Happy Father’s Day! What our fathers teach us about business and life
photo credit: quinn.anya
As I mentioned on Mother’s Day, I grew up in a household where both parents were business people. (My mother, as I said in that post, spent years as a chamber of commerce executive and is now an elected official in my hometown.) My father spent 30-some years in industrial sales and sales management, and he worked out of our house when he wasn’t on the road, so I saw him in work mode a great deal of the time.
Both my parents were role models for me in many ways to become the Corporate Idealist I am today. Below are a few lessons I learned from my father, and which I hope are similar to lessons other people have learned from their own fathers about business.
Act sensibly, but be passionate about what you do.
My father was a likable, friendly guy but he had a short fuse and I sometimes heard him getting angry on the phone with suppliers, colleagues, and probably even customers. I know that what set him off the most was when people didn’t match his expectations of quality and service.
While I don’t think yelling at people on the phone is necessarily the best way to conduct ourselves in business, it shows passion. If you’re passionate about what you do, the challenge is to use your zeal to fuel others’ enthusiasm, and to spark your own creativity and innovation. Even slightly hot-headed dads would probably agree.
Don’t start fights, but stand up for yourself if you’re bullied.
This lesson comes not so much from the workplace as from the playground, but it applies everywhere. Unfortunately, even in the most mundane office environments, there are often still playground bullies. Sometimes they’re the CEO; sometimes they’re just at the next desk. Fortunately, Cy Wakeman recently posted an entry over at Fast Company about dealing with office bullies.
Invent and innovate.
My dad and I were on the front porch swing one time, and he started talking about inventions, and how much money there was in inventing something, and how I should try to think of something I could invent. I remember describing a concept I had for a typewriter that would type down onto paper underneath of it so it could work on odd size pages and bound paper. I don’t think he was very impressed, and I chuckle when I think of it.
Still, while I have not invented something in a classic sense, I have certainly tried to apply a philosophy of innovation to my work and other areas of my life.
In the end, your relationships matter.
When my dad was dying from cancer in 2005, he asked me to help him write some letters to some of his friends. He had a very difficult time finding a way to express what he wanted to say, so we came up with something that said “thank you for everything – your support, your kindness, your prayers, and most of all, your love.” Several of his friends approached me at his funeral to tell me how much they cherished that letter. Many of us may not suffer long enough to get the bittersweet chance to write those kinds of letters, so it’s important to express our love and gratitude to each other as often as we can.
The corollary to that lesson is that life is too short to spend your time with people you don’t care about, or who don’t share your values.
How about you? What did you learn from your father about business, or about life in general? Leave your lessons and stories in the comments.
And Happy Father’s Day to all fathers and children of fathers!
My Father taught me a great deal about business and life – but it took me years to really appreciate it. Growing up as a small kid, my Dad was not the “warm fuzzy” type – he definitely wasn’t Mr. Brady. I was intimidated by him, and sometimes downright scared of his demeanor – very stern and no-nonsense. But as a teenager I went to work for him in his accounting office – and I learned he was a very thorough, detailed and disciplined man who always made sure everything was done well, and done correctly. He would not hesitate to tell me if I had done something that wasn’t really up to par – but then would praise me for a job well done if I had done it correctly.
From working in his office I learned how to behave in the corporate world, long before most kids ever are exposed to that environment. He encouraged me to learn computing as early as the late 70’s, (BTW, it was an ALTOS – google it!) which was a head-start that most kids my age never got. I did my first programming in Q-BASIC while working for him. I wrote a program which actually figured out people’s taxes and deductions on their weekly paychecks – all because I’d do a little something and he’d encourage me by saying “that’s good, but why don’t you add this too…”
Overall, I didn’t really appreciate my relationship with my Father until I was old enough to relate to him on a more adult level – but once I became more adult, I came to value our relationship more and more, and still do – and I appreciate everything he taught me about business, respect for others, work ethics, money, and lots more. Love you, Dad!
My Dad is the greatest salesman I’ve ever laid eyes on. I actually call him “the most genuine bullshitter I know”. EVERYTHING I’ve learned about business relationships has come from him. While my father might be trying to sell something to someone every moment of his life, he does it with such care and concern for the other person in the conversation that you can’t help but fall in love with him. He’s funny, extremely well read and well traveled, and always taught my brother and I that business relationships are first and foremost a relationship. I strive every day to be as good at sales as my father is, and I think he hopes that I strive every day to be BETTER than he is. That’s why he’s such an amazing man.
Happy Father’s Day to all the Dad’s out there, especially to my Dad, who is the greatest man I’ve ever known.
Probably one of the greatest lessons I learned from my father came from his unwillingness to make a decision for me. Many times I would ask for his advice and his response would be to listen, to ask me what I thought, ask more questions, point out things. Then he would tell me, “Well, you’ve thought it out. YOU have a decision to make – I am never going to tell you what to do. You have the ability to make good and bad decisions. Don’t let the fear of making a bad decision keep you from making decisions – you will be able to fix any mistake you might make.” Although some children might have found this directionless, it instilled in me the awareness that I was responsible for decisions that I make.
I keep a piece of artwork in my office. It is printed on an old US flag (well, not a real flag) and is based on something “inspired by The National Institution of Moral Instructions, Washington, DC 1913″ (I would hate to see what a place like that would do today, but this one makes sense to me.) Every time I read it, I’m thankful my dad taught me this lesson:
Self Reliance.
I will gladly listen to the advice of older and wiser people; I will reverence the wishes of those who love and care for me; but I will learn to think for myself. I will not be afraid of being laughed at. I will not be afraid of doing right when the crowd does wrong.
My dad was a machinist at the General Electric Company in Schenectady, NY for 40 years (where I grew up). He went in at 7am and came home at 3:30pm. I remember driving down with my mom to pick him up at the GE gate. He never complained, he enjoyed the challenges of his job as he one of only three precision tolerance machinists in his division. He taught me that hard work and faithfulness to one’s work is a virtue and that you should love what you do. If you don’t love what you do, it’s going to be a miserable life…
When he came home, he would take a short nap, put on a white shirt and a tie, and come downstairs for dinner. He was very well read and had a library of classics, every copy of Life Magazine (in binders), and books on science of all sorts and he would show me things of interest that he was studying. The race to the moon was very high on the list and I remember sitting in front of our little black and white TV watching the fuzzy pictures the day that Neil Armstrong stepped out of the lunar lander. Consequently, I am interested in just about everything and I learned the value of reading both new and classic literature. He would have loved the Internet in its form today!
We also had a shop in the garage where we would do metal projects like iron railings and such. My dad was very creative and always was applying the creativity into other fields. At the GE, all the shop guys brought lunch pails usually with some kind of meat and bread sandwich and other goodies. My dad was working in the sheet metal division and was building submarine control panels which had little heating coil elements in them to keep some of the instruments warm (this is 1950’s-60’s technology). He wanted to have a way to heat a sandwich up so he made a little box with a tray and a door and placed the heating coils in the top with a cord to a DC power supply. You could then place your sandwich on the tray, close the door, and plug in the coils and – voila – hot sandwiches in about 3 minutes! Soon there were guys lined up to use the little sandwich heater and an engineer from corporate heard about it and came down to look at it. In about a year and half, the GE Toaster Oven appeared on the market. My dad didn’t get anything for his invention but he did get his sandwiches heated and made the shop pretty happy. Sometimes the best rewards for great ideas are not monetary but the lives you help and affect (although this did teach me a valuable lesson about checking what kind of IP rights I have under a contract!)
On Fridays he got paid by check and our trip home would require a stop at the bank. He would cash his check and 15% stayed in the bank in a savings account (how many of us do that?). Then we would go home and he would come down to the kitchen table with the “Shoebox” which had envelopes for each monthly bill and place money in each envelope. Most bills we paid by cash as my mom would go to the utility companies and pay them. The few checks they wrote were done by money order from the bank. Unfortunately I learned almost nothing from this as easy credit, spend-it-now, and other bad financial habits were inculcated into me and it has taken years to learn the hard way about money! I didn’t learn about the power of compound interest until I had frittered away many good savings years. If you are 20’s-30’s check this out http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2008/04/02/the-extraordinary-power-of-compound-interest/ and get started now…
Above all my dad cared about people and went out of his way to volunteer his time to help. He was an Explorer Scout leader and their troop build handmade canoes. I remember going up to their little shop with my older brothers who were both Explorers and smelling polyurethane and fiberglass resin as they built the canoes (my brothers were 10 years older than me). In the spring my dad would take the Explorers up to the Adirondack Mountains and they would run white water. I would pick up the pieces of the inevitable wreckage… My dad taught me a great love for nature and the fun of adventure – even if you do smash your canoe up!
Dad wasn’t too much of a politician. We lived across the street from the Democratic Club and he would help out at the clam bakes but he never talked much about politics. He was a life long AFL-CIO member and I remember one Christmas when the union had been on strike for over 6 months. We had been living on almost nothing and the union strike fund was running out. I got a pair of socks for Christmas. But my dad wouldn’t break a strike line regardless of how hard it got on us. What I learned here was to move to a Right to Work state and stay out of unions…
Dad was a great guy and for someone who never more than $40k a year in his life he left an amazingly large inheritance for my mom and us. The biggest inheritance was himself and I hope I do half as well.
Thanks dad, I miss you.
All, these are wonderful stories! Thank you so much for sharing them.
I hope we hear more today. Anyone else?
My dad was 42 when I was born so by the time I was a Senior in High School, he was retiring…he always talked about promptness and perfection in the workplace…he was a “time keeper” for Allis Chalmers for 30 yrs and had to go around the shop collecting the time cards…as they moved from Harvey, Il plant to a larger one in Matteson Il, he was a little apprehensive of the new move…my dad had an artifical leg lost to a drunk driver when he was 22 bending over his trunk changing a tire on his car and in the old plant it was easy to walk around and collect them…so they liked him well enough that he had his own “golf cart” to go around to all the depts…he was very happy and knew he had a great boss at that time…when he retired, he was given a retirement party along with 2 other people..one of which he often was annoyed at for calling off all the time, never on time, etc and commented that he was given the same “send off” as the guy whos work ethic he questioned..I the 18 yr old know it all said “so whats the difference?” He became a bit angry pointing out HE knew he did a better job and felt better about himself being dedicated and I better learn that early on…can’t say I have been “on time” all the time, but I do put my heart and soul into what I do…
Kathleen, your dad was a GEM!!