I was on the phone with someone this morning who I should have talked with a month ago.  I had kept putting the conversation off.  Not because I didn’t want to talk with them, but because I couldn’t get myself organized to have a productive conversation.

She said, You must be very busy.

Not in any unmanageable way, I answered.

What I explained was that the restructuring process that we are undergoing at NCI is progressing in an orderly and productive fashion.  There isn’t an unreasonable amount of time that needs to be spent on it, and the key issues are well-defined and being advanced by a team of very capable professionals who do this kind of thing all the time.

But it does create a distraction.  In the face of uncertainty you spend time thinking through the different possible outcomes and waiting for the next development, which help you narrow that range of outcomes.

We brought the top management together this week to talk about where we are.  I outlined my belief that as a company we’d come through two critical phases:  the first, where we reacted to the economic downturn; and the second, where we created new frameworks for recovering.

We were now at the third phase:  The selling phase.  And, I observed, we weren’t moving with as much purpose and effectiveness as I wanted.

The problem, I think, is that we still believe we are mired in uncertainty.  The questions “When will things improve” and “Will things get any worse” are central to our conversations.

That has to change.  The real questions need to be “What did we do this week and how did it work?” and “If things didn’t work the way we expected, what should we change?”  And then, we have to make the changes.  The only way to have these conversations is to track, report and discuss specifics.  Otherwise, you end up mired in generalities.

The challenge is to really demonstrate the mental fortitude and discipline to face forward.  I acknowledge it’s hard, but boy, it’s necessary.

Go read this five-part blog series from Erroll Morris and then ask yourself the question, How do I make sure that I know when I’m wrong?

Morris is writing about a condition termed Anosognosia, which you can broadly define as not having a clue how wrong you are. No matter how smart we are, none of us are exempt from the condition: we all will encounter the famous “unknown unknowns” that influence our life on a macro- and micro- scale.

As one expert tells Morris:

But when you’re incompetent, the skills you need to produce a right answer are exactly the skills you need to recognize what a right answer is.

The challenge for those of us who are in positions in responsibility is to minimize the potential for anosognostic behavior as much a possible.

The most important way to do this on a daily basis is to try to see things through other people’s eyes. When someone presents an alternative point of view, no matter how aggressively or impolitely, we are obligated to try to understand how that point of view makes sense to them.

When you are in a position of putative power and authority this is one of the hardest disciplines to exercise. But it is one of the most important.

This has been a challenging time to be in a job. The industry doesn’t really matter, although the industries that I’m close to — housing, multi-family, media, marketing and publishing — have experienced challenges on an order of magnitude that none of us could ever imagine. But for everyone, the work of going to work, doing what you’re asked to do, managing people and dealing with customers is fraught with an undercurrent of anxiety and uncertainty.

This is at the core of the national mood. A quick look at Gallup’s Economic Averages shows that the suppressed mood of Americans is barely changed from a year ago, despite a perception that the outlook for the job market is somewhat better.

Our day-to-day work life lacks the public and external validation, such as raises, promotions and bonuses, that helped boost our sense of self and well-being. I was reminded of this over the past week as we went through budget reviews at my company, NCI. Our teams have been incredible over the past two years, making balanced decisions about people, products and resources even while the business conditions have deteriorated around them. We’ve preserved our company, have improved our operating abilities and have innovated in exciting and promising ways. As we went through the presentations, I was struck by just how much has been done to define exactly what the benefit of each of our different services is, and to clear away any statement, activity or process that is not critical to delivering that benefit.

I was also struck by how little external reward there is in the current business climate. I can only recognize people and thank them.

But does that recognition have the same value as the more tangible rewards that were readily available in the past?

Maybe it does, if I’m able to be honest and authentic, and if my engagement with others is genuine.

In a reflective blog post this week,  the writer Scott Berkun exemplifies the power of candor.

In a list of his greatest professional mistakes, Berkun shuns cataloging business failures to take stock of  how aspects of his nature have kept him from realizing opportunities for growth.

Not learning to draw. I’m a visual thinker, at least some of the time. When I work with people on anything, I work at whiteboards and on big sheets of paper. But I can’t actually draw with sufficient aesthetics to warrant posting them here, or including them in books. This is a liability. But it’s one I plan to correct this year, as one of my goals for 2010 is to learn to draw. I’m working from Drawing on the Right side of the brain, and it’s going well so far.

The kind of self-awareness and honesty that Berkun promotes in this post is of great value today. In order to achieve a sense of balance, calm and productivity, each one of us can benefit from acceptance of ourselves and our circumstances. In that acceptance we’ll find tremendous opportunity.

I’ve had this conversation with a number of my colleagues over the past couple of years. At the center of rapid change, it is easy to lose your bearings.

As a manager, keeping those bearings is important to helping the people around you. I was reminded of this as I read an article from The Gallup Organization that looked at how to bolster employee confidence during these lean times.

The secret is to take a genuine interest in their future, to help them learn new skills and gain new experiences.

“This last year, I have had opportunities at work to learn and grow.” Employees’ optimism about their standard of living also rises steadily with their level of agreement that they have opportunities at work to learn and grow. In fact, employees who strongly agreed in early 2009 that they have such opportunities were significantly more likely to feel their standard of living was getting better (50%) than to feel it was getting worse (33%).

The feeling of making progress against the long-term goal of their professional life creates a sense of mastery and confidence that diminishes the short-term discouragements of an adverse business cycle, the Gallup researchers say.

Two important touch points for a challenging time: Accept who you are and take a genuine interest in the people around you. These are enduring truths that are too easy to lose sight of when times are tough. But, these truths are about accepting the human spirit, being humbled by our lives and shedding the illusion that we can control the fates.

We all love stories and we all love to tell stories. The line of a narrative, with colorful characters, personal touches and suspense and excitement, captures us and engages our imagination.

Why then do we lose touch with the power of story-telling when we approach our business life? Do we think it’s self-indulgent? Exposing? A risk?

Storytelling can bring topics to life in ways that our traditional methods of sharing business information can’t, the Center for Creative Leadership points out in a recent post. Trust the power of storytelling and the instinct to share, CCL says.

I saw the power of this approach earlier this week when I opened up a speech I was giving to a group of luxury real estate agents at a conference in Beaver Creek.

I wanted to find a way to illustrate the profound shift that has occurred among affluent Americans as a result of the economic contraction — something that would capture the essence of the change and put a face to the different statistics I was about to share.

An incident on the plane flying out to Vail sprung to mind. As we were getting ready to pull out of the gate, an agent came on board and asked whether anyone in the packed plane would be willing to give up their seat. The gentleman sitting next to me in First Class — a well-groomed and obviously experienced business traveler — raised his hand and asked, “What will you give me?” The agent was surprised; he hadn’t expected someone from the front of the plane to volunteer. “Will you give me an international round trip ticket?” the man asked. “I can do that,” the agent said.

While people clapped and the man gathered his belongings, I asked what had prompted the offer. “My son is graduating this year and I’d like to give him a trip somewhere fun. I don’t need to be anywhere this evening and I figured, why not get something free?”

Off he went, the CEO and owner of a mid-sized manufacturing company, to spend the night in a hotel, a free ticket voucher in his hand.

That’s the new face of luxury: Looking for a deal, keeping their standards high.

As I told the story, I saw knowing smiles across the room. I’d made a connection. My point was real. I could start the speech.

That can be the power of telling a story.

What should we do when the bottom has fallen out?

When you run a company, you intersect with hundreds of lives in dozens of ways. You have some degree of authority, you have a meaningful amount of responsibility, but in the end, you have only a limited amount of control.

The control in your company rests with all of the people who make it up. They drive the culture, the effort, the quality and the results.

In good times…the times that are normal, even…you’re able to reward your team with increases in compensation, the feelings of being involved with something that is good and meaningful, a piece of the increased value of the company, simple moments of praise and recognition.

If you’re in the leadership of a magazine company, these times are bad times like we haven’t seen before.

So what do you do?

I think you have to find a way to give your people the opportunity to try and to learn something new. And to hope that in finding a new thing, they are able to gain the sense of opportunity the breeds confidence and optimism. Whether they stay with you or go, they can feel certain that they have improved their skills.

This is a really hard thing to stay focused on when you are cutting costs and trying to keep your head above water. But, if you’re able to do it, I believe the things that are good and positive in our nature will reward your organization for the effort.

I just got off the phone with American Express customer service. The conversation ended in one of the most unimaginable sequences I’ve ever experienced.

American Express is one of those iconic and pristine American brands that I grew up with. The image and the voice of the brand was authoritative, global, secure and customer-focused. The exhortation of “Don’t Leave Home Without It” was more than a path to using debt to satisfy your wants…it was protection and certainty in a big and uncertain world.

Tomorrow, my 16-year old son Will is going off to Spain for three weeks: a couple of weeks in a language immersion program and then a week with my brother Andy and his wife Maria at their home in Madrid.

Will got his first AmEx card this year, when he started driving, so that we could feel confident he would be safe in an emergency. So, this weekend, before heading down to the bank to get Will a debit card for his trip, I figured I would call American Express and see if we could set the card up to handle his cash needs while he’s in Spain.

The representative was helpful and personable. He asked about Will’s trip. He quickly set up the bank debit feature. He told me that we should get a PIN number in the mail by Tuesday, and that if we didn’t get it before Will left, Will could get a temporary number to use while he was in Spain.

The representative was also completely wrong.

I’m on the road this week, so I called home this evening to see if the PIN number had come. It hadn’t, so I gave Will a call. I figured that it would be a good experience for him to contact customer service and work through getting the temporary number to use while he was on the trip.

He called me back 20 minutes later. They told him that he wouldn’t get the PIN number in the mail for 5 to 7 business days, and that if he needed money he could call an emergency number and withdraw up to $500. (That’s $355 euros.) He could access that emergency withdrawal function once every 90 days.

That was a lot different from what I had understood during my very delightful call to set the service up. Don’t worry, I told Will. I’ll give them a call and sort it out.

Because, of course, this is American Express…I’m a capable professional…and I’m a long-time cardholder. That’s kind of brand-alignment nirvana. We’re cool.

We weren’t. I get a service rep on the phone and explain the situation. He repeats, likely from a script, the circumstance under which Will would be able to use the emergency withdrawal pin.

“I’m sending a 16-year old to Spain with the ability to withdraw 500 euros — and only that — because of information that your representative gave me in my last call. If I’d thought it wasn’t possible, I would have gone to the bank and gotten a debit card!”

“Actually, sir, it’s $500. I don’t know how much that is in Euros.”

We went through my issue a couple of more times. The question I asked in several different ways, with elevating degrees of frustration, was: Can’t you do something to fix a situation that isn’t acceptable?

The answer was always no.

“Please put me on hold and find someone who can help me solve this problem.”

After a few minutes, a woman comes on the phone. They do a very polite hand-off, with the first rep telling me that the supervisor will help me with my problem.

That wasn’t true, exactly. She simply repeated everything that the first customer service rep told me, in a more cultivated voice and with a slower cadence. But, the bottom line was that no one at American Express could either a)give me a PIN that he could use more than once or b)increase the amount of money that he could withdraw during the one use of his emergency PIN.

Why couldn’t they? “The regular PIN is generated by a computer and no one can see it.”  “The system won’t allow us to make an exception on a withdrawal limit on the emergency PIN.” (Of course, their computers are able to calculate and adjust credit limits on a moment’s notice…but anyway.)

She did have a couple of bright suggestions. “Why don’t you give your son traveler’s checks and cash for his trip?” Answer: Because, as I mentioned at the start of the conversation, I’m 800 miles away from him! And, “Why don’t you have your son go to a hotel or bank and get a wire for some cash?”

This is how it ended: “So,” I say, “let me understand this clearly. I am sending my son to Spain without the ability to get cash, based on erroneous information that your representative gave me when I set the features up, and you are telling me that American Express feels no need to find a way to solve this problem, and that there is no way to work around your systems to make sure my 16-year old has access to money.”

“Yes,” she says.

“So, there is no way that you can help me?”

“No,” she says.

I hung up.

Amazing.

So, the essence of customer experience is in every contact. The way that these reps were scripted, the clear directions they had received to not go off script, the complete and utter lack of interest in my problem all are critical parts of the American Express brand experience. By the time I got off that call, I had a strong sense that AmEx was no different than any other financial services brand. And that’s a long drop from where I started.

Last year, I had the good fortune of hearing Tom Brokaw do a question and answer session with Patagonia founder Yves Chouinard at Google’s partner think-tank.

Chouinard is a model of common sense embodied in a purpose-driven life. Tools and technology are useful not for their own sake, but for the contribution that they can make to clearing a path to the purpose of your life. For Chouinard is was to get outdoors, to travel the world, to find things that were natural, immediate and new.

Two of his quotes struck me so much they made it into my notebook, and have been transcribed into each of new notebook since.

First, the role of the CEO in a company.

The major role of a CEO in a company is to effect change, not to protect the status quo.

What was so remarkable was that for Chouinard this statement was a matter of fact, the by-product of his behavior, not an aspiration.

Second, the genius of making a product right.

A product is perfected not when you can’t add anything more to it, but when you can’t take anything else away from it.

Simple and elegant.

With social media and social networks on the tip of everyone’s tongue, I begin to think about how people across an organization will merge their personal and professional identities online.

After all, we’ve moved a long way from wondering what will pop up about us in a Google search. As we get more and more connected on the Social Web, we are archiving more and more digital content about ourself.

Two blog posts that I came across today connected to this thought in an interesting way.

First, a ground level view from a blogger in the multi-family space, Heather Blume of Behind The Leasing Desk. (This is a great hands-on, practical source of information about getting and keeping tenants, by the way.)

And if you think your computer literate residents haven’t checked out your MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Blog, LinkedIn, insert social media platform here, then you’re very mistaken. I know they’re your spaces, but when they’re on the web, you lose the right to say who comes and goes on them to some extent, so before you post those pictures of your 21st or 40th birthday party last week, you might want to think twice. My basic rule of thumb has been the same since high school for anything on the internet. If I wouldn’t want my dad to find it, I don’t even consider posting it. My dad is pretty net savvy and has a habit of finding things you don’t want the man to find. He’s a dad, that’s what he does. It makes most internet choices a pretty easy call. Think about it this way: would you want your manager to google you? What about your manager’s manager?

Reputation management is everything in a society where privacy has been reduced to the minimum amount possible and when you work for a company, you’re not only looking at your reputation but also that of your employer. Just like Revlon noticed the reputation damage of Rihanna, your competitors, whether outside your current company or even someone you’re competing with for an internal promotion, will also see and exploit the weakness.

That’s clearly relevant advice when you’re in such close quarters with your customers, but how broadly does it apply in other, disparate industries?

If you listen to the experts at BrandingStrategyInsider, this authentic, open approach is going to have to start at the top, with the CEO.

A strong CEO has credibility and respect not only because of business talent and organizational power but also because of the depth of experience, knowledge, and insight. A suggestion from a visionary CEO with branding talent and managerial experience in branding and marketing is the key driver of the branding efforts and results in any successful organization – internally and externally.

Their prescription is a tall order for most CEO’s. If the success of a company relies on the CEO’s branding genius, then most companies are in a lot of trouble.

But I do think that their emphasis is right: CEO’s need to pick a strategy and embrace it themselves. This is a time when the people in a company have to feel good about leadership doing the things that they are asking others to do.

When it comes to social media, that’s a lot of exposure for some CEO’s.

I’ve got CEO friends who I am connected with on Facebook or LinkedIn. They’ve got a profile — they must have felt it was necessary for some reason — but their profile is incomplete, or their content is stale.

Abandoned online content is a bad thing for a personal brand. And if a CEO is going to be the personification of a brand, and if they believe there is opportunity for their organization in using a tool like social media, then they have to have the commitment and the energy to keep it up and make it work.

Idearc, the big directory publisher, filed for protection under bankruptcy law last week with the intention of restructuring their debt in order to give the business operating room.

“Essentially we have a company with good potential being held back by a terminally ill balance sheet,” Chief Executive Scott W. Klein said.

Terminally ill balance sheets are not good for anyone in the capital structure: secured and unsecured lenders and the equity holders. Idearc has $9 billion of bank debt and intends to convert that to $3 billion, with the remaining bank debt and bonds being converted to equity.

The current debt load calls for interest payments of about $650 million a year on a business that is experiencing significant declines in revenue.

How does a restructuring work? A company like Idearc, which has a declining business but throws off a lot of cash, is worth significantly more to all of its stakeholders as an ongoing business than as a liquidated business. It’s in the interest of the parties involved to reset the debt load so that the company can operate with more flexibility, ensure the security of its debt and increase the value of its equity to the benefit of customers, employees and stakeholders.

That means, though, that the company has a focus and a direction that can build value.

For that, you have to look both at recent results and future intentions.

That lead me to Idearc’s mission statement. Read it closely. The focus is on helping consumers “find what they want, how and where they want to find it.” And, helping businesses “attract the customers they want.” Idearc is the experts at that.

Is this really true? It’s a bold claim that speaks to the basic business philosophy behind the company’s activity. But is it a mission that can energize the people in the company, be meaningful in terms of each decision an individual makes?

A few years ago, my senior team and I spent some time with Jim Collins, the author of Good to Great. His book was clarifying in its emphasis on focus, fortitude and simplicity. One of his mandates to companies was that they try to decide what they could be the best at the world in.

I’ve thought about that mandate a lot. It’s an audacious claim to make, but Collins’ belief was that if this claim was made with ownership and authenticity, then it would help focus thinking and decision-making for the entire company.

Google has had that laser focus from the outset.  Look at the company’s philosophy as presented on their web site.  I’m not saying we can all be Google, but there’s a lesson there.

In today’s marketplace, having a mission that can be relevant and valuable to every one of your colleagues feels more important than ever. When you’re facing adversity, you want to know that what you are doing is important, that it matters and that you might be able to succeed.  That’s the filter you have to run your critical statements through.

One last thought: Look at the mix of Idearc’s revenue over the past three years. The company is in the midst of a huge change, with highly profitable revenue declining at an accelerating pace and new, developing revenue growing at a slower pace. The mission of that company and its executives is to find a path to transition the businesses core values and skills to a wholly changed economic model.

We’re facing that same challenge at NCI. We want to balance our belief and our focus on our core business models with an approach to expanding and innovating in new ways to serve our customers, and their customers. It’s not easy and requires us to revisit and rethink a lot of the assumptions we have about our business.

Hard, but exciting.

P.S.  Kelsey’s blog offers more color on the company’s announcement.