CEO Intern Cast Diary

Hi America I am back, sorry I left you for so long. As is always the case when we speak I have mountains share so sit, read, envision, and engage this blog for time is its spine and immortality is its reward. This past week has served to be another awakening for me, you may ask how many times will I wake? To that question, my response is simple; I will stop when the sun has finally set.

Lets move on to the details of this past week now. This week the five interns, Mr. Paulin and our producer Prescott started the city tours (Parker came too). St Louis was up first and in this city, we did two sales presentations one to a billion dollar military contractor known as DRS and the other to “a plant manager” of Omega steel. On a side note, I put plant manager in quotes because that is the repose I was given when I asked if making a trip to omega steel would be worth our time and gas. As you can imagine getting the door to DRS was no easy task, but thanks to some persistence as well as a few inside connections, we made it to a fancy conference room. Everyone needed to be an American citizen, and have a passport to get into the building, and that is one of the many reasons why Prescott’s camera was not allowed to enter the building. We asked the camera if it had a passport and got no response so we left it in the car with the king of the castle. Sorry we didn’t get the sales pitch on camera America, the presentation was textbook, take my word for it.

In the meeting with us from DRS there was a CTO, metallurgist, several other engineers, and a logician, oh my a logician (as he shakes his head and smiles). This sales pitch is exactly what school is supposed to be preparing me for but ironically, this experience can’t be taught in a class room America there is no simulating reality there is just reality so after graduation, at whatever level that may be remember one thing, school has started (another side note). Four interns presented a power point we created to kick things off.  From slide two our audiences was engaged and asking questions about information on the slides so, we had to pull out our terminator Mr. Paulin earlier than expected. He shot there question out of the sky as if he was shooting trap or skeet, PULL! After the slides were done, the questions continued and Mr. Paulin just kept loading shells.

When the meeting was finished, we made a stop toured Wachovia’s headquarters and continued to our 3’oclock with Omega. I had my reservations about omega but either way I look at it my resulting response is the same. It was an experience for the ages. Omega was like going into a large garage. There was no fancy table or leather chairs like DRS just a plant manager and an assistant in an office. We stood huddled facing the manager while Mr. Paulin politely engaged the man in conversation then bid him farewell. In one day we experienced both sides of the sales experience, one side exceeded expectations and the other was reality check.

Sales was not the only thing we learned about on the trip though, we also learned the importance of being prepared, polite, punctual, organized, aware, intuitive, energetic, dedicated and the list goes on America. The amount I learned in one day as been the theme of this whole trip and that is what  brings me to my current predicament, a question I have been struggling with since week two. The question is how do I say thank you to the Paulin’s for a summer like no other, one that has been filled with life lessons that currency can’t pay for, that a thank you letter alone cannot service. Let me put it this way I have taken a loan from the Paulin bank. My loan does not have an interest rate because the Paulin’s are not concerned with a rate of return but instead with the rate at which I learn. I call it a loan because I plan to repay. I know that I am deeply in debt and since time in this case is inflation, I will never be able to fully repay my debt. The answer then to the question posed above is time and service. The only way for me to make payments on my loan is to use my time and my hands to foster and maintain the relationship that has been established in my time here.

America you stay thank you for the intangible by giving of yourself and never leaving the thoughts of the ones you are indebted to.  Irie I, One Love. Charlie H.         

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Yesterday after working in the office I had a feeling that I could not explain but after CrossFit this morning I understand what I was feeling. CrossFit this morning was a seventeen minute workout designed to leave you on the floor. I completed the workout and stood just fine waiting for the next round, which obviously means that I didn’t push hard enough. I view this as a problem but I also see how this habit of mine works in my favor at times because on one end of the coin I have not seen my full potential and at the other end I do need energy to be able to be productive at work. I have experiences like this on a regular basis. Overall I feel that I am selling myself short but at the same time I may just be throwing all of my similar experiences into one pot and analyzing them as a whole, which means that I may not be considering factors unique to a given experience.

The conclusion that I have come to, which is not really a conclusion, is that I need to push myself, in the office, in the gym, everywhere. I was used to getting pushed by tough coaches and mentors in the past and now it’s all self reliance and motivation. This struggle is one that also applies to my responsibilities as CEO because there is no coach standing behind me screaming PUSH, instead all I have to hold to is my internal drive and individual passion for conquering challenges as I engage them. America, aim to leave it all out on the floor. Irie I, One Love. Charlie H.

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I mentioned in a prior blog that I got to do a short intervies with Jay lefler and Kenny Wallace.  I thought that this was a once in a lifetime oportunity, but I may have been mistaken.  Our associate producer has been calling some race teams that will be in the area in coming weeks and getting some promising responses.  I'm really excited, because 300 Below has been working with the race teams for over 15 years.  I would love to get the chance to interview more drivers.  I would also love to interview thier engineers and pit crews to.

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Yesterday we received and assignment from the chairman. He instructed us each to research nine companies; three in Chicago, three in Indianapolis, and three in St Louis. After selecting the nine companies we are each responsible for selecting one company in each city that we will call and schedule an appointment with, for a total of 15 company visits. There are compensation incentives set out for us as well as being responsible for the dinner reservations after presentations. So can I get an encore, do you want more. Irie I, One Love. Charlie H.

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Overall, I'm pleasantly surprised with the Midwest.  Being born on long island and having spent most of my life within 20 minutes of Boston, I grew up with the stereotype that there’s nothing to do here.  If you like shopping for expensive clothes and surfing, you're right, but if you like tractor pulls and dirt track, you'll fit right in.  Truth be told, I have a strong preference for races that occur on pavement, but I'd take dirt track over the mall any day.  There's just one thing that that puzzles me.  I can't understand why people who dirt tracks in every county and tractor pulls at every fair drive soo slow.  Everywhere we go, the road is full of drivers traveling at or below the speed limit on the straightest, best maintained roads that I've ever seen in my life.  The worst part is the tendency of most people here to assume the speed of those around them.  This leads to an inordinate number of slowpokes riding side by side, for miles.  They can't be bothered to speed up or slow down a fraction of a mile per hour to pass or allow you to do so or drive in the same lane as the car that they're pacing.  This makes me wonder just how they got there.  Did their similar speeds result in them winding up next to each other after hours of driving?  Did they start out together?  Or did one of them just take a liking to the speed of the other during the process of passing them?

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Today was the longest days by far and it was long because we went scuba diving into the financials. We did not complete our analysis and we are not ready to present a proposal for doubling the company’s revenue to the chairman yet. We are however mentally drained; I would like to share something with you that I said today on a phone interview with the Heralds review. The reporter asked me to share something that I have learned so far, I was taken by the question and hesitated because as I started to think about all that I have learned thus far I simultaneously reminded myself that I had only been here a week and a half. I felt that I could have ranted and raved for an hour talking about facing fears as an entrepreneur, time management, people management, planning, communication, foresight, seeing opportunities, and much more. That is why I was hesitant because I said to myself, is it possible to learn about an array of topics in such a short period of time?

The answer is yes, but my answer to the reporter was a bit different. I told her that I learned why this internship is like none other. I used an analogy to it to her, I said that the difference is that normally when taking and internship at a given corporation the intern comes in feeling like clay. Hoping to be molded into something grand and more defined than when they entered. This internship however makes you the potter. As the potter you are responsible for molding this experience in every way, shape and form. From planning to purchasing, from reading to leading, and from managing to…..well more managing. Ultimately this internship is what we make it, and that is the life a CEO.

Irie I, One Love, Charlie H.

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Today what we needed to do and how we needed to do it was felt by all. We sat down with Mr. Paulin today after lunch and it was his last fifteen minutes with us until the upcoming Thursday since he was flying to Washington D.C. . Mr. Paulin let us know that he was aware that the group was on idol but not because of lack of drive or understanding on our part but instead because there are so many forces between the five of us coming into contact with each other. The forces arise since there are five decision makers with five different walks of life.

The office and cabin are our crucibles and the soup inside is what Mr. Paulin referred to as a dynamic situation. His charge to us left his tongue with an aura of simplicity, disguising its complexity. What he said was that there are five that need to act as one and in order to do so we all need to first have the same understanding of what our goal is, the overall goal as well as task oriented goals. When we understand our goals we then need to all agree on a system aimed at measuring task related behaviors and actions, so that we can quantify individual contributions to the completion of a given task.

 

Please understand that in his charge to us he said an infinite more that I can explain or rather than language can express but his words served as a catalyst for the, much needed, group conflict mediation talk that took place after. I will not get into specifics but I will say that a fair amount of underlying tension was fleshed out today. We took steps towards each other talking through our differences and we started to put a wise mans call of duty into action. Irie I, one love.

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We've got most of our surpluss capitol on ebay now and its time to get down to buisness for real. We have untill thursday or Friday to make a plan to double the revenue of the company. There's no time to waste if we're to do a good job on it.

We watched the footage of me interviewing Jay Leffler and Kenny Wallace. It was clear that Kenny didn’t know that I’ve built part of a car that I later raced, but a majority of the people that he’s interviewed by are TV personalities and not engineers. Even more amazing than interviewing Kenny Wallace was meeting his father and seeing him with his entire family. I met his father! Do you know how many NASCAR babies that man has had? But seriously after that it was time to get to work, for real.

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This weekend was relaxing. We finally had some down time to do laundry, clean the cabin, and catch up on some much needed sleep. We got some waterskiing time in too. I was forced to learn slalom skiing when the team found out that I already knew how to water ski on two skis. At first I wasn’t thrilled, I wanted a relaxing spin around the lake on both my skis. The team’s persistence paid off. Not only did they get me to try to get up on a slalom ski, but they got me o do it, with the promise that I could get the other ski when I succeeded. For the first time since we’ve moved in the cabin isn’t covered in clothes, boxes and luggage, which is nice. It took about 10 hours of five people’s work to get I that way.

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Ladies and gentlemen, horses and cows, I come before you to stand behind you to tell you something I know nothing about. This Thursday the day after Friday there will be a ladies meeting. Men aren’t allowed but they are still permitted. Wear your best cloths, if you have none still come. Seats will be provided to sit on the floor, thank you for this wonderful announcement. Well I am strapped for time right now so I am typing and thinking a mile a minute so I apologize if I write in circles or incoherent sentences or have spelling errors. I am afraid I will not have a chance to go into much detail today but much has happened.

My days have begun with this work out program called CrossFit know to Beni as cross fight, I guess it’s a Russian thing. I do the work outs with Lieutenant Paulin in the mornings and since he is off to the Marines soon he is whipping himself into shape via a CrossFit trainer. He told me about CrossFit when I got here since I pestered him about daily exercise. Now the catch to this “great work out” is that I must wake up at 4am and start the work out at 5, which along with the work out being designed as a “burn out” makes cross fit a defining part of the morning since I head to the office right after I get burned out.

Moving on, after working out I went to the office and had our morning meeting then meet with Dave and Mr. Paulin to talk about the product they introduced to us, so long story short we ate lunch with Dave and talked business. Went to tractor pull in the evenings and now I am at the cabin and I just took a bite of the steak that nick took off the grill so got to go if I want to get to sleep soon.

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I woke up this morning and did CrossFit with Charles and Beni with some varied dead lifts after running both forward and backward on a treadmill.  On our drive to the office, I called in to 102.9 FM and made an on-air suggestion for getting cryogenically treated golf clubs from 300 Below for father's day.  The host seemed to know about the process and underscored that it worked.  Later in the morning, the interns met with John Koucky to learn more about the cryogenic process.  I spent some time on the phone with our friends over at Xerox to figure out how to use their new solid ink MFP effectively.  The team then went to lunch at Mojo's Barbeque to meet a potential business contact and decided to head home early because they were feeling tired.  (See this link: http://tinyurl.com/4ycxdm)

I stayed at 300 Below until 6pm, closed the office and then left for the Macon County Fair, where we introduced the CEO Interns to tractor pulling-- which none of them had experienced before.  I left the race around 10pm to get home and prepare for tomorrow, when we will try to get access to the Macon Speedway to do some filming while Nick and Charles caddy at the Hickory Point Golf Course for the Futures Tournament.  We're all going to attend the world premiere of "Brothers at War" afterwards.  That said, Nick left steaks to marinate at the cabin and we're going to hit the sack soon so we can get up early again for CrossFit.

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Today went very smoothly.  Beni and Charles woke up with me at 4:30am to join me at Club Fitness where Mike Lamden is working on CrossFit exercises with me as I prepare for the Marine Corps.  Kevin Breheny again appears on our blog today for finding tickets to the world premiere of the movie "Brothers of War" in Decatur on Thursday night.  Tickets sold out in the first day, so the CEO Intern team, along with Capt. Raymer and SSgt. Garrett from the United States Marine Corps Officer Selection Office in Champaign, IL, are grateful for the extended invitation.  The team met for lunch at Panera Bread today and made contact with the Regional Manager to jump start a relationship with the TV show.  The afternoon also brought about an offer from a South American television network seeking to acquire a finished version of the CEO Intern show for their viewer base of 5 million people.  If we can raise the money to get a few episodes filmed and edited, perhaps we can make this a reality.

After work Charles Brown went to play racquetball with Pete Paulin and then everyone met up at the Hickory Point Golf Course to redeem their VIP Passes to the Futures Par-tee kickoff event.  After food, beer, and a great band, the students jumped on a six person golf cart and took a tour of the greens.  Charles commented that someone should show up with a Staples Easy Button after Beni struck up a conversation with one of the female golfers from Russia.  We all ate dinner afterwards at Steak n Shake during which time Beni took it upon himself to entertain most everyone in the restaurant.

And now, since I'm already about to pass out to get up early for another 4:30am workout, I'd better head to bed.  Good night!

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Today was the first day with structure, ahhh sweet discipline. Today unlike the first day we sat down together and talked about the actions for the day. This process which I call “down to earth” will happen every morning from 8-9am, we sit, talk and develop an action plan. I call it a process because that is the impression I have of it so far since it needs polishing. I understand that today was the first day of this developed structure but I am a bit impatient when I come to organizing a group because I feel that it should be blatantly apparent to each person that a group will not function unless the parts assemble.

Once we finally assembled, and by assemble I mean sat in the same space, talked in turn and constructively contributed to a given conversation we constructed an agenda. The agenda addressed company time (internet, phone calls etc), “Adventure capital,” WiFI, Daily and weekly schedules, and a call from Mr. Paulin about a doctor who we would like to host. My favorite part of the agenda is the “adventure capital” which is a term I came up with to describe raising capital by selling military equipment on Ebay. I call it an adventure because we have to find manuals and information for all of these parts also knows as “specs”, take pictures, clean them, and make sure they work, which was problem with an air compressor.

Thought the compressor didn’t work at first or brilliant engineer fixed it, though that was exciting the most valuable take away came from a series of phone calls. The first call came from a friend of Mr. Paulin’s and the second was from Mr. Paulin himself. The purpose of the calls were to inform the team about a potential investment that confused the mess out of us because we didn’t understand the first man we spoke to and naturally as whole we were dismissive. I was in the confused boat but wanted to know more and after talking with Mr. Paulin he energized my curiosity with a better phrased presentation of the opportunity. My take away was that even though the majority may dismiss and idea I should hold on to my natural inclination to seek out and understand before concluding.

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