationships in our organizations. Notice how these lessons emphasize harmony and passion between the players, conductor and audience as one — “We”! Read on …

Ed gives his lessons learned from this three-part series on “Leadership Lessons from a Maestro,” featuring the maestro workshop of famous conductor Itay Talgram.

The words that struck me in this clip are harmony and maestro. Harmony is the magic that happens when, according to Maestro Talgram, “one hundred instruments become a clear, unified and powerful sound. Led by the silent Maestro, each individual musician plays in perfect harmony working towards the shared goal — a magnificant performance.”

Some of my thought bubbles about this are these:

• The conductor’s job is to interpret the piece and the most frequently played pieces are the hardest to differentiate / interpret. Think about our own jobs. Isn’t it hardest to create excitement out of our recurring tasks? What can we learn from these musicians about making every “performance” magical?
• The conductor’s job is to read ahead of the orchestra. Aren’t all leaders supposed to be “reading ahead” of our organizations? Are you cognizant of the emerging trends and issues facing your organization?
• The goal is JOY, MAGIC, PASSION for the audience and the players. Isn’t that about customer experience? Wow, wouldn’t that be cool if we could incorporate those words and actions into our businesses and organizations?
• Expertise and skill for each instrument (he uses the term “minds”) that come together in harmony (agreement / concord). This is cross-functional, silo-breaking work at its best.
• It is all about the audience, or to paraphrase Peter Drucker, the number one reason for a company to exist is to create (and serve) a customer!
• Maestro means master / teacher in Italian. Isn’t this really servant leadership?

Which also reminds me of another resource from Maestro Benjamin Zander of the Boston Philharmonic, who wrote a great book called The Art of Possibility, which also incorporates many of these concepts, along with some new ideas. A couple are worth adding:

• Lead from any chair — the concept that we can all be leaders even if we do not have any real “power.” Zander talks about leadership as a gift that helps others achieve greatness. How much greatness are you willing to grant?
• My favorite, Rule No. 6: Don’t take yourself too seriously, and the complementary 95 Percent Rule: 95 percent of my pain is caused by my own stupidity.
• Telling the “WE” story. It is about the importance of relationships, synergy (1 + 1 = 3), the beauty of “AND” versus “OR.” There is that “We” thing again.

What do you think? What are the keys to beating an economic downturn?

I also want to add that I think we achieved a magnificant performance last week when we performed at our first Maryland Business and Accounting Expo. While we have already harvested a ton of improvements and lessons learned, the member feedback told us we provided a terrific member experience and I saw personal bests from our entire MACPA team. I think they even surprised themselves! This post is dedicated to them …