David Novak 0:03 

Welcome to How leaders lead where every week you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world, I break down the key learning so that by the end of the episode, you'll have something simple you can apply as you develop into a better leader. That's what this podcast is all about. Today's guest is Bill Harrison, the former chairman and CEO of JP Morgan Chase. Have you ever worked for somebody who's taken you under their wing and believed in you enough to pave the way for you to take his or her job? Let me tell you, throughout my career, I've had the great fortune of this happening to me multiple times, I've worked for leaders who wanted me to succeed wanted me to develop the capability to move to that next level. But here's the sad thing. I don't think this is all too common of a story. Too many leaders have a you work for me mentality. And the last thing they want is for you to take their job, so they actually hold you back. So what do we do about this? Well, we can learn to be the kind of leader who can identify top talent, and do whatever is required to help them succeed in their careers, so that they're prepared to take your job or another job just like it. On this week's episode, you're going to learn how to do this from one of the all time greats, Bill Harrison is an example we can all follow and how he prepared the next leader of JP Morgan Chase, setting the stage for Jamie Dimon to take over. So let's not wait any longer. Here's my conversation with my good friend. And soon to be yours, Bill Harrison. You know, I want to get into how you lead and how you were the leading architect of what is now the largest and arguably the best financial institution in the world, JP Morgan Chase. But first, I really want to understand how you got to where you are, you know, and I understand you came up in a family of three generation of bankers,

Bill Harrison 2:05 

I did come up and sort of a family of bankers, not totally, but I grew up in a small town, Rocky Mountain, North Carolina. And I had like a lot of us, I was blessed with wonderful parents, they taught values, they taught us how to be the best we could be. And I was very close to him and miss him greatly. But they had a big impact on my life. But also, small town gives you the opportunity to get to know everybody. I mean, you know, your teachers, you know, your coaches, you know, your friends, well, and you know, the parents that be friends. So it's a very integrated community. And it certainly gave me a sense of who I was. And I got very comfortable in my own skin through all of that. So then then I went off to prep school and great experience there play basketball is a very good basketball player, I was an average student, and I want to point that out, because that never left me wherever I was, in the academic world.

David Novak 3:00 

You're always so humble. I'm not sure I'm gonna buy into that. No,

Bill Harrison 3:03 

it's true. That one of the things my dad taught us, which is interesting, I guess, I think back on my management style, is that he's a very entrepreneurial guy. He was He loved politics, he loved people, he loved to enjoy life, and he was successful. So we live well in the small town, and he taught us values. But he also one of the things he taught me was son, I want you to be responsible and my checkbook is your checkbook. So when I went off to college, I had his checkbook, I could do anything I wanted. And I learned to be responsible. I didn't take advantage of it. I didn't live poorly, I might add, but I lived well. And I thought was a great lesson because he had to trust me to do that. And I trusted him. And that was something I carried on. And my mom was tough. She just demanded a lot. And I was never living up to what I should do academically. She just she was always on my case. But they had a huge impact on me. And I was very close to him.

David Novak 3:55 

You know, Bill, you mentioned you play basketball. And I understand you were a huge basketball star in high school and you got a scholarship to play at North Carolina under the legendary Dean Smith. What did he teach you about leadership?

Bill Harrison 4:09 

He taught us a lot. You know, I was his. I was in his first recruiting class. And I think 62 It wasn't a very good class, I might add, but it was all good from there. But he was very disciplined. One of his slogans that he really lived by that you can use in business you can use anywhere. He said, play hard, play smart, and play together. And if you think about those three things, they work everywhere and I used his discipline I used how he led with his values. In my business career. And in my life. He had a big impact on me, as did a lot of the coaches I was blessed to have along the way.

David Novak 4:45 

Can you tell us about a one on one coaching experience that you had with Dean Smith?

Bill Harrison 4:50 

Well, I wasn't good enough for him to really focus on me too much, but he would tell you things that you needed to work on. He treated everybody equally. I mean, that was what was remarkable about him. He was there for three already five years, I had argued he had the most dedicated group of Letterman over 35 years of coach could have because he treated me the same. And I was one of his least talented Letterman, he treated me the same as he treated Michael Jordan, he would come to New York. And this was before I was a senior guy in the bank, and he'd say, Hey, we're playing in the garden next week, I got four tickets for you. And I'm just thinking about you. And I could go into his office anytime when I was in Chapel Hill, he wanted to see you had a photographic memory. So he knew your family knew everybody he was he built a great network. And it was another wonderful lesson in leadership about connecting with people through his value system.

David Novak 5:39 

You know, you mentioned that you spent a lot of time on the bench, that first year when you were on scholarship, but I understand you actually gave up your scholarships so that Dean Smith could recruit more talented players. Um, what made you do that?

Bill Harrison 5:53 

Well, your interpretation is a bit generous, you have three things going on in college that did plan basketball, you're there for academics, and you're there for getting to know people and enjoying the University. After two years of playing basketball, I found that it was hard to do all three well, and I decided that best I might play some my senior year, seventh or eighth man, maybe. But I said, you know, I don't like the trade, I think I should give basketball up. So I did for that reason that in hindsight, I regret doing that. One of the few things I really regret in life, and I regret doing that, because I missed out on an opportunity to really get another two years under great coach, but also missed out on the opportunity to just to continue to learn and to not give up. If I had continued to play basketball, I could have easily done all three of them, it would have been fine. So

David Novak 6:47 

you got on with your business career. And you start out as a trainee at Chemical Bank, and you get promoted eight times on the way the top by my count, I might have missed a couple. But what was your favorite assignment as you're working your way up before you became the top dog?

Bill Harrison 7:04 

Well, I liked all of them. And that was an interesting, it's an interesting observation. I went to New York thinking I really don't want to go, but it's better than staying with a bank in North Carolina, get out of your comfort zone, go do something. So I went to New York thinking I'd be there for two years while I got there. And lo and behold, I love going to work every day I was learning. And I was contributing. And I thought that was really great. And so I had this first job in New York for eight years. And then they asked me to go to San Francisco. And I didn't want to I said no, look, I'm very comfortable doing what I'm doing. Don't ask me to go do something else. And they said, well, everybody wants to go to San Francisco, I said, Fine, go ask one of them. Because I don't want to go, they were very patient with me. And I went to San Francisco took me about a week to fall in love with it. And then I was in San Francisco for three years, and love that. And then they asked me to go to London. And I will I don't want to go to London. I mean, I'm happy in San Francisco. And then same coming back to New York, I don't want to come back to New York, I'm happy in New York. So it was interesting that I was very comfortable staying in zone, I was one of the people who didn't want to keep moving so fast. A lot of people always saying I got to have this that I wanted to be happy doing what I was doing, and be comfortable doing what I was doing. I was never afraid about the next job. I just like my life. I like my friends and family and the environment that I was in. So it's kind of interesting. And looking back on that.

David Novak 8:25 

When you think about a bill, how did the process of getting promoted so many times shape what you need to see now when you look at people and and you assess whether they need to move up.

Bill Harrison 8:37 

The takeaway for me through all of that was, you gotta take a chance on young people, they moved me to London when I was 33 years old, I went from a management my first management job in San Francisco was managing 13 People I found out I really liked that I was actually good at it. And then I'll go to London had 1300 people, and I was 33 years old. And I look back on that. And I said, wow, you know, it's kind of amazing that they would take that risk on me. And it's a good lesson learn. It was for me that you got to take risk on young people. And back to my earlier comments. You got to get people out of the comfort zone. That's how you keep growing.

David Novak 9:18 

Now you ultimately rose to the top of Chemical Bank, and was there a catalytic event or a person that really accelerated your career trajectory,

Bill Harrison 9:27 

the most important one was going to London, because that's when I moved from managing 13 people to managing 1300 people. And I had some big challenges with the group there that I inherited. And so I learned how to really become a leader. And it was a great challenge. And we ended up being very successful and ended up running Europe after the UK. So you had you know, 10 countries and had a branch in each country. So you're dealing with different general managers who were Italian and French and whatever. So you get into all the cultures and I had to pull them together and melons. It was a great learning experience from building a team and bringing people together,

David Novak 10:05 

you know, chemical then merged with Chase, did you see it at the time as the beginning of the consolidation of the banking industry?

Bill Harrison 10:12 

Well, our first, our first big merger that I was part of I started at chemical and we merged with manufacturers Hanover. In 1991, we were the fourth and fifth largest banks in New York, we were losing altitude against the other three and against a lot of other global banks. And so that merger was not a great strategic vision, it was more a merger of necessities, let's put these two organizations together, we got to do something, take out cost, and hopefully one in one is going to be greater than two, it turns out it was. And as soon as we saw that, after about a year, the market liked it. And we started really making one and one equal three, stock went up. And it became very clear that size and scale and leadership positions and the right culture are going to be really valuable. We then said, we know how to do this, we are becoming a leader and what started to become pretty apparent that consolidation was going to be a driving force in our industry, a real driving force, and we got out in front of it, then we did Chase in 1996, that did hammer conquest in 97, Fleming's big asset management firm in the UK in 2008. And then we bought JP Morgan in 2000, and then bought bank one and 2004. So every time we advanced along that consolidation process, it made us feel more strongly that our strategy was right that size and scale leadership positions and globally in the right businesses really matter. And we got out in front of it. So I feel great. But actually, we did have a strategy and didn't start that way. As I said it was a Manhattan chemical emerges of necessity, but it turned into a great strategy that we became convinced was right.

David Novak 12:01 

You orchestrated the merger with JP Morgan. And that was a huge deal. I mean, it was a big one, and how do you get up the nerve or the courage to really pull the trigger on a deal like that?

Bill Harrison 12:11 

Well, we believed in consolidation. And we believe that we had to continue to fill out our strategic platform. And we needed a firm that had more investment banking capabilities. And we talked to a couple of other pure investment banks didn't work out. We went to JP Morgan and talked about that deal. And I think they were experiencing the same thing that they needed to do something. And so it was an easy call, we went to him first and 98. And they didn't want to do the deal. Then when I became CEO, I went back to him. And they agreed, thank goodness, and they should have been the consolidator in the business. And when we did our first deal, in 1991, the combined market cap of chemical manufacturers was less than $2 billion. The market cap of JP Morgan was $9 billion. And they were only triple A bank in the country. They were the best bank in the country, they should have been the consolidated they weren't we ascended, they declined, we ended up buying him, then we put them together. And we were very thoughtful about how we did that, because they had a lot of great people. And it worked.

David Novak 13:18 

How do you orchestrate that process to make a deal happen and then make it work?

Bill Harrison 13:23 

Well, it has to fit into your strategic vision that this is something you really want to do. So we were talking to everybody was talking to everybody, I'd say we had more confidence in the soul consolidation deal than most people because we had done a lot and we'd been successful, we thought we were pretty good at pulling organizations together. And then you figure out who you want to merge with. And one of the one of the advantages of being a leader, if you believe your industry is consolidating is you get to sort of pick who you want to go talk to versus nobody's left. And that's what we did, then you got to talk to them. And the most important thing, and I want to underline this, the most important thing, when you really start thinking about another deal is do the cultures come together? Because on paper, all these deals look great. When you take the top 10 or 15 banks, investment banks, you could put all them together on paper, you could make that look pretty good. But the key is, can you pull them together culturally, and if the gap was too wide, we would try to figure that out. We kind of knew each other pretty well. And if the gap was too wide, it's a it's not something we want to do. I mean, I had a conversation with Hank Paulson about Goldman Sachs, because everybody was talking to everybody. And we talked about putting together and I said, Hank, you know, it wouldn't make any sense. Your culture is so good and so strong. We would buy you guys it wouldn't work. So you have to find somebody where it can work. And then once you do it, and you agree that you can manage that cultural divide, then you got to go to work and make decisions quickly and start executing the merger and those are hard. They're hard. There's no question about it.

David Novak 14:57 

As I understand it, when you orcas At the JP Morgan in the chase Berger, you got a lot of criticism by the press, it wasn't a popular merger and the investment community wasn't that happy with you making the deal? How did you really dig into what the reason was for that? And how did you coach yourself through such a tough experience?

Bill Harrison 15:17 

Well, the market didn't like the fact that we paid a 30% premium for JP Morgan. And I took the view that, hey, this is so important for us strategically, we're not going to think the year down the road, we're gonna think, you know, three or four or five years down the road. And let's do it. Furthermore, I thought we could create a lot of value. So we put the two together. And I'd say the merger process itself went as well as most of the others. But what happened in the second year of the merger, is that you had the bursting of the bubble that was in the tech space in 2000. And that created a lot of problems in our private equity business. And then we had Worldcom and Enron, we had big exposures there. And so all of a sudden, we were in the spotlight, and it was tough. Well, what I do in a situation like that is, I try to make sure I'm assessing it right. For example, somebody would friend would walk into my office, a partner would walk into my office and say, Bill, you know, I'm so sorry, you're getting all this heat from the market and, and others and, you know, wish I could help out more. So how you doing? I said, Look, I'm doing fine. Because when I get into a crisis like that, or a situation, that's tough, I try to quickly do a worst case scenario, okay, what's the worst case that can happen here. And I would say, every time I've ever done that, so far in my life, I get to the point where I can manage the worst case, and the company can manage or the family can manage the worst case. If you get to that, then you say, okay, that's the worst case, we're going to survive, we're going to do this go to the best case, and let's go try to implement and come up with a plan to go to the best case. And then I would turn to my friend and say, Don't feel sorry for me, I said, worst case it happened to me is that the board removes me from my job. And I said, if that happens, it would be very sad, because I believe in this company so much, that it would be a sad day. But I said, having said that, I've had an unbelievable career based on anything I thought coming out of a Rocky Mount North Carolina. And secondly, I'm financially secure. I have a great family. I'm healthy. I'm 57 years old, I'm doing this fine. So don't worry about me. Let's put this in perspective. And our worst year, we're going to make $3 billion after tax, we a double A rated, we've got a great future. We got great people and we got a strategy that's going to work and we will be a really, really good bank. No question. And I really totally believe that. Turns out that was true. Now a lot of people had to get there. But that's how I felt. And I think the leader has to have that vision and belief and articulate it. The good news is I did I mean, it wasn't even a close call. I'll be honest, I wasn't that worried about I didn't like all the stuff going on. But you had to manage it.

David Novak 18:00 

You know, you always hear that phrase that it's lonely in the corner office.

Bill Harrison 18:04 

Is it bill? No, I never looked at it that way. I had a lot of great partners, I would bring them in on everything. They knew most everything I knew. And I didn't feel like I was by myself. And also my relationship with the board was such that I felt good about it. I mean, I told the board everything. I didn't try to sugarcoat anything. Hey, this is what we have, guys, this is why I think we can manage it. And this is why I think we're going to end up being a great bank. And so I never felt alone at all. Thank goodness, I didn't I mean, maybe I shouldn't have but I didn't.

David Novak 18:39 

You know, it's been said that mergers and acquisitions really represent the real acid test for leadership. Do you agree with that? And why is that? So if you do,

Bill Harrison 18:48 

oh, yeah, that's a true statement. I mean, I did a lot of work, specially in London and doing some other things before we got in the merger process. But once you get in the merger process, it's a whole new ballgame. And I would say if you're not a good leader, you're gonna be exposed very quickly. Because things have to happen really quickly. You have to be decisive. You have to build a team, you have to bring things together. And if you don't, you're going to be exposed as a leader based on the normal operating environment. I mean, our people used to call it the Desert Storm mentality. This, you know, came out of when Bush 41 had his program to go to fix the rock, and they call it doesn't storm and we would use that analogy. We're in Desert Storm, man, if you don't see that and act like that, as a leader, make decisions to get on with it, you're gonna be exposed. So you have to, and it just really brings to the fore all the important things of leadership, and that's why I loved it and people who couldn't do that got exposed and they probably left.

David Novak 19:51 

I'm on a mission to make the world a better place by developing better leaders. And every week I send out an email called the weekly leadership plan where I I'll give you some simple tips that you can apply to help you grow in your confidence as a leader, you can get this weekly leadership plan for free. Just go to how leaders lead.com/plan and sign up today. Again, that's how leaders lead.com/plan.

You know, I've heard you say, Bill that no one can command power to you, you have to earn it. Was there a specific experience that really helped you draw that conclusion? And what was your key to earning power?

Bill Harrison 20:36 

I think that I really relied on one of my fundamental beliefs about how a company can be successful. And that is the leader has got to have a strategy that he or she can articulate. And you got to get good people around you, and they have to buy into it. And then you start pushing it down around building a really strong culture. And part of that culture is bringing people together through teamwork and partnership and getting them to understand strategy and understand the issues and talk about it. So I understood that I liked doing that. My first exposure was San Francisco with 13 people, when I realized for the first time, hey, you know, this is kind of fun, I can do this. And then London was a further test. And then the CEO, obviously, the ultimate test, but it was something that I felt very comfortable with. And one of the things David, I knew you were part of this because David was on our board and did a great job there as a board member. And he also as CEO of Yum, brands would come in and help our leadership programs. I started when we did the JP Morgan deal, you bring in two strong banks together, really important to bring people together. So I started a leadership program economy leadership, Morgan Chase. And I hired Jack Welsh as an advisor to me, he was fabulous. He helped teaching this, another colleague, Jimmy Lee, and a few others. So we taught the class it was two days, we did it once a month for two years, we had 100 people at a time, we started at the top of the firm, top 100 People next month, next 100 People next month. So over two years, a covered 2000 people. And in those sessions, I'm the emcee, I'm there for two days, I don't just pop in and out. I'm there for two days, I'm teaching three or four modules, Jack Welsh is teaching to three modules and others. And it was a great way to connect with everybody and build a culture. And I think stuff like that is really important. That was one that certainly, I enjoyed very much. And David came in and spoke and gave his chicken talk. And everybody loved that recognition and all the other stuff David talks about so well. So that was just a good experience. But you got to do a lot of things like that.

David Novak 22:39 

You know, Bill, you know, hubris takes down a lot of CEOs and a lot of companies and you're one of the most humble guys, I know. How do you stay that way, when you have so much power?

Bill Harrison 22:51 

I think we all want to be successful in what we do, and accomplish something. And then it's a question of how you do it. And I always felt that the way for me to be the best leader I could be was to have a right strategy to get good people around me build a culture, and then have teamwork and partnership and make sure that people felt like they were part of the team and not me up there just by myself. So the more I could share, and get people involved, the more successful I was going to be they were going to be the company was going to be so it was just sort of a natural thing for me and me believe in teamwork. You know, you, you can't take all the credit yourself, you got to get others involved. And I believe in teamwork, a team will always be a bunch of individuals.

David Novak 23:36 

In the banking industry. As you were coming up there were literally titular heads of the banks like Sandy Weill at Citibank. And they're, you know, a lot of what I would call all knowing CEOs, you know, kind of this is the way out, it's going to be and you were really one of the first bankers to really take on more of a relationship team building collaboration perspective with growing a bank, when did you realize you had to do that, and you also received a little bit of criticism for being that way at it, what gave you your conviction to not be that guy, the guy that walks into the room?

Bill Harrison 24:09 

Well, I guess I started with a view that I'm not usually not the smartest guy in the room necessarily. And you need to build a team around you to be successful. And I really believe that I probably learned that in sports first. So it wasn't hard for me to manage like I did. As a matter of fact, I'd say every job I got along the way, in a lot of ways was easier than the prior job. That doesn't mean I didn't have to work as much. It was easy in the sense that it played more to my strength. If I was a pure banker, I would have been okay, but I wouldn't have been a star. I became good playing to what my strengths were which are probably high on EQ skills high and building teams, competitive you know, get their strategy, right implement and all that stuff. That was more natural for me. So that's what I did it it was a very natural flow and And it sort of came into vogue a little bit. But whether it's in Bogota, that's the way I was, that's the way I would have been. And if I'd failed because of that, I'd fail because of that. But that's who I was,

David Novak 25:09 

you know, a few years after you put JP Morgan Chase together, you acquired bank one, you mentioned that, what drove that move,

Bill Harrison 25:17 

what drove that move was if you had the strategic vision, and you want to be complete in your businesses, we had basically two businesses, we had a wholesale investment banking, asset management business. And then we had a consumer business emerges up until Bank One had sort of gotten us to where I was very comfortable, we could be a leader, you want to be a leader in all these activities, you're in not just the average player. And I was pretty comfortable that we were there. And we weren't number one, and everything and investment banking, but I could see that we could get there without doing another merger. We were not number one in consumer banking. And we needed to do another merger in the consumer space. Well, you need to do a big one. And they weren't, but three or four banks out there that could do it, most of them wouldn't have wanted to do a deal with the New York bank, Jamie and I had lunch. And I'd known Jamie for a long time, because he used to call on him when he was a commercial credit. And he and I had lunch. And this was three years after the JPMorgan merger was two or three, three years, probably into Jamie's job fixing bank one. And so we had lunch. And both of us quickly agreed that, you know, if we put these two organizations together, it could be a home run strategically. And for me, not only homeruns, strategically, I didn't have a good successor. And that's really strange. When you think about all the banks we put together, I didn't have the right successor, I told the board that. So this deal was like the deal made in heaven. And so Jamie and I decided that launch and I said, Jamie, I haven't talked to my board. But here's what could make this deal work. I think when if I go to the board, and when I say this, remember that three of these first things I'm gonna say, usually derail a deal for the wrong reasons. I said, Okay, Jamie, here's what our boards gonna probably want. It's got to be named JP Morgan Chase, not bank one. It's got to be headquartered in New York, not Chicago. And Jamie says, yes, yes. And I said, they're going to want me to be CEO for a couple of years, I'll be 63. At that point, when I retire, you have 49? I'm very comfortable with that. But they're going to want that you may not want to do that. And you may not want to work for me. He said no problem. And I said at the fourth one is that because I was criticized for overpaying for JP Morgan that all been merged with equals financially. Well, I can't comment on that. That's the board matter. I said, fair enough. That's the only sticking point we had in this whole deal. And then we negotiated for about two, three months. And thank goodness it worked out. And I remember David going home that night that Jamie and I announced the bank one deal in January of 2004. And I walked into and I said, Annie, I have to say this is the most satisfying day of my business career by far, because a CEO really worries about strategy, and you worry about a successor and today both of those were done.

David Novak 28:02 

That's true. And it was a marriage made in heaven. And but Bill to do this deal, you basically had to agree to step down as CEO, and hand the reins over to Jamie Dimon after two years. And you know, I know you love the company and you love being CEO. How could you agree to such a selfless move?

Bill Harrison 28:21 

Well, again, I wouldn't say it was selfless. I was so happy that I had a successor. I didn't want to work for another seven or eight years trying to develop a successor I was 61. At the time we did the deal. And so to have a successor like Jamie, who I thought was best in the business. Matter of fact, I told the board early on, if we have to go outside, we ought to go after Jamie Dimon, he's the best guy out there. So for this deal to produce Jamie plus a great strategic outcome for the company was just great. So that was the first thing I was happy to have a great successor. And secondly, after two years of doing this deal, I would have worked there for 40 years, 40 years long time to work in a company. And I was fine. I was ready to move on some guys. Some ladies have to keep working 24 by seven and a serious job. That was not me, I had a lot of outside interests. So I was very happy to step back I really was. So the only thing for me that was important was to just to watch Jamie and make sure the values and the culture that he and I had agreed on. Were actually true. And it didn't take long to say man, he is really good not only as a great banker and leader and operator, but he's got the right instincts on culture. So it was I'd say the smoothest transition that's happened in most organizations at the top level for those reasons.

David Novak 29:40 

When you brought the two companies together, what did you think about the possibilities? And what did you really think was going to happen? Everybody always says we're going to become the best in the world and data data that I mean, what was the vision and what do you guys think about?

Bill Harrison 29:54 

As we all know, every time companies do merger, they'll sit down with the new management team and come up With a new vision strategy, please. And we did that. So Jamie and I sat down and in the prime urges, we would do that. And by the time we got to say Chase chemical, we were pretty big. So you could sit down and say, with the new management team, hey, we want to be one of the best banks in the United States. And we can get there maybe, maybe at some point. So that was the mission, you sort of thought you might, when Jamie and I did this deal, we weren't the best bank. But we both honestly believed that we could be the best bank in the world. So our mission vision statement was, we want to be the best bank in the world. We didn't put a timeframe on it. But we honestly thought that could happen. And that's what I feel the best about that it actually did.

David Novak 30:43 

I had the good fortune bill to work with you, you know, I was on the bank, one board with Jamie. And then I'd went on the JPMorgan Chase board when you acquire bank one. And so I really saw you in action. And one of the things you have to do when you bring two companies together is you got to bring two boards together as well. And I'll never forget the dinner that you hosted when we first got together and you went around, and you had everybody basically give five minutes on their backgrounds and really started to build the relationships. And I have to tell you, it was a meeting where I really felt the board came together that night just getting to know each other, what is your key to really building relationships and bringing people together,

Bill Harrison 31:25 

I think it's getting people to talk and share their experiences, share their views, share their values, and just getting to know each other. And when we did that, at the board that night, you know is a little dicey. Because you know, you got a lot of big hitters in that room, including you and, and many others. And so to ask them to go around the room and share five minutes, the best story I mean, ask li Raman CEO of Exxon, these tough guy wasn't sure how much he wanted to do that. But I thought it was important was consistent with how I thought and let's try to build a team. We're doing it with the rest of the organization, this at least started the board. And I think it was good. And I think we had a really good board. And it came together very well not because of that, but just because we all related to each other and got to know each other and ended up trusting each other.

David Novak 32:14 

And you continually worked on the board in that kind of manner, you know, getting people to open up and share. I thought that was great learning to see in action. And the other thing I noticed is that, you know, here you are the CEO, you're gonna move out basically in two years, the minute Jamie Dimon walked into JPMorgan Chase, you did everything you could to help him be successful and be your successor there was no, I'm the guy in charge at this point. You know, you were really focused on making Jamie successful, how do you think you can really help successors really take on the next role? What advice can you give to people?

Bill Harrison 32:51 

Well, that transition was easy, because Jamie was so good. And I knew he was good. And I knew him. And so we had a really easy time. And he was Chief Operating Officer, I was CEO, but I defer to Jamie, almost everything because I took the view that, okay, he's gonna be CEO in two years. And if he disagrees with me on this, he don't change it in two years. So unless I really disagreed with something, then I would generally go along with Jamie. But the good news is, we never really disagreed on many things at all. But if we had, then I would have said, No, I'm CEO, and I'm going to do it that way. But I think you have to be pragmatic and do what's best for the company. It was easy in this case, because we agreed. And then Jamie was what you could see, it was so good. And I was blessed to have a successor like this. So I just wanted to make sure he had all of my support to be as successful as he can be. But I think in terms of passing it on to others, the main thing is as outgoing CEO is to have a process with the board to find the right person and find the right person, you can kind of work out that other stuff, but finding the right person is always hard.

David Novak 34:04 

We'll be back with the rest of my conversation with Bill Harrison in just a moment. As you've heard us talk about the person who took over a CEO of JPMorgan Chase after Bill was Jamie Dimon. I've known Jamie for years. He was originally on my board at yum brands. And then I became a director of JP Morgan Chase when he had the reins in our episode on how leaders lead. Jamie talks about how you always need a plan to deal with problems. crises happen,

Jamie Dimon 34:32 

and they happen in ways you don't necessarily understand like the one today, but in the best preparation of a great company. Have good margins, respond quickly. Take care of your customers know the problems happen. Don't be over leveraged. Don't say I never expect them to get back. It can always get back.

David Novak 34:50 

Go back and listen to my entire conversation with Jamie. Episode 14 here on how leaders lead You talked about your leadership program, and you and I share a common belief that leaders need to teach. Give us your elevator speech on your teachable point of view on on leadership,

Bill Harrison 35:12 

I think a good leader has to have a vision strategy, and then convince the people around him that that's what we're going to do. And then build a culture that supports all of that, and then go execute it. I mean, those are the things I would always keep coming back to, you know, I teach in high school here down in Florida, teach 11th grade, and I talked about vision. And I said, you know, whether you're CEO of a company, or whether you're in 11th grade, you folks ought to have a vision, your vision could be as simple as I want to go to college in two years, or I want to go into a vocational school, I want to have a family, but have a vision, because you really need that. So I'm just a great believer, that's where it starts. And then you got to get people to follow you, you got to build people around you who can help support you. And getting it done.

David Novak 36:00 

You mentioned that you hired the late Jack Welch's, an advisor on Leadership for the company and you had the good fortune to get some coaching from Jack Welch, how would you describe his coaching style? And here he was one of the greatest leaders in business history? And what did he help you discover about yourself? Well, it

Bill Harrison 36:19 

was a funny story. When Jack retired, he went out so publicly and said, I will be an advisor to three CEOs if they would like, and come to see me. So I sort of met him, I went over to see him, didn't know him that well. And I said, Jack, we'd really love to have you come in and help us. He said, No, I don't want to do that. I don't like investment bank. And I don't like those guys. I don't like your culture. And whatever. I said, Well, that's exactly why we need you, Jack. So after an hour and a half, he said, Okay, I'll do it. I walked out there, I felt like I've known Jack Welch forever. And he and I became very close. So the way I would use Jack is number one, he taught in this leadership Morgan Chase program every month. And that was great. Secondly, I would call Jack, I mean, I wouldn't sit down with Jack and just say, just give me feedback so much, because Jack naturally does that when he sees it. Anytime I had a sort of an issue, I'd wanted to get more brainpower on experience on, I would call jack and jack, what do you think? And number one, he was always accessible, he would always give you a really smart, thoughtful answer on what he thought, but he didn't try to push it on you. I'd love the guy. He was just right.

David Novak 37:28 

You know, I want to take you back a few seconds into some of the things that we've talked about earlier. And and you mentioned that when you were a chemical, you went to London and ran an office with 12 1300 people. What was it like being an American in English, you know, London office, how did you go about building credibility

Bill Harrison 37:48 

33 year old is plopped in the middle of a organization of 1300 people. And the view is I'm sure What are you doing here, you don't really know our businesses, you don't really know the UK, you're 33 years old, whatever. And to make it worse, we had a very dysfunctional executive committee that I inherited. I mean, they didn't like each other. And they probably didn't like me, but they disliked each other even more. So here's something I did, it really taught me probably more than most anything I've ever done, the team just didn't get along. And after about six months, I ran across an organizational consultant. And he said, Bill, this is what I'd suggest we're going to have an off site for two and a half days, we're going to take these eight people out there. And we're going to peel the onion back. And he told me how he's going to do that. And I said, Wow, I said, just make sure you don't peel it back so much that all these guys quit, because then I lose my job. And I don't want to do that. So we went to this off site. And here's how you started the meeting. It was brutal. It taught me feedback in a very real way. It's okay, the first thing we're going to do, you're going to go to the person on your left, we're going to go around the circle, and we're going to say, Okay, John Jones, I want everybody in here to tell you what they do not like about you personally. And of course, these guys couldn't wait to do that. Because they didn't like a joke. They just lit in each other. And of course, the next guy couldn't wait to get back at him. So you got a lot of bad stuff out. And it was a it was personal. Then he flipped it say, Okay, let's go around and say, What don't you like about John Jones, who's running operations? What don't you like about how he's doing his job? Well, of course, everybody piles on this guy. And it goes around like this. Everybody's piling on everybody. And it gets ugly. And I'm like, wow, but I trusted my organizational consultant. Because he told me exactly what's going to happen. It did. He said about the second day, somebody didn't say wow, you know, why don't we talk about something positive. So then you flip it and you do the same thing the other way you go, what do you like about John Jones? Personally? What do you like about him was somebody would say I liked it. I liked that. And you know, as good and John just say, Wow, I couldn't believe the guy likes me for something. And so you do that and then you do the same thing on the on the business side and the result of that is you get everything out, and it was all flushed out. It was pretty harsh. But then once you ended up with Israel purity, because the team has gotten everything out there. And then you spend the last half a day. So it Okay, how are we going to work together? So we went back to London actually, as a very unified team. We weren't perfect team, for sure. But we did a lot of great stuff as a team after that, because everybody kind of knew everybody was coming from. The lesson learned from that David was feedback is as long as you do it in a way that you can manage it and control it is something you ought to do. And just deal with it, get people together, get them to talk, get them to be open, and you can resolve a lot of problems and build a team that starts working. And I use that a bunch after that.

David Novak 40:38 

I want to take you back to another thing that you mentioned a little bit earlier, you talked about the bank having huge exposure to Enron, which failed in historic fashion. And this was a high flying company that it would have been great to have exposure to when they were on the way up. But they obviously, you know, went south, what were your key learnings from handling that challenge,

Bill Harrison 41:01 

we were actually pretty conservative relative to some banks, about pure exposure to Enron. But we've had these payment contracts that were insured by insurance companies that we thought were very pure had all the legal advice. And when they got in trouble, the insurance companies bailed out and we had an exposure that we didn't anticipate. And then everybody piled on, you know, the regulator's come out to you, the other side comes out to the shareholders gonna have to, and we had to settle for a big number. And it was pretty unpleasant because to me, it wasn't fair. But that's what CEOs run into. You know, I didn't learn a whole lot because we were pretty disciplined about how we manage the credit risk. It was just, we got it wrong. I think for the wrong reasons. I don't want to be defensive. But that's one that we got a lot of flack for, and it cost the shareholders money and was too bad.

David Novak 41:54 

So you don't want to be defensive. But how do you keep your team positive in a situation like that, where you think you guys have definitely been wronged?

Bill Harrison 42:01 

Well, I didn't get a lot of sympathy from the board. And, you know, our employees, we tried to explain it to him, I think most of employees did. You know, I went on Maria Bartiromo several times to talk about it. on anything like that, that becomes an issue. Again, you're back to how do you manage a crisis, you try to really define it to try to articulate and communicate to your people, your constituents as best you can. And you know, that was a hard one to do. It was hard to explain, but you do the best you can. And we got through it.

David Novak 42:31 

Yeah. You know, I said at the top of the show that you led the consolidation of the banking industry and, and big banks, you know, draw lots of criticism today, do you think it's justified?

Bill Harrison 42:43 

Well, I think in the global world that we're operating in that size, and scale, are critical for success, they create a lot of American jobs, they create a lot of American prestige. And you don't want to have your American banks, the smallest in the world. And we were heading in that direction, actually, because we had very strict consolidation regulations in the US for a long time. So no, I think it's the positive. And I think if you look at JP Morgan Chase today, I think we serve our clients a lot better than how we serve the clients, that Chemical Bank, whether you're a consumer client, or whether you're a corporate banking client will just do a much better job in every way. So I think you can I think its size and scale can create real value if you do it, right. But there are plenty of big companies that don't do it right, for a whole bunch of reasons. But I think if you look at the well run financial institutions, they're adding a lot of value. And I'd make the same argument for the other big companies. And in the US, it's a real advantage for the US to have this strategic advantage.

David Novak 43:42 

Bill, it's been so much fun learning from an incredible career. As I listened to you, you don't really sound like you were ever overly ambitious in your career. Did you always want to be a CEO, I got to ask you this or to just kind of come upon you.

Bill Harrison 43:57 

I never looked at the next job is something I really had to happen three years or whatever, I just, I'd like to feel like I was accomplishing something. And I was learning something. And then I was enjoying myself. So certainly never looked at the potential that I'd be CEO, not even when I got up to be relatively senior. But then when I got to be pretty senior, I know Walter Shipley, who was CEO at the time, sort of indicated that I was on the shortlist to be considered. And we had lunch one day, and his dining room and he said, Bill, you know, it's really between you and another guy I'm looking at and I just want to just keep talking to you. And I said, Well, I'm honored. But I said, Walter, I gotta tell you something. I said, if given the opportunity, I'm not sure I really want it. And he was course shocked. He said, well, let's just think about it. He was very cool about it. So I wouldn't talk to an my wife, talk to my friends and talk to my parents. All them said, Are you crazy? You get that opportunity. You got to take it, and I was sort of leaning that way but I wasn't totally sure because it gets back to getting out of your comfort zone. And my comfort zone here wasn't that I was afraid of the job actually going back to what I said I, I was very comfortable that I could lead and continue to do the strategy, right and all that. I just liked life. I like my friends, I like the environment I was in. And I was 57 years old, I was financially secure, I want to keep working. Thank goodness, I decided that if given the opportunity, I would take it because I look back and say if I hadn't done that, we would have missed out on an unbelievable experience that I had being a CEO and all the things that we've accomplished and now the greatest bank in the world, which gives me a lot of satisfaction. So it was interesting, and most people wouldn't think the way I did but that's the way to be honest. That's the way I was thinking.

David Novak 45:47 

You are you're I am what I am I am Popeye the Sailor Man your bill. Here's the van. That's it's you and you stay true to who you believe. You know, you know, I want to wrap this up. I have a little fun with you here with lightning round of q&a. Bill. Are you ready for this? Yes, sir. What's one word that best describes you?

Bill Harrison 46:04 

I'd say competitive. I've always liked to win. So I'm competitive, hopefully in a nice way. But I like to win at everything. And if you'd like to win, you got to have a strategy.

David Novak 46:14 

If you could be one person for a day beside yourself, who would it be? And why?

Bill Harrison 46:19 

I would say Roy McIlroy because I've always thought that I would be a really good golfer and I'm not and it's a huge disappointment that I'm not I keep working on it. So I realized that to be in his shoes for a day to hit a great ball and have crowds cheering for you and to win a tournament. That would be pretty cool. And let's I'd love that.

David Novak 46:42 

What's your biggest pet peeve?

Bill Harrison 46:44 

I think the biggest pet peeve is negative people. I like positive attitude positive attitudes people is a really important attribute and people who aren't positive about things I just have a hard time with.

David Novak 46:57 

What's up that about you that few people would know.

Bill Harrison 46:59 

I still do a doc start waterskiing, and slalom ski at age 78. And I plan on continuing to do that as a goal.

David Novak 47:09 

I didn't know that. That's great. Do you have any hidden talents bill?

Bill Harrison 47:13 

I'd say I love playing cornhole with my kids. And I got to be a pretty good cornhole player. And I can play both with my left hand and right hand, I had to go to the left hand because I got the yips on my right hand. So I can go both ways.

David Novak 47:25 

Yeah, there's your basketball skills coming into play. What's your favorite business book and why?

Bill Harrison 47:32 

One of the most favorite books I've read in the last year was called the accidental president. And it's about Harry Truman becoming president after Roosevelt died, and it just showed what a remarkable leader he was, you know, we all know Harry Truman, but to read that book. It was quite a story. And I'd love it.

David Novak 47:53 

One last question here. If you had one bit of advice to give to aspiring leaders, what would it be?

Bill Harrison 47:58 

Well, I hate to keep repeating this. But I would go back and say, You ought to have a vision to do what you want to do whatever that is, and then try to get people to follow you on that vision, and then start building a team and go execute it.

David Novak 48:12 

You might have stepped down as CEO, but you've never really retired, I know you're a really active engaged guy, what's your business interest these days,

Bill Harrison 48:21 

I don't have a lot of business interests other than following, you know, some of my own personal stuff. I've aged off all of the public boards I was on, but I'm on three private equity boards I enjoy that sort of keeps you engaged. I teach school a little bit here before COVID. And I'll do that again. I have a lot of hobbies. Like I'd love to do videos of the family trips, where you integrate music and photos and videos that you've taken into it and create a story of trip to Africa or whatever. I'll do it the same with books. So I have a lot of little hobbies that keep me busy. Because I'm a great believer that for me to be a person I want to be I have to be happy first. And how do you be happy I think everybody's happy a different way. What makes me happy family and friends, and helping other people. And then having projects now when I was working, you know, I had a big project JP Morgan, I was a big project, a retired. And now I have a lot of really small projects, but I get out of bed every day. And I have four or five things four or five projects that I'm working on that I want to go do and I've run out of time. And people say well, what are you doing? You know, he said me it usually retired. And I said I don't know what I do all day, but I'm busy as heck.

David Novak 49:37 

Well, Bill, I can't tell you how much I value your friendship and appreciate you take the time to share your insights today. You're a heck of a guy.

Bill Harrison 49:46 

David, thank you for having me. And I just applaud all you doing in this leadership space because it's so important and you're having a great impact on a lot of people. So keep it up.

David Novak 50:04 

I'm really struck by how selfless Bill Harrison is as a leader. You know, he stepped away from the North Carolina basketball team and let someone else come in and take his spot. He also stepped aside from JP Morgan Chase and let Jamie diamond take the reins. In both cases, Bill was so accomplished at what he does. But he did this willingly because he wanted the best for the teams he played on. So this week, here's something simple you can do to apply what you've learned in this episode, I want you to think about something. If you were to walk out the door tomorrow, who would you want to have take your place? All right, then here's the big question. Are they ready? If you don't have someone in mind to take your place, start there. And then as soon as you have that person or a couple of people with some potential, invest time to get them ready, teach them what you know and pave the way for them to be successful. So do you want to know how leaders lead what we learned today is that great leaders prepare the next leader. Coming up next week on how leaders lead is guy Roz, the host and creator of two wildly popular podcast how I built this and wisdom from the top. So be sure to come back again next week to hear our entire conversation. Thanks again for tuning in to another episode of how leaders lead where every Thursday you get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the world. I make it a point to give you something simple on each episode that you can apply to your business so that you will become the best leader you can be