“Pushing Up People” is the culmination of over 20 years of working with people — first as a teacher and football coach, and later as president of A.L. Williams. Both situations involved working closely with large numbers of people, learning to balance teamwork with individual success. But that’s only part of the story behind “Pushing Up People.” Some background information on how we built our company further explains how I formed many of the “push-up principles” that I use in management and why I feel so strongly about them.
In 1977, we formed a company with seven managers and 85 people who had been marketing “buy term and invest the difference” for a national company, and who were willing to take a risk. We gave up our jobs, put the security of our families on the line and struck out to build a company based on a belief. At the time that we made our decision, we had “nothing” to get started with: no office, no compensation plan worked out, no materials to take to clients to show them the philosophy we believed in. We didn’t even have a name for our company! All we had was a group of people who felt so strongly about what they were selling and the type of company they wanted to work for, that the risk didn’t matter. Were we scared? Yes. We all knew that we might not make it. In fact, the odds were that we wouldn’t.
A high percentage of people who start their own business today don’t make it. That’s not all we had against us. We also had people telling us that what we were doing wouldn’t work. According to the “experts,” we weren’t building our company with the “right kind” of people. You see, we didn’t try to recruit people who had already sold insurance or people who had CFPs, CLUs or fancy degrees from an important university. We recruited people like ourselves, from all walks of life. They were people who had dreamed all their lives of accomplishing something special, but didn’t necessarily have the social or financial means in hand to do so.
When you add that to the fact that our philosophy was controversial, that our “buy term and invest the difference” belief was scorned by nearly every insurance company in the United States, you really start to get the picture! But you know. A.L. Williams did make it. In seven short years, we have grown from a company of 85 people to over 100,000. As of the end of 1984, we had produced over $61 billion worth of term life insurance. Right now we do business in 49 states and we’re producing over $3 billion of insurance every month. The average size policy we sell the consumer has a face value of more than $135,000. We’re helping to protect hundreds of thousands of families all across America. And just as incredible is the individual success of the people in our company. At least 75 people in A.L. Williams are millionaires. Many more are “on target” to become millionaires. We have many managers who make, not $20,000 a year, but $20,000 a month! They operate with a sense of pride.
I’m proud of what our company has done for people, but the thing that I’m the most proud of is the way we’ve built our company. In the end. I really believe that’s the main reason for our success. We built A.L. Williams based on the principle of treating people right, of making all of our decisions based on what was good for our people and our clients first.
When we started out with those seven managers and 85 people, we said we were going to build a company that would operate for the good of the people who worked for it. I have always believed that you can run a company to obtain selfish goals by using intimidating management techniques only for a certain period of time. Sooner or later, the people who work for you will figure you out.
They’ll figure you out. and either try to cheat you back or quit. In either case, you reach a point of zero growth, or possibly bankruptcy. You wake up one day and find you’ve built yourself a business where maybe you’re a little ashamed of the way you do things. When we started our company, we vowed that it would never come to that. I have felt from Day One that we would manage our way. We would lay the whole company on the line to follow our management beliefs. We were going to treat people the way people ought to be treated. We were willing to stand by that belief…no matter what.
We knew what we were doing was right. You can’t replace that feeling with anything in the world. To me, no amount of money is worth the feeling I have about this company every night before I cut off the light to go to sleep.
Folks, I believe that 99 percent of all Americans would build their business that way if they knew from the start they were going to make money. But a lot of people won’t even try because they don’t think you can have both. They don’t believe that treating other people right and helping the people who work for you to succeed is going to make you financially independent. Well. I’m here to tell you right now that the beautiful thing about A.L. Williams is that you can have both. In fact, we have built our company in such a manner so that the only way you can succeed is by “Pushing Up People.”
I know it’s hard to believe. A lot of people who join A.L. Williams don’t see it at first. They don’t really realize that they succeed by building other successful people. I’ve written “Pushing Up People” just for that reason. I promise you that if you follow the principles and take hold of the beliefs set out in this book, that you will learn what it takes to become the kind of business man or woman you always dreamed of being — someone who is successful, but not at the expense of other people. You’ll begin to establish financial independence for your family and at the same time, earn love and respect from your people. “Pushing Up People” is for those who want to win in a career with A.L. Williams. Read it knowing that this is management philosophy that has made thousands of people successful and that this philosophy has made A.L. Williams one of the most exciting success stories in American business.