A Team Leader (page 2 of 2)

A Central Hub

Smith completed two tours in Vietnam, eventually flying more than 200 ground-support missions. In 1970, he was honorably discharged, as captain, with a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts -- and a profound sense of what it means to be a leader.

"The Marines are arguably the best leadership training organization that one could possibly imagine," he says. "In the military, leadership means getting a group of people to subordinate their individual desires and ambitions for the achievement of organizational goals. And good leadership has very measurable effects on a company's bottom line."

Home from Vietnam, Smith became fascinated by the notion that if you connected all the points of a network through a central hub, the efficiencies could be enormous, whether the system involved moving packages and letters or people and planes. With an investment from his father's company, as well as a chunk of his own inheritance, Smith bought his first Dassault Falcon planes, and in 1971 formed the Federal Express Corporation.

Today, FedEx is a $32 billion global transportation and logistics company, serving over 220 countries and territories. Operations include more than 670 aircraft and 70,000 vehicles. Some 260,000 employees and independent contractors worldwide handle more than 6 million shipments each business day.

Along the way, FedEx pioneered the "hub and spoke" system, which has since been adopted by almost all major airlines. The phrase "FedEx it" has become as much a part of the language as Xerox or Google.

Smith says success in business boils down to three things. "You have got to have a viable product or service and a compelling strategy. Then you need an efficient management system. Assuming you have those things, leading a team is the single most important issue in running an organization today."

For Fred Smith, there is a bred-in-the-bone satisfaction that comes from getting people to do the best job they can do every day.

From Reader's Digest - September 2006

 

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