March 19, 2011
All Are Welcome at His Meetings. (That Means Interns, Too.)
By ADAM BRYANT
This interview with Irwin D. Simon, chairman, president and C.E.O. of the Hain Celestial Group, the natural and organic food and personal care products company, was conducted and condensed by Adam Bryant.
Q. Who were some big influences early on for you?
A. I learned two big things from my father. He was a great person, and he cared about people, and he was very genuine and very nice to people. But my father, who had a little retail store, was not a great businessman. So I had to be a great person like him, but I had to not be a businessperson like he was. So from a leadership standpoint, I never forget where I came from.
And how do I treat people? I am somebody who has learned throughout my career about empowering people, about how I don’t have to be in control. It’s about not having an ego out there. We all have egos, but don’t let your egos get in the way. I don’t have to show people I’m the boss or I’m the leader. Just by treating people right, I find that they want to be part of your team.
Q. What were some other important leadership lessons you’ve learned?
A. There were a couple of inflection points. No. 1, I worked in some corporate environments that were very political. If you got behind the right people, you would do well. And if you didn’t support certain people, you were off the team — your competency or loyalty didn’t matter. You just didn’t make it. So I’m a big believer in the idea that we’re all on the team together, and you have to treat everybody equally. It’s not the select few — here’s the boys club, here’s the girls club. I’m a big believer of bringing everybody in.
The other really big one in my career happened when I was working for a certain gentleman, and I used to ask a lot of questions. One day he pulled me aside and said: “You’re asking too many questions, and you are perceived as smarter than me, and I’m the chairman. And you shouldn’t be perceived as smarter than me.”
I love to be around smart, fun people. And if you’re confident, let your people ask questions, and do things, and speak up.
Q. How do you draw people out?
A. I have a philosophy at Hain that there are no closed doors. Anybody can go into any meeting they want. If you’re not invited, you still can go in. I’m a big believer in getting people comfortable in meetings, making them comfortable to ask questions. And there’s no such thing as a dumb question.
I’ll bring interns into my board meetings. It gives them exposure. This is where they’re going to learn; this is where the grass is going to grow. There were times when board members were saying, why do we bring these people in here? And I said, they are good employees of this company and they’re here to learn. I bring them into important discussions. If we’re talking about acquisitions, I want to know their opinions, their thoughts. It’s not just about sitting through a presentation where you’re going to learn about market data and market share.
Q. How do you get everyone talking in meetings?
A. I’m consistent. It’s not, Monday I mean it, Tuesday I don’t. It’s just been the way from the beginning here. I will say, “What are your thoughts on that?” It comes back to, you hire good people who are smart. You’re not going to embarrass them. The point is to make them feel good. There were some situations in my career where some nasty things were said to me. There’s scar tissue from that stuff. I think it’s important, with people who work with me, to spoon-feed them.
Q. What do you mean by spoon-feed them"?
A. Spoon-feeding them means playing to their strengths, to help them build confidence. It’s not just my senior executives. It’s everybody. You should know what people want because I know what I want. I know how I like to be treated. And you just take that and say, how do I treat people in the same way?
Q. What’s your approach to building a culture?
A. I look at my days of playing sports and you apply that to business today — where’s your strong offense, where’s your strong defense, building a team. I was always a part of a team. We huddled, we won, but we also got beaten up sometimes. A lot of times when I’m with my people, I talk about sports and I talk about offense and defense and talk about how we played short-handed.
As C.E.O., I look at myself not as chief executive officer, but as chief energy officer, chief cheerleader. I’m a big communicator by telephone and by person. I’m not big on writing the whole staff my holiday observations and where we’re going and what’s the strategy. You’re never going to see me do that. I’m just big into communicating face-to-face, eye-to-eye and not through e-mail. Part of what’s happened today is we lose a sense of communication because everything is done electronically.
Q. People may say that sounds great, but there’s just no time to do it face-to-face.
A. It comes back to, what are your priorities? Am I doing that for everybody in every place? No. But I live by this philosophy: I juggle 13 balls, and there are certain balls I never drop.
Q. What else did you see in your previous corporate jobs that you’re making sure to avoid in your company?
A. Within corporate America, I learned that people are put in a box — you are an accountant or you are a marketing person, and basically, you were labeled for life. So I love to take a marketing person and put them in finance, or I’ll take a finance person and put them in marketing. I believe in taking people out of their box, taking them out of their comfort zone and putting them into other areas.
Q. What do you do if people say, “That’s not my comfort zone”? How does that conversation go?
A. How do you grow in life? Look at the exciting opportunity for you. I love people to move to other parts of the world, just to see how the world works. I try to push people to do other things and see other things.
Q. How do you decide if somebody is right for a new box?
A. Sometimes it’s just my gut. I have a hole to fill, and this person seems to be right to try it. At the end of the day, what’s the worst situation? They’re not going to take us down; they’re not going to destroy the company. Let’s go do it. And that’s what it comes down to. There is no science. There is no major interviewing process. It’s just I think they have it, and I sell the idea. And that’s kind of what’s fun about what I do. I’m a big believer in the idea that you’ve got to push people. They can get in this comfort zone, and if you don’t push them, they get very comfortable.
I don’t believe in organization charts, and we don’t have organization charts. You should know what you have to do. You should know what’s necessary. I can’t tell you the last time I looked at an organization chart within my company.
Q. Let’s shift to hiring. Let’s say you’re interviewing me for a senior position. What are you looking for and what questions do you often ask?
A. I interview almost every person who comes into the company. I’m not hiring all of them, but the reason I want them to meet me is, if you’re coming to work for us, you should meet the head of the company and believe in the person running the company. But if I were interviewing for a head of finance, I’d ask you a lot about your financial skills and I want to understand your background and what you’ve done in your life and in your career.
I’ll sit down and say: Tell me about yourself. Tell me what you’ve done. Tell me what you’ve accomplished. I love it when people tell me about their kids and their family. I don’t care if you’re the smartest marketing person or financial person, but you’ve got to be a human being first. To me their experience is important, but their personality, their experiences really matter.
And then I usually have a good gut feel about whether they’re a good person and whether they’re sincere. And I come right out and ask them: Do you believe in what we’re doing? Do you live a healthy lifestyle? Do you believe in natural organic products? Because if you don’t, don’t come work for us.
Q. Can you talk more about the intangible qualities you’re looking for?
A. I look for people who can grow, who can do more, who can take on more responsibilities.
Q. And how do you find that out?
A. Are they a risk-taker? Do they want to stay in their box? Do they want to do other things? I also look for people who would want to move, who would want to go abroad, who would want to do that. And we’ll come out and ask them that. I like people who want to make money. I want to hear about schools, where they live, stuff they want to do because they’ve got fire in their belly. I look for that fire in the belly. I look at their eyes and I look for whether they can look me straight in the eye. I can’t stand it if someone’s eyes are moving all over the place and they’re looking down or up. I really look for confident people, secure people.
Q. What else do you ask about?
A. Whether they played sports. I believe in playing sports. It says a lot about leadership that you went out there, and were part of a team. Or were you involved in school politics? Were you on a student council? Did you ever run for presidency of the council? Did you ever do entrepreneurial stuff before?