I intentionally keep naseba separate from this blog, however, as we are recruiting for Beirut and Mumbai, as well as for our current offices in Dubai and KL , I will use this entry to focus on naseba and to explain a bit of what we are looking for in potential recruits.

Several people have left comments about working at naseba, but I am not involved with recruitment.
Please send your cv and emails to the address listed on the advertisement.
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“naseba is not for everyone” is big and bold on our recruitment collateral.

If you are looking for an easy, cushy job with minimal return… naseba is not for you.

If you are a super bitch, who prefers to sit around and moan and complain about things, or someone who focuses on the negatives in life…naseba is not for you.

If you are sloppy, and have allowed yourself to become grossly out of shape…naseba is not for you.

If you are looking to be challenged to use your talent to the fullest; become the best, sharpest and successful person you can become – naseba is for you.

Download the recruitment criteria

“Pressure is a privilege.”  Billie Jean King

This is what Billie Jean King reportedly, replied when someone asked her how it felt to be playing in her first U.S. Open.

I like this quote.

I have hammered a similar theme over and over ….too many people waste their time searching for easier, cushier ways to go through life.

…we tend to forget that all great men and women who achieve extraordinary things … they didn’t t just “stumble” to the top of their proverbial summit; they didn’t just achieve without making it happen.

Think about the great people in your life.

What makes them great?
Are they constantly looking for cushier, easier ways to do things?  Probably not.

I think most people understand (but we often forget) that the greatest things in life are the hardest to achieve.

As Billie Jean King said, pressure is a privilege … if it was easy, everyone would go to the US Open.
If it was easy, everyone would be successful.

I recently, saw the movie “Social Network” supposedly, the story about facebook and how it began.
I enjoyed the movie very much.

However, for me …. the real “great story” in the movie and book is Sean Parker’s story.

Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning changed the world as we once knew it — they created the first online music swapping site – Napster.

Napster was instantly popular, but lawsuits from the music industry killed the site, and both Fanning and Sean Parker got sued to oblivion.

Incredible to think:  Sean Parker (comparatively speaking), didn’t make any money from developing something which changed the music and movie industry.

Over the years, I have thought of Sean… and always wondered what it would be like to change the world, yet —receive nothing for it,and get sued to the point of ruin.

How many people could come back from this kind of disappointment???
Imagine you and your friend launching the idea for what became itunes… and have to watch others make billions from your idea….

….most people in the same situation would become crippled by negativity, and probably just sit around and moan and complain for the rest of their lives…

For many years after Napster, (from all the interviews I have read) – Sean was nearly broke and had to sleep on his friends couches…but he kept fighting to succeed.

His genius and persistency paid off …

Sean Parker played a crucial role in launching facebook to what it is today.

Once again, he changed the world.

It’s a great story – not because Sean Parker is finally a (well deserved) multi-hundred millionare…

But because he never quit climbing and chasing his summit.

No matter how many times he fell…

He got back up and kept climbing.

We have all made mistakes; we’ve all made poor choices which negatively impacted us.

To be frank:  everyone has fucked up once or twice in their lives …

What’s important is learning from our mistakes, and climbing higher.

A couple of years ago, Michael Vick, a black NFL football star was convicted and sentence to federal prison for his involvement with dog fighting.

I won’t give my opinion on whether I think he would have gone to jail if he was a “white” star athlete …
Nor will I give my opinion on whether I think serving 21 months in a maximum federal prison was necessary, considering he didn’t fight Lassie against Hooch.

I definitely wont adventure into discussing why Madoff who stole billions, ruined countless people’s lives sits in a medium security, camp-like prison, but black Vick went to a maximum security … for dog fighting.

None of that has to do with today’s theme…so I will keep my opinions on those issues to myself.

At the end of the day, what Mike Vick was allegedly involved with was illegal, and a jury of his peers found him guilty, convicted him … and he served 21 months in prison.

Michael Vick made some poor choices, and suffered the consequences for his poor choices – however, his mistakes did not hurt the lives of others; he did not kill anyone; didnt steal billions; he didnt rape….
(just to be clear:  in my opinion, theft, murder, rape, etc …. are not mistakes or poor choices, they are heinous crimes)

After he served nearly 2 years in a maximum federal penitentiary, he was released … and spent another 2 months in home confinement before being released.

During this time, he went bankrupt – losing something like 100+ million dollars…

After he got out of prison –  the Philadelphia Eagles (one of the only NFL teams who would) decided to give Vick another chance.

To make a long ramble short – Michael Vick (his first full season back in the NFL) is having an incredible year, and has guided the Eagles to the top of their division in American football.

What a great story – the guy fuck’s up … accepts the consequences for his actions, doesn’t moan or complain about the severity ….and serves his time.

Many people would have been further sucked down by negativity; or feel sorry for themselves for the rest of their lives — the guy lost everything, and had  to start over….

I really hope to see him win the super bowl.

This blog is motivated by an email I received yesterday from an old staff who worked for me in Shanghai back in 1999 … I havent heard from this person since 2000, but his email and his mention of a couple stories in his mail motivated me to post this blog…..because it blends into the theme I have been recently discussing: “the importance of core values.”

When I first opened an office in Shanghai back in 1999 for the previous company I worked…..

I was in the right place at the right time and recruited a couple great sales leaders to help me build an army of successful operations, production and sales people.

The office took off quickly, and within a few months we had 70 mainland Chinese employees making their success happen – even though we had American, Australian, New Zealand, Chinese and British employees, the office had been built by people who all had similar, or the same “core values.”

Within just a few months, the Shanghai office became one of the most consistent, and best performing offices in the company —  so the CEO of Asia (based in Sydney) asked me to watch over the Hong Kong office while the General Manager of that office was on a 3 week vacation.

The Hong Kong office averaged less than US$20,000 a week …. I wanted to be the managing director of Greater China, so controlling the HK office was my goal.

As I type, I remember back to that phone call where Simon (the CEO) called me about watching over the office for 3 weeks….

I explained to the CEO of Asia that if my name was going to be associated with the Hong Kong office for 3 weeks, then I had to be able to run the office my style.

He laughingly called me an “arrogant prick” but agreed.

It’s an easy 3 hour flight from Shanghai to Hong Kong…
on the flight, I reviewed the previous 12 months of sales figures for the HK office which also included staffing, recruitment information (where I noticed massive turnover of staff)  There was only one person in the office who seemed to have any consistency, a Hong Kongnese sales woman who was also on vacation for the period I would be in the office.

For the 3 weeks I was in Hong Kong, the company put me up in the Mandarin Oriental hotel – a gorgeous 5 star hotel which I completely took for granted.  (issues discussed in “ode to Marcus Evans…”)

The memo I received the day before my trip stated there were 20 staff working in the Hong Kong office, 18 of them were in sales.

My first day in the office wasn’t a big surprise —  the office was in a gorgeous part of HK, had a view of the harbor, but was messy.

The CEO of Asia knew how competitive I was so he sent a company memo to all the GMs stating that “Scott Ragsdale was running the Hong Kong office for the next 3 weeks.”

As I was walking into the office, a young, good looking British guy was walking out …

I stopped him, and asked where he was going… he told me he had worked for the company for the month, saw no future so had quit the previous week and was just picking up his pay check.

I remember the way the guy spoke to me – looking me directly in the eyes as he spoke,  you could see he had something – a spirit, or a passion, something that not everyone has…

He was dressed very well (I dont mean he was wearing an expensive suit, just very sharp)
I introduced myself, and told him to go back in the office, listen to my morning speech and see if what I had to say was something which might change his mind.

Within a few minutes of the work day beginning, I had a morning meeting with the office to introduce myself.

I also used the meeting to discuss the next 3 weeks…

I explained that we would spend the first few hours cleaning the office up, retraining and getting ready for the next 3 weeks…

I set several ridiculously generous incentives for the 3 weeks (I often gave lavish incentives out of my own pocket to make the job more fun – it was my way of investing)

I told the team that one of the 3 weeks we would break US$100,000 in business for the week (Simon had challenged me to do this because it was something which had never been achieved before in this small office).

As I was speaking, I saw one of the young men roll his eyes to two girls in the office …. and the girls giggled. (all three were Hong Kongnese)

I terminated all three of them on the spot, in the middle of my meeting …. once they were gone, probably 3 minutes later,  I continued the meeting…

I knew all the sales figures, thus I knew these nobodies didn’t really exist anyways….two of them had worked for the company for more than 2 years and in those 2 years didn’t do much, definitely, did not add value to the office so I was certain that I had done what was best for both the office and the company.

As I stood there waiting for the 3 to leave the office, the sharp young British man (Adam Fletcher) came up and told me (I can still hear him say) “I am hooked.”After my meeting he immediately, started to clean up the mess, and his actions got the rest of the team to start cleaning up the office (you could see (clearly) this guy was a leader)

We spent the first morning cleaning, making the office sharp – and then I retrained the sales team – all at the same time, judging who I believed wanted what I wanted …

After lunch, I terminated 4 more because they showed up 15 minutes late … surely, just to say “fuck you” to me.

… so by 14:00 on the first Monday, I had terminated 7 out of the 20 staff …. In an office that I was just overseeing for 3 weeks.

My CEO (Simon) called me later that day from Sydney telling me how the General Manager of the office (a man in his early 30s from Mumbai) had called him on his mobile from his vacation to say ‘Scott Ragsdale is destroying my office!!!’

The CEO knew me well … and gave me the trust and support I needed and told me “he looked forward to seeing my results.”

The following day, my 2^nd day in the office …. I got rid of a few more.

Now the office was down to 8 staff …. 7 of them sales staff.  I was convinced that all 7 had the same “core values.”

The office did US$74,000 that first week; US$48,000 the second week and $108,000 the third week.
(I still have the memo from the Chairman and CEO highlighting the success achieved over those 3 weeks)

Upon reflection – my biggest achievement during those 3 weeks was not the 3 weeks of great sales, but more importantly — I saved the company from losing two exceptional talents – one of them being the young British guy and the other a young American woman who both went on to senior management positions in the company.  (both were quiting or had quit the company the day I arrived)

The British guy, Adam Fletcher worked with me for several years, and was directly involved with closing and developing several million euro of business during his time with the company.

How could I get that shitty little office to do 3 weeks of big business so quickly??

Because … during the 3 weeks I was in that office – I ensured everyone who was with me had the same core values, or if they didn’t have the same values … at least, I was convinced they wanted to have the same values as me.

It’s something I learned when I was just a sales executive in Tokyo …

At the time, I had no power because I was just a newly hired sales staff, but I saw firsthand how one negative staff –  destroyed, or nearly destroyed the bunch.

It was a brilliant management training course – because I saw firsthand how just one negative employee, destroyed the potential success of many – like cancer.

Three years after my Hong Kong adventure, I was based in Europe and was transferred to run the Barcelona office ….Barcelona was a massive office for the company in the number of staff who were in it, but shit figures when it came to business.

My first day in that office I fired at least 15 people, maybe a few more than that – people who came late, left early, or obviously didn’t want what I wanted.

That week, the office had the biggest week it ever had in the 2 years it was open …
(I am sure there are people who still talk about that first week because it was exceptional, like God came down and touched us)

Every manager falls in the trap of wanting to have as many staff as possible to “manage” … but the secret is not the number of staff a manager oversees, but to ensure everyone on the team has the same “core values.”

Much more can be achieved with a small group of people with the same values than can be achieved by a large group of people who have mixed values.

Maybe the best team I ever worked with was TEAM MONACO…

The team was made up of French, Italian, British, and American, but everyone worked together as a team – with the same goal, to be the best ….

From my experience, I dont believe that one can simply blanket the same management style over employees from France, India or China, etc, however, by ensuring the team/office have the same “core values” … the chance for consistency and success is far greater than simply just employing anyone for the job.

What “core values…”  am I talking about….?  will be discussed tomorrow.

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I intentionally, do not use examples from naseba to discuss my point in this blog … this is not to say that we are perfect, or that everyone at naseba has the same “core values”
Unfortunately, as we have expanded, senior management (me included) have slipped in regards to sticking/ensuring everyone has the same “core values.”
I am certain this has slowed us down; prevented us from climbing faster and more efficiently – something which is being reviewed and addressed.

I am not a baseball fan.

However, several years ago, Larry Lucchino, the CEO of the Boston Red Sox promoted Theo Epstein, a 28 year old with nearly, no management experience to be the General Manager of the club – the youngest General Manager in Major League Baseball’s history.

The Boston Red Sox had not won the world series in 80+ years … and promoting a 28 year old with no management experience was extremely, controversial.

I was intrigued.

Imagine being 28 years old and being in charge of the 2^nd most valuable baseball franchise in Major League Baseball.
The pressure must have been incredible – having the entire sport, the media, the other management, and an entire city – all watching and questioning your every move.

So from that day, the Boston Red Sox became my favorite team – and I followed Theo and the Red Sox with great interest.

2 years later, the Boston Red Sox won the World Series.

3 years after that win, the Red Sox won the World Series again.

A brilliant success story.

Larry Lucchino didn’t care about Theo’s age; he didn’t care about Theo’s lack of management experience – he chose Theo Epstein because he believed Theo was the best man for the job.

Yesterday, I promoted Robin Titus, a 25 year old with relatively, no management experience to be the General Manager of the Middle East and Africa.

Robin has been the number one salesman at naseba for the past 5 years.  The past two years, he has been involved helping the producers develop the product, as well as working with marketing to expand our marketing machine.

Although he will have the experienced, senior management support in ensuring his development, and success, he is now the boss responsible for developing/leading/managing our Dubai office which has 43 people; and in charge of developing and expanding our Middle East and Africa business.

I don’t care if Robin doesn’t have a MBA.

I don’t care if he doesn’t have a wealth of management experience.

I don’t care if he is only 25 years old.

Robin Titus has something that age, experience, and no school can teach — he is driven.

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If you work in sales, or want more information on Robin Titus this is worth reading:  http://www.scottragsdale.com/?p=2709