President relies on partners to help build Brookfield engineering company

Mark Peters believes that when people have a vested interest in the company where they work, they are more likely to care about that company’s success. While that may not be a revolutionary viewpoint, Peters puts his wallet where his mouth is.
The president and chief executive officer of Impact Engineering Solutions Inc., Brookfield, retains 65% ownership in his company. However, he has granted partner status to five others who help oversee the day-to-day operations of the firm.
Those partners include: Jane Armstrong, controller; Tom Miller,
director of operations; Mike Stone, director of sales; Brian Quincey, director of consulting services; and Tom Volk, senior project manager.
"These people focus on doing the right things. It heightens their commitment to involvement," Peters says. "It instills a sense of pride and owner-
ship. It certainly gives them a more pronounced voice when sharing their opinions on directions and policies."
Although Impact Engineering’s customers have been struggling through a depressed manufacturing economy, the Brookfield company continues to grow.
By focusing on the "who" of his company, before the "what," Impact Engineering’s annual revenues have grown from $2.5 million when Peters acquired the firm in 1995 to $4 million.
Peters says his management team is the key to his company’s success in providing technology-based design engineering support services to original equipment manufacturers, including Harley-Davidson Motor Co., Strattec Securities, Rockwell International, Magnetek, Regal Ware and John Deere & Co.
That stable of customers with a strong presence in Wisconsin is one reason Impact Engineering intends to stay in the state and ultimately move to its own building, Peters says.
Peters, his partners and a rotating handful of key employees meet quarterly "off-site" with an independent consultant to take a look back and to project where they’re going.
"It’s not my vision. It’s a management vision," Peters says. "The other partners are managers. When we go through a year-end (evaluation), I don’t put the budget together. They put the budget together and build a plan to achieve that."
Sometimes, that plan needs to change, and Peters and his managers must confront brutal facts. For instance, the company had planned to open an office in Chicago this year.
"We thought the economy would come around sooner, and we’re now adjusting. We put some of our strategic initiatives on hold. We’re going to reforecast and re-budget," Peters says.
The company walks a fine line between focusing on its core competencies and being flexible and creative enough to change course to embrace new opportunities.
Impact Engineering recently added Vince Adams as the director of its new Analysis Services Division.
"When you’re young and growing, there’s lots of opportunities, and you’ve got to figure out which ones fit your core competencies and which ones don’t," Peters says. "Opportunities are not all created equal. We believe in a process here called progress, not perfection. Do something to get the ball rolling and refine it as we go."

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

Maverick consultant turns theme of courage into executive development

By Susan Paprcka, for SBT

No guts, no story. It’s Susan Marshall’s trademark saying, and she has certainly lived by it. An author, speaker and consultant, Marshall has built a career on providing consulting and coaching resources for businesspeople seeking to develop and enhance powerful and practical executive skills with an experiential approach.
She founded her company, Executive Advisor, in 1997, offering organizations three primary consulting services: strategic positioning, performance management and executive development. The delivery of those services focuses on Marshall’s central themes of vision, courage and leadership.
"Growth, improved performance and measurable results are not possible without vision, courage and leadership," according to Marshall, of Jackson in Washington County. "An individual’s growth will be limited by what he or she refuses to see. The same is true for companies."
Marshall published her first book in 2000 entitled How To Grow A Backbone: 10 Strategies for Gaining Power and Influence at Work, which effectively ties into her consulting themes. The book’s focus is on tangible ways individuals can succeed through confidence, competence and risk-taking.
Her book has been translated into German, Spanish and Chinese.
She says she chose the terminology of "backbone" because of what she witnessed during her many years in the corporate world — lack of courage and accountability in leadership roles. "In my interactions with people, I’d see so much conflict avoidance," Marshall recalls. "People that were afraid to speak up and take responsibility and say what they really wanted to say; many of them simply lacked confidence."
Since the book’s release, Marshall has also developed the concept into a course based on the same themes. The course is titled "Developing Executive Stature: Six Weeks to Greater Power and Influence" and is designed to offer executives an experiential, accountable learning experience.

Are you in the game?
According to Marshall, too much executive development has become what she calls "entertainment training." Meaning that executives attend conferences, seminars and workshops with the expectation that speakers will be interesting, engaging and entertaining, and that their learning is the responsibility of the speaker.
"Accumulating a catalog of ‘learning experiences’ has nothing to do with growth or improvement," says Marshall. "Just as a resume can list important titles and well-known companies, the quality of the individual’s experience will be determined by how fully engaged he or she was in learning and performing each role."
That’s why Marshall says she decided to make the course into a six-week format that meets once a week. She wants executives to listen, engage and use what they’ve learned in the work setting, then return to the class ready to discuss the effectiveness of what they’ve discovered. Such an experiential approach makes the executive more engaged in and accountable to the learning process, she says.
"The quality of coaching experience lies in helping the individual to take responsibility for his or her current state and to help those people decide how they want to improve it," she says. "It is not a simple or quick proposition, and it should not be billed as such."
Week one of the course is an introduction and overview that sets the stage for understanding how prevailing business events affect the individual and organizational success. Participants rate their current levels of power and influence as a basis for comparison throughout the course.
The second week is "context and intelligence gathering," in which participants develop a context within their current work, including a brief developmental sketch to understand how they arrived where they are at, and an integration map that shows important links to others.
Week three is about "perceptive observation" – the importance of listening, information gathering and eye contact.
Week four is "new thinking, stronger partnerships," which builds on the enhanced awareness of the first three weeks and focuses on individual thought habits and the importance of relationships.
The fifth week is called "powerful presentation," where participants learn to assess their effectiveness based on feedback from a variety of sources and identify ways in which to modify their actions for enhanced success.
And the final week is about generating consistent results. Participants evaluate their propensity for making excuses, creating diversions or constructing rationalizations to avoid challenging situations or potentially controversial decisions. Participants once again rate themselves on their current level of power and influence and compare them with the first week’s self-evaluation.
The curriculum is under consideration for several graduate outreach programs across the country.

Paying attention
Marshall has been active in the business community for more than 25 years, both in the corporate setting and in her private practice. She has held corporate positions in advertising, marketing, training and development, and general management, and has worked with a variety of organizations, including General Motors, Nestle, Subaru of America, Harley-Davidson, Apple Computer, Revere Ware, Hewitt Associates, the Society of Automotive Engineers, Kmart, Sears and many other Fortune 50 to 1000 companies and organizations.
She also has a very diverse background — from leading a turnaround to coaching executives, from creating workshops to facilitating MBA orientation at the University of Michigan Graduate School of Business. Marshall is also currently a chairperson for the executive coaching organization Executive Agenda.
Always a reader and a learner, Marshall says she became interested in executive development during her experience in corporate situations where she says she many times felt she threatened people because she challenged the way things were being done and the excuses for lack of success that were being made.
"I noticed that executives many times resisted real learning, that once they reached their executive goal, they felt they had no more reason to learn," says Marshall. "They saw the presentation of new ideas as challenging their authority, and I found it to be quite a disturbing reality."

For more information on Executive Advisor, visit www.executiveadvisorllc.com.

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

Larson Co. announces two acquisitions

The Gustave A. Larson Co. of Pewaukee has purchased certain assets from Pameco Corp. in seven states and has acquired Jensen-Klich Supply Co.
Larson will now be operating 14 former Pameco locations in Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Minnesota.
The move is designed to establish a major presence for Larson in the Colorado, Utah and Idaho markets, and helps strengthen Larson’s customer service to it’s customers in the states of Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Minnesota, said Andrew Larson, president of Gustave A. Larson Co.
"The branch teams in these locations have had a strong commitment to customer service. This is a tremendous opportunity for our company to work with them, and achieve the long-term growth potential that these markets offer," Larson said.
The Klich acquisiton is designed to establish a major presence for Larson in the Iowa and Nebraska markets. Jensen-Klich has branches in Omaha and Lincoln, Neb. and Clear Lake, Cedar Rapids and Des Moines, Iowa.
"This acquisition further establishes Larson as an industry leader and a major regional player in the consolidation of the highly fragmented HVAC/R industry," Larson said.
Jensen-Klich Supply Co. works in the Iowa and Nebraska residential new construction markets with three locations in Iowa and two locations in Nebraska. The company’s products include Armstrong Air Conditioning Products, Magic Pak multi-family comfort systems, Lennox Hearth Products, Heatcraft Refrigeration Products, Snappy sheet metal products, Tecumseh compressors, and Hart and Cooley registers and grilles.
The Larson company is a wholesale distributor of commercial refrigeration and HVAC products. Its products include residential and commercial HVAC equipment and accessories and commercial refrigeration products. Following the completion of these transactions, the company will operate 45 locations serving customers in 13 Midwestern states.

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

East Troy’s Contract Comestibles helps Saz’s take off in retail sales

By David Niles, of SBT

Steve Sazama has been working for more than five years to build a solid retail business to complement his Saz’s restaurant and related operations in Milwaukee.
He’s encountered challenges typical of any smaller player in the consumer-oriented retail food business, including those associated with finding producers willing to handle his smaller amount of product with consistency and high quality.
Until he found out about an East Troy company that has a reputation for doing things that don’t seem quite feasible.
It’s a connection that Sazama believes is crucial to the expansion of his retail business, now that he’s reached a plateau in market development. That plateau was reached by a combination of diligence, trial-and-error, persistence, relationships and branding savvy. He himself is now part of the brand – witness his smiling face in the Sunday newspaper grocery store coupon section pages and on the packages of his products in grocery store refrigerators and freezers.
His East Troy business partners, John Delikat and Matt Nitz of Contact Comestibles, are smiling, too. Because the Saz’s connection has helped position their relatively young company for growth well beyond the work they do for Sazama and a handful of other customers.
The future is so promising that a "penthouse of pork" — as Sazama refers to is — is under construction on the upper level of the East Troy plant, a former milk condensing facility, providing dedicated space for the production of Saz’s shredded barbecue pork and chicken that is sold in grocery store "party packs."
Contract Comestibles also makes and bottles Saz’s barbecue sauces for grocery store sales, while other products — mozzarella sticks and barbecue ribs — are made elsewhere.
Delikat and Nitz are also working on a way to produce Saz’s salad dressing for bottling. And, someday, they may produce chili for the restaurateur.
And that’s how the connection between Saz’s and Contract Comestibles began.
Delikat and Nitz started their business in 1997, taking their experience from another food products company. "We decided we were going to start doing miracles for ourselves rather than for other people," Nitz recalled in a recent interview at the East Troy facility on Beulah Avenue.
Fortunately, they started with a product line, giving them immediate cash flow.
"But we knew a company isn’t built on one customer," Delikat said. "We knew we had to broaden the customer base."
A few leads went nowhere. Then their insurance agent contacted them. He had read an article about Sazama’s desires for more retail business. Delikat sent an e-mail to Kathy Koncel, sales and marketing director for Saz’s, noting that Contract Comestibles had some production time available.
The two sides talked — about chili. "The first product we talked about, chili, we haven’t even done; everything else just took off," Delikat said. "We just haven’t gotten to that chili yet."
Contact Comestibles started producing Saz’s pork and chicken in one package size, "and they just kept throwing more ideas at us," Nitz said.
Among those ideas was barbecue sauce, which another company had been making. When that plant was sold, Sazama learned the new owner wasn’t interested in batches as small as he required. He needed to find a new producer, and he turned to Delikat and Nitz.
The two were reluctant.
"We didn’t have any interest in putting in bottling equipment," Nitz said. "Working with rigid plastic bottles is completely different from packaging in bags."
And they didn’t see how it would make economic sense. "It’s kind of tough to put in a whole line of machinery for one customer’s sauce," Nitz said. But working with Sazama, they determined that it was feasible, although not terribly profitable.
So they agreed to take on the sauce project – in a slow, controlled manner. "But they wanted it about immediately," Delikat said. "So we did it."
"It was a minor miracle," Nitz added.
"They did the impossible," Sazama said of the situation. "Our goal was one year; they did it in two months."
While the sauce line might not be so profitable in the short term for Contract Comestibles, Delikat and Nitz see it as an opportunity for future business. "The equipment is now in place, opening a venue for more business," Nitz said.
Like the controlled growth of the business since its start, Delikat and Nitz want future growth to be measured. The welcome expansion, but not at the cost of lower quality.
They focus on lines that can be easily automated — for two reasons. One is the labor issue. The other is the quality issue.
Contract Comestibles currently employs eight people — four full-time and four part-time. Three to four people run production lines on any given day. It’s a staff that’s largely stayed on with the company. "We’re blessed with very little turnover; we do our darndest to take care of our employees," Nitz said.
But they don’t want too many employees. "We’re not fond of the minimum-wage concept that comes with labor-intensive lines of production, and the supervision needed for such work," Nitz added. "So we don’t want hand-intensive jobs."
"So we’re a little bit selective in the companies we’ll do work for," Delikat added. "If it doesn’t lend itself to automation, it’s not for us."
That automation not only reduces the need for labor, it also helps control quality, which pleases Sazama.
"The consistency of the product from this company is really great," Sazama said of Contract Comestibles. That high quality wasn’t always there when Sazama tried other food processors. He recalled how a former processor would provide barrels of sauce that significantly varied in weight. "So the viscosity of the sauce varied tremendously," he said. "Contract Comestibles caught that situation right away."
That’s thanks to the quality-control background of Delikat and Nitz. "We measure everything," Nitz said. "I think we have filed that companies 10 times our size keep."
Contract Comestibles also handles egg products for another firm. "When we learned they were dealing with eggs, we knew quality control wouldn’t be an issue," Sazama said.
Not only does keeping such records help ensure consistency, it also makes it a lot easier to correct a problem if something does go wrong.
"There’s definitely a lot to be said for keeping good records," Delikat said.
There’s also a lot to be said about controlling growth and about having the right mindset when selecting growth opportunities, the two owners say.
When asked why the company is doing so well, Nitz attributes the size of the company and the mindset of its management. Delikat adds that it’s because of a willingness to do things that other companies don’t want to undertake.
"They’ve been able to adjust things for us – things that other processors wouldn’t do," Sazama says.
Delikat, who had studied for a degree in electrical engineering, says the "you can’t do that" attitude seems to be too prevalent in some businesses. "By the time other businesses are saying that, I prefer to be starting to do it," he said. "There is no ‘can’t.’ It may be a matter of financial viability, but there is no ‘can’t’."
Nitz, with a chemistry degree, added: "You kind of have to look at it and find your way around the problem; to see what you can do to make it affordable."
Saz’s salad dressing is a classic case in point. Contract Comestibles is studying how to bottle it for retail sales. It’s not a matter of just making the dressing and bottling it. The problem? "Saz’s dressing is real food; it’s not a bunch of chemicals," Delikat said. "It contains real sour cream. Real eggs. Many salad dressings on store shelves really don’t have real food in them."
So they’re working on a way to keep the real ingredients and stabilize the product for shelf life.
Contract Comestibles currently leases about 15,000 square feet of space in its plant. It’s enough space to allow for growth – but regulated growth. "If we continue to add production lines at the same rate at which we’ve done, which is about one or two new lines per year, things will go well," Nitz said.
And the company will remain a processor of foods for other companies. "Contract Comestibles wouldn’t make a good brand name on a package," Nitz says. "But we’re not about having our name on a package; that’s not what we do. We’d rather do the manufacturing and figure out things for other companies. We know what our strengths and weaknesses are."

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

To win tomorrow, create and cultivate new leaders today
Fast Company editor Polly LaBarre explains the new leadership agenda at Racine’s Sustainable Community Series

By Kay Falk, for SBT

As senior editor and the public face of Fast Company magazine, Polly LaBarre shares its mission to explore today’s business world with "the intensely competitive but often unsung heroes and rising stars at companies across America," as she puts it.
Those ideas are designed to explain how the business game and competition have changed, and to equip readers to be successful in this new business environment.
Winning in business was the focus of her recent speech in Racine — "The New Leadership Agenda — Are You Navigating or Just Weathering the Storm?" LaBarre spoke as part of the Racine Sustainable Community Series, sponsored by SC Johnson and the Racine County Economic Development Corp., on May 22. Prior to her visit, she shared these thoughts with Small Business Times:
— This battered economy is all we have. "Recession, recovery, a falling stock market, slowdowns, war, unemployment and layoffs, corporate greed and dishonesty — these constant economic pressures have people waiting for the next big thing to happen," she says.
"People have to stop waiting for the rest of their lives to begin — and stop hoping for some killer app to come along and jumpstart the economy," LeBarre says. "The reality is, the next thing has started. This is it. Great things will happen, new ideas will get funded and companies will grow, but it won’t happen as quickly or dramatically as it did from 1995 to 1999."
— Former "givens" won’t work. Most facets of the business world have changed. There are continual advances in digital technology, global competition, deregulated industries such as telecommunications and energy and a shift in younger people’s expectations about business, lifestyles and why people work in the first place.
"The notion that you can do business in the same old way and be the kind of a leader that rallies the ‘troops’ to blindly follow you won’t work anymore," she says.
At the same time, LaBarre says, "We need to forget everything we learned about time (faster is better), about how money works (there’s no free capital anymore) and leadership. There’s a new concept of ‘normal’ that we focused on as the cover story in our May issue, and it affects how you go about equipping future leaders."
— Winning companies are different. "My talk focuses on what it takes to win in business today. My key points are that real winners compete on ideas," she emphasizes. "Strategic originality is a requirement if you want to even be in the game today. At the same time, the best companies understand that they don’t prosper at the expense of customers."
She continues, "In many ways, the past decade has been a betrayal of all the business world’s promises to customers. How many really satisfied customers are there? Winning companies are serious, and seriously creative about their relationship with their customers."
LaBarre adds, "Real winners are as disciplined as they are creative. They execute relentlessly and understand the need to be creative in that execution."
* Leaders help everyone in the company succeed. "The businesses that truly succeed in the future will be the ones that do the best job of creating the most confident and committed leaders, deepest in the ranks," she emphasizes. "That’s what success – both at the individual and the organization levels – really hinges on."

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

How managers can keep their distance while staying close to their employees

By Daniel Schroeder, for SBT

Question: I’m getting a lot of pushback about my management style from a couple of my employees. Although we work closely, I don’t want to get "too close." I invite their input, but reserve the right to make the final decision. I can tell they don’t like this, but I’m their boss, and my boss holds me accountable for what they do. I don’t think they fully appreciate the difficult position I am in — I get pressure from two directions. How can I help them to understand that I am on their side and trying to do what it takes for all of us to succeed?

Answer: In my last article, I talked about the important contribution that communications and interpersonal skills make to managerial success. Your question underscores this point — a foundational ability for any manager is being able to work effectively through and with others.
Your situation is a common one. On the one hand, you want to forge an open channel and establish a good working relationship with your direct reports. You want to have the value of their experience and insight. You want to develop a positive climate. Yet, you recognize that sometimes the tough calls have to be made. You know that being an effective manager isn’t simply about being popular — it’s about achieving results. Now, I’ll grant you that it would be nice to be both popular and a producer, but that’s not always possible.
For starters, then, you need to come to grips with the fact that not every decision you make is going to yield neat and tidy results. You may not always have the luxury of pleasing all parties. Sometimes the decision you make will bring closure to the immediate situation. At other times, one decision will open up or expose other issues that will need to be decided. Over time, then, the ability to tolerate ambiguity becomes increasingly important.
Confronted with those kinds of difficult scenarios where the "right" alternative appears elusive, you are forced to engage in what some have called paradoxical thinking. Paradoxical thinking helps managers deal with competing priorities. As you are well aware, managers are constantly making trade-offs. Sometimes, there are no right answers. And the higher you move in the chain of command, the more severe the tensions become.
Managers are frequently asked to confront contradictory pressures (e.g., connecting with people vs. generating results). Much of the time the choice is not between good and bad, but between good and good or bad and bad. In such cases, there is a need for paradoxical thinking – thinking that transcends the contradictions and offers the perspective that two seemingly opposite conditions can simultaneously be true.
In order to engage in paradoxical thinking, you must be willing and able to engage in contradiction. You must be willing and able to integrate seemingly opposite ideas or behaviors. You must be willing and able to step outside your current level of thinking and attempt to see things from a new perspective.
For you, the contradiction appears to have the issue of control at its core. Your employees want more autonomy. You want to hold on tight. Using paradoxical thinking, you will be able to see that each of you is right. After all, it is desirable to have employees who are self-sufficient and autonomous. Yet, as a manager it is also desirable to exercise control and legitimate authority.
So, what needs to happen is for you and your employees to be work through this situation before their morale and/or productivity take a nosedive.
Put simply, you need to establish a "common ground" around work expectations. Here is a simple technique that I often use to help clarify the amount of independence that employees may exercise in making decisions that attach to their work. Ideally, to promote maximum "buy in," the following three steps should be constructed and implemented in participative (i.e., manager and employees) fashion.
First, identify the decisions that attach to the job. Second, identify the levels of operating authority that attach to each decision using this "freedom scale":
Level 5 – Act on your own.
Level 4 – Act, but advise me.
Level 3 – Recommend a course of action that is negotiated with me.
Level 2 – Ask me what to do.
Level 1 – Wait until being told what to do.

The third step is to put this "road map" into practice, monitor the results, and evaluate its effectiveness.
My experience tells me that the kind of clarity that emerges from this process can be quite powerful. Every one is reading from the same page and ambiguity is decreased. Employees understand the latitude with which they can operate. Managers sponsor the process and control its execution.
Over time, the freedom scale can be revisited and changed. In that sense, it becomes a dynamic process, not one that is rigid and unbending.
For that to happen, though, you will have to engage in more paradoxical thinking.
But, you already knew that.

Daniel Schroeder, Ph.D., of Organization Development Consultants Inc. (ODC) in Brookfield, provides "HR Connection." Small Business Times readers who would like to see an issue addressed in a column may reach him at 262-827-1901, via fax at 262-827-8383, via e-mail at schroeder@odcons.com or via the Internet at www.odcons.com.

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

More employers learning Spanish as Hispanic workforce expands

By Heather Stur, of SBT

Mark Wiener is not the kind of manager who wants his employees to be intimidated by him. He wants them to feel comfortable talking to him, and he wants conversations to be more than shoptalk. He likes to know his employees — their backgrounds, families, interests.
He believes one of the ways to cultivate a congenial work atmosphere is to speak the employees’ language.
At the Four Points Sheraton Milwaukee North, which Wiener operates, several of his employees are native Spanish speakers. So he decided to enroll in a Spanish course at the Spanish Immersion Institute in Whitefish Bay so that he could communicate with his employees in a way that was most comfortable for them.
"This is a family-oriented business, and I want my employees to feel like they’re part of a family here," Wiener said. "I want them to feel comfortable, and sometimes that means speaking in their language."
A second language, primarily Spanish, has become a popular business tool, whether used to communicate with a growing number of Spanish-speaking employees or to do international business.
Coral Mateu Anderegg, a native of Madrid, Spain, and a former Spanish professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, opened the Spanish Immersion Institute about a year ago, originally to provide an immersion education program for children. She soon recognized that there were many adults interested in learning Spanish, primarily to communicate with Spanish speaking employees.
"Milwaukee has a large and growing Hispanic population, especially on the south side, and people who work in that area have come here wanting to learn Spanish so that they can communicate with their customers," Anderegg said.
Nurses, doctors and police officers are some of the professionals who have enrolled in the institute’s two-year Spanish immersion program. Courses meet twice a week and are taught in conversational Spanish from day one. Students typically are fluent by the time they complete the program, Anderegg said. Classes include a maximum of 10 students.
"People who enroll in these classes usually do not want to be in a university setting to learn a language," Anderegg said. "They are not as comfortable in larger classes, and they tend to have different objectives than college students."
For about five years, Milwaukee Area Technical College has offered Spanish courses tailored specifically for various industries, companies and organizations. The curricula are designed by an organization called Command Spanish, and MATC is a licensed registered provider.
At MATC, an individual company or organization requests a program, and MATC instructors teach the classes at the business site. Fluency is not the goal of the program, said Genell Gialdini, spokeswoman for MATC’s Office of Community and Corporate Learning. Rather, programs are designed so that employees can quickly learn basic phrases they might need in their jobs.
Mostly, students learn basic commands. For example, nurses learn phrases such as "Step on the scale," and "This may hurt a bit." Students do not learn verb conjugation, tenses or the difference between masculine and feminine nouns.
"We market it as a time-sensitive, short-term program," Gialdini said. "The companies that use it know it does not take the place of an interpreter."
Programs can be as short as six weeks, in which students meet for two hours per week and learn about two pages of phrases. Learning takes place through various repetition and memorization exercises, and classes are highly interactive, Gialdini said.
From a business perspective, speaking Spanish not only can make Spanish speaking employees feel more comfortable, it also can be an effective customer-service tool regardless of what language the customer speaks.
"Our employees often work directly with customers, and if an employee has a question that I can’t answer right away due to a language difference, that’s not good for our customers," Wiener said. "If I or other managers can communicate directly with our employees, it will make our operation more efficient, and we will provide better service to our customers."
What’s more, being in the hotel industry, Wiener’s customers come from all over the world, including the Spanish speaking regions. The ability to communicate in the customer’s language is another element of service Wiener can provide.
"Any way that we can provide better service to our customers, we will do it," Wiener said. "That is most important."

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

Motivating employees in difficult times

Motivating employees is always important, but inspiring your team takes on increased significance during challenging economic times. When business results are less than promising, emotions, such as fear and anxiety, can bring employee performance to a standstill. Here are some suggestions from the Wisconsin Institute of CPAs to help foster productivity, high morale and loyalty in your workforce in the best and worst of times.

Give them vision
To keep up morale, make sure employees know and understand the organization’s mission, vision, values and goals. Those concepts represent the organization’s reason for being and, as such, help workers focus their efforts in the right direction and see that their contributions matter. Be sure they know who benefits from the work of your organization.

Don’t hide the target
Setting clear expectations is a great way to motivate employees and keep them on track. Clearly establish goals with each employee, indicate the results you expect and how those results contribute to the overall performance of your business. To confirm their understanding, ask employees if they have any questions or need any resources to complete the tasks you assign. Finally, make sure if the organization’s goals change, you let your employees know how these changes impact their roles.

Provide regular feedback
Conducting an annual employee performance review is important, but it’s not enough. Employees need to know, on an ongoing basis, when they have done a job well and when you expect better or different results. Keep in mind that the more immediate the feedback, the more effective it is. Try to catch people in the act of doing what you want and acknowledge their performance immediately.

Make employees part of the solution
Employees need to be involved. Empowering employees to make decisions about their work and to solve day-to-day problems demonstrates your confidence in them and motivates them to live up to your expectations. Another bonus: when you make employees part of the solution, it is easier to get their buy-in and commitment for the long-term.

Focus on people development
Since most people thrive when skill building and learning are part of their daily experiences, investing in your staff’s development should remain a priority. Training, career development and other learning opportunities don’t have to cost a lot, particularly when you utilize internal resources. The best way to ensure the growth of your team is to create an individual development plan for each employee and work with them to carry out the plan.

Communicate!
You cannot over-communicate, particularly in uncertain or difficult times. Sharing information and building your staff’s understanding of what’s happening in the business and in the industry is key to engaging them and to aligning their efforts and performance with the organization’s objectives. What’s more, sharing information with employees sets a good example and encourages them to do the same with one another.
Since not everyone processes information the same way, it’s helpful to use multiple forms of communication, particularly when the information is critical. For example, you might follow up an e-mail message with a voice mail reminder. And don’t assume that, just because a communication has gone out, that it has been understood and accepted. Instead, ask questions to confirm comprehension.

The power of praise
Recognizing and rewarding workers is one of the most powerful ways to impact morale. Acknowledge good effort, not just results. Keep in mind, too, that people are motivated by different things, whether it be money, travel, training, promotions or a flexible work schedule. The best way to find out what motivates your staff is to ask them.

Build fun
There are important milestones in the life of every business. Be sure to mark them. Throw a party and celebrate your workers’ accomplishments. Don’t ever allow yourself to get so caught up in the daily routine that you fail to see the good work being done.

Be positive
Every day, millions of people arrive at their workplace ready to contribute their best. The attitude of business leaders can greatly impact employees. Be positive and supportive and your employees are more likely to act similarly.

The above column was provided by the Wisconsin Institute of CPAs, based in Brookfield; www.wicpa.org.

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

National private equity firm interested in boosting Wisconsin presence
The Prism Opportunity Fund (www.prismfund.com), a venture capital fund with a national scope, plans to increase its visibility in Wisconsin.
Prism is headquartered in Chicago, but also has offices in Seattle, New York and Mequon. Ted Feierstein, a partner in the fund, manages the Mequon office.
“I’m a Wisconsin native that grew up in Brookfield and lived on both the West (San Francisco and Portland, Ore.) and East (Boston) coasts before returning to my home state. I guess I’m living proof that it’s possible to reside in Wisconsin while at the same time establishing a national practice focused in technology,” Feierstein said.
Prism typically invests $0.5 to $3 million in institutional-caliber emerging private companies that are beyond the “start-up” phase in four markets: information technology (IT), publishing/content, outsourcing/business services and specialty manufacturing.
“We typically invest as a member of a private equity syndicate,” Feierstein said. “I’d estimate that, on average, each of our portfolio companies will eventually receive between $10 and $15 million in funding prior to a liquidity event.”
The fund has made one Wisconsin investment in SecurePipe of Madison. SecurePipe is a 24×7 managed security provider offering outsourced security services, which include fully managed firewalls, active intrusion detection, virtual private networks and email virus scanning combined into a holistic solution.
Feierstein noted, “We co-invested with security-industry savvy First Analysis of Chicago as well as a couple of sophisticated individual investors. We are very high on the company’s prospects to leverage its proprietary intellectual property and emerge as the “Paychex” of the rapidly expanding managed-security space.”
Feierstein added, “To increase our reach in Wisconsin, we have developed an association with Telaric Alliance. Telaric’s members have a broad network of contacts, deep domain knowledge in a number of industries, and broad expertise in growing a company. We, therefore, expect them to help us identify the most promising opportunities in Wisconsin and provide local support for our portfolio companies where appropriate.”
Allen Oelschlaeger, a founder of Telaric Alliance, stated, “With our intimate understanding of Prism’s investment criteria, we can rapidly focus Prism’s and Telaric’s resources on opportunities likely to be of institutional investment caliber.”
May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

Sheboygan’s Greg Bultman has the right people on his bus

Gregory Bultman appears to be doing things backwards. While many business owners aspire to sell their businesses and become venture capitalists, Bultman’s career in venture capital and finance led him to his current role as owner-manager of a growing chain of convenience stores and 10 bulk petroleum facilities.
Bultman has made the transition successfully. In 2002, his company, Quality State Oil Inc., Sheboygan, posted twice the revenue as it did when he bought into the firm in 1988 – with the same complement of employees.
As Bultman works to build his company’s Q-Mart convenience store chain to about 25 stores — a critical point, given fixed expenses — he works to set a benchmark for customer service along the way. In May, Q-Mart was recognized with the Customer First Award by Lakeland College and the Sheboygan Press.
According to Bultman, the Q-Mart strategy involves competing with grocery stores on high-volume convenience items, including milk and case beer.
"We want them to come here for other things and happen to buy their gas at the same time," Bultman says, stressing that it in recent years, it has been harder to make a profit strictly on gasoline. "To do this, we need to partner with our vendors on promotional and pricing strategies."
Bultman, who closed on the purchase of the company’s 15th Q-Mart retail location May 14, acknowledges he had a few things to learn about the industry he entered when he purchased Quality State Oil.
"I told the former owner (Gordon Petherick) that I didn’t know anything about the convenience store industry," Bultman says. "He promised that I could learn everything I needed to in 30 days. But I find I am still learning everything I need to know every 30 days with no end in sight."
Because of the depth of his ignorance, Bultman says, his decision to invest in the business had a lot to do with the presence of a strong management team. Two managers, vice president of operations Bernard Nowicki and controller Deborah DeBlaey, bought into the company with Bultman. Both Nowicki and DeBlaey had been with the company for more than 15 years — a tenure that now stands at more than 30 years for each.
Another key player, vice president of planning and development John Winter, is described by Bultman as a rising star.
Bultman has a long history of looking at businesses for their investment potential, having worked for Aetna Life & Casualty and as founding partner of the R.W. Allsop & Associates venture capital company.
However, it may be Bultman’s ability to look beyond the balance sheet that is fueling Quality State Oil’s success.
In the lingo of author Jim Collins, Bultman values companies that have the right people on the bus — and can keep them there.
"I have good partners," Bultman says. "I own most of Quality State Oil, but the fact that Bernie and Deb have each been here 30 years is significant."
Bultman says retaining people in lower level positions – including at retail locations – also is key.
"We have one store where we did not turn over a single employee all last year," Bultman says, stressing that managers of each store are motivated by a system of bonuses and incentives based on store revenues vs. budget, secret shopper visits and other factors.
However, even when it comes to Bultman’s other business "investment" ventures, he tends to realize he is investing in the people as much as the profit margin.
Bultman is part-owner of Wrought Washer Manufacturing, Milwaukee, with president Paul Schulz and Jerome Kringel. Kringel was legal counsel when Bultman bought into the firm in 1985. Schulz was CFO and later became president.
In addition, Bultman works with a partner, Ralph Freitag, in another business dealing, CommFleet, a Detroit semi-tractor repair business Bultman hopes to take nationwide.
Bultman also partners with Freitag in QSR, a Taco Bell franchise. In looking at other business opportunities, Bultman feels a sense of loyalty toward his current partners.
"Since the early 1990s, it has been my feeling that I am not going to do anything unless it is with them," Bultman says.
As Bultman looks for additional businesses to invest in, he says he learned that when it comes to active partnerships, there are only two types of managers.
"Some business owners want passive involvement," Bultman says. "And then there are those who truly need help, and they fall into two categories; those who will listen and those who can’t."
The tricky thing, according to Bultman, is knowing the difference.
"You usually don’t know until it is too late," Bultman says, stressing that a strong contract is no guarantee of a successful relationship. "The best contract is a handshake between two honest people."

Gregory Bultman
President, CEO
Quality State Oil
Sheboygan
Age: 58
Education: Bachelor’s degree in business administration, University of Wisconsin- Madison
Company’s annual revenues: $80 million
Employees: 180
Role model: Two mentor figures he got to know at a distance – via reading about what they were doing and through personal relationships. "I am reticent to say who they were, because I have been inspired and helped by so many people."
Leadership philosophy: "Work with the right people and make sure their hearts and minds are focused on corporate goals."

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

New services complement core mission at R.A. Smith & Associates

When National Survey and Engineering (NSE), a subsidiary of Brookfield-based R.A. Smith & Associates, won just a surveying contract for work on the immense Pabst Farms project in Oconomowoc, president Rick Smith was disappointed, but hopeful.
"Most of the work was to be done by the city’s consultant, Ruekert/Mielke," Smith says. "And then the city hired Earthtech (a multinational engineering firm) to complete a stormwater study. We were competing for that work, too."
In the end, R.A. Smith’s performance on the surveying project convinced the powers that be that the engineering firm should get additional work on the 1,300-acre mixed-use development, according to Smith.
Recently, the firm’s private development group landed civil engineering work for East Lake Village, a 170-lot residential development within Pabst Farms. R.A. Smith is designing the civil engineering aspects of the project, including grading, stormwater management, storm and sanitary sewers and a sewage lift station.
Work will have to be completed by late summer – a very tight timeline for a major development like East Lake Village. Deadlines need to be adhered to, so homes can be constructed at the site in time for East Lake Village to be a stop on the 2004 Tour of Homes, according to those close to the project.
"It illustrates my point that if you provide excellent service, people will seek you out, regardless of the economy," Smith says, explaining how his company’s revenues swelled to over $18 million — a $2 million increase from the previous year.
The fact that R.A. Smith, which owns a good share of municipal engineering work in southeastern Wisconsin, would go out of its way to pursue work with private projects such as Pabst Farms runs counter to the way civil engineering firms typically do business.
Many of R.A. Smith’s competitors choose to work for municipalities as their engineer of record, avoiding entanglements with developers whose interests may conflict with those of the cities, towns and villages where development takes place.
However, Smith’s creation of different divisions of his company to handle each type of client has paid off. In 1994, Smith acquired NSE to handle surveying duties for R.A. Smith, as well as build its own client roster.
In March 1999, R.A. Smith added geographic information system (GIS) services to its offerings through the purchase of Access Technologies Inc. The acquisition of Access Technologies also brought to R.A. Smith personnel who created a division devoted to creating 3-D visuals of buildings and development projects.
Already, 3-D division manager John Chapman has grown the practice into projects atypical for a civil engineering firm, including the creation of 3D images of La-Z-Boy furniture.
While Smith drives the more traditional divisions of the company to gain a greater share of the overall civil engineering market, the newer portions of the business are experiencing the most explosive growth.
In the vein of Good to Great author Jim Collins, Smith is successfully preserving his core businesses while simultaneously pioneering new avenues to growth.
"The fundamental distinguishing dynamic of enduring great companies is that they preserve a cherished core ideology while simultaneously stimulating progress and change in everything that is not part of the core ideology," Collins writes.
While some small businesses choke on growth as they divert resources from bread-and-butter projects and clients to bleeding-edge opportunities, Smith says his goal is to always take on a little more work than each division can complete – forcing growth across the board.
"We have an annual brainstorming session with people from across the company," Smith says. "We look for ideas for new products and services and pursue the ideas with the greatest interest. If we come up with one or two ideas a year, we are doing well."
One service the firm may enter soon is e-commerce, according to Smith. R.A. Smith could offer e-commerce access to its services, allowing clients to view their account information on-line. The company also could set up e-commerce solutions for clients.
So far, Smith’s vision seems to be working. According to R.A. Smith chief financial officer John O’Connell, the company is on track for projected 15% growth in 2003.
"Most divisions are growing 11% to 17%, but the overall blended rate will be about 15%," O’Connell says. "The newer divisions are growing at a much faster rate, but the fact that they are starting off with much less revenue means the total dollar contribution will not be as great."

Richard Smith
President
R.A. Smith & Associates
Brookfield
Age: 53
Education: Bachelor of science degree in civil engineering and master of science degree in environmental engineering, Marquette University
Company’s annual revenues: $18.1 million projected for 2003
Employees: 205
Role model: The school of hard knocks, but also individuals such as President John Kennedy, Marquette University basketball coach Al McGuire and architect Frank Lloyd Wright
Leadership philosophy: "The president of the company cannot be above any task in the business."

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee

Used properly, this modern communications tool can advance your market position

By Robert Grede, for SBT

To: Reader
cc: mom
Subject: E-mail, communication system of the 21st Century

Reader –

In the era of the telephone, the glib talker reigned supreme.
No more. Today, clear, succinct, readable e-mail can be an ideal way to correspond with clients too distant for face-to-face meetings or too busy to take your telephone call.
E-mail can request information, make a recommendation or serve as an inexpensive marketing tool. Written well, it can set you apart from your colleagues.
Here are a few simple guidelines for communicating effectively via e-mail.
1. Use the "Subject" as your headline
The "Subject" of your e-mail should serve as a headline. Draw in your reader. Identify the benefit of reading your communiqué.
Research shows that five times as many people read the Subject line as read the entire e-mail. Eighty percent delete the message without ever reading it! At that doesn’t include spam.

2. Get to the point
At Leo Burnett, we began all our memos with "This" as in "This recommends …" or "This requests information regarding …" or "This responds to your request …". While that may be appropriate for more formal correspondence, the same principle applies to e-mail.
Tell your recipient the purpose of your e-mail up front. Don’t put your examples first. Don’t digress.
The best advice I ever received: When finished writing a memo or e-mail, try putting the last sentence first and see if that doesn’t vastly improve the flow.
It often does.

3. Make it interesting
Convey your message in such a way as to make the reader want to read it. Your opening statement should compel the reader to read line two; line two should compel the reader to read line three. And so on.
Sometimes, when you need to have a long sentence to explain some complicated thing or another, follow it with a short sentence. Like this one.
Write as if you are talking to the person next to you. And forget about complete sentences. Remember the way your high school English teacher taught you? With a subject and a predicate? People don’t talk that way. You don’t need to write that way, either.

4. No more than one page
John Smale, former president of Procter & Gamble and the brand manager who first put the American Dental Association endorsement on Crest toothpaste, once dictated: "Keep all memos to one page. If you can’t say it in one page, you haven’t clearly thought out your message."
We live in a world of sound bites. We have become so busy (or perhaps so lazy), we prefer not to engage the down arrow on our keyboards.
So get to the point quickly. State your issue. Close.
If you need more than one page to state your case, make it an attachment.

5. It’s not whom you send it to, it’s whom you copy
Imagine your colleague just sent you an e-mail complimenting you upon your creativity and hard work on a particular project. And he copied your boss and your boss’s boss.
Or you just outlined a new service-training program designed to streamline your shipping and save two days on delivery. And you copied your key customers.
Use the cc: judiciously. No one wants to receive uninteresting or irrelevant e-mail.
But copying others can be an effective marketing tool. As your e-mail opinions and recommendations are circulated throughout your company and your industry, with your name attached to them, your visibility grows.

6. Use a standard format
E-mail need not follow formal letter writing format. The date and return address are automatic anyway. You can even skip the salutation, though opening with the recipient’s name is always a good idea.
Then, state your case and the reason for the correspondence, and then close. Most e-mail software includes an option for a signature. This may be anything from a simple name to a complete corporate address, phone, fax and Web site address.
Even so, it’s not a bad idea to personalize your close with your name. I use my initials like this:
rg
Robert Grede
The Grede Company
Marketing & Strategic Planning Consulting
www.thegredecompany.com

Robert Grede, author of "Naked Marketing – The Bare Essentials" (Prentice Hall), speaks on marketing and promotion at universities, trade shows, and playgrounds everywhere.

May 30, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee