Tuesday, March 1, 2016

Contagious Passion Fuels Success

 Entrepreneurs launch new companies on the foundation of their novel ideas. Yet no matter how groundbreaking that idea may be, it won’t succeed in the marketplace unless that person believes in it with a passion that evolves into an all-consuming dedication and commitment.
      But what exactly is “passion” in that context? If you’re an opera buff, you know how thrilling it is to hear a great aria. But why is it thrilling? The same is true with a great performance by a blues or jazz musician, which can be just as spine tingling as any opera.
      We get swept away by great music because of the passion it stirs within us – the passion written into the music by the composer and the passion of the performance that brings that music alive. If you witness great music in concert – be it jazz, opera, blues, rock, or classical – you can see how totally absorbed the performers are in the music, often with eyes closed. The music carries them away, and they carry you with them.
      It’s the passion.

 
Meet my friend, Mrs. Inches
When I visit the American Wing of Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, I always look for John Singer Sargent’s 1887 portrait of Mrs. Charles E. Inches (Louise Pomeroy) on the third floor. The first time I saw the 34” x 24” portrait, it stopped me in my tracks. I felt that I knew this woman, even though I knew nothing about her beyond her name. With each subsequent visit, she is an appointment for me. Why am I so transported by this 129-year-old painting?
     
I believe it’s because of the passion that Sargent was able to pour into the portrait, the passion in his understanding of and appreciation for Mrs. Inches, and his ability to accurately capture her mood, intelligence, and emotion. It’s all there on the canvas for us, generations later, to enjoy and ponder.
      Mrs. Inches was a beautiful woman and an ideal subject for Sargent. But to achieve a portrait of such beauty and insight, he also had to capture the inner woman – which I believe is most apparent in her eyes, in her modest, seemingly absent-minded gaze. Sargent’s talent was such that he was able to put his awareness and understanding of her onto the canvas. Despite all his skill, however, without his passion, it would not have been half the painting it is and would not evoke passion in viewers to this day.
      None of these great works of art – the opera performance, the jazz or blues concerts, or the oil portrait – is possible without that commitment and dedication to the art, that fervor for the art.

Passion in business

In the case of business, that passion will be immediately evident and practically contagious when the entrepreneur with the original idea meets with investors, and when recruiting talented people who will help bring the idea to life. If you’ve ever met, dealt with or worked for such people, you know what I’m talking about.
      They are often several steps ahead of everyone else. In their presence, you feel like you’ve jumped on a runaway train. Their activities seem those of a fanatic, a sometimes erratic one. Their sense of urgency is palpable. It seems they never sleep or take time off.
      Recall the founding story of Microsoft, how Bill Gates quit Harvard as an under-graduate to act on his idea of a computer operating system. He left without a bachelor’s degree because he feared he was too late and that someone else with the same idea would beat him. The ensuing months and years consumed him as he spent countless hours inventing and writing code, while seeking investors and talent to bring it to fruition. Ultimately, he and the team he built birthed MS-DOS, the basis for the up-until-then unheard-of PC industry.
      Whether entrepreneurs succeed in bringing their ideas to market is, to a large extent, contingent on their ability to transmit their passion to others, to make it contagious – like a virus. Employees, partners, investors and customers sense that passion. They understand, and then develop a yearning to be associated with it, in turn, spawning a similar passion and loyalty to an idea.
      Such organizations are rare, and few last beyond the tenure of their founder. As that company matures and the initiator moves on to other things, succeeding generations of leaders and managers must have the same founding passion for excellence and innovation that created the company. Their ability to keep the organization thriving and growing with more groundbreaking ideas, in turn, is contingent on their ability to invest employees with that same passion – ad infinitum.
      In some cases, the founder must come out of retirement, reassume the leadership mantle and revive their foundering companies. Two cases in point: Charles Schwab came back to his eponymous company, as did Howard Schultz to Starbucks, both to right those listing ships and re-inject their founding visions and passion.
      What traits do Schultz and Schwab share? I dare say they have the same talent, at base, as Sargent, Gates, et al: an uncanny ability and passion for one’s art to such a degree that it is contagious, that it tingles spines and instills enthusiasm in other people.
      Success in business, then, is ultimately contingent on keeping the passion of genesis alive, both within the founder, and the successor teams.