Part 3: Rollercoaster Indemnity Company reaches its apex

Around them, the Rollercoaster Indemnity Company hummed. From the outside, the nondescript building they had previously shared with a handful of small companies remained the same. Now, however, it was owned and filled to capacity by the Rollercoaster Indemnity Company.

The company needed to expand in order to accommodate its growth. The mentoring program alone took up two full floors – resources worth using now that the long-predicted labor shortage had reached crisis levels.

Stan’s performance measurement process had been calibrated to discover a myriad of important, employee-related truths. By the end of the second year, Stan knew the strengths and weaknesses of every single person at RIC. He used that knowledge to help ensure the right people were moved into the right jobs – jobs in which they felt secure, challenged and necessary.

Whereas other companies lost trained staff on a regular basis, RIC had a near-100% retention. Although other companies scrambled to fill positions from entry level to upper management, RIC’s mentoring program ensured a constant flow of skilled, pro-active employees.

The biannual executive meeting, once a quarterly affair that made Stan’s stomach twist and flutter, was coming up. He was as prepared as he always was, but this time – armed with success – it was easy. Reports generated as a result of his reviews were all the proof the higher-ups needed. The executive had stopped micromanaging nearly six years ago, content to focus on bigger pictures.

Stan’s team of managers was very well trained; their team members were equally so. Every sector, division, team and employee at RIC was aligned with the company’s aims, goals and objectives. The executive told Stan what they wanted done, and let him and his people figure out the best way to do it.

Stan looked up as a man and a woman passed by his window. It was Charlie Watts, head of Claims and Frances Wilton, CFO.

Five years ago, old rivalries and bitter struggles to maintain personal power – by keeping sector strengths secret, for example – would have kept these two at arms length. But eventually the performance management process had been able to illustrate the need for interdepartmental communication – and prove that it was not taking place.

Now all strengths were shared: departments and divisions, each led and staffed by people with varying business backgrounds and lifestyles, gathered to share and learn from one another’s experiences. The resultant success had been almost immediate: old problems were filtered through different eyes and experiences and were therefore solved.

Best practices that worked in one division were tried in others; if efficiency improved, the practice continued. Knowledge spread, and performance standards were raised. Everyone moved in alignment towards a single goal: the increased success and growth of the Rollercoaster Indemnity Company.

And now….

Stan knew this day would come. It was as inevitable as a sunrise. Rollercoaster Indemnity had grown and would continue to grow, but the executive had a different vision – acquisition. He turned the word over and over in his head. It made sense. RIC certainly had the workforce and talent to foray into a new direction entirely should they choose.

They hadn’t, though. Not entirely. Instead, they had just acquired seven floundering insurance companies – and the process was about to begin again.

This time, however, Stan didn’t need to convince anyone of anything. These days everyone knew about the success of Rollercoaster Indemnity and the reasons for it. He smiled.

But what a fight it had been. Milgrin Farquad sat on the fence until a rumor had circulated that Winifred Maus was looking into early retirement. Winifred didn’t retire early, and Stan long suspected that Alfie Mann had circulated the rumor, but he kept that to himself.

The fight didn’t stop there, though. For nearly a year, middle management thwarted almost all of Stan and Alfie’s recommendations.

A majority of the middle managers seemed to think the recommendations were a personal attack. Others believed the power they thought they commanded was in jeopardy. Some were too fearful of change. Others were too lazy to see that the changes were being made.

Whatever the reasons, that fight continued until someone on the executive had had enough. Suddenly, upper management was enforcing the recommendations. Middle management began to moan less and shift more. To their credit, though, once they saw that the system worked – and that with remarkably little effort, great things could happen – they came around to nearly a person.

A few never got it. Winifred Maus was one of these. Stan never learned what really happened to her. There were rumors, of course. But no one had heard anything for a couple of years. Winifred had simply drifted into obscurity, her time having passed.

The industrial revolution was over. The knowledge revolution just beginning. We have to measure brain power, not man power. Stan nodded to himself.

Stan left his office and headed down to the third-floor training facilities, where the heads of each of the seven recently acquired insurance companies – along with their management teams – were waiting. Stan was going to explain to them the process that had taken RIC from a struggling insurance company to a successful umbrella corporation in less than five years.

That was the key, he thought to himself as he waited for the elevator. The key was in recognizing that this is an ongoing lifestyle process, a lifestyle. The applications of this process were literally endless. RIC, for example, was so finely tuned they could now look for other companies to realign.

He smiled as he entered the room and 23 sets of eyes regarded him. He saw curiosity there, some anxiety – even a little bit of stubbornness. Perhaps it wouldn’t be quite as simple as he had thought. But these were very intelligent men and women. He would let the process speak for itself.

And they would understand.