My Struggle with Wall Street

By: Patrick C. KellyTue Dec 18, 2007 at 5:43 PM

"Many of the most important practices at this company exist in large part because Wall Street and the banks have applied so much pressure. If the financial community had gone easier on us, we might not be where we are today."

But CEOs are made, not born. This year we'll invest $3 million to educate our people in business fundamentals. New salespeople spend 14 weeks in training, including a full week at PSS University learning the economics of the health-care business. Leaders-in-training will read Plato's "Allegory of the Cave," which captures the image of leaders as facilitators, and Dostoyevsky's "The Brothers Karamazov," which depicts management by fear and intimidation.

But business education is not a one-time event. It's an all-the-time discipline. One of our programs -- PSS Challenge -- keeps people immersed in the business. Once a month employees convene to review the company's P&L statement and stay current on various operations. Attendance isn't mandatory -- but we use an interesting technique to keep it high. At the beginning of the year we set aside $1 million worth of stock. Then we announce that we'll divide those shares evenly among all the employees who attend 10 of that year's 12 PSS Challenge meetings. If a thousand people attend 10 sessions, they each get $1,000 worth of stock. If only one person makes 10 meetings we've created another millionaire.

That's why I'm grateful Wall Street and the banks have given us a hard time. It's pushed us to performance levels we wouldn't have reached otherwise. Even today, when we're flush with success, I never forget those early encounters.

A few years ago we held a company party in my backyard. Things were going well at PSS -- so well, in fact, that we no longer had to do business with a bank that had twice cut off our credit. We wanted to commemorate our freedom. We gathered all the gizmos this bank had given us -- coffee cups, golf balls, calendars, stationary -- along with all the contracts and loan agreements we'd signed. We put them in a casket, placed the casket in the ground, erected a headstone, and held a proper funeral.

During the ceremony one of our people asked why we didn't bury the casket at sea. "I'd love to do that," I responded, "but I'm a realist. You never know when I might have to dig up that casket and kiss that bank's ass again."

Patrick C. Kelly is Chairman and CEO of Physician Sales & Service, Inc. (PSS), based in Jacksonville, Florida.