Driven by a commitment to excellence
The best companies in the world are not driven by the things they sell but a commitment to excellence to a certain something.
Whether it’s a company that’s been around for a long time, or a new comer, the best and brightest companies are driven by conviction.
I asked my team at Unity Central — Does Nike sell shoes or do they sell a commitment to excellence?
It’s the latter. Nike sells shoes, amongst other things, but their core is driven by a commitment to celebrating excellence in athletics.
In their advertisements, you won’t actually see the shoe itself. Maybe a glance. But mostly you’ll see Serena Williams playing tennis or Lebron James dunking a basketball.
Nike could come out with Nike ‘Milk’ tomorrow and people would buy it, thinking that if I drink that milk, it might help me jump higher or play tennis like John McEnroe.
Apple, albeit sells (IMO) the best Unix based operating system in the world — but that is because they are driven by a commitment to excellence in security and user experience.
I asked my team what they felt what our commitment was — just to see if they had remembered our original discussion when the project was just getting going.
I was happy to hear that Unity Central’s commitment is to bring excellence to data and information solutions. When our compass wavers, we can always come back to this sentence.
It made my day.
Chicken and egg situation if you get philosophical about it. And in some cases, we may never know. With Nike, I’m pretty sure they started out with that commitment — with a focus on track, cross country etc — before signing Michael Jordan.
With Apple, I believe they had some internal struggles in regards to the conviction of their company. The firing of Steve Jobs was indicative of that. Jobs was fired for sticking to Apple’s commitment to excellence in security and user experience — inside and out during the creation of the first Apple computer, even if it didn’t look very good on the quarterly earnings report.
If you go back, to say Savile Row, in London, these haberdasheries have stood the test of time, making the finest of wares for the Royal family to myself for hundreds of years.
I once went to Gieves and Hawkes — and I asked for something, and they very kindly said that “Sir, I think you might find a better fit for your request next door.”
Conventional wisdom would dictate that the company next door is a competitor, but Gieves and Hawkes has a commitment to the way they make their jackets and suits. Their lapels reach for the sky — and anyone with a discerning eye can appreciate it and say that jacket was made by Gieves and Hawkes on Savile Row, in Mayfair, London.
You might want to try Mr. Porters, he said gently, as he poured me a whiskey, neat, for there are no ice cubes in England.
I was amazed by the comfort in his voice.
As someone who was visiting and journaling from America, why would you turn away a customer? Well, when you’ve been around as long as Gieves and Hawkes, you know that a simple piece of advice gives your company an aura of ‘we’ll be just fine without you’.
So guess what happened, I went to Mr. Porters, and they were a little more relaxed in their mannerism. You could tell they were sort of the new kids on the block. I bought a pair of suede shoes from them and then went back to Gieves and Hawkes — and I said, you know, “dealers choice sir”. I picked out the pattern and the color but after that I gave them the creative liberty that they owned.
Long story short, do not jump when the customer says jump. Reach back to the commitment you made to yourself, your company and then if your commitment is real and true, your customers are the joyous recipient of that commitment.
Happy 4th of July,
