The Persimmon Group

TPG CEO Bill Fournet was recently featured in the Tulsa World’s “5 Questions” series, where he discusses The Persimmon Group, generational diversity in the workplace, and today’s business leaders.

Having survived the 2012 Mayan Apocalypse, I wonder what 2013 will bring us. Most economic talking heads and soothsayers predict it will be an improvement over the past few years, but that there is still much uncertainty — the debt ceiling, government spending cuts, taxes, health care changes and European and Asian markets’ volatility. In [...]

This week, our country finds itself sandwiched between two monumental events — Superstorm Sandy and its aftermath, and the presidential election — that could define our personal and national success for the near future. One is a crisis of today, the other the foundation for the future. Both lead us to ask: What do you [...]

Recently, my oldest son and I completed a nine-day, 105-mile canoe trip in the Canadian Crown Lands with our Boy Scout troop. There were nine of us, miles from any civilization or roads, where the only way out was by bush plane. We had to paddle and carry everything with us — food, clothing, gear, and the canoes. If we forgot something, there was no friend or family member we could call on a cell to have it dropped off. We had to make do with what we had. And if we broke something (or someone) we could well be … up a lake without a paddle!

Each day we carefully dried our wet socks, made sure all our gear was clean, and made sure we attached our food bag rubber bands to our packs so as not to lose them. These tasks focused on the “little things” versus the “big things” of a canoe or our food pack. But if one of those “little things” wasn’t focused on, we could have had a big issue. Just ask someone who has paddled all day on an open, windblown lake in wet clothes.

This trip reminded me of the importance of focusing on the little things. In life, we often hear “don’t sweat the small stuff.” While often true, we sometimes follow too far — forgetting that some of the “small stuff” can actually lead to “big stuff” — good or bad. In business, we often focus on the big goal or the big client. And we should. But if we forget to focus on the little things, such as taking the time to talk with a co-worker about their kids or taking the time to give a new employee constructive feedback, then it can lead to big problems.

Especially in the past decade, it seems that U.S. workers have taken and simplified the motto “do more with less” to simply “do more.” When you couple technological advances with hard economic times, an organization can create an environment in which the workforce is asked or is driven to an unhealthy and unsustainable work-life balance. When this occurs, the only thing “less” in the equation is sleep, family, health, and at some point quality and/or productivity. My recommendation is to create “performance slack.”

Let me equate performance slack to a term most are familiar with: “slack in a project schedule.” Slack in a schedule helps a project team minimize the impact of tasks or activities lasting longer than planned. It is a well-established and accepted approach to managing scheduling risk. It is no different from having a certain amount of dollars set aside as contingency funds to guard against budget overruns. Like scheduling and budgeting slack, we create performance slack when we create standards and conditions that allow people the latitude to not perform at 100 percent.

Here are three suggestions for creating performance slack: