Cosmetics Queen, Mary
Kay Ash
She made beauty a big seller
By Sun News Publishing
Monday, August 27, 2007
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Mary Kay
Photo: Sun News Publishing |
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It wasn’t worrying about what went wrong, thought Mary
Kay Ash (1915 – 2001); it was all about focusing on what was going right.
She’d retired in 1963 after spending 25 years working for several companies
in direct sales.
As she wrote in her autobiography, while she loved the
work, she didn’t like the attitude: “There were times when I would
be asked to take a man out on the road to train him, and for six months of training
he would be brought back to Dallas, made my superior and given twice my salary!
It happened more than once.”
She found herself bitter. As Ash wrote
in: On People Management, another of her books: “To ward off those feelings,
I decided to make a list of only those good things that had happened to me during
the previous 25 years. Forcing myself to think positively did wonders for my spirit.”
At first, she thought the list she’d compiled might become the basis
for a book, one that could help other women in the same predicament. But somewhere
along the line, she asked herself: “Why write about a company based on Golden
rule of management techniques? Instead of just writing about it, why not give
it a try myself?”
Do it yourself
She’d
recently purchased the rights to a series of skin-care products originally developed
by a tanner who discovered that the solutions he worked with in leather kept the
skin of his hands youthful looking. He modified the solutions for use on the face
as well as hands.
“I knew that these skin-care products were tremendous,
and with some modifications and high-quality packaging, I was sure they would
be big seller,” Ash wrote. She financed the company with her life savings
of $5,000 and on Sept. 13, 1963, opened Mary Kay Cosmetics in a 500-square-foot
Dallas storefront and plowed ahead, using the grit and determination instilled
in her during a difficult childhood.
Mary Kathleen Wagner had a difficult
childhood. At age 6, she had to take care of an ill father, while her mother worked
two jobs. She still did well in school and found time to participate in extracurricular
activities. “My mother’s words became the theme of my childhood,”
Ash said. “They have stayed with me all my life: ‘You can do it.’
While Ash had to experience running a company, she’d worked with
people she felt couldn’t manage either. She planned to learn from those
negative experiences.
For example, she remembered once waiting in a long line
to meet a sales manager who’d delivered an inspiring speech earlier in the
day. She waited three hours, but when it was her turn: “He never even looked
at me. Instead he looked over my shoulder to see how much longer the line was.
Right on the spot, I made a decision that if I ever became someone people waited
in line to shake hands with, I’d give the person my undivided attention
– no matter how tired I was.
She made a point of knowing all her
employees until that became physically impossible. But even as the company grew
from its initial nine employees to more than 850,000 with $1 billion in sales,
she’d send each employee a personal birthday card.
Ash set high standards
for her employees. “My experience with people is that they generally do
what you expect them to!” She wrote. If you expect them to perform well,
they will, conversely, if you expect them to perform poorly, they’ll probably
oblige. I believe that average employees who try their hardest to live up to your
high expectations of them will do better than above-average people with low self-esteem.”
She
felt it important, too, that supervisors let employees know that their work is
appreciated. “I never yet met a person who didn’t want to be appreciated,”
Ash wrote. At Mary Kay, Ash set up a thank-you system that ranges from a simple
“ thank you for showing up early” to a pink Cadillac.
The company
is well known for giving the expensive luxury car to its top producers. Ash said
the vehicles were chosen because of their association with excellence.
Whatever
incentive programme the company runs, Ash wrote: “We go first class, and
although it’s expensive , it’s worth it, because our people are made
to feel important… It (is) our way of telling our people how important they
are to our company…. We might settle for one elegant banquet a year rather
than two moderate ones.”
Ash thought that one of her most important
management tools was her ability to listen. She called it “the most undervalued
of communication skills” and suggested “that’s why God gave
us two ears and only one mouth.”
Make It Personal
Beyond
listening, Ash said, it’s important to solicit opinions. One of the best
managers she ever worked for always asked: “What do you think you should
do?”
Asking for employee’s opinion makes them feel important. Just
as important, Ash said, it makes them buy into a plan. “People will support
that which they help create. When you dictate even the most thoughtful and logical
concept to a person–this idea is still a command. When you ask her to contribute
to its inception, that very same idea becomes a personal crusade.’ “
Ash
wrote that once she promised something, she had to deliver. “A manager should
never make a promise that something will be done unless he is absolutely certain
that it will be done! A broken promise is devastating for those who have been
disappointed, and there is no excuse for it in management. Furthermore, a manager
should never make a commitment unless he has the complete authority to do so.”
Ash
considered her employees investments and assets. “If we spend six months
training someone, only to see that person leave us, we feel we have lost a lot
of time and money. So, once people come aboard, we make every attempt to keep
them. If by chance they don’t seem to be working out in one area, we’ll
try our best to find another spot for them.”
Ash once had a secretary
who wasn’t right for her job. She was conscientious, but something was out
of whack. After sitting down and discussing the situation with her, Ash transferred
the woman to the accounting department, “where she did a first-rate job.
Good people are hard to find – so when you do find them, it’s important
you make every effort to keep them.” |
