Here are a few key moments of truth, leadership examples, advice received and so on. Most of them seem to come from when I was in Scandinavia - maybe 36-41 is peak time for these things.
Can you remember any performances from Shell leaders? No? I'm not surprised, there is generally not much that is memorable! But I can still remember an address given by Phil Turberville, then CEO of Shell Europe Oil Products, to 50 odd Scandinavian retail staff, in Copenhagen on the third Thursday in September 1997. We had just been through BFI (in case you have heard of it - if not just think of it as some mega corporate trauma). He told stories about his own life and career, used examples including one using a rubber band, and was altogether inspirational. We were all mesmorised, and motivated, and learned so much, and finished so much more positive about Shell, and performed better as a direct result of that half hour. The address left such an impression that I can today picture the room, where I was sitting, and with some effort I could recreate a good chunk of the content.
I guess it shows that this sort of inspiring leadership is possible, even in Shell. Unfortunately, the guy was a bit wild and hopelessly out on a limb in a Shell culture, and he left Shell less than a year later. That didn't do a lot to the motivation of our audience of 50, and maybe hundreds of similar audiences. It was probably right for Shell that he left (in fact in a way it is amazing he lasted as long as he did), but a shame that such rare leadership - true charisma - couldn't sustain a place in our company.
I also recall an address by Jeroen van der Veer, in Rome or Milan I think it was, maybe around 2000 when he was just a humble CMD member. It was an odd sort of speech, but I remember one key theme. The job of the senior leader, he said, was to manage the dimensions which don't manage themselves. So, when Shell had a regional organisation, the job of CMD was to focus on global opportunities at business level and make sure they were followed up. When we moved to a business line, the job changed to look at cross-business and in-country issues. That message stuck with me and rings very true. Lesson - one great message beats a hundred clever points, and can endure whatever the context.
One favourite Key Moment of Truth came just as we were trying to complete the complicated M&A swap deal with Fina. The Norway end of the deal had a working capital clause, as all M&A has to have (think of it like renting a car: you have to have a sub-deal about fuel in the car. The same is true of companies). Fina had drafted this clause in a strange way, and, after a while, our finance people worked out that they had messed it up big time, and the result of the clause would be we would almost get the company for free. Shell being Shell, we went out of our way to try to tell them they had (possibly) messed up, and checked again and again that they really meant it the way they said it, but they kept coming back confirming it is was correct in their eyes.
We were all set for ceremonial signing on Monday 1 March, including visiting dignatories. Saturday morning 27 Feb (I was on a walk with my daughter in the woods in Stockholm) I got a call from my Fina counterparty - they had discovered what they had done. Poor guy - talk about a career limiting moment! There were some implications for me too - not least that my job starting on Monday as integration manager seemed to be in some jeopardy. Once he had calmed down, we all agreed to meet on Sunday 10am in Oslo to see what we could rescue. We arrived with a list of demands - yes we could change this clause, but all the rubbish we had conceded to them over the last four months had to come back our way, after all our whole valuation had been compromised. True, justifiable, and we just held this line. We held it on Sunday (until midnight), then all through Monday (dignatories politely asked to sit in the waiting room, staff in Norske Fina left in the dark), then all through Tuesday. Wednesday 2pm I got the call to say we had a deal, and we signed at 11am on Thursday.
All great fun. But the Key Moment of Truth came from one of the dignatories, the country chair of Norske Shell who of course was an upstream man. He was sitting around in Oslo for all these days - he was very good about it, and adjusted his schedules willingly. He wanted the deal as it was quite prestigious for Norway and was certainly a step change for Norske Shell Retail. I think it was on the Wednesday morning he sidled up to me and asked how far apart the two sides were in cash equivalent terms. I told him - it was about two or three million dollars. Then I learned how much upstream and downstream mindsets don't mix. For downstream this value mattered - the NPV of the deal was maybe 10 million. He basically asked if he could make up the difference somehow, just offering some subsidy from upstream for 2-3 million to make the deal happen. To him, it was incredible that a difference as small as that could be a deal breaker. Think about that - and what it means for Shell. (Just for the record, the request was declined, and in any case it was not really seriously offered - imagine the tax department trying to work that one out! But the sentiment was sincere)
My best ever coaching received came from Martien van den Wittenboer, a stately Dutchman who ended up being disliked by everyone through the circumstance he landed in - SEOP's reorganisation obsession did a lot of damage to careers. He was my boss, and generally a good one. In staff discussions, we had the normal focus on what could be better, what I could do to close gaps etc. Then he just looked across the table and said - forget all this, just be yourself. Don't waste your talent by trying to be someone different, just use your strengths and manage your weaknesses. Simple, and brilliant, and (to the eternal frustration of all my subsequent bosses) a mantra I still use.
One story less flattering of Shell came in 2004 during the reserves crisis. Jeroen van der Veer did a brave thing and called a series of town hall type information meetings in the C16 atrium. He started the first one with an observation that in all Shell's history he believed this was the first time such a gathering had taken place. Oh dear. What a company we are - any company with any sort of external focus or human feel would do this every month, not once in 100 years! That story sums up a lot about the falings of Shell's leadership culture, in my humble opinion. Calling the meeting was a class thing to do, and the personal homilies we still get by e-mail are class as well, but it is a shame that the town halls stopped as soon as the reserves crisis had calmed down.
That was interesting today, trying to think of personal Key Moments Of Truth. A bit nostalgic, but it taught me things too. I recommend the exercise.
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