Earning my MBA from The Wharton School in '99 was a transformational experience for me.  A big part of that experience were graduates returning to campus to speak to my class.  So I have returned to the school, once to twice per year (in more recent years, twice), on my own dime, ever since graduating to pay it forward to the best of my ability.  It strikes me that this isn't unlike shoppers, who we see encouraged to write their own content as they read more reviews, answers, and stories from their peers, receiving value and being motivated to pay it forward (see this study with the Keller Fay Group).

Last Thursday, I spoke from 9am-4:30pm to Dr. Stew Friedman's leadership and teamwork classes.  Stew has been a mentor for around eight years now.  He authored Total Leadership, an amazing culmination of his life's work and a book I deployed, with Stew's help (he graciously visited us in Austin twice, and our London team attended his talk there), to the entire Bazaarvoice staff last year and then this year to all of our new people.  You can read about that experience here, which The New York Times graciously covered.

Every time I return to speak to Stew's class, I reinvent my talk.  These talks come from the heart, and I prepare for them in the cab ride on the way to speak.  These are the key themes I spoke to on Thursday:

Humility. The single best leadership article that Stew pointed to me in our mentoring meetings was Level 5 Leadership by Jim Collins, author of Good to Great.  It is required reading for our executive team (and his class at Wharton), and I find myself referring to it often.  From the Wall Street meltdown, due to lack of transparency and oversight on very complex financial products (which still cannot be explained in most cases), to the hubris at AIG, we are living through a period of extraordinary transformation.

Lack of humility is a big problem in corporate America.  If you don't have it, spend some time in the real world (perhaps you should go help Dick Grace build a hospital in an impoverished area in Tibet).  Whatever it takes, get humble and reflective.  Ask the tough questions.  Don't sit comfortably with bad profits.  A lack of humility almost caused another Great Depression, but this time on a global scale.  It bankrupted an entire country (Iceland).

On the Bazaarvoice front, I believe our solution encourages humility through negative reviews.  You have nothing to be afraid of but having the data and the will to do something with it.  I have seen countless cases of initial shock to the negative, followed by the a-ha moment where the merchandiser realizes the reason they have such a high return rate with that product.  We are, after all, a digital reflection of offline word of mouth.  These are the conversations that people are having every day, like it or not (and you should like it – word of mouth drives your sales).  So have the humility to listen and do something about it.  Then have the wisdom to leverage it.

Transparency. The World Wide Web has brought us sites like Glassdoor.com, founded by Rich Barton, the founder of Expedia.  At Glassdoor.com, you have the ability to rate and review CEOs as well as report your salary information.  HR heads have reported the salary data as 90% accurate for large companies like Microsoft.  I learned about Glassdoor.com at Liberty Media's NetLeaders event last year, where Rich was a speaker (his theme: everything – people, person, place, service, product, thing – that can be rated and reviewed will be).  The Web has also brought us TheFunded.com, where you can rate and review venture capitalists (and not without an uproar).

Obama embraces transparency.  Leveraging social media, he went straight to the people for his election campaign fundraising efforts, and raised more money, in small amounts, than any other candidate in history.  And now, as President, he is bringing social media to government.  He gets his share of criticism (such as not allowing visitors to comment on some of the government sites), but my belief is that the genie is out of the bottle.  Just like his campaign is being heavily studied, and will be imitated, so will his efforts for social media in government.  No one can question that he is racing through policy discussions, from stem-cell research to reform on Wall Street.  The pace of legislation is unprecedented in modern times.

With the Web, including blogging, Facebook, Twitter, Glassdoor.com, TheFunded.com, reviews, and so many other forces, leaders will be held accountable to a higher level of transparency.  The opaqueness of poor employee satisfaction (and ethics) on Wall Street is coming to an end, quickly.  This transparency will transform leadership as we have known it.  The command-and-control style, coming out of military training, is dying.

Connectedness. My daughter, who is now 4, will literally grow up on Facebook (or something like it), with a digital lifestream of connectivity to her friends.  When she is my age, 37, she will be able to jump to a different job at a much faster pace than my generation.  She will be connected globally to friends that she has known since childhood.  If she doesn't like the company culture, her friends will know.  The level of transparency will be unlike anything we can imagine now.  As a result, the focus on leadership, management, and culture will be at a level that today we cannot imagine, as employee retention is already, today, often the most costly expense a company has.

Culture. Due to these themes, the importance of focusing on culture is greater than ever.  I'll spare you our uniqueness here, and instead provide you with this reference to all of our blog posts that have been categorized under culture – there are many.  I spend around 15% of my time focused on culture, and I believe it is largely responsible for our success as a company.

Total Leadership. Stew's book is the start of many initiatives to focus on the development of the whole person.  Although that may not directly help you sell or service more widgets (although it actually will raise performance), it will lead to greater retention, employee satisfaction, and, ultimately, productivity, in this era of transparency and connectedness.  Learn more at TotalLeadership.org (and check out TLTV).

Soul. The Corporation, a stirring documentary I watched 4 years ago, made me think hard about the soul of a corporation.  I'm a believer in karma, and the more successful we are, the more I focus on the nourishment of our company's soul.  The Bazaarvoice Foundation is a part of that nourishment, but there is much more (such as the charity CEO speaker series Tony Capasso launched this year).

After speaking all day (both exhausting and exhilarating), Stew and I had the pleasure of hosting dinner at Tequilas, my favorite interior Mexican food in Philadelphia, with Glen Senk, CEO of client Urban Outfitters; Dmitri Siegel, head of Direct at Urban Outfitters; Fiona Dias, EVP of Partner Strategy and Marketing at GSI Commerce; and Dana Lasher, an old friend from CDnow (former VP of Sales and Marketing) that helped me design Coremetrics' initial reports who is now an entrepreneur herself at get Ready girls, an affinity sportswear company.  It was a magical evening of discussion, and I passed along my endorsement of Total Leadership in the hopes of helping others.

I hope that this post encourages you to speak at your alma mater.  I have found it to be an incredibly reflective process, one of the most important leadership development activities that I do, and have really enjoyed the karma of it all.  To teach is to learn.

$1,000 split among everyone was little. $1,000 by itself was large. So I decided this year we would do something different. I called one of our investors, Julie Constantin, and asked her for a recommendation of where to donate the money. Julie and her husband are very involved with charities – helping the V foundation and many others. She immediately suggested The Grace Family Vineyard Foundation, and gave me Dick Grace’s phone number. What happened next was unbelievable.

Dick Grace and I talked and he happily agreed to chat with the entire global sales team live – to tell his stories and explain what they do. The Grace Family runs a vineyard in Napa Valley that’s known for their incredible wines – cult rarities that often fetch tens of thousands of dollars at auction. And all of the proceeds go directly to the foundation. Dick explained that he himself (a man of seventy plus years) and family and friends travel the world helping children and the underprivileged DIRECTLY, using each dime of the foundation’s money to directly impact those in need. Bottles of their wine will sell for $500 in a restaurant, and Dick told us that the same amount of money will feed, clothe, house, and educate 3 people FOR A YEAR. Dick’s stories about helping children attacked by wild dogs, building hospitals and schools, and building libraries for those in need touched everyone in the room.

Dick’s philosophy is simple: don’t JUST donate with your money, donate with your time, your vision, your guidance, and your experience. He offered everyone to join him in a future trip, and I know that multiple people in the room will take him up on that offer. It was a reminder that the divide between those who have and those that need is getting bigger and more severe every day. Dick told us of girls he had helped when they were young just to eat and learn who are now graduating from top universities with careers in medicine and other fields that can give back. It was a reminder that this gesture by a few people in Austin, or anywhere, can change lives. It was a reminder that we have to do a lot more.

The words from Dick (mind you, he’ll immediately state that he doesn’t inspire, merely helps people tap into the good that is already there) encouraged others to add their own donations. My personal donation of $1,000 started an avalanche of giving – by the time we sent them the FedEx the sales team’s additional donations, Brett Hurt’s donations, other executives’ donations, and Bazaarvoice’s totaled over $5,250, a sum that the Grace Family Foundation will use to do far more good than what we’d think it can.

Check out the Foundation’s website and tap into what you’ve got to give. As Dick said, it isn’t just money – time, guidance, vision – all help. It matters.

Happy Holidays from Bazaarvoice Sales.