Conversations with the “Silver Gray Hairs” in Business Lessons
Dear Bank of Prairie Village Community~
Recently I had a conversation with an old college friend. He stated that the college men of today are “different” than when we went to school.
Let me be clear and brutally honest. College men today are no different than when I was in school. In fact, young 20-year-old men are fundamentally no different than the young men who marched with Caesar in his Roman Legions 2,000 years ago. Young men then and young men now are driven by the same basic instincts, survival desires, motivations, fears, jealousies, aspirations, prides and pleasures.
Since this may be disconcerting to contemplate, let me explain. If you pulled 15 young men from Caesar’s Roman Legions, and 15 young men from a Fraternity and placed them together in common clothes and with a common language- you will find quickly their jokes are the same, mannerism the same, comments on girls and authority the same, and even their horseplay the same.
Put together, these combined 30 young men would be capable of the most brutal atrocities performed by the Roman legion and the most generous community service performed by today’s civic minded students.
You see, it is not the young men of who have changed over the millenniums, but it is their culture and the discipline demanded by their culture that determines their behaviors. Whether you dress the young men in Roman Helmets, legion shields, and marching sandals, or in Blue Blazers, J. Crew Nantucket Red pants, and Vineyard Vines ties they will quickly look and act the same. Their collective emotions and instinctual drives will be virtually the same.
Behavior and actions by young men acceptable in one culture or society in one point of time may not be acceptable in another culture at another time point. When speaking of today’s college men as being different than 30 years ago or even 2,000 years ago, what is really being said, is that the culture in which they operate, and the behavior expected from them is different.
I have no doubt if Julius Caesar were alive today, he’d be a great football coach. Visa versa if Bear Bryant, Vince Lombardi or General Patton were to have lived in ancient Roman they likewise would have successfully commanded their own legions.
Regardless of age, culture or time, Caesar, Bryant, Lombardi, and Patton understood and could positively channel through discipline and leadership the collective hopes, dreams, fears and aspirations of 20-year-old males. They could speak, connect and motivate 20-year-old males at a visceral level. They knew what made them “tick” and how to harness their young men’s raw energy, talents and emotions to achieve a common goal.
Accepting this controversial point is critical if one wants to best understand how to study and prepare a young graduate for a business career. If one accepts that basic human nature has not fundamentally changed since the Greeks and Romans, one can then be confident a great deal can be learned by studying the successful careers of past businessmen and women who have preceded us. Past is Prologue. Civilizations failing to study history are doomed to repeat past failures. Young people failing to understand past business challenges will equally fall prey to timeless business traps.
However, if one believes human nature remains the same, one can study predecessors for lessons in coping with today’s personal daily trials and tribulations.
Nothing is really new in business. The terms change but the issues and challenges remain the same. If a successful Colonial Boston Whale Oil merchant in 1771 were to sit down with college graduates and discuss his personal formula for business success, the lessons would be the same as a successful Lockton Insurance producer today. Both the colonial oil whale merchant and the big time Lockton insurance producer share personal characteristics, habits, practices and insights enabling them to be successful. Both approached their business challenges in the same manner.
Let me be blunt. Every business school student embarking on a career, should ask their parents, grandparents, and anyone else with requisite “grey hair and life experience” about their personal business histories, mistakes, victories, skills, and advice. Talking to someone who has gained scars, wrinkles, frown lines, and grey hair is far more beneficial than studying a quickly outdated Harvard Business Review article on changing markets.
I once had an intern who asked me about the mortgage business. I was stunned at the question. I pointed out that his still living grandfather had been perhaps the most respected mortgage banker in Kansas City. I told him his grandfather had forgotten more about the mortgage business than I would ever know.
My intern’s response was he never thought of his “Papa” as a businessman let alone asked him about the mortgage business. This was ironic as his “Papa Grandfather” was well known in Kansas City banking circles and had had fundamentally changed the way mortgages were made and marketed in Kansas City. (The Grandfather’s company had provided mortgages for what I calculate at one time or another to be about 15 percent of the homes in Kansas City proper.)
My instruction to my erstwhile intern was to invite his Grandfather to a formal business lunch and ask him about the mortgage business. I pointed out my intern would learn more from his Grandfather in a two-hour lunch than he would learn in a whole semester at business school.
Seeing my intern’s hesitancy, I gave him some “training wheels” by directing the intern not only to take his Grandfather to lunch, but to include two fellow interns as well~ just so they can see what a business lunch entailed.
The day of the lunch, I drafted a set of generic business questions for the interns to ask “Grandfather.” I made clear when they returned, I expected a two-page singled spaced typed “after action” report with Grandfather’s answers to their assigned generic questions.
The interns left for the lunch thinking they were humoring an eccentric summer boss (me), and codling a doddering old man (Grandfather.) However, like all college interns with ravenous appetites~ they were happy to grab a nice lunch especially~ on the bank’s credit card.
When returning to the bank, I could see they were humbled. As I had anticipated, they had learned “Past is Prologue”.
Grandfather’s comments regarding the business issues he encountered over his career centered on 1) organization, 2) efficiency, 3) creating networks, 4) business plans, 5) corporate values, 6) the threat of new technology, 7) the adaptation of different technology, 8) the use and dangers of debt, 9) successful and unsuccessful advertising campaigns and 10) the key importance of creating repeat customers to enhance the business’s franchise value.
His side comments touched on A) balancing family commitments and work, B) the fears of being able to pay his bills when starting out, C) how he developed his own lucky breaks, and D) how he created his own “book of business” through friendships, introductions and contacts enabling him to gain a toe hold in the industry. Grandfather was frank about both his failures and successes~ and the need to constantly have optimism and persistence.
Each intern realized the anxieties and fears “Grandfather” confronted starting out in 1947 were the same issues they must confront upon graduation. They learned how Grandfather confronted those issues, the mistakes he made, what to avoid, the key business skill requirement of perseverance, measured optimism and the need to take carefully considered and calculated risks.
As I said, the terms may change but the issues motivating someone to tackle those issues remain the same. A Knut Rockne half time pep talk from 1927, or a Bear Bryant chew out from 1963 would still resonate with today’s college football players. General Patton’s famous WWII speech would have motivated the young Roman Legionnaires marching into the Rhine Valley~ as it still motivates combat bound divisions today.
My advice for college business students is to spend less time reading about what academics think necessary to be successful in the new iPhone, Google and Al technology age, and more time asking retired businessmen and women about their careers-starting with their own family members.
Mark Twain commented, “I left home at age 18 thinking my father one of the most ignorant men on the face of the earth. After traveling the country and working in a variety of laborers and places, I returned home at 23~ and was simply amazed at how much my father had learned in those 5 years.”
Yours in a wonderful Spring and remembering Past is Prologue!
Dan Bolen ~ Chairman
Bank of Prairie Village
913~707~3369 Cell
“The Bank of Prairie Village ~ Home of Blue Lion Banking” ~ cited March 2020, April 2021, April 2022, April 2023 and April 2024 by the by the Kansas City Business Journal as one of the “Safest Banks in Kansas City for Your Money.”
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