Business Doctors - Management Consulting Gone Wild (5 page)

Woody who was watching Martin’s monologue with both his hands clasped
behind his head, leaned forward and kept his hands on the table.

“Yeah, you are right,” he said. “But we do not make much money from our real estate activities. In comparison, our other businesses are way better. Well, at least they used to be till some time back.”

Woody was finding it hard to understand anything Martin had said for the past few minutes and was wondering if all this was a big grand mistake.

“Other businesses?” Martin asked. The associates in his research team had obviously missed out some important data.

“Yup, drugs, weapons, porn, extortion, gambling, you know, things like that” Woody added in a matter-of-fact tone.

“I’m sorry?” Martin wasn’t sure he heard it right.

Consultants had different ways to break the ice and make the client feel comfortable. In contrast, the client seemed to be taking the initiative here, in a slightly unusual and bizarre manner.

“Yeah, no point in keeping secrets from the doctor, right? If I can’t tell you my problems, you can’t help me out. We gotta work as a team. So I won’t beat around the bush. I’ll be open about it. I’m hoping you aren’t wired.”

Woody looked at Joe enquiringly. Joe nodded and confirmed that their guests were clean.

Schneider and Martin looked at each other askance - a mild look akin to horror on their faces. Smartly dressed in dark coats, nondescript shirts and plainer ties, they looked and seemed like what they were – m
anagement consultants. Well-groomed, intelligent, mildly aggressive. The closest they came to being wired was their possession of iPhones.

After a brief pause, which was hardly enough for Schneider and Martin to digest the generous helping of trust that had just been dumped on them, Woody went on to add, “We are getting badly screwed in almost all of our businesses. We need to find out what’s wrong with it. I am telling you, this recession thing has really spelled doom for us.”

“Er, I -” Schneider struggled for words, “I’ll have to admit, this wasn’t exactly what we had in mind when we came over for this discussion,” the words finally started to flow, but the struggle to achieve coherence still appeared to be a problem.

“We have to be honest, Mr. Woody, our team isn’t equipped to handle such a request. Our expertise and our skills are focused mainly in the Technology and Manufacturing industries.”

“No sweat,” said Woody, “our counterfeiting business uses a lot of technology and we do manufacture - currency notes, CDs, DVDs and stuff. Didn’t you say your skills are, umm, what was the word -
transferrable
? Can you go back to that colorful image where you list your amazing capabilities?” he gestured at Martin who was now fidgeting with the laptop, to avoid looking directly at Woody.

“Mr. Woody, we really apologize, but we are not the best team to engage for something like this,” continued Schneider hoping to use the convincing skills that he had been lauded so many times for. “I would be happy to recommend someone else who would be better positioned, in terms of skills and experience, to assist you. But your business is so, er, unique. I’m not sure I’d know anyone else who’s done this before”.

“There, you said it,” Woody seemed to have experienced an unlikely eureka moment. “There isn’t anyone else who can help us out with it. And we can’t let you go and tell the world that the most ruthless gang in L.A. went begging on their knees for help. No can do, guys. There’s not much of an option for you right now.”

Schneider looked at Martin expectantly to see if he had any trump cards up his sleeves that could bail them out of this situation. The analytical whiz-kid didn’t seem to have a clue either. The best they could do was to buy some time and give it more thought in an ambience a little less stressful than this.

Schneider looked back at Woody. “We’ll need to discuss this internally, Mr. Woody. Can we come back to you by next week?”

“Two days,” Woody curtly replied and left the room.

Joe looked at the consultants and shrugged his shoulders as he let out a sigh, in mock empathy, as he followed his boss out of the room.

The duo from Schneider Associates quickly dismantled and packed their stuff, each silently mulling the turn of events. They had an anxious need to discuss this novel business proposal but maintained quiet till they had exited the building and got into their cars.

“Jesus! What the hell was that? What do we do, Schneider?” burst out Martin on the phone as their cars started to roll and headed out of the parking lot. They did not have the courage to discuss it in person at the venue. Martin was still shuddering from the unexpected turn of events.

“They are insane,” replied Schneider, “It’s ridiculous to even think of something like this. There’s no way we can take this up. Let’s think about this with a cool head. I’m sure we’ll come up with a good response in two days.”

Martin put down the phone and just then, it rang again. It was Anita.

“Hey hun,” Anita chimed as usual, “so how did it go?”

Though consultants were advised to refrain from sharing client details, it was commonplace for spouses and significant others to be privy to the latest happenings.

“Oh I don’t know dear, it seems we’ve landed in a hot pot of boiling soup. There is no firm, it’s the freakin’ underworld that called on us.”

“How exciting, so will you guys do it? I am sure these guys will have enough money to end your late nights and you would rather spend them with me,” Anita asked in her seductive voice hinting of hidden possibilities Martin had not yet realized.

“Are you out of your mind? This is crazy, we could be put behind the bars for such a thing.” Martin blew his top.

“If you want to be a sissy all your life, go ahead. But don’t ever talk to me like that again.” Anita took out her disappointment on the innocent phone, and banged it down.

Great day
, thought Martin.
First, my career gets the jolt of a life time. And the only person I can turn to at a time like this has just slammed the door in my face
.

* * *

Two days after the initial meeting, Schneider was back in the Dungeon with Martin. On the other side of the table, Joe and Mr. Woody looked on intently. “So, how does this work?” Joe asked the consultants. “Where does Mr. Woody lie down for the questioning? Do we arrange for the couch? Or you got your own - like you got the projector last time?”

Woody did not say anything, but looked up expectantly at Martin and Schneider, waiting for a response.

“Mr. Woody is taking this business doctor concept a little too literally,” Schneider muttered to Martin. “Or is it just Joe? Either ways, I truly hope it’s out of ignorance. Coz if this is some kinda
gangsta humor
that I don’t understand, it’s definitely going to get on my nerves real soon.”

“No, Mr. Woody,” said Schneider preferring not to look at Joe, “that’s not how it works. We need to take care of a few formalities first. For obvious reasons, we don’t think it would be appropriate to draft a formal statement of work or contract for this assignment. With other clients, that would normally be our first step. We can’t go on record and make this official. But we would still need to decide on what we intend to do, how long it’ll take, what support we’d expect from your side and what our final deliverable would be.”

“De-li-ve-ra-ble,” Joe repeated every syllable and sniggered. “I like the way you guys talk. I want my kid to be like you when he grows up. Maybe he can work with you.” He had found role models for his non-existent offspring.

Schneider shuddered at the thought of having a little Joe-like employee wearing a Hawaiian shirt and torn jeans, bumbling around in his office. Before the hypothetical creature could wreak any havoc, Schneider continued, “- and we need to talk about our consulting charges, of course.”

“You can discuss the details with Joe,” Woody responded. It was beneath his dignity and capabilities to get into the insignificant operational details. “Just let me know how long it’ll take to fix the problem and how much it’s gonna cost.”

“It wouldn’t be as straight-forward as that, Mr. Woody.” Schneider tried to explain. “First of all, we will not fix your problems for you.”

“What? If you aren’t going to fix our problems, then why the hell are we talking?” Woody seemed to be losing his patience.

Keeping his cool, Schneider added, “We’ll help you understand the key areas that need your attention and we’ll also provide recommendations on how they can be addressed. However, implementing those recommendations is something that you’d need to do.”

“I don’t get it! Why are we paying you then?” Woody was obviously not seeing where all this was going. “You had two days to think about it and you are back in this room now because you are willing to help us. Now what part of that did I not understand?”

After a brief pause, Schneider tried again, “Let me explain this in another way. When you go to a doctor,” Schneider had realized he’d have to live with the medical analogy for a while more. So why not use it to his advantage? “- he examines you, asks several questions related to the problem, and gives you a prescription, doesn’t he? You then decide if you want to go ahead and buy the medicines or tear up the prescription on your way out of the clinic. Whether you want to go forward with the treatment and buy the prescribed medicines is totally up to you.”

Woody thought for a while. “I guess you are right,” he said. Martin heaved a sigh of relief. Finally the concept seemed to have dawned upon Woody.

“After we make the recommendations, my team moves out of the scene and you take over the responsibility of
implementing the recommended solutions,
if
you see merit in them,” added Schneider hoping to put the final nail in the coffin and close the discussion.

“Ok. You can talk about what you need to get you going, with Joe. He’s your man. Take care of
'em, Joe and let me know if there’s anything you need from me.” Woody looked at Joe as he left the room.

Schneider turned to Joe, “We usually try to gain an understanding of a new client’s business before we start our analysis. For the more regular clients, we do this even before we meet them and have a suggestion even before starting. But in your case, we may need to visit locations where your business is conducted. We need to gain an insight into the existing processes that are followed by your organization. Based on our preliminary estimates, we feel that this project will take us around three months. Our billing will
be time and material based, er, in other words, on an hourly basis,” Schneider quickly simplified the consulting jargon he was so used to. “Our consultants will maintain a tracker of the hours we spend on this assignment, and we will send you biweekly reports with these details. We maintain complete transparency in our business dealings, and we would expect the same from you as well.”

Joe’s expression hadn’t changed as Martin was playing out his standard speech.  But one word evoked his interest.

“Transparency, hmm, that’s not always practical in our business, you’d agree, Mr. Schneider,” said Joe woefully. This was the first intelligent, coherent and fully relevant statement he had made since the consultants met him. Being in the mere presence of the consultants was lighting up his gray cells. “But we’ll do what we can to make it easy for you.”

“In our firm, we have a small ritual that we follow for each new assignment,” said Schneider while being escorted
towards the exit by Joe. “At any point in time, we work on multiple projects. In order to easily identify each of them and to maintain their confidentiality, we give them code-names. How does ‘Project Lean and Mean’ sound? It’s a common phrase frequently used in corporate circles to define an organization that’s shed its fat and has become tough enough to take on the competition.”

“Whatever,” said Joe, sounding least bothered. “It’s your ritual. You guys can call it whatever you want. Just make sure you deliver what you’ve promised.”

The last part almost sounded like a threat.

All three stepped out of the lift. “So you want to see what we do, huh? Just to make you guys comfortable, we could start off with a review of one of our legit activities. We’d have to plan a trip to one of my favorite locations over the weekend. We can be back on Monday morning,” suggested Joe.

“Couldn’t we start this on Monday morning?” Martin was accustomed to flying out of Los Angeles on Monday mornings and returning on Friday evenings to spend the weekend with Anita. That was the standard consulting drill and Martin did not want to lose a weekend just for a crazy new client.

“No, wouldn’t recommend that. It’ll take the fun out of the whole thing.” said Joe.

“Why? Where are we going?” Martin got curious.

“Las Vegas, bay-beeeee!”

Chapter 4

The rendezvous was fixed for Friday evening. As Schneider and Martin reached the top storey of the high rise, they saw Joe already waiting for them. The helicopter perched atop the building was a sight to behold for the bespectacled Martin, though Schneider was trying hard to appear nonchalant. It was a Bell 429, painted in black, glistening in the yellowish-orange glow of the setting sun. It was a lean and mean machine – sleek, efficient and powerful – much like what Schneider and team were setting out to transform WFB to. The aircraft was very well-maintained – no soot on the turbo exhausts and no black greasy residue was to be seen on the rotor assembly. The slowly churning composite blades idly chopped the already thin air and gave the entire evening dollops of style, as if they were taking a breather before starting to slice and dice the air during their upcoming flight. The chopper, with WFB emblazoned in large yellow lettering across the rear portion of its fuselage lurched and swung away from the ground and Martin’s stomach lurched with it. He swallowed, scared. This client was loaded, he thought, trying to forget that he was precariously swinging in mid-air.
Couldn’t this blasted thing fly straight and steady like a plane
? He thought glumly to himself, sitting stiff as a board. Next to him, Schneider seemed to be doing fine. His face was expressionless, as he looked out the side. Going by the way he was almost leaning out the window of the thing, he seemed to be enjoying the ride. It was a different point altogether that the ‘window’ looked more like a hole punched into the vehicle at the last minute.

Martin looked away hastily, keeping his attention straight ahead – w
hich happened to be the headset-mounted head of the pilot. While Martin’s stomach was churning, Schneider noticed that the pilot was wearing a David Clark H10-76 headset, with ‘
Reiner
’ imprinted on one of the right ear-cup. He knew that that model was a standard issue to USAF recruits, and it was customary for them to imprint their names on the ear-cups. He also spotted the remnants of what looked like an entry bullet wound on Reiner’s exposed forearm, suffered many years ago in a war fought in a far off land. The wound had healed, but it had left its mark. Knowing that the aircraft was in the capable hands of a well-trained former Air Force pilot, some of his tension eased away. What he did not know was that Captain Reiner was a veteran of two wars – Iraq and Afghanistan – and had recently been recruited by Woody to serve as his trusted pilot. Closing his eyes he muttered a small frantic prayer that this journey would end, quickly. Quickly and safely.

The two of them were seated at the back, with Joe ahead next to the pilot.

When Woody had suggested that they go ahead and reconnoiter his places of business, they assumed they would book their own air tickets and then charge it back to WFB as project expenses. Woody seemed to have other ideas. He offered them the use of his private helicopter. He actually thrust it on them, refusing to take no for an answer. He claimed it would save them the time and the effort, which it definitely seemed to be doing. Like a well-oiled machinery, the internal project accounting code was already setup by Martin, and the billing hours had started counting the moment they had agreed to have a look at WFB. According to their pilot’s briefing, they would be in Las Vegas – their destination, in under an hour. WFB did seem to provide perks, at least for a select few people. Not many companies could boast private airborne transport. The consultants were suitably impressed but were professional enough not to show it. Pretending to take all these fancy peripherals in their stride, both men stayed silent for most of the ride. Martin, more so, because he was seriously scared of heights. That left Schneider, who was fascinated with the chopper and was secretly thrilled to be riding one, wishing he owned one of these dragonflies. As the wind settled in, Martin too became more comfortable and he felt as if they were hanging in mid-air without moving forward to backwards. Then a sudden gust shook the cabin-in-the-air and Martin closed his eyes again.

Schneider looked below as the city flew past under them. The view was fantastic. The city twinkled and glowed with myriad lights. The highways and bridges looked model perfect. Over the horizon, he could almost make out the chimera in the desert, the strip. The night was chilly and the wind gushed into the machine, invigorating Michael.  He grinned to himself. He had to get himself one of these babies, he promised himself. Not now, when the going was tough. But surely in the future. He mentally made a note of a series of questions he would put to Reiner once they were on the ground - in terms of overhead and peripheral costs for maintaining, licensing and flying these things.

If things worked out with ‘Mr. Moneybags’, they should be comfortable for the next year at least and maybe, just maybe he would sign up for flying lessons. 

He smiled and listened to what Joe was saying.  They had to shout to speak to each other over the roar of the chopper but Joe’s own roar of a voice carried over to the men at the back.

“See that stream of light down there?” Joe pointed down from the chopper. “It’s the main street in Las Vegas. Oh yeah, that’s
The Strip.
That’s where all the action is. Though I’ve never been able to figure out why it seems unusually bright on weekends.”

Reiner gestured to Joe and he turned round to tell the boys that they would be landing in Vegas in five minutes.

Martin had been fiddling around in his pockets trying to find something. After a while, Joe looked up at him and was taken aback.

“What the hell are you doing, dude?” said Joe shocked to see a moustache suddenly appearing on Martin’s face and sunglasses.

“Just want to ensure my reputation stays intact. I’ve never been here, but all the stories I’ve heard about the place aren’t what fairy tales are made of. I’m just trying to be safe.”

“In Las Vegas, if safety is your main concern, you should be wearing a condom, not a moustache, ya know what I mean,” quipped Joe.
He glanced at Martin leering, “You’re guessing the moustache lures the ladies, eh?”

“No. Just don’t want to be recognised. Those blasted TV channels always have some cameramen and reporters floating around here.”

Joe could see through the lame excuse. “It’s night buddy. And you aren’t a celebrity to be wearing shades in the night. Haven’t you heard? What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.”

But Martin wasn’t going to change his mind. He had worked out a plan to keep himself under the radar, and no goon was going to convince him to stray away from it.

The chopper veered off The Strip and swept to the right.  Martin clutched at his middle again. Schneider gazed out fascinated by how smoothly Reiner made the chopper descend rapidly into the seeming blackness of the desert, just the way he had done countless times in the desert, piloting the behemoth Chinooks, in the two hellholes he had served in – this was a cakewalk. He could make out faint guide lights that Reiner was making his way towards.

As they quickly lost altitude, Schneider could just barely see a clearing and a circle of lights, with the familiar ‘H’ mark. Schneider was pleased to see the helipad. Their extended roller coaster ride in the air was over. Another one on the ground was about to begin.

Within minutes, the bug had descended and touched down on the tarmac. Unbuckling, Schneider shook hands with the pilot, thanked him and got on with the list of questions that were building up in his mind on the cost of chopper ownership. Martin looked clearly relieved to be on ground.

While walking away from the helipad, Joe put his hand over Schneider’s shoulder and in an almost leery manner.
“While you are here, it’s perfectly ok - in fact, highly recommended - to mix business with pleasure, if you know what I mean,” Joe explained with a sly smile as all three walked out of the airport and headed towards a car waiting for them. He pulled out his mobile and made a call. “Always good to have important numbers handy. Hey there Susie, you doing ok? Yes. You bet. Yes. So, what have you got for me tonight Susie? Great. Ok. I got a few guests over with me. That’s right,
special
guests of the boss, you know, and we need to make sure they go back happy. Great. We’ll be at the Pecker. Talk to you later, hon.”

“Where are we going?” Schneider asked. The short and sweet exchange between Joe and Susie had made him curious.

“We own
Woody’s Pecker
- hotel and casino. And it is special for WFB, and for Mr. Woody. Because it was special for his grandfather, who started it,” said Joe.

He had been around long enough to have built up a repository of stories about the boss and his ancestors.

“Many of the big casinos here were owned by enterprising folks - like Mr. Woody Senior and his buddies. Gambling is legal business here. Slowly, corporate guys - just like you - all slick talkers, came over and decided to buy this place out. Not WFB, though. Mr. Woody’s old man and his grandfather refused to sell off their prime possession. That’s one of the reasons the Pecker looks dwarfed, when surrounded by the bigger grander buildings that have come up recently,” Joe turned around to see Martin looking amused.

“I know Martin finds the story funny. It’s the name, right? I did too and then over the years, it just became a part of the vocabulary. The Pecker is not exactly on the Strip, but almost there. The biggies have taken up most of the prime space. You can dump your stuff at the hotel, freshen up and then we explore the area.”

The ride to the hotel took another thirty minutes. The consultants were eager to drop their overnight bags and get familiar with the sights and sounds that the city had to offer. After all, working on the weekend for a client was out of the ordinary – Martin was already beginning to think if this was one of those crazy one week projects that they occasionally did for the elite private equity firms. Those projects were considered a double-edged sword by consultants – they made your life hell as the client in this case was at least as smart, if not smarter than the consultants. On the other hand, some consultants saw this as a ticket to enter the big bad world of private equity where the stakes and incentives were higher.

The distance to the hotel wasn’t too much but the number of visitors who had descended into the city for the weekend added to the traffic miseries and slowed down the pace.

After reaching the hotel, Joe offered to take the consultants around the casino.

“We have two main guys who run the show here. There’s Dave who manages the
gaming operations and there’s Ed who manages the hotel and everything else. You need anything, and I mean anything, in Las Vegas, all you need to do is talk to Ed. Let’s move to the gaming area.”

As the group walked on, Martin heard the familiar chimes of electronic machines. “Slot machines. Gambling!” he exclaimed.

“We prefer the term
gaming
. It’s legal, remember? We pay taxes just like good citizens such as you,” clarified Joe. “Well, at least on some of our businesses, we do, ya know what I mean. And this is one of them.”

In Las Vegas, Joe sounded a little more intelligent than he did back in Los Angeles. Maybe it was the persona of their boss that reduced them to bumbling buffoons. Maybe they were far more capable than the consultants had assumed.

“We’ve got 'em all. Blackjack, Poker, Roulette. You can either play at that table over there for beginners or you can go into that glass partitioned space with no-limits,” Joe explained.

Looking at Schneider and pointing in the direction of seemingly endless rows of electronic slot machines, he added “There’s the technology stuff you were talking about in the Dungeon, the other day. Modern day gizmos.”

So Joe was paying attention to the discussions during the first meeting
, thought Martin.

“I prefer it old-fashioned though, man-to-man, ya know what I mean.”

As Martin raised one curious eyebrow, Joe added. “A dealer, a real guy, dealing out the cards. Not a computer. I think video games are for kids.”

Martin nodded and continued to look around. All the colorful lights and electronic sounds around made him feel like Super Mario, without the powers, and with a smaller moustache.

“Considering it’s a small place compared to the big casinos that surround it, the gaming room appears packed to the brim. How do you get people to come into the place?” Schneider was curious.

Dave, the gaming boss, who had accompanied Joe to show the consultants around grinned from ear to ear with the smile merging with his balding head on hearing Schneider’s question. It was an implicit acceptance of his fantastic marketing and advertising skills.

“We send out mailers to our past customers and prospective ones,” explained Dave. “In magazines, newspapers, direct mailers with coupons, free games and stuff. Our room rents are cheaper as well. Casino hopping is pretty common here. Most of the guys you see playing here are familiar faces to us. They win sometimes, lose most of the times and are still with us after all these years. The power of addiction!” a knowledgeable Dave doled out the insights.

Schneider was looking around him, at the ceilings and around the edges of the walls.

“Most casinos have cameras placed all over, capturing every activity that takes place in gaming areas. I don’t see many around this place. I did see one at the entrance as we came in. But I’m guessing that’s for general security. What about this place? The main gaming area? Don’t you see the need to keep a tab on what’s happening at each table?”