Jeffrey Hayzlett speaks at Heavy Duty Aftermarket Week (2017) Tuesday in Las Vegas.Renowned business celebrity and former Chief Marketing Officer of Eastman Kodak Jeffrey Hayzlett told a group of aftermarket industry leaders Tuesday that businesses must adapt and change or they will die.
Hayzlett said he’s often asked why Kodak was forced into bankruptcy two years ago.
“I tell them, Kodak didn’t go bankrupt two years ago,” he said. “They went bankrupt in 1975.”
Hayzlett said a Kodak employee developed digital photography in 1975, but executives passed on the technology and stuck to the model they knew.
“They didn’t want to change,” he said.
Hayzlett, a host on C-Suite TV and on CBS Radio, was the keynote speaker for the HDAW general session Tuesday in Las Vegas.
Author of Think Big Act Bigger, Hayzlett said leaders must be “different” to succeed.
“You have to be a little irrational to win,” Hayzlett said, as he shared some reasons that people often fail.
Fear, tension, radical transparency, risk and failing to keep promises are causes of failure, he said.
“I want you to leave here today and re-print your business cards to say Chief Tension Officer,” Hayzlett said. “It is your job to create tension. That’s what great teams do, they cause tension and radical transparency.”
By causing tension, leaders create competition, he said.
Hayzlett also said great teams acknowledge their problems and face them head on.
He shared Domino’s Pizza’s recent shift in business models in which the company told customers that their product “tasted like cardboard.”
“They completely changed the company. Their promise had never been great pizza, it was to deliver your pizza in 30 minutes or less or it was free,” he said. “Stocks went from 70 cents to $80.
“They were radically transparent. Now, they are running commercials telling you not to call because they will mess up your order. They want you to use their app now.”
He then told the audience that a company’s inability to keep promises to customers is also a cause of failure.
“A brand is nothing more than a promise delivered,” he said. “What is your brand? Your promise is your brand.”
Hayzlett, a personal friend of President Donald Trump, took questions from the audience about the new commander-in-chief as well.
“He will move fast and furiously,” he said. “He is a consumer of facts, figures and numbers. I think he will move to do a lot quickly.”
