All Selling Aside With Alex Mandossian

Herman Miller was founded by D. J. De Pree in 1923 and is one of the most profitable in the Fortune 500. While it’s #456 in revenue, it’s #7 in profit. Isn’t that incredible? This is because revenue never equals profit. Revenue is top-line, and profit is bottom-line. Are you wondering how to get more profit, and why Herman Miller has been so profitable relative to its revenue? The answer is leadership, specifically servant leadership. At Herman Miller, the concept is that leaders don’t inflict pain. Instead, leaders bear pain. In other words, leaders aren’t command and control, they’re engage and enroll. Another reason I love using Herman Miller as an example is that Max De Pree, one of my mentors, taught me the three responsibilities of a leader. Let’s shift gears for a moment and talk about agreements, their three functions, and the three ways to handle them. The functions of an agreement are who’s in charge, what’s getting done, and when is it due (or who, what, and when). The first way to handle an agree