Lessons in Leadership: Making Decisions

Lee Coulter: Service, Leadership, and Other Stuff from Lee... As Shared Services leaders you are entrusted with making decisions that, today, increasingly impact the output of the organizations you represent. The biggest challenge, therefore, lies in understanding what the organization requires, so that you can meet its needs through Shared Services support. Lee Coulter, CEO of Ascension Health Shared Services, shares his best leadership lesson on decision-making. The best lesson in leadership I ever received was a "gift" of sorts from one of the greatest leaders I have ever worked for. One day, I was reviewing a spreadsheet with a ton of data on it, with him. There were about 9 different options for action, and I was going into great detail on each. The spreadsheet had taken me a considerable time to put together, and I was sharing all the costs, risks, and considerations. After half hour, he got mad at me and shouted: "What do you want from me right now?" I said, "I need a decision!" He said, "There is no way that I will ever know as much as you do about all of this – and frankly, I don’t want to! " He went on to say, "Why are you here? If I have to make this decision, then what do I need you for?" (I acknowledge this was pretty harsh, but there is a point.) I didn’t have an answer. I was fuming mad and couldn’t form an acceptable response. After an uncomfortable silence, he asked me, "Do you know what we are trying to do? Do you know what our goals are?" I answered, tightly, "Yes." Then he said one of the most profound things I have ever been told: "Then why are you here? To do what I tell you?! Let me tell you something: Don’t do what I tell you. Please don’t ever do what I tell you!" He went on: "You know more about all of this stuff than I ever could. You know …" He trailed off, then said, "Lee, there is no way I could make all the right decisions. Just want what I want. Then you will know what the right decision is." Then he asked me, "Do you know enough about what I want?" I said I did not. For the next week, he had me clear my calendar, and sit in his office for 12 hours a day. I was like this weird wallflower. I sat in a corner. People came in, people went out. He put every call on speakerphone. Folks looked at me weirdly on their way in and out of his office. Before and after meetings, he would ask if I needed to understand what was about to be discussed or what had just been discussed. Late that Friday, he stopped what he was doing, looked up at me, and asked, "Now do you know what I want?" "Yes", I replied. He asked if I still needed him to make that critical decision. "Nope," I said, "I’ve got it from here." And I walked out. Coincidentally, that week and all that it has taught me over the years is one of the greatest gifts I have ever received. So here is what it means to me today, as leader of Ascention Health's growing Shared Services team: I know that 99% of the decisions we make are more or less irrelevant. It’s like when you leave your house to run to the store. There are many ways to get there. Left turns. Right turns. Lights. Time of day. Traffic. They all factor into your decision-making. But you always arrive at the store, irrespective of which decision you took. The same applies to our work. More often than not, the organization is just coming up to a light and needs to know: Turn left? Turn right? Straight? Make a U-turn? There are some times when the path you choose to get somewhere will matter. It might take more or less time. Might take more or less resources. Might carry more or less risk. But for a whole lot of stuff, we just need to know which direction to go that day, to keep us on the path to our eventual destination. The other thing that comes into play is how much information is needed to make a good decision in any situation, so I spend a lot of time figuring out how relevant a decision is to our overall goal at Ascension Health. I invest a lot of effort in sharing, with my team and direct reports, what I want us to be for Ascension Health, what the organization wants from us. I want to leave as many decisions as I can to the folks who are way better informed than I am about what is needed at that precise moment. The 1% that remains…? That relates to decisions that have to do with what the path is, and what the destination is. What it looks and smells like. So the most important decisions I make are about the what rather than the how. The power of an organization lies in mobilizing to get somewhere. The specifics of the where are the most important things I have been entrusted with deciding for my organization. NOTE: Lee Coulter heads Ascension Health's Ministry Service Center, which is in the third year of a six-year implementation for all healthcare entities in Ascension, the largest not-for-profit health system in the United States. By the end of calendar year 2014, the Ministry Service Center will support 150,000 associates as clients across the US. MSC is also in the early stages of supporting other key initiatives within Ascension, such as launching a new Service, Ascension Travel Services in partnership with Ascension Holdings, a division of Ascension. The Ministry Service Center was the winner across two categories in SSON's 2014 Shared Services Excellence Awards: once for "Culture Creation", and a second time for "Improvement and Innovation." [eventpdf] About Lee Coulter: Lee Coulter has had an impressive career, and is broadly considered one of the leading Shared Services practitioners in North America today. Now in his 8th industry, Lee was previously Senior Vice President of Global Shared Services at Kraft Foods and a leader of Kraft’s corporate wide "Organize for Growth" transformation initiative. In this role he implemented shared services in nine global functions, delivering support across more than 70 countries and completing major outsourcing transformation "mega-deals" in IT, HR, and facilities management. He created and led the Shared Services Center of Excellence and the Outsourcing Center of Excellence at Kraft. While there, he also received Chairman Roger Deromedi¹s CEO Award for his efforts. Prior to joining Kraft, Lee served as Vice President of Infrastructure Services at AON Corporation, where he implemented ITIL and shared services, reduced costs by more than 35%, and integrated legacy infrastructure from a long acquisition strategy, finally outsourcing IT to CSC. Lee spent 15 years with GE in a multitude of roles culminating in VP of GE’s outsourcing business. He also spearheaded the Company’s global Y2K initiative and served as a technical and operating executive in its Healthcare Services business, including as an expatriate in China. He received the President¹s Award from GE CEO Jeff Immelt. Lee holds a BS in Electronics Engineering from DeVry University and has completed all course work for a BS in Electrical Engineering and a Masters Degree in Biomedical Engineering at California State University at Long Beach. When not leading MSC, Lee can be found in his workshop, making sculptures out of wood and stone. He will be writing a weekly column for SSON's website in which he will share (nearly) everything that comes across his desk these days. More from Lee next week...

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