Business Doctors - Management Consulting Gone Wild (10 page)

This explanation was relatively easier to understand. Woody’s glaring glance at Dave could have shred him to pieces right in the Dungeon. But Schneider did not want his well-planned presentation to be interrupted. Woody could find creative outlets for his rage after the meeting was over. Schneider allowed a few seconds of silence and then quickly jumped to the next topic.

“Let’s move on to the narcotics business.”

Phil jumped in, “Remind me again. Who did you meet for your information? I thought your meeting with Romain got cancelled at the last minute?”

“Well, er…” Schneider, taken aback by Phil’s question, struggled to find the right words. He wasn’t sure how much Angie had shared with Woody about the informal updates she was providing him.

“I caught up with a few other people over the phone and got my information.” Schneider kept his fingers firmly crossed inside his pockets, praying that Phil wouldn’t continue probing him further on this topic.

“Let’s focus on the findings,” Woody roared at Phil. “What these guys have found is more important than where and how they found it.”

Woody’s
response did not reveal whether he knew the answer to Phil’s query. But Schneider felt relieved to have Woody on his side and continued.

“Unlike other drug peddling organizations in the area, WFB has traditionally stuck to marijuana. Though WFB does deal in the other hard drugs as well, volume-wise, it’s marijuana all the way. Am I correct in my understanding?” Schneider paused to see if he had been successful in deflecting the group’s attention back to the primary topic. He saw a few heads in the room nodding, the same guys who were nodding when Dave was getting cornered. Why the hell did they have to keep doing that? Martin wanted to get around the table and check their ears to see if they were wearing wireless earphones and head-banging to the music.

“In an attempt to get your customers hooked on, what do you do?” Schneider scanned the room for reactions.

“We mix a small quantity of hard drugs to it in order to make it more addictive. It was Mr. Woody’s father, who started the trend,” a voice in the room explained the modus operan
di. It was Romain, the guy Schneider was originally expected to meet. The meeting had never materialized.

“Are you familiar with Purple Haze and G-13?” Schneider’s question seemed to abruptly dart across to an unrelated topic.

“You don’t deserve to be in the business if you haven’t. They are highly potent variations of grass,” Romain explained with a hint of authority in his voice.

“Potency, my ass,” Schneider’s tone was getting more aggressive as the meeting proceeded. He would never use such language in front of a regular corporate client, but he reckoned that his current audience would respond better to a little tough talking. He was convinced he had Woody to save his posterior in case someone dared to rub him the wrong way in the meeting. The participants in the room were
glued to the wisdom Schneider was doling out. Or with their boss in presence, it was more likely that they were pretending to.

As long as the main boss who paid their fees saw benefit in their work, what his other cronies in the room felt didn’t matter. Of course, there was the risk that some of them could look at Schneider as the bad guy out to get them. But the consultants were not directly pointing fingers at anyone in particular in the room. They were just highlighting
the flaws in the business processes.

Schneider could only hope that the difference between the two approaches was apparent to the men in the room.

Schneider continued, “No one has actually verified these claims of highly potent strains. Most of such stories are a marketing strategy to gain a premium from the street junkie for the dope sold on the street. The poor customer down the alley obviously does not have a scientific background to challenge any of these claims.”

“WFB doesn’t have its own potent strain. Your strategy of mixing drugs may come close to replicating it. But do you think it’s delivered the results you wanted?”

“I’d think so,” Romain, the drug guy, replied but this time his tone didn’t exude confidence.

“On the contrary, by doing that you accomplish two things – you drive away your customers and you kill your profits as well. Want to know how? Your marijuana customers get addicted to your highly potent dose and realize there’s a more exotic world out there. Eventually they move on to hard drugs and then there’s no turning back. Also, as the cost per gram of heroin is much higher than marijuana, the additional volume of marijuana that you sell would hardly be enough to cover the losses.”

“This ends up squeezing WFB’s profits,” Schneider carefully left out the other part that Angie had mentioned about Mr. Woody’s family jewels also getting squeezed. Ironically, though Angie had no direct involvement in Woody’s business matters, her thoughts and words had a greater influence in the Dungeon and on WFB’s business than she realized.

“The guy is good. He seems to know more about it than our own guys in this room, ya know what I mean. Where did ya find him?” Joe sitting next to Woody whispered in his ear. But Woody was in no mood to promote Schneider’s fan club.

“Good time for a lunch break?” Schneider saw that the interest in the room was waning. The group agreed and went out into the lawn.

Power lunches and long drawn meetings had never been part of the proceedings at WFB. Today was an exception. Martin had suggested the agenda for this meeting. Joe had obliged and made the arrangements on his request without asking too many questions.

The cool breeze in the lawn and the bright sky was a contrast to the meeting room environment. It provided a well-needed break for Schneider and Martin as well. The bright green grass was immaculately manicured and provided relief for Martin’s eyes. As the laptop operator, he had been staring at the screen to control the presentation. The images on the wall were too unaesthetic for his taste. He had worked hard on the data and the presentation slides and felt no urge to stare at the dismembered images on the wall like everyone else.

Schneider was happy with the goings on so far. He did wonder if his resolve to keep the corporate talk at a minimal level had succeeded. Usually in his fact finding presentations with other clients, he was used to a lot of cross-examination from the experts on the other side. The gangsters from this group seemed tame in comparison. Woody’s presence made all the difference. Without Woody, his goons would’ve devoured him and Martin in the first five minutes.

Woody was in a somber mood and did not seem to be in the mood to talk with anyone. He focused on having his food while others around him were engrossed in conversation. Martin and Schneider had each other for company. None of the guys around came over to have a friendly chat.

Woody had arranged for a sumptuous lunch for his guests that afternoon. The consultants were there to pull his sinking Titanic out of the deep cold currents that were sucking it in. Not a mean feat for the consultants. For that they deserved special treatment.

Martin had been to several corporate luncheons, but his eyes always lit up whenever mouth-watering dishes were laid out before them. He was a hard-core foodie. The ambience, Mr. Woody and his henchmen were not going to distract him from enjoying his culinary pleasures.

Schneider just decided to pick up a chicken sandwich and some juice to help wash it down.

For Woody’s men, this formal working lunch was an u
ncommon event. “There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch,” Woody senior would frequently quote, as if this was his original brilliant one-liner. But here they were, staring at free lunch. They eagerly stuffed themselves with as much food as possible. It wasn’t as if this was the last meal before a long and torturous journey through the desert. But they almost seemed like they were saving some of it, as reserve fat, for the long haul.

Chapter 9

After the quick lunch break, the team was back in the dingy Dungeon.

“Ok, gentlemen, let’s get back to business,” Schneider tried to stop the private conversations that had started in the room and get the attention back to the primary topic. “We talked about several individual businesses before lunch.  We covered casinos and the drug business. From all that you saw on the wall, what did we learn?” Schneider pointed at the wall where the projected images were being displayed.

“That all those colorful, geometric shapes would’ve looked better if the wall had white paint?” Joe offered to break the ice.

“Yes, and anything else,” Schneider asked in an encouraging voice and looked around the room.

No one volunteered with any response. The heavy lunch may have had something to do with the lackluster start to the second half of the meeting. From Schneider’s experience in conducting such marathon meetings, post-lunch sessions were always slow and painful as overloaded digestive systems within the meeting rooms tried to cope up with the sudden influx of exotic food. Schneider had no control or influence on many aspects in the meeting room, including the metabolism rates of his audience. But he had to go on, and he did.

“We spent some time with Lenny in L.A. and in the San Fernando studios. In the porn industry, you generate a great deal of content. But you have very little presence in the packaging and distribution aspects.” 

Schneider was aware he wasn’t talking to a bunch of business school graduates and most of the jargon he used would sound like Greek and Latin to the esteemed members present in the audience. No buzzwords, keep it simple, he kept reminding himself. But there were times he’d have to resort to technical terms.

“And why would these areas be important? Because that is where the money actually lies. On the other hand when you peddle drugs on streets, you think the money is good. What you don’t realize is that it pales in comparison to the money that the other guys have made
before
it reached you.”

Martin who was quiet so far wondered why Schneider was beating around the bush when a single sentence could summarize it all. So he moved in for the kill.

“We would term it as wrong positioning in the value chain,” Martin said with a confident smile and looked at Schneider.

But Schneider didn’t seem to appreciate the helpful gesture. References to
value chain
and
wrong positioning
weren’t the best phrases to unleash on the half-asleep gentlemen with less than half-capable brains present in the meeting.

Schneider picked up the ropes. “In the casino business, you are getting fleeced by your own employees as well as your customers. We are talking about downright fraud here.”

Schneider knew there was at least one person in the room who was getting serious about all this. But Woody’s expression concealed any concern that he might have been feeling. Woody might not have been one to roll up his sleeves and get into the details, but this business was all he had that justified the power he wielded. Without WFB, Woody was as good as dead.

“With all that we just covered, I guess you are with me when I say that there aren’t too many reasons to be too thrilled about.” Schneider walked around the room and looked at Martin who suddenly started fiddling with the laptop trying to put up the next slide on the screen.

After years of working together, Martin seemed tuned into Schneider’s approach to client interactions. It was obvious from the body language the two displayed that the agenda for the day had been prepared,
practised and debated before the live performance in the Dungeon.

“Enough of the complicated business-talk. Let’s move to some plain and simple stuff now.” Schneider tried to change the pace and the focus.

“We could categorize an organization such as WFB based on the average age of its members, the kind of money it deals in and the variety of activities that it carries out. You have all been in this business for a long time and you should be able to picture in your mind as we describe each category.”

Martin realized Joe’s eyes were drooping. But he was still in his chair, his posture erect.

“To begin with we’d have what we refer to as
Wanna-be
guys. They find gang-life glamorous and fascinating. These are generally school dropouts who want to be associated with gangs in the hope that they’d get respect. They do not follow any guidelines and can act without feeling guilt and regret. They try to act, dress and talk like gangsters. You’ll find plenty of them in schools and around many of the neighborhoods.”

Joe’s posture was changing now. He started leaning towards Woody. Every few seconds Joe would open his eyes abruptly and stare straight ahead. Then his eyes would start drooping again. Martin gestured to Schneider who took a quick glance at Joe and went back to the presentation.

“Higher up in the pecking order would be
Scavenger Gangs
. They tend to be disorganized and because of this the level of success they achieve is limited. They have a tendency towards violent and unpredictable acts. Many of the crimes they commit are not planned in advance.”

After six subsequent posture corrections, Joe’s head finally rested on Woody’s shoulder. Woody responded with a tight whack on his arm, and Joe was back in his upright position, eyes wide open again. He was still staring straight ahead. The guys sitting across the table were enjoying the show. Schneider continued to ignore the parallel entertainment show.

“
Territorial Gangs
come up next. In comparison to the earlier two, these guys are a little more organized. They fight to retain their respect and control within their own territories and frequently use violence and fear as tools to achieve this. They resort to selling drugs and other crimes to sustain themselves. But their primary focus still is not on profit. Many members come from difficult homes. They use graffiti and signs, mostly to establish their presence and right over their territory, and for communication.”

Joe was awake. He rubbed his eyes with his palms, stretched his arms behind the chair and let out a big audible yawn. Schneider was getting distracted and Woody seemed to notice it.

“Good heavy lunch, huh? Go splash some water on your face and become useful!” Woody said in an admonishing manner. Joe got up from his seat and left the room sheepishly. Schneider was back into his presentation.

“Finally, highest up within the evolution pyramid, you’d have the most organized of the lot, the
Corporate Gangs.
They work towards maximizing their profits. They do not get involved in territorial wars like the other groups, as they do not see this as meaningful use of their energy. They have strict guidelines that members have to follow and deviating from these rules can mean severe penalties…irrespective of whether those mistakes were committed intentionally or not.”

Joe returned back, looking refreshed. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t sleep well yesterday,” he muttered as he quietly slunk in the chair as if nothing had happened.

“Welcome back, Joe. Ok, guys. That’s the end of the theory session. Let’s play a game now.”

“I like games,” said Joe announcing his new found energy. He was going to be an active, enthusiastic member of this discussion, he had promised himself as he had splashed water in his eyes. He wanted to redeem himself.

“Good. This one’s a general knowledge game. I’ll flash a few images on the projector. People, hand signs, graffiti, attire. Tell me if you recognize them. We’ll start off with some symbols. Martin, can you jump to the symbols slide please?”

As Martin flashed through the slides, WFB members called out names of gangs they belonged to. Competition and the presence of their boss were bringing out the dormant desire in them to flaunt their knowledge. They couldn’t appear like rookies.

“Domes use that ‘U’ symbol. It stands for unity. But we prefer to call them Dumbs.” Schneider could hear snickers in the room. He continued looking at the projected images as they rolled on one after another amidst sarcastic comments from the attendees in the room.

“The broken ‘P’ with the arrow belongs to Penaks. Meant to denote power. Not that they have any.”

“The ‘
Bleeding Eye
’ tattoo is used by our good old friends, Skaros. Idiots didn’t realize there was a similar one used by
Crima Donna
several years ago. Serious identity crisis issues for them.”

Martin flashed another symbol that looked like a ‘W’ shaped pointed trident with a handle.

“Looks familiar?” Schneider asked.

“Of course, that’s our logo.”

“And these graffiti signs, these colors, these hand signs?” Schneider continued to run through the slides quickly without waiting for a response.

“WFB,” Woody responded to Schneider’s open query for the first time during the meeting. His voice was cold and emotionless “What are you trying to say, Schneider?”

Schneider looked at Woody. So he was listening to his story all along.

“You think you are a corporate gang, but you act and operate like a territorial gang. Your energy is spent on petty things, most of them short-sighted and unplanned…revenge, vendetta, territorial brawls, ambushing rival gangs,” Schneider paused for a while and then went on, “There are over six hundred gangs operating in California and currently you are competing directly with these competitors for money, respect, space, people and customers. Judging by the way this number has grown over the last few decades the situation is only going to get worse for you guys in the future if you continue operating the way you’ve always had.”

“Six hundred gangs!” Joe exclaimed. “Never knew that.”

Schneider added, “WFB has grown much too big for its boots. There are far too many people involved in far too many activities. The cohesiveness, the glue that’s needed to bind the organization together is missing. As the leader of this organization, there’s very little control and visibility for you here at the headquarters.” Schneider was sure he’d get some reaction from that last statement, but he was wrong again.

Schneider continued, “This applies to almost all areas, whether it’s recruitment, or maintaining links with customers and those who supply your stuff. Apologies for saying this bluntly, but several people who manage these individual businesses do not have the skills and the specific capabilities needed for that business. In simple terms, they are not fit for the job.”

Martin let out a little gasp
.
Did he really say that?

Schneider did not seem bothered with whatever he had said and continued. His voice was louder now. The pace with which the words came out of his mouth increased. Schneider was on a roll.

“No one has a clue about the money. On the face of it, there appears to be a lot of activity in the business, but where are the profits? Considering all these aspects, I’m surprised that the business is still up and running. Any other business in a similar situation would’ve gone down a long time back. It’s possibly your goodwill that’s keeping you afloat and I can say for sure that this wouldn’t last for ever either.”

The demons that had possessed his body for the last several minutes turned to green smoke and escaped into the air-conditioning ducts, leaving an exhausted Schneider behind.

There was silence in the Dungeon, an eerie uncomfortable lull. Everyone seemed to be waiting for someone else to speak up and break the awkward silence. All heads veered towards Woody who had his arms crossed across the table and his gaze down. He wasn’t studying the granular irregularities of the table for sure.

Finally Woody spoke up. “Schneider! All that you just said -”

Martin waited with bated breath for the axe to fall.

“- requires a lot of balls, and I appreciate it,” said Woody.

That’s it? Woody wasn’t going to chop his head off? Schneider was relieved. He waited for Woody to commend them on the fantastic analysis he had done, in digging out all the issues and putting them on the table in such a short time.

“Now that you’ve told us what the problems are, how can we fix them?” Woody was not a details man, for sure. Schneider wasn’t even sure how much of the analytical information that he presented in the past two hours actually made sense to the people sitting in the room.

“I apologize if I offended anyone. I don’t have anything personal against anyone. I’m just amazed at the total lack of basic processes in an organization as old as yours. But to answer your question, Mr. Woody, the logical next step would be to address each of the areas that we talked about today. Tackle the people and capability issues to begin with. In parallel, look at how many of the other issues can be managed.” Schneider kept his response short and very general. He did not want to present any magical pill to the group sitting in front of him.

“That sounds fine, Schneider. You do seem to know our business better than we do, as Joe pointed out to me during your presentation. You’ve dissected WFB like an expert surgeon -”

Schneider cringed as he imagined where this analogy was going. In order to prevent Woody from inflicting any more damage on the pristine image of management consultants, he interrupted Woody, “Thanks, Mr. Woody. It is always good to hear from clients that they found our analysis useful. I hope WFB manages to address the issues that we’ve highlighted today and the profits start to come back soon. Thank you for your cooperation during the study phase of the project. And good luck”