Loosening Up Bk. 07 Ch. 30-33 - End

"I should have asked, but how do you go about determining what the culture or ethos of a business is?" Dave and Ginny were sitting on the sofa in his EneRG office.

Ginny stood and went to the flip chart in the corner of the seating area. She turned to a blank page and wrote: traits, behaviors, leaders, and measurements. Opposite those terms she drew a line and wrote clan, adhocracy, market, and hierarchy."

She turned to Dave, "Let's define some terms. By the term 'culture' we mean the social and psychological environment of a business. It includes how people interact, their resistance patterns, how they share knowledge, the values and beliefs of the group, the stories that they embrace, and the sometimes unwritten rules about how business really gets done. All types of things influence it: history, group lore, past behaviors and major events or milestones, technology, skill base, market, products, management style, the industry or setting it is in, its vision, norms, systems, symbols, language, assumptions, environment, location, and habits. I probably forget a few things, but you get the idea. Everything impacts a group's culture to some extent.

"Think about two large companies that have vastly different cultures. I'll pick Apple and Exxon Mobil. Do you think they have the same cultures? They're both big, rich, providing critical products to their customers, and so on."

"No, not at all. Apple became almost a cult built around Steve Jobs. It's innovative, design sensitive, customer centric, and wants to see major changes in how its products shape society. Exxon is a big, dinosaur of an oil company. They turn the crank and out comes petroleum products."

"Right, so expect your culture to be different from others that you think you know about."

Dave said, "So, we're talking about two groups: the Circle and EneRG. Both are important to me, as well as to the many others around me in both settings."

Ginny smiled, "I'm going to wander around both groups and interview people. I want them to tell me what makes the Circle and-or EneRG great and not so great? What guides their behavior in those settings? I'll gradually develop a model for each group, something like what I wrote on the flip chart. Those are some of the things I'm looking to hear. They're standard models popular in consulting circles dealing with the culture of organizations. You won't be all in one category or another; you'll smush out among those areas, with an emphasis here and there."

"How long? How many interviews?"

"I'll be doing both groups in sequence, but I'll focus on EneRG first and then the Circle. Of course, just from hearing you talk, I have some idea about what I expect to hear, but I'll see whether I'm right or not."

"You do this alone?"

Ginny shook her head. "I take someone in the group that appears to have the confidence of the others in the company. Later, after an interview, they can also clue me into anything subtle that I missed, like an oblique reference to some accomplishment that turned out to be major in some way."

"Have you picked your partners?"

She smiled, "Yes, so I'm asking permission to co-opt them for about two weeks each. I'd like Jenny Harvest from EneRG and Cricket from the Circle."

Dave nodded, "They're yours. Should I tell them?"

Ginny nodded and Dave yelled out for Jenny to join them for a moment. Five minutes later she'd been conscripted as Ginny's assistant in the interviews. She said she'd get Deborah to spend time at her desk to help with appointments and calls. Nikky could help out, too.

Dave turned to Ginny after Jenny left. "Are we OK? I want to emphasize that what we did on Sunday night had no bearing on you getting and keeping this consulting gig."

Ginny chuckled, "I think you've told me that about fifty times now. Personally, I don't examine my baser motivations, so even if it did, I don't care. Chill on the issue. It's past, and I'm already on the job. I also am more that happy at our lovemaking and how much pleasure you gave me. I really do love you and I believed you when you told me that you loved me. I want us to maintain our social and sexual relationship, as well as our business relationship. So, there!"

Jenny reported to Dave on Friday afternoon just before they left for the weekend. She was pumped up, juiced, excited, and twitching. "I have learned so much from Ginny Fuller. I want to go back to college and get an MBA. They teach all the stuff she uses every day in the B-School at the university."

"What have you been doing?"

"Well, since we met Monday morning, we've done fifteen interviews with the execs and a few of the staff. I learned so much about how to interview somebody. Throw out an open-ended question and then shut-up and let them ramble around in the space of the question. Ginny taught me and I even led the last couple of interviews. She taught me about listening frameworks, and I've got a whole new way to talk to people and listen to what they say."

"And you've discovered what about our culture?"

Jenny danced around, "I'm sworn to secrecy. I can't tell you really, because we haven't done the analysis. Ginny and I will finish typing up the interviews and on Monday we'll start our analysis. She has a unique methodology she's going to teach me – organizational analysis frameworks. She said I'll have analysis matrices coming out my ass when we're through, but we'll have a thorough analysis of the culture, what's changing, what we want to change, what will change if we do or don't tinker with it, and a lot more. This is so exciting. I hated to take the weekend off, but she insisted."

Dave laughed. "Well, I can see we have at least one convert among us. I'll wait. I assume we're not sinking fast on any front?"

"No. Ginny liked what she was hearing. She said it was all good."

"What about the Circle?"

"We'll start on that after we tell you about EneRG, maybe next Friday."

Dave teased, "I'll block off that afternoon for our meeting and discussion."

"Yes! Yes! Do it. I'll put it on your calendar." Jenny ran to her desk and fussed with her computer to put the appointment on the calendar.

Dave yelled out. "Have JR, Nikky, Deb, and Larry at the meeting, too."

Friday evening, after getting home and changing into casual clothes, Dave joined several others in tending bar. He was surprised to find Tony Harris as one of the volunteers.

Tony told Dave, "Leann told me I should take this job because I would meet just about everybody in the Circle this way. You'll note that Carol and Nora are playing apprentice waitresses, too. They're working with Sharon and Morgan as 'trainees'. They don't have the cute and revealing little uniforms, but they know from your team where to order them online. Morgan is kind of like very pregnant, and I heard a rumor that you're responsible for that."

Dave effused, "I'm glad you and they are here. This is nice. I see some of the students we met a week or so ago here too, even setting the table as part of the dinner team. As for Morgan, she is one of the women I love."

Tony said, "I met the twins – Savannah and Samantha. They went into the kitchen for something, but they're ... well, topless and only wearing little cheerleader skirts with nothing underneath. One of them told me she hoped to find me later for, and I quote, 'a fabulous fuck'. She ... they ... are really hot. I wasn't sure which one it was – damn!"

As Dave worked he spotted Ginny, Cricket, and Jenny sitting away from the main group and talking to Kat. They all had serious looks on their faces, and Cricket and Ginny appeared to be taking copious notes about what Kat was saying. Dave smiled. He hoped this was going in the right direction. He noted later that they spent about two hours with Kat before their informal meeting broke up. Kat looked happy, as did Jenny.

Ginny came and sat with Dave as the coffee carafes were put on the table. "Hi, Boss."

Dave laughed, "I'm not your boss. I'm indebted to you for your diligence and tenacity in helping me with my projects. You're more my boss than you perhaps realize."

"Oh, good. Then I have a series of tasks for you."

"Name them," Dave said, thinking he'd get a list about cultural elements he expected to hear about in the Circle.

Ginny said methodically, "Well, the first several tasks involve you helping me remove my blouse and then dancing with me. After that, there needs to be some serious kissing with lots of tongue and fondling. I then want that tongue on my bare breasts and soon thereafter slathering and licking in my nether region absorbing as much of my female nectar as you can and eliciting several orgasms from yours truly at the ideal rate of one a minute.

"I have learned about something you do for a woman called The Experience, and in the course of the cunnilingus that you will be providing, I would like to experience The Experience. I am told that I will not ever forget what happens, and I am hopeful for that pleasurable result.

"After those orgasms, I would then like to make love to you and I am hopeful for both an initial and subsequent session this evening. So, those are the steps forward as I see them based on extensive experience and education in such matters. If I left something out, please feel free to improvise."

Dave nodded, "Well, those steps define a tough assignment, but I will take it on with determination, resolution, and enthusiasm." He leaned in and kissed Ginny, who practically melted in his arms. Seconds later, the scoop neck blouse she'd been wearing lay atop the table they were sitting at. Dave's t-shirt joined hers, and then the couple was dancing with Ginny's breasts rubbing gently against his chest, providing rapidly escalating sexual stimulation to both parties.

About fifteen minutes later, Dave's face was buried solidly in Ginny's sodden pussy, his tongue slashing and lashing out to absorb every drop of her magnificently secreted glandular juices. His fingers started their dance right beside his tongue and kisses.

Fifteen minutes later, Ginny lay comatose with her body twitching. Dave lapped up the sweet feminine fluids he'd collected from inside her body as he fisted her and stimulated her A-spot, bringing her to a colossal orgasm, no doubt larger and more powerful than anything she'd ever experienced before in her life.

Dave cradled her body to his on the chaise, and kissed her tenderly.

Ginny's eyes blinked open and her body shuddered in his arms. She looked deep into Dave's eyes and started to cry. "Oh, God, I love you so much. Every pore of my body ... no, every cell in my body is in love with you. My soul wants to be with you for the rest of time."

"I love you as well Ginny Fuller," Dave told her as he kissed away her tears of happiness and stress relief.

About two minutes passed with nothing said. They just looked at each other as Dave stroked her naked body in a sensual manner. Ginny finally spoke, "You knew what would happen didn't you?"

Dave nodded, "I did. It's happened a lot to women I love."

Ginny explained, "I did, too; kind of. Nora told us what you'd done and how she felt about you. Have you done that to all the women in the Circle?"

Dave nodded and said his steady refrain, "Consenting adults can do whatever they want about sex. I made sure before I started that you knew you could stop me."

"I had no plans to stop you. I'm just surprised at my own reaction. I've never passed out from too much pleasure before. I'm really in love with you, too."

"Don't forget Bob."

"Oh, I know I love him. If I didn't know I could love more than one person before, I sure do now. I love everybody – male and female. I am so glad to be in this life where I can express myself physically and sexually, especially here in the Circle and in our neighborhood where I can include making love in those interpersonal connections."

"Out of curiosity, have you ever had an affair with a client before?"

Ginny chuckled as she continued to perk up after the physiological shock he'd given her system. "No, not an affair because that's secretive and clandestine. I've made love with some, had sex with some, and developed good relationships with all of them. As you've found out, I am a very physical person. Speaking of being physical, I just realized that we haven't made love yet. Please."

Dave snorted, "I know how to fix that."

There were five people in the Friday meeting: Dave, JR, Alice, Jenny, Nikky, and Deborah from EneRG, and Ginny Fuller, an independent consultant who'd been doing a cultural assessment of the company. Larry would have been there, too, except he'd flown to Arizona to check on the production runs for the new Apple phone.

They were in the modestly decorated conference room near Dave's office with Ginny's computer plugged into a projector so she could show some PowerPoint slides.

Ginny started the meeting just after they'd all returned from lunch as the local Applebees. She said, "First, the good news; nothing is broken but I see a few things that could be improved, I think. Dave, I know you were worried about where you stood and whether things were happening that would later hurt the company. Overall, I think not, but you'll have to judge. You have some homework to do."

She turned on the first slide, a two-by-two matrix showing four boxes arranged along two axes: internal focus/integration versus external focus/differentiation, horizontally; and stability and control versus flexibility and discretion, vertically. The boxes were labeled Clan, Adhocracy, Hierarchy, and Market.

"I believe you are solidly anchored in the 'Adhocracy' box more than anywhere else. She went on explaining the boxes. "You are innovative leaders, stress visionary concepts for your products and markets, have a loose and flat management structure, are not prone to micro-manage individuals yet definitely delegate responsibility and hold people's feet to the fire for performance at their own discretion. You set the 'what' and get them involved in the 'how'.

"EneRG is achievement oriented – results matter more than control or doing 'it' according to some prescribed control structure. You're externally focused, yet pay attention to your own operations to make that happen. You are also a technology company with the revered skill sets technically based; that's fine in your industry. People that don't have the formal education in technical skills are adept at developing them on their own.

"Communication is mostly informal. Nobody worries about CYA memos to the file. The place fosters individualism, and rewards performance not excuses – witness Nat's million-dollar bonus, and your own zero pay but multi million-dollar bonus if all goes well through launch and the IPO. Office space is not rank or individually dependent; it's functional to get the job done."

"Dave you give away your power to those that are better positioned to use it, yet you back them up. There's a strong sense of 'team' here in the head shed, but it's not an ivory tower. Some people were concerned when Alice took over the CFO role, but those concerns ebbed as they saw she had the same focus as everyone else. Everybody down the hall knows about your open door policy. "You've also fostered a slight 'family' atmosphere here – 'we're all in this together'."

All the heads in the room were nodding in agreement with what Ginny was telling them about themselves.

Ginny paused and said, "NOW, FOR SOME OTHER NEWS." Her voice was loud and commanding. "You have a tiger by the tail. This business is going to soar into being a multi-billion a year business in the next few microseconds.

"In my opinion, you can't continue to run a business that size the way you are right now." She put up the next slide. "You need a legal department of your own rather than borrowed lawyers and some reliance on Worthington Industries. You will be a contract-based business for a while as you replace the stock of existing batteries in everything you can imagine and more.

"You need a Vice President of Manufacturing. You four, Maury, and Larry plus the people you hired to run each plant are the manufacturing leadership, and as you go into full-scale production, you need more leadership and control – more horsepower. If there's a weak link right now, that's it.

"In the marketing area, you need a leader for each of the technology segments that you will be chasing after. That's more in JR's area, but you hopefully hear what I'm telling you. You also need to open a Customer Service department. People will use your products but have questions. You need to think about recycling and the reclamation of the Thallium catalyst. Engineers in that CS department can help customers with new applications that may help you build them into major accounts. You need a PR team; right now Nikky or Jenny has been handling most of that when JR has been busy.

"I also suggest you designate a person or two from each of the departments to come up with worst case scenarios so you're all prepared when some disaster happens that appears to be based on your products – and that WILL happen. Be prepared! I recommend you read the Tylenol case study about how J&J responded when some jerk tampered with their aspirin containers and killed a few people. Look at how Samsung handled the battery problems with their Android phones."

Ginny went on with more recommendations. Dave knew she was right on every count, and from the nods of the others on his team they did, too. She finally stopped.

Dave teased, "And, knowing consultants including being married to one, where is your proposal for the implementation and follow-on phase?" He laughed, but so did Ginny.

She said, "I can have it for you next week. For now, I think I need to work on the Circle, and let you digest all of these things for EneRG. I urge you not to stall in staffing out the organization. You are soon going to move to a point where you can't keep all the marbles rolling across the floor in the right direction."

Dave poured his heart out again when Ginny and Cricket interviewed him about the Circle on Saturday morning. He was full of worries and minor issues that if left unmanaged MIGHT blossom into something serious that could erode the Circle away to nothing but a housing development with shared common facilities.

Sunday, he saw Ginny and Cricket interviewing Alice, Grace, and then Cindy Worthington. Sunday, he saw Cricket and Ginny talking to Christie, Dori, Ty, and Wendy. Monday at cocktails he learned that the pair had interviewed Bobbie Wyatt, Dale, Amanda, and Ron.

Dave sighed many times, trying to guess at what each person might have said about the Circle. He'd seek out Ginny around cocktail time 'just to say hello' and hoping that if she'd seen some deadly flaw she'd alert him before her debriefing the weekend after next. All Ginny would say was that the interviews were going well, she was getting a wealth of information, and learning more of the lore about the Circle. She laughed when Dave tried to milk her for information about what one person or another might have said.

Ginny did calm Dave down, and it took a heavenly round of sex to do it. She enlisted Deborah's help and the two of them showed Dave some sex acts he hadn't experienced before. For a change, the women were the aggressors and proud of it.

The following Saturday afternoon Ginny came to Dave on the patio and informed him that she'd finished the interviews and was beginning her analysis of all the comments she'd received. She wouldn't reveal anything to him, but Dave took solace in that she really liked the Circle and didn't seem concerned about anything. They set a time for Ginny to present to the Circle Board and anybody else that were interested morning after the communal breakfast on Sunday.