What Would Oliver Do?

In the summer of 1970 I met a man named Oliver Butterworth.  As school was off, I was just sort of hanging around the stores at the center of town.  Butterworth, a quasi famous children’s author was campaigning on the street for Joe Duffey, a very liberal anti-war Democrat who was running against Lowell Weicker for one of Connecticut’s Senate seats. It was during Vietnam and Oliver was handing out Duffey buttons and peace movement leaflets out of a VW Minivan. He had rigged a makeshift awning and had a card table with lemonade.  He was like a character out of  ”Alice’s Restaurant.”  Kind of an old Hippie.

As I was just hanging around with nothing to do, (I realized later, he worked as a local teacher and was just hanging out during the summer too) he invited me to hand out buttons and leaflets.  He explained the anti war movement and how much was at stake in the coming election, and how it’s up to the people to change things.  I have a picture somewhere of me standing in front of that van with Duffey for Senate buttons all over my shirt trying to look informed and ready to fight for the people.  I wasn’t informed or ready to fight.  I was eleven, but I had a cause.

Butterworth had written a children’s book named ‘The Enormous Egg.’ It was about a New Hampshire farm kid (Nate) whose chicken predictably lays an enormous egg.  When the egg hatches, not a chicken emerges, but a Triceratops whom Timmy names Uncle Beazley.  As soon as this is discovered, all who had been laughing at the kid with the enormous egg develop their own agendas.  As the dinosaur grows amid media hoopla and opportunists trying to profit on the find, they need to ship Uncle Beazley off to the National Zoo in Washington DC, because he’s basically eating the farm.  Eventually, Congress, appalled at how much the Dinosaur is eating at the Zoo decides to declare it Un-American (Oliver wrote it in 1956 and was trying to turn 8 year olds everywhere against McCarthy.)  Timmy goes on TV and rallies the masses to petition Congress to “do the will of the people” and accept Uncle Beazley as a permanent resident at the Zoo.  They all live happily ever after.

During that summer and fall, Oliver would tell me where he was going to park the van and I would show up there, hand out stuff and get a civics lesson.  Did my Mom know I was out meeting an old guy with a van? Yes, and she didn’t think anything of it.  It was a different time and we didn’t assume everyone was out to molest us.  I’m sure she thought “well, it’s not like he’s a Catholic Priest or anything, so what the hell.”  Oliver only molested me with anti-war rhetoric and a far left liberalism (in retrospect socialism) that I think I still retain today. Actually, he was pretty cool.

Lowell Weicker sticking it to Nixon

At the end of it all, Joe Duffey lost the election by 90,000 votes.  Lowell Weicker went on to become the moderate Republican that swayed everyone against Nixon and forced his resignation.  In the end,  it pretty much worked out the way Oliver wanted it to. Oliver wasn’t a big Nixon fan.

After the election was lost, Oliver called me and told me we had stood for what we believed in and in taking a stand there are no regrets.  Not long after, he mailed me an autographed copy of the Enormous Egg which I still have.

Hollywood offers up many fights, competing agendas and deception so thick, Nixon would be proud.  Honor sometimes can be scarce.  The higher the stakes, the more ruthless people become.  Perhaps it’s just human nature.  I’m not complaining mind you.  By and large I find it fascinating, and those around me find my righteous indignation in the face of it a constant form of entertainment.

What I find myself fighting sometimes is the regret.  If I had only done this, or if only I had done that I would have gotten the result I wanted.  I always try to do the right thing and believe it or not, doing the right thing around here sometimes gets you screwed. I have a nasty habit of obsessing about that stuff long after the fight has ended.  I’m learning to let go.

For 2012 my main resolution is: WWOD (what would Oliver do.)  He had fought the good fight, done what he could, mentored where he could, spoke his truth in public, moved on from each fight with no regrets at the outcome.  He trusted that goodness would prevail, which it eventually does in one way or the other, and that setbacks are temporary.

It’s a funny thought. What WOULD Oliver do in Hollywood?  I guess I’m going to find out.  Stay tuned.

Snapshots From Bydgoszsz

Downtown Bydgoszsz

I Just returned from Poland. Bydgoszsz, Poland to be exact.  It’s pronounced (bid-goe-sh.) Yeah pronouncing it took a while.  For the longest time before my business partner Richard and I took the trip, we were just calling it Badonkadonk. We were there for Cameraimage, the international cinematographers film festival.

It took four planes to get there. Halfway through the journey I was trying to figure out exactly why we were going in the first place, especially on the last plane, a small prop plane that was pitched around in the winds and seemed like it was going to land upside down. Oh yeah and the plane before that which Richard proclaimed looked suspiciously like the one from the movie ‘Alive.’

Looking forward to the post flight meal.

With any trip to a culture that is completely foreign, the answer doesn’t come until you’re there. I checked out some travel sites before we went, one of which proclaimed it was unclear why anyone would want to go to Bydgoszsz, but if you did, after a few day you would find it charming.

You see it’s a rather strange place where the sun rises at 8:30am and sets by 3:30pm and they are not even in the shortest days of the year yet.  It’s cold, (see Richard’s over compensating coat) and the architecture is a mix of new post Berlin Wall, Soviet era cheap housing and pre WW II buildings, some stucco’d over in places to hide the cracks of age and  bullet holes.

That being the case, I found that Polish people seem to rely heavily on three things: 1) Vodka, 2) Various dumplings and 3) Cold cuts. Those of you who know me know I am not a drinker.  However I can attest that the dumplings and cold cuts rock. Richard assures me that the Vodka rocks as well.

The people are not what you would expect.  After decades of Soviet propaganda, you would think they would be either be wary of Americans or downright hostile. Not the case at all.  It seemed to me that only about a third knew how to speak English.  When I found myself trying to communicate with a non english speaker, they would hurridly look around to find someone to translate, dragging them over, genuinely and happily wanting to speak with me.  No one was put out that I dared to come to their country not knowing the language.

The short day messes with your internal clock and produces an active nightlife.  Not a big city at all, the Bydgoszsz Holiday Inn (yes, there was a Holiday Inn) came alive and blossomed into a huge party at midnight.  So, when the sun went down, there was a tendency to retreat to nap for a few hours, grab a late dinner, then hit the Holiday Inn.  People proceded to stay up until 5 or 6 am, then grabbed a few hours sleep until the sun came up at 8:30a and started their day. I’m pretty sure they didn’t do that every night, but you never know.

Richard and our French colleagues Vanessa and Magali about to get on the prop plane from Hell.

The festival itself was pretty cool.  Films from everywhere in the world and more importantly, the people from everywhere who made them.  The whole experience reinforced in me the importance of people.  We talk about great films, great performances, great technical innovation, great distribution platforms. But, it’s groups of committed people, coming together and finding ways to communicate a vision.  First to each other and to the world.  Any endeavor depends on this. In the information age when you would think communication advances would bring us closer together in meaningful dialogue, we seem instead to be dumbing down the quality of our collaboration.

I used to talk on the phone to people all day everyday.  Now it’s all email and iChat and a few calls a day.  It’s faster, more efficient and creates a communication economy of scale.  But, direct conversation creates a deeper bond and a more visceral truth.

Renown Cinematographers from all over the world came to teach master classes. Young Cinematographers came to take them.  There was a spirit among the teachers and students alike of:  ”I may know a certain amount, but there’s always more.” In that lies a creative delight.

Ah yes, then there’s truth.  In Bydgoszsz there was a lot of talk of truth.  Films that were “true to character, true to story, true to vision.” That comes back to people gathered around a camera face to face, deciding to achieve that truth.

So, if I learned lessons in Bydgoszsz they were these:

1) Cold Cuts can be a dietary staple and are delicious.

2) If your day is more like night, learn to live in it.

3) Just because a plane looks like one that crashed into a snowy mountainside in the Andes, doesn’t mean you’re going to end up dining on a stack of pancreas and someone’s foot.

4) Popularity does not define successful art, truth does.

5) True masters realize that there will always be more to learn and they take joy in teaching others the art of trying to understand this.

6) Nothing beats face to face communication.  Even if you don’t speak the same language, the effort of pursuing mutual understanding  in any form is worth going halfway around the world for.

I’m Back!

Hello again, it’s me. Back from my self-imposed or should I say self involved sabbatical.  I ran out of things to say there for a while (I find we all do that sometimes) and faced with reprinting other people’s material, re-treading my own, or clamming up I chose the latter for three months. I must admit some guilt every time I passed my computer on my way to watching football or playing my guitar, but never enough to actually sit down and write something.  So, here I am again, with a (hopefully) simple message.

Once upon a time I had a girlfriend who told me about how her father got hit by a trolley car when he was a kid.  Obviously, he was OK as he grew up to father children, but the story goes like this:  he and his mother had just come from the shoe store where he had gotten a new pair of shoes.  He was enthralled by how shiny they were and kept looking down at them.  His mother implored him to  pay less attention to his new shoes and more attention to where he was walking. They came to a busy street corner, he stepped off the curb whilst looking at his shoes and …. well you know the rest, he got hit by a trolley car.

Why do I bring this up now? WPA, the company I started with a great group of intrepid and committed people just celebrated its 1 year anniversary.  The enterprise is going gangbusters and dare I say, is more successful in one year of operation than my previous company was in ten years. I could attribute this to any number of factors and there are a lot at work here.  But, when it comes right down to it, it’s about the people involved.  They all have vision, commitment and ambition, both personal and collective. As a group, we’ve flourished.

There have been challenges for sure. There was and still is a learning curve of how to work together for the common good. There have been control issues (mostly mine) and the fits and starts of implementing a new and innovative team system of representation and corporate culture. I’m very proud of everyone involved and what we’ve accomplished together.

What does this have to do with shiny new shoes?  Only everything. It would be so easy to sit back, look at what we’ve done and be delighted.  But, to keep staring at the glow of our shiny shoes would be to invite a trolley car to run us over.  So, instead we are looking ahead.

“Yesterday’s home runs won’t help you win today” – Babe Ruth

Too true. As we start to plot a course for 2012, we’re asking ourselves a lot of questions. What were the successes and why?  Where did we fall down and why? Both sets are tough to answer, but are equally important.  I personally have been taking a lot of time to plot goals and strategy.  Here’s what I have found: I’ve been very bad in the past at plotting goals and strategy. Here’s why:  I haven’t ever spent enough time doing it.  I’ve always just sat down and written it out, then moved on.  This time, I’m writing, considering, coming back to it a few days later, suddenly adding insight when I have an inspiration.  It’s been a process of several weeks now and I can tell I’m not done yet.

Setting goals are one thing. Adding a detailed strategy to achieve them is quite another. I just read “Great By Choice” by Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen. I found it to be a fantastic system of goal setting and strategy.  The basic techniques are: set your goal, figure out how you’re going to get there with a SMaC recipe. These are actions to be taken that are Specific, Methodical and Consistent (SMaC) and are then formed into what they call a “twenty mile march.” A march you do day in, day out, week by week, year by year.

It has opened my eyes to a new way of thinking about goals.  In short, there’s an accountability mechanism built in. Because, you’re either marching or you’re not. You’re either advancing on your goals or you’re not. You have a specific list of actionable steps or you don’t. I recommend this read.

So then, what’s next for WPA?  You’ll have to keep reading. I can tell you we won’t be caught staring down at our shiny shoes.  This is Hollywood, the trolley cars don’t just pass by, they’re aiming for you.

Typical dress for a hollywood Trolley Car.

Learning To Persevere

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘press on’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.” – Calvin Coolidge

We live in a world of instant gratification, where success looks easy.  I don’t have any trouble making that statement.  If you watch TV at all, then your days are filled with instantly white teeth, instant and inexplicable celebrity and seemingly easy financial success. And we fall for it every time.  Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian, Sarah Palin and of course my favorite, freakin  Snookie. They all have the same things, white teeth, unexplained celebrity and financial success.

But, they also all have three other things in common: Head scratching mediocrity, an ability to manipulate us with our own desire for overnight success and that they only play one note. When we tire of that note, they are gone and the next one comes along.

You Betcha!

It is truly not them though, it is a very skilled media who chose them to hold up as examples of what we desire for ourselves. In many ways, they were just convenient.  In the right place at the right time when a hungry dream machine needed fresh fodder. Or, in Palin’s case, a fading and cynical political campaign’s need for a woman, a black person, anything to appear relevant to an increasingly diverse electorate. They really didn’t care much that they were promoting a half wit who thinks Africa is a country and the French Revolution a ballet step.

OK, so where does that leave the rest of us?  Well, personally, my sex tape didn’t really take off and my reality show “The Real Goys of Hollywood” didn’t get past the pitch phase, so to succeed I’m left with persistance, determination and hard work.

“Permanence, perseverance and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragement and impossibilities: It is this, that in all things distinguishes the strong soul from the weak.” – Thomas Carlyle

It’s hard to grind it out every day. I get that. At some point you may ask your self why keep going? The answer to that question is purpose. It’s the purpose of loving your art, loving your family and loving those that work next to you. It’s the purpose of contributing to something bigger than yourself and creating a legacy. That’s what keeps you going. That’s what keeps you looking forward to the next step.

But what makes for purpose? Author Guy Kawasaki gives a simple equation in his book ‘Enchantment.’ He uses an acronym: ‘M.A.P.’ which stands for mastery, autonomy and purpose. He explains that in any endeavor, if we are given the opportunity to master a skill and receive autonomy in doing so, all we have to add is our unique purpose of something bigger and we will have no problem finding the energy for persistance and determination.

I find his equation not so much a recipe for success as a formula for joy. As we all have, I find I have reinvented myself numerous times. Life just unfolds that way. If you really look closely at it, what makes change interesting and purpose easier, is the simple act of learning new things. When your interest is held, you become persistent in your pursuit of practicing the new skills you are acquiring. That feeds your purpose and vice versa.  That’s right, what I am suggesting is that constant progress is the result of persistence, and persistance is the child of constant learning and expanding your skills. Mix it all together and you manage to support your purpose.

For myself, my learning consists of downloading a steady stream of audio books from iTunes.  I have a 45 minute commute each way and I have decided to fill it with learning.  In the past year, I’ve listened to books on business culture, leadership, happiness, purpose and entrepreneurship to name a few subjects.  My current title is: The Talent Code, Unlocking The Secret of Skill by Thomas Coyle. It’s a remarkable  study of where our physiology and habits meet to propel our talents. It’s all about how we learn, how we are coached by others and how we should coach others.

The bottom line is this: In pursuit of my purpose I have become extremely determined and persistent when it comes to learning. Even this blog is me learning. I’ve come to realize that no matter what I’m doing, I’m learning something.  Even when doing nothing I’m learning something (how to do nothing.)  For me, it’s become a question of what do I need to know to make my business better, my relationships better and what excites me and makes me want to get up in the morning.

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now” - Chinese Proverb

Do you want  (or need) to be more persistent, tenacious, determined? Those traits want constant fuel to keep them ignited.  Even if you just surf the net, something as benign as Stumbleupon.com will help you learn.  It’s great. You just plug in your interests and the website randomly sends you to other websites that contain articles and information on the subjects of your choosing. As a matter of fact, just last night on Stumble I learned of a new concept: PLN or Personal Learning Networks. Groups of people that share what they are learning through Twitter.  They point out blogs, videos and articles.  Kind of what I’m doing here. I learn, I share, I learn some more.  It’s made me better at all facets of my life.

So, what are you learning about for your career? How is that translating to your life.  What things spark your passion, make you persistent and determined to push farther?  I want to know!  At this point I want to do more than throw words out into the blogosphere. I want to start a conversation! I want to start a PLN.

I’ve been writing this blog for over a year now.  In that pursuit I have been determined and persistent.  Learning new things has been the vehicle to spark my imagination to try and communicate new things and that’s my epiphany. What’s yours?

“I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn to do it”  - Pablo Picasso

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Want to share this idea with your own Twitter network? Here are tweetable bits.

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now” - Chinese Proverb http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence.” – Calvin Coolidge http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

Permanence, perseverance and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragement and impossibilities: http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

“I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn to do it”  - Pablo Picasso http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

Stoked

One winter when I was a kid the power went out for two days.  I grew up in Connecticut and every winter we would have several Ice Storms.  On these days, you would wake up to all the tree branches glistening with a coating of ice around everything.  It was most fantastic because school was always cancelled.  My sisters and I would sit around the kitchen table, ears stuck to the radio waiting to hear our town called out as closed. When there were Ice Storms they always closed school.

You see, as the storm progressed, the roads would develop a half inch or so of solid ice.  I remember this particular time putting on ice skates and skating right down the middle of the road. That is until those beautiful tree branches began to break and fall on the equally coated power lines. Then, what was a lot of fun became something else. Downed lines flailing and sparking and a stupid kid in skates trying to run down the street.  I did manage to make it home.

After several hours of the power being out and phone calls to friends who still had power and reports from the radio, it became apparent that it would be a few days before we had heat again. So, my parents hatched a plan where after waiting for the roads to be sanded, my mother and sisters would head off to my Grandparents house in the next town to wait it out while my father and I stayed behind to drain the radiators (we had those old steam kind) and keep a fire going in the fireplace so that hopefully the whole plumbing system didn’t freeze up.

It was quite an adventure.  We had sleeping bags in the living room, a pile of wood and we took shifts staying up and keeping the fire going. I was only 12, we sat up for a long time talking.  He let me have a beer, I didn’t really like beer that much at the time, especially beer that had been sitting in 10 degree weather on the back porch and was more like a half frozen 7/11 beer slushy.  But we were two men braving the elements and surviving anything a  suburban living room could throw at them.

I remember keeping that fire going strong all night. I mean the house was freezing and I’m not sure the fire warmed the plumbing system that much (though it didn’t freeze) but we made it through the night. The following afternoon as we were preparing for another death defying night on Mt. Rumpus Room, the power unexpectedly came back on.

I think we all have experience sitting around a fire and tending it, keeping it going.  There’s something primal and satisfying about making a “roaring” fire and keeping it really big.

So what about your career’s fire?  Is it roaring? Is it fading?  I’ve seen plenty of careers that at one time were roaring but one day become barely glowing embers. They got that way simply because as they died down, the owner failed to stoke it and put more wood on.  There’s a misnomer that once you “make it” your career will just keep going on it’s own momentum.  But, it won’t.  It’s just like a fire that needs constant tending.

Some say, “that’s why I have an agent” but, as an agent myself I can tell you that isn’t enough.  If you rely solely on your agent’s contacts without making and maintaining contacts on your own, the day will come when you will realize that you don’t actually know many people in the business. You’ve worked with a lot of people, you’ve done a good job, but years after the fact, you don’t really know them well enough to suddenly reach out and start a work dialogue.  When you finally do reach out long after working together, it seems desperate because let’s face it, as a freelancer, if you wait until you need work to work on getting work, it is desperate.

On the other hand, if you maintain your contacts by regular casual ‘hey what’s up emails, birthday and holiday greetings, or even just using the Facebook ‘Like’ button daily, you are ahead of the game. Through constant contact you may even make some close friends and we all want more of that.  You have to see each contact you make as a stick of wood going on to the fire of your career.  The more sticks, the higher the fire may grow.  If you make contact with people infrequently, don’t expect too big of a fire. If not at all, you will find yourself blowing at the embers just trying to get a small flame started up.

It may be that you think that since people really like you when you’ve worked with them, and that’s enough for them to think of you next time.  It’s not.  People forget very quickly and need to be reminded that they really like you. And the best way to do that is to keep being likable. When you pay attention to people, it shows you like them. When people feel you like them, you in turn become likable.

It’s never too late to sleep in the living room and get that fire going again.  But once you do, make sure you keep an eye on it every day. And more than that, make sure that every day you keep throwing sticks on the fire.  More sticks = more fire. More contacts = longer career.

The math isn’t hard, but organizing a plan can be.  Try this: make a list of everyone you can ever remember working with.  Now go on Facebook and if you’re not Facebook friends already, FRIEND THEM.  In almost every person’s Facebook info is their birthday and their email address. Add this info to your contact list. Now the hard part: use the information. Put together a daily list of contacts that can be made and follow through.

This is a simple first step towards building a fire.  The casual contacts are sticks, so put them on the fire.  When you actually work together, those are logs so make them count.  After the job, make sure you keep throwing sticks on the fire until the next job.

And take my advice: don’t try to run in the street in ice skates. It’s very difficult.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Want to share this idea with your own Twitter network? Here are handy tweetable bits.

More sticks = more fire. More contacts = longer career. http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

What about your career’s fire?  Is it roaring? Is it fading? http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

When you pay attention to people, it shows you like them. When people feel you like them, you in turn become likable. http://bitly.com/lF4tfb

Don’t try to run in the street in ice skates. It’s very difficult. http://bitly.com/lF4tfb @agentonloose

Value Added Proposition?

The new Prius. Now with 'Smug Suppression!"

I leased a new Prius a few weeks ago. That’s right a Prius. Hollywood agent rolling on 15′s. It has a mode that lets you drive up to 25 mph all electric. Which in LA covers most freeway driving. Once upon a time I had a black Mercedes E430, blacked out windows, 0 to 60 in, now. Really fast car and it looked very cool. I called it my agent car. Unbelievable vehicle. Before I had it, it belonged to Paul Walker. His agent bought it for him to drive around when the original ‘Fast and the Furious‘ came out. He left the agent 4 months later, the agent took it back and sold it to me. But, the car never really fit me somehow. Or did it? Maybe it did at the time, or maybe I just changed.

I’d like to say that I’ve shunned the Hollywood image thing, but I’m not sure that’s even it. I think I just got pissed. Pissed at the price of gas. Not just the price at the pump. pissed at the human cost of gas. The oil wars, terrorism, the crumbling American society, all in the name of cheap gas and the oil company’s continued government subsidies amidst record profits.

So, I decided to vote with my wallet. I want to use the least amount of petroleum possible and encourage car makers to move to all electric in my lifetime. But, don’t give me too much credit. I could have gone the route my wife has advocated for years, which is to buy a diesel car and convert the engine to veggie fuel. Of course this requires putting a vegetable oil straining unit next to my garage. I just keep picturing myself trying to strain used fryer oil. Covered in grease while I try to clean enough Mazola to get me to Hollywood and back. Or, better yet, when the voice in the McDonalds drive through asks if I want fries with that, I could just respond “no thank you, I’m just here for a fill up.”

Anyway, what I’m getting at is values. I have developed certain values based on my experience. Those point me towards a Prius. My wife’s values point her in a more difficult direction and I must admit, while I respect and applaud her choice, I’ve held her back in her pursuit of a vehicle that emits nothing but a vague scent that reminds you of the Outback Steakhouse parking lot.

I’ve had clients who have refused to shoot Exxon commercials because of the Valdez calamity and still others that refused to shoot for McDonald’s because of their destruction of the Amazon for their grazing farms. Granted, that was a few years ago, before the economy tanked and work slowed. In actuality, I can’t say I’ve heard of anyone refusing to shoot anything on moral grounds for some time now. What does that say?

Just a few days into my Prius adventure, I was driving home on the 101, living my values to the fullest and I found myself climbing a hill and closing in on what appeared to be a 15 year old Ford, belching smoke and chugging up the grade at 40mph. As I smugly zipped alongside in my 50 miles per gallon Eco statement, I noticed all the windows of the Ford down, and a sweaty woman driving that had to be all of 22 years old. No AC, engine failing. someone just trying to get somewhere.

People just trying to get somewhere.

That’s the problem we all face isn’t it? In one way or another, we’re all just people trying to get somewhere. A lot of people living in this world have values that are based solely on being someone just trying to get somewhere. They can’t afford to have Eco friendly values. That is a luxury, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have values.

I’m beginning to come to grips with the idea that one’s values are relative to their situation and ever evolving. That’s ok because, well, it has to be. Gone are the times of Patrick Henry and “Give me great gas milage or give me death!” I cant argue with someone just trying to get somewhere. That’s a valid reason for driving a bomb of a car while the polar ice caps melt. But OK, this is a business blog right? What does any of this have to do with business?

Businesses have relative and ever evolving values also. At the beginning of this year, we at WPA got together to talk about ours. It’s not easy to talk about. Actually, It’s a rather esoteric discussion for a business setting. We came up with buzzwords, they were: customer service, forward thinking culture, positive attitude, ascension, tribe, family, innovation, top of mind. These are things we value a lot. They are not by any means all the things we value, but it gives us a reference point.

We tend to think of values in terms of what our parents taught us: be polite, play fair, cleanliness is important, be kind to animals, etc, etc, etc… But as we get older, those kinds of values are assumed. We have to sit down and try to work out for ourselves where our values live within our professional lives and where our professional lives live within our values.

Sal about to 'go for a ride' in a Prius

There have been plenty of times where I have made tough decisions based on necessity and called them just business. We strive for the win/win situations where everyone comes away happy, but it just doesn’t work out that way every time. I always harken back to that scene at the end of the Godfather where they are escorting Abe Vigoda to the car to “take him for a ride. ” They say to him “It’s nothing personal, it’s just business” and Abe nods and gets in the car knowing full well what’s to come.

Values are a double edged sword. On one hand there’s the golden rule. On the other there’s what needs to be done for the benefit of the many over the benefit of the few. And let’s not forget about self-preservation. What must be done in business doesn’t always jibe with the Golden Rule. The inescapable truth is that to win in business, someone else must lose.

After all, in the end we’re all just someone trying to get somewhere. For every time I’ve made a decision that has an air of ethical justice, it seems there’s another time that may appear to others hypocritical or duplicitous on my part. However, I’m the one left with the decisions I make. I’ve read ‘The Art of War’ and I’ve read the ‘Bible.’ In reality both are full of humanity and both are pretty violent, but there are good lessons in both.

I do believe we’re entering a new era in business culture. I don’t believe that it’s necessarliy kinder or gentler. I’m mean layoffs are layoffs right? But, it is far more philosophical, far more based on the proven science of interaction and collaboration. What the most progressive business thinkers of todays view’s on values have in common are establishing a culture of  working towards a ‘common purpose’ based on shared values.

Film crews and theatrical productions have a natural common purpose.  It’s bringing a script to life.  The hiring of the crew and casting, is the process of finding the people who have not only have the requisite talent, but similar values to the creators of the project. For the cast and crew have to become co-creators in pursuit of the common purpose.  I’ve heard it time and time again when clients meet on feature projects that what the producers and directors are really looking for is the answer to this question: who do I want to spend the next 6 months with? In essence, they are looking for a values match.

So think about it.  What are your values? How can you express them? It’s not an easy question, but essential to answer.  When you have verbally committed them to yourself, others will be able to see them too!

I’ve Seen London, I’ve Seen France…

Headed to Paris from London today. Rocking the Eurostar through the Chunnel. The English countryside has been flying by for the past half hour, looking vaguely like New England until a random castle pops onto the landscape out of nowhere. The train conductor is making an announcement through a squeaky speaker in an accent so thick and unintelligible that he sounds like inspector Clouseau taking your order at a Jack In The Box drive through. I hope it wasn’t something important like “the Chunnel ahead has sprung a leak, please proceed to the lifeboats.” I think if that’s the case we’re pretty well screwed anyway, but still.

People have been commenting on my American accent over the past few days!! Can you imagine? I keep telling them I’m not the one with the accent, but it hasn’t helped. When I realize that I am indeed the different one, I make a quick apology for the Bush administration and we move right along with the conversation.

Back to the train. Most of the seats on this train face each other and I’m opposite a rather large man. We are alternating our foot position to give us each enough leg room. The guy next to me is asleep with his fist against the side of his head, his propped elbow taking up the whole arm rest between us. Therefore, I am now typing in a contorted sideways position, my body twisted against the window and my feet headed in the opposite direction between the fat man’s feet. I would say something, but my accent would be discovered and I would have to start the Bush apology all over again.  However, It does remind me about the importance of positioning.

The view from my train!

Ah, we’ve come out of the dark tunnel and into France. I just got a text from the French cell provider that my per minute rates are one quarter of what they were in Great Britain. Imagine the joy of the troops coming ashore at Normandy when they realized their cell phone calls just got cheaper. And we wonder how they found the resolve to push on to Berlin…

Back to positioning. How is your career and indeed your life positioned? It’s a tricky question. Are you doing commercials, features, television? Are you at the top of the market, the middle of the market or are you just breaking in? Are you single with very little stuff and no debt or are you married with kids and a mortgage?

None of these scenarios are better or worse than another, but they all point to what your positioning is. You may wish to work at the high end of features but you are working in the middle market of tv commercials and you have a family. Not impossible by any means, but not as easy as the transition of someone without a family, as the financial foundation must be supported and risk is tougher. You have the talent, but the positioning is wrong. You may be single, just out of film school with a few student films under your belt and you are positioning for high end commercials. Your reel is pretty good but your set experience is light and you’ve never worked in the stressful environment of advertising where money changes hands fast.  And errors, well lets just say there isn’t much latitude for errors.

Positioning is a starting point at the beginning of a career.  Positioning is also choosing a NEW starting point at any time during a career.  So, how do you find the right positioning to have the career you want? How do you then move it forward? There is no right way to answer to this, but in my experience I would say slowly. Step by step, day by day get to where you want to go by moving in the direction you desire. If you have financial and family commitments, build up your savings so you can take a low paying feature as an intro to that world. If you are young, join a department at the bottom and work your way up so you are exposed to both the technical and political workings of the business.

If you are pointed one way and where you want to go is in the opposite direction, you first need to turn around. Assess where you really want to go and take the first small steps in getting there. There is a pressure in society to live your whole career in a month.  To be a millionaire before you are 30. That happens of course, but only in a minute percentage of careers.  Mostly, it’s the image we tend to see in the media, so it’s our own fault really.  But, you don’t have to buy into it.

The idea is to be calculating and make choices wisely over a period of time. If you can avoid it, don’t head in directions that are just lucrative and not artistically satisfying, unless of course you have to.  There is a point where money will no longer be enough. I heard a great quote by the speaker John C. Maxwell. “To go up you have to give up.”

It’s true. Many on my trip have been surprised and some even appalled that this is my first trip to Europe. I could have gone earlier of course, but I was working mostly office jobs, supporting a family, working my way up. The positioning and direction I had chosen for my life just hadn’t led to Europe until now.  It’s ironic of course that many of the clients I work with travel to Europe constantly. Some live there. However, I now realize my positioning has been changing slowly over the past several years and I’ve wanted it to. This sea change has culminated in the creation of WPA, The Worldwide Production Agency. With that name, of course there is going to be a bit more travel involved.

So, assess where you’ve positioned yourself and where you want to go. Remember, steering a career is like steering a big ship. To turn it in a new direction you turn the wheel slowly.  To try and spin it around quickly is to risk capsizing.

As Thoreau said: “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams.” I’ll add: as you go, be aware of your course and make the small adjustments to keep you on your path.

I’ve always wanted to go to Europe and here I am.  It took a while, but now I am on a train, twisted against the window between a snoring arm rest hog and a fat man. Inspector Clouseau is muttering about his “Minkey” over the intercom and I’m loving every second. It’s funny, I chose this long ago and step by step, with some decent and often hard choices, I slowly got here.

Tonight I see the Eiffel Tower. Tomorrow, who knows?

25 Rules for Surviving and Thriving In Hollywood

As an actor (my first career in entertainment) I came across a list of rules for making it in show business. I can’t remember who it was by, but it was funny, succinct and to the point.  That was a long time ago and I don’t remember the rules other than the mantra which I’ve repeated here in rules 3, 8, 16 & 25. Also, rule 1. came from an English blogger who’s blog I can’t find now (credit where credit is due… sort of.)

So, here we go.  My first rules for making it in Hollywood. Based on my experience, I wrote down  the 25 most common sense things I could think of. Why 25? I figured you could handle that many.  If I thought if the cast of Jersey Shore was reading, there would only have to be four and I’ll let you guess which ones they are. If you think there are some missing, feel free to chime in.  With no further ado, I bring you my 25 Rules:

1. Always carry a pen.

2. Have specific, time sensitive goals.  Use the pen to write them down. Keep them in a place where you can see them.

3. Save your money.

4. Don’t neglect your family and friends. When the bottom falls out, they are the net that will catch you.

5. Go easy on the cosmetic surgery. There’s a fine line between looking younger and like a surprised floatation device.

6. The best route between Hollywood and Beverly Hills is Fountain Avenue to La Cienega to Burton Way.

7. Always remember that youth and skill are no match for age and treachery.

8. Save your money.

9. There’s no such thing as overnight success.  There are only years of hard work that suddenly pay off.

10. There is a big difference between leaving your mark and marking your territory. Don’t confuse the two.

10. Failure is not an option, it is an inevitable and necessary ingredient of success.

12. Getting knocked down in Hollywood thins out the herd.  Always be sure to get back up.

13. If anyone ever says you’ll never work in this town again, realize it’s only until they need you again.

14. People don’t need a good reason to sue you, they just need a lawyer. Don’t take it personally, it’s just business.

15.  If you don’t love the movie business, find something you love and do that instead.  Love expands and so does bitterness.

16. Save your money.

17. Always make sure you’ve removed the lens cap before rolling.  Success is in the details.

18. The town can smell fear and desperation. Find a way to erase these emotions from your business life.

19. Be nice to waiters, valets and receptionists.  Someday they’ll be green lighting your projects.

20. When someone’s assistant says “actually he/she is in a meeting and can’t talk now.” They “actually” just don’t want to talk to you.

21. Know the difference between providing opportunity and mentoring.  It’s the difference between making someone opportunistic or loyal.

22. Movie making is problem solving. If there are problems, it means that you’re still in business.

23. Never say “to be honest with you” or “I’ll be totally honest.”  These phrases mean that you are not usually honest and your current honesty is an exception to your standard operating procedure.

24.  Anything positive you do or say is instantly forgotten.  Anything negative you do or say follows you forever and makes you a suspect in all the ills of humanity.

25. Save your money.

Culture? I Got Your Culture Right Here

Here’s a question for you; as an artist, entertainer or freelancer, what does corporate culture have to do with you? You’re not a CEO with hundreds of people working under you, so why would you have to think about it? We all have to think about it.  If we don’t, no one will work with us.  Or at the least, if you’re hyper talented, but impossible, people will work with you begrudgingly.

I’ve been involved in a lot of different cultures throughout my working career.  At my first production staff job I was told early on “Our credo is: assume everyone is dumber than you.”  Brilliant!  Grammatically incoherent, promotes arrogance while belittling you all at the same time.  Teamwork wasn’t our thing. It was every idiot for themselves.

My first job at a talent agency was different. I was told by the guy who hired me: “The object of the game here is to devour the top. I won’t be satisfied until you make me obsolete and I’m on the sidewalk looking for a job.”  I don’t think he realized that it would only be three months before he actually was on the sidewalk looking for a job.  I can’t take credit for it.  There was a sudden palace coup that dispatched of him quickly and finally.  Brutal.  It taught me to keep my head down, work hard and never let my bookings or revenue slip.

Looks like the right gear for storming an agent's office.

See, rather quickly it became obvious to me that big talent agency culture was simple: you can have dead bodies piling up in the corner of your office and as long as your bookings are strong, all management will do is send out for air freshener. However, let your bookings slip and they’ll call out for a SWAT team.

So, what is corporate culture?  In essence, it’s the spirit in which groups of people work together.  But, it’s up to each member of the group to individually contribute.  For example:  Good culture would be a movie set where the various departments communicate well towards the common goal.  Great culture would be that the team and individual attitude is ‘serving’ the other departments and the common goal.

Culture tends to be established from the top down, as in the two examples I gave you previously from my own experience.  My favorite movie example of this is in “Tropic Thunder” when Tom Cruise‘s studio head Les Grossman commands the Key Grip to punch the director in the face via Satellite link.  In the real world of movie making there are also examples of establishing culture good and bad.

Jack Nicholson is known for starting up an on set poker game with the cast and crew at the beginning of each movie he does. Invariably, when making movies there’s a lot of waiting around while different departments get ready for a scene. Jack doesn’t hide in his trailer, he spends the time with who’s ever available, building commraderie and passing the time having some fun with those around him.  He’s the boss and he knows it, so he sets a fun relaxed tone with the built in message that waiting is OK.

There’s another actor in Hollywood that arrives for each work day by helicopter. When the crew hears that chopper overhead, they have 20 minutes to be ready to roll camera.  If they’re not, the actor gets back in ther chopper and flies away. Now, there may be good reasons for the actor having to work this way, to each his own. But, the net effect is that the rest of the crew becomes paranoid, anxious and has flashbacks when seeing traffic copters or the opening titles of M*A*S*H.

The individual in the group dynamic is important!  Though it starts from the top down, any team member has the power to make the culture positive or to undermine it.  To make that point, imagine a big lighting setup.  While you are shooting away, someone randomly keeps pulling out plugs. As soon as you get it plugged back in and are rolling again, another one gets pulled on the other side. That is the power of the individual!

So think about it.  What is your individual contribution to the corporate culture of your crew, team or group?  Is it positive or negative? Is it about serving the group or your personal aspirations?

This is a fluid subject. I’m not the poster boy for creating good corporate culture. I think we teach what we most need to learn.  But, I’ve become aware that not only does culture count, if you want to keep your sanity and you want to love going to work everyday it’s essential.

So, how do you change a culture, in an office? On a set? If you’re the boss or department head take a good look at the tone you are setting.  Is it collaborative? Can people ask questions and feel heard in their concerns without feeling their jobs are threatened? Remember, the space shuttle Challenger accident?  The official investigation revealed that the engineers brought up concerns repeatedly. Their concerns were so aggressively rebuffed that they stopped bringing them up out of fear of losing their jobs.

After you’ve done some introspection, write down your personal philosophy of a good working environment and make sure those around you are aware of your feelings.  Then walk your talk and implement your point of view.

If you’re not the boss, it’s all about one thing: ATTITUDE! What attitude are you bringing to the team?  Is it positive? Negative? Self preserving? Secretive? Collaborative? Again introspection is in order. Ask yourself some hard questions. There’s always something to work on.

In the end, attitude always wins out, positive OR negative. But, only you can choose.  The beauty is that you can change the culture around you top down or bottom up. The choice is yours.

Related articles

• How our Culture is Different (davidcummings.org)
• The Cult in Culture (davidcummings.org)
• Ron Ashkenas: Let’s Talk About Culture Change (huffingtonpost.com)

Customer Service

When I was 12, I had a paper route.  I worked for the Hartford Courant, a morning paper.  I was pretty good at getting up early and delivering the papers. But getting paid for my work was another matter.  In those days, the paperboy would have to go every week and get paid from the customers individually for the week of papers on Friday night. Then on Saturday morning, I’d have to go to the paper’s offices and pay the wholesale price for the newspapers I had delivered during the week.

So Friday evenings were an important time for paperboys to work.  But, it was also an important time for 12 year old boys to go to the local skating rink to hang out with their friends and pretend girls were remotely interested in them.  So, invariably I would go and collect just enough money to pay my newspaper bill and get into the skating rink, thinking I would make it back sometime on Saturday to get the rest. Never quite worked out that way and created some customer service issues for me.

In one instance, there was a Mrs. Gaudette who was on a strict weekly budget and insisted I come every Friday night.  After a few times of missing a collection and the ensuing reprimands, then missing a few more times, I just stopped going back out of fear.  I kept delivering papers for 2 years and just didn’t get paid for that house.  What can I say? I was twelve and she was mean, but she was the customer and she made her expectations known.

On the other side of the coin, there was Mrs. Buckley on the next street.  It was 1971, she was alone and her son had been killed in Vietnam early in the war.  She would invite me in while she got her $1.10 together and then talk to me for an hour about her son.  Brutal, but I was polite and I felt so sorry for her.

When we think of customer service, it seems we think of some person on the phone sitting in the midwest or India or my favorite “Peggy” in the Capital 1 commercials.  Basically they exist to listen to our complaints and offer some kind of mediocre or inadequate fix to our problem (whatever it is.)  So really, we think of the worst job in creation.  A never ending array of complaints and demands and anger.

In reality, customer service is one of the most simple concepts in business and at the same time the most complex. Especially for Artists, who are just more interested in the creative elements of the business.  There are Mrs. Gaudettes who intimidate and then are happy to get stuff for free because of it (no, I’m not bitter) and Mrs. Buckley’s who are needy and take a great deal of time.

But, customer service needn’t be the extremes and can be broken down.  First of all, customer service implies or assumes that you already have a customer.  Once someone is a customer, only then can you worry about customer service.  Before that it’s called marketing.

Once you have a customer, the whole drill can be boiled down to one concept: REPEAT BUSINESS.  For all the fancy business rhetoric, charts, facts, figures, personal development and techniques, this is the only real measurement.  How much repeat business are you getting?  If you have consistent repeat business, you are doing something right.  If you don’t have enough, you are doing something wrong in your working process.

Customers do not forget a great experience and they do not forget a bad experience. But, they do forget an average experience or even an above average experience. So, what’s the fix? Give them a great experience, first time, every time.

What is that supposed to mean? It means giving great care to the entire process. In the book ‘Purple Cow,’ author Seth Godin puts it simply: “be remarkable.” The premiss of the book is that if you’re driving through the countryside and you see some cows grazing, you notice them and may think they’re cool.  But, as you keep driving and you keep seeing different versions of brown cows, eventually they just blend into the background. However, if you see a purple cow, now that’s something you’ll remember for a long time. Because, lets face it, a purple cow is remarkable.

Customer service is a lot of things, but mostly it’s going way way beyond what is expected. Way way beyond starts with listening to the customer about their goals, but listening even harder to their concerns and expectations. Nothing can be beneath you to address, no matter how ridiculous and no lengths are too far.

In Tony Hsieh‘s book  about the culture of Zappos.com “Delivering Happiness,” the CEO recounts the story of how he once goaded a client into calling the the Zappos customer service line in the middle of the night to ask “can you tell me where I can order a pizza in Santa Monica and get it delivered at 1am? Remember, Zappos is an online shoe store.  They put him on hold, found the information and gave it to him. That’s customer service!!

It’s preparation, it’s execution, it’s follow up. But, it’s not THAT you do these things consistently, it’s about HOW you do these things. Do you do some of these things begrudgingly? DO you become stressed and yell at subordinates in the heat of battle?  Are you onto the next project after and do minimal follow up?  It’s all seen and it all counts.

A few years ago I heard a great and challenging quote by the speaker and author T.Harv Ecker.  It goes: “how you do anything is how you do everything.”  I think that deep in each of our minds we are programmed to reason: “once I see someone do something, that’s how they do it every time.” That simple concept has kept me from all sorts of laziness, half measures and half cocked stress related mistakes.

So how do you do things?  Are you inconsistent in your marketing?  Do you shy away from the business end of being professionally creative? Is repeat business alluding you?  You have to ask yourself the tough questions to begin to move forward.

After all, with no customers, there’s no point in thinking about service and with no service there are no customers.  It’s a tricky ‘Catch 22.’ What are you going to do about it?

Related articles

• Tony Hsieh on Empowerment – Best Customer Service (bjconquest.com)
• Leadership Hall of Fame: Seth Godin, Author of “Purple Cow” (fastcompany.com)