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Never eat alone, 19. CHAPTER 3 - Step Three: Create a Personal "Board of Advisors"

19. CHAPTER 3 - Step Three: Create a Personal "Board of Advisors"

Step Three: Create a Personal "Board of Advisors"

Goals, like everything else I write about in this book, aren't achieved alone.

With a plan in place, you're going to need reinforcement to stay focused. As in any business, even the best conceived plans benefit from external vetting. It helps to have an enlightened counselor, or two or three, to act as both cheerleader and eagle-eyed supervisor, who will hold you accountable.

I call this group my Personal Board of Advisors. They may be made up of family members; perhaps someone who's been a mentor to you; even an old friend or two. My board came to my own aid at a critical juncture in my career after I left Starwood Hotels and Resorts, the company that owns such brands as the W Hotel and the Westin.

I was adrift. For the first time in my life, I couldn't lay claim to a title or a job. I had to reassess my mission. I had come to Starwood from Deloitte to accept what was an irresistible offer: to be the youngest chief marketing officer in a Fortune 500 company (a goal I had set for myself three years earlier) and reinvent the way an industry thought about marketing.

But my new job didn't go exactly as planned.

Juergen Bartels, the president at Starwood who recruited me, promised to mentor me and pave my way toward becoming a future leader of the company.

My goals for the company were large and required changing an entire company's way of thinking. Up until that point, marketing in the hospitality industry was a regional affair, often left to individual hotels.

But the cost of that arrangement was a lack of company-wide brand consistency. Our plan was to consolidate our marketing functions under one roof with a global outlook. Rather than allow each of our regions around the world to set their own individual marketing strategies, I wanted to centralize our marketing operations more in order to clarify our message and create greater impact in the marketplace with a cohesive brand. After all, our primary customers—business travelers—were increasingly global and expected consistency. Shortly after I was hired, however, Juergen Bartels left the company.

Corporations, like any bureaucracy, tend to resist change, especially when the change doesn't have the support of top management. It became clear, a year into my job, that under the latest president I wouldn't be able to garner the kind of support within the company I needed for such a radical reorganization. The new president made it clear that we would not be moving forward with our plan to reorganize the marketing department.

The writing was on the wall for the plan and for me personally. Without the go-ahead needed to make the kind of bold decisions that I felt would ultimately lead to company success and a more senior personal position, I knew I wouldn't be able to reach my goals here. I was shocked.

I left work early that particular day and jogged mile after mile through the beautiful paths of New York's Central Park. Exercise has always been a refuge where I do some of my best thinking. But some ten miles later, I was still in shock. The next morning, as I walked into the office, I knew that my future was somewhere else.

All the accoutrements of a top executive's life—the large, cushy office, the mahogany furniture, the corporate jet, the fancy title on the door—meant nothing if I couldn't implement the ideas that made work fun, creative, and exciting. I officially resigned soon after, and if I hadn't, I know I wouldn't have been long for the company anyway.


19. CHAPTER 3 - Step Three: Create a Personal "Board of Advisors"

Step Three: Create a Personal "Board of Advisors"

Goals, like everything else I write about in this book, aren’t achieved alone.

With a plan in place, you’re going to need reinforcement to stay focused. As in any business, even the best conceived plans benefit from external vetting. It helps to have an enlightened counselor, or two or three, to act as both cheerleader and eagle-eyed supervisor, who will hold you accountable.

I call this group my Personal Board of Advisors. They may be made up of family members; perhaps someone who’s been a mentor to you; even an old friend or two. My board came to my own aid at a critical juncture in my career after I left Starwood Hotels and Resorts, the company that owns such brands as the W Hotel and the Westin.

I was adrift. For the first time in my life, I couldn’t lay claim to a title or a job. I had to reassess my mission. I had come to Starwood from Deloitte to accept what was an irresistible offer: to be the youngest chief marketing officer in a Fortune 500 company (a goal I had set for myself three years earlier) and reinvent the way an industry thought about marketing.

But my new job didn’t go exactly as planned.

Juergen Bartels, the president at Starwood who recruited me, promised to mentor me and pave my way toward becoming a future leader of the company.

My goals for the company were large and required changing an entire company’s way of thinking. Up until that point, marketing in the hospitality industry was a regional affair, often left to individual hotels.

But the cost of that arrangement was a lack of company-wide brand consistency. Our plan was to consolidate our marketing functions under one roof with a global outlook. Rather than allow each of our regions around the world to set their own individual marketing strategies, I wanted to centralize our marketing operations more in order to clarify our message and create greater impact in the marketplace with a cohesive brand. After all, our primary customers—business travelers—were increasingly global and expected consistency. Shortly after I was hired, however, Juergen Bartels left the company.

Corporations, like any bureaucracy, tend to resist change, especially when the change doesn’t have the support of top management. It became clear, a year into my job, that under the latest president I wouldn’t be able to garner the kind of support within the company I needed for such a radical reorganization. The new president made it clear that we would not be moving forward with our plan to reorganize the marketing department.

The writing was on the wall for the plan and for me personally. Without the go-ahead needed to make the kind of bold decisions that I felt would ultimately lead to company success and a more senior personal position, I knew I wouldn’t be able to reach my goals here. I was shocked.

I left work early that particular day and jogged mile after mile through the beautiful paths of New York’s Central Park. Exercise has always been a refuge where I do some of my best thinking. But some ten miles later, I was still in shock. The next morning, as I walked into the office, I knew that my future was somewhere else.

All the accoutrements of a top executive’s life—the large, cushy office, the mahogany furniture, the corporate jet, the fancy title on the door—meant nothing if I couldn’t implement the ideas that made work fun, creative, and exciting. I officially resigned soon after, and if I hadn’t, I know I wouldn’t have been long for the company anyway.