The Power Of Adversity: Al Weatherhead's inspiring advice on life and business
Last updated 27/01/2010 11:27:11
The Power Of Adversity Al Weatherhead
He's faced serious arthritis, heart disease, depression, family estrangements and a battle with alcohol. But as an American businessman in his eighties, Al Weatherhead is a survivor and knows how to overcome the tough times.
Not only is Al the Chairman and CEO of Weatherchem in Ohio, a private manufacturer of plastic closures for food, spice, pharmaceutical, and nutraceutical products. He's also the co-author of The Power of Adversity, a guide to positive thinking.
Al has a sixty year background in the plastics and metalworking industries and is the recipient of various U.S. and Canadian patents for metalworking processes and plastic products.
Among his many other roles, Al is also the president of the Weatherhead Foundation and founder of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University and the Weatherhead Centre for International Affairs at Harvard University.
His story is fascinating, his experience extraordinary and his approach inspirational. So, let's ask Al about the secrets of his positivity and his success. His may be the best advice you ever get...
Al, What has been your approach to life and business over the years - and how has that changed later in life?
"I have come to believe in both life and business that successful management is more like taking a pulse than taking inventory. After decades of leadership experience, I can now walk onto any factory floor and intuit its health from the spark, rhythm and air of its space. Is there the buzz of dissonance or the hum of synchronicity? Confusion or creativity? Chaos or vision? Conflict or unity? In short, is the adversity that inevitably must run through a factory like electricity, a friction or a fuel?
"I can always find the answers to those questions in the faces of the employees, for beyond all the mechanics of the place there is one truth: a factory is a collective human endeavour. Indeed, much of what is wrong in a good deal of current business theory and practice is its failure to recognise that the heart of any factory beats to the rhythms of its employees. The bottom line must not be profit, because profit can only come as a fruit of the health and dreams of the human endeavour the factory represents. Management's responsibility, then, is to cultivate within the work place an environment that lends itself to creativity, dreams, and collective spirit larger than the sum of its paychecks and mechanical parts.
"I have learned all this – as I've learned most everything else – through adversity's hard knocks. As a child, dreaming in my father's factory, I saw the camaraderie, respect, love and energy shared by Weatherhead employees. I watched, too, as my parents poured their lives into the company. All this created the heartbeat of that factory. Then, with the death of my father, the Weatherhead Company developed a diseased heart. Mismanagement crushed the human endeavour upon which the factory thrived, as you and I thrive on clean air, water, nourishing food, a healthy heart and a happy soul. It was this adversity which empowered me to realise that what was torn down, I could – and needed – to rebuild. And so I decided to start my own company.
"For several years I put out feelers and investigated different opportunities. Then, in May of 1971, I heard about a little plastics company for sale in Twinsburg, Ohio: the Ankney Company, which I purchased. I quickly began calculating what it would take for my new baby – Weatherchem – to achieve the lofty heights of my father's company. On the factory floor, I saw opportunities everywhere and asked questions: Why is it done this way? Is there a better way to do it? I could share with you hundreds of stories of triumphs and failures. But as my leadership matured and my creativity blossomed, I came to see failure not as a defeat but as learning one more way that something is not done. Such learning can be daunting, but it is the only way a business can survive and thrive."
How much would you say you're a natural optimist and how much has that stood you in good stead for life's trials and tribulations?
"I am not an optimist despite my troubles. I am an optimist because of my troubles. As readers of my book know, I've had my share of major adversity. I have been a drunk. I've endured failed business ventures, failed marriages and I've suffered the terrors of clinical depression, crippling arthritis and terrifying heart disease. There was a time in my life when I felt I had sunk as low as I thought one could go. Then things turned around for me. Why? This question tormented and fascinated me. What was I doing now in my life that I wasn't doing when adversity was threatening to overwhelm me? How had I changed? My introspection provided me with a sudden illumination. I realised that I had at some point recognised serious adversity for what it is: the natural order of life; that adversity is meant to act like a grain of sand inside an oyster and be an irritant in our lives that can stimulate us to create pearls.
"Ultimately, I came to understand the power of adversity and some of the lessons it can teach us, starting with the all important truth that we are not meant, in the grand scheme of life, to be happy and comfortable. Rather, we are meant to forge our characters on the anvil of adversity. Since then I've come to believe most of us experience monumental periods of adversity and it's these devastating setbacks which propel us in our quest to become fully and creatively human. Sometimes we get stuck, so stuck, in fact, that only great pain will impel us to move. It's then that the power of adversity is revealed. But to see it requires a new way of looking at the world, a radical shifting of perspective."
What is your advice for keeping active and maintaining your purpose in your eighties?
"The number one factor to maintaining your youth is to develop a youthful perspective – by keeping a positive mindset. You will go a long way toward overcoming your adversities that do so much to age you when you avail yourself of the power of positive thinking. Start now to put positive imagery to work for you. One powerful technique to help you do so that I elaborate upon in my book is to not think when facing a life-challenge: "I have to do it." Instead, think: "I have it to do." This will help you take control of your adversity – and your life. You see, staying young is all about choice. So choose to be young – or restore your youth – by thinking positively with the right imagery. Next, practicing meditation is a way to create and sustain your positive mindset. Most of the time, our heads are filled with an endless loop of the same thoughts formed over our lives. They drive us to distraction and often plunge us into anxiety. This mental stress and strain becomes physical stress, which greatly contributes to our ageing.
"Meditation helps alleviate mental stress, short-circuiting the aging process. Far from being a mystical art, meditation is as down to earth and results-oriented as physical exercise. There's lot of information available on different ways to meditate. Do a bit of web surfing or browse the shelves of your local bookstore to find a method that feels right for you. I meditate in the pool, by concentrating on my breathing while swimming laps. Finally, practice communication. The poet W.B. Yeats described prayer as the "inarticulate speech of the heart." Our youthful goal is to articulate the heart's thoughts and feelings, to help us revitalise our spirits, reconnect with others, and replenish our youth.It was my gruelling experience confronting serious, chronic rheumatoid arthritis that shoved me stumbling along the first few steps of the communication path. Before that bout of suffering, I had barricaded myself from the world. As I struggled with the relentless pain, depression and a lack of certainty about the future, I was granted the gift of a lifetime: the opportunity to relearn how to trust others. I also relearned that trying to get through life alone wears away one's youth, both inside and out. Reaching out to others and accepting their reaching out to you will go a long way to help you stay young."
What's the best piece of advice you have ever been given?
"In 1966, I started going to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. At that time I prided myself on being only a periodic drunk. I was, I thought, better than the drunken slob lying in the gutter. At an AA meeting, Jack Ball, a thirty-year-old timer said, "Al, you're nothing more than a drunk who's periodically sober." There it was. The bold faced truth. And that meant no more lying to myself! No more running and no more hiding from myself. So I made a decision about what next step I could take beyond AA to resolve my problem, and that step placed me in Rosary Hall, a retreat for recovering alcoholics at Saint Vincent Charity Hospital in Cleveland. There I went through an Alcoholics Anonymous boot camp. Since then, I have been sober, one day at a time, which AA teaches is the only unit of time that matters."
To find out more about Al's approach to life and business go to visit www.powerofadversity.net
Read also >> Malcolm Levene - Optimist - Power Of One Principles