An interview with this year's EXCEL honoree Rick George - Suncor Energy CEO and 1998 recipient of Excellence in Communication Award - Interview

Rick George joined Suncor Energy Inc. at a time when the company's future was less than certain. In the last seven years, he has turned the company from what one Canadian publication dubbed the "unluckiest oil company in Canada" into what the same publication later called the "darling of the stock market? Under George's leadership, Suncor achieved a remarkable turnaround. Earnings have gone from a loss of a Cdn. $228 million in 1992 to $223 million in profit in 1997. George attributes much of the success in the turnaround to the emphasis on communication with employees about the future. "You can't over-communicate, whether it's your vision, your values and beliefs, or your goals and objectives," he said.

GG: When you took the helm at Suncor in 1991, you instituted some dramatic changes with some dramatic results. Could you discuss the most important elements that you felt contributed to those results?

GEORGE: By way of background, Suncor is a company with three very distinct businesses: We are in the oil sands business [extracting oil from massive deposits of tarry sand in northern Canada], which is our largest asset; we're in the conventional oil and gas business in western Canada, and we're in the refining and marketing business in Ontario.

I think what really made the difference in the early days was, rather than just going in and taking a shotgun approach to make change, we took a number of months to devise a strategy to get each one of our businesses to be top performers, yet remain as low as we could on the cost curve. Unfortunately, as a result, we laid off more than 500 people, so those were very difficult days. This was strategy-based, long term, and executed down to where we now have a very solid company. So it's not just cutting for cutting's sake. And through it all we made communication a top priority, which it continues to be today.

GG: You obviously are a true believer in the importance of effective communication within an organization - have you had any formal training in communication, or have you honed your skills "on the job," so to speak?

GEORGE: I think I've honed my skills more on the job than in formal education. In engineering school, we only had to take one speech class ever, although law school certainly helped some! I found early on in my career, when I was running smaller organizations, that communication with people was absolutely important in terms of having them share a common vision, take ownership in what we were doing and where we were going. These early experiences convinced me that if you are going to get an organization to really change with you, you have to be able to articulate your objectives clearly. I am an optimist by background. I have a feeling and belief that 98 percent of people want to do great work; they want their companies to succeed; they want themselves to succeed. You can either design an organization for that percentage of people, or you can design it to take care of the two percent who don't want to do well. My point is, effective communication really gets the crowd with you. Once you get the majority of people moving, it's amazing how quickly things change.

GG: How is your communication department structured? How many employees do you have dedicated to either internal or external communication?

GEORGE: In each of our three businesses, we have between one and four communicators. All must be able to handle internal as well as external communication. In our corporate office, we have people who specialize in internal and external communication, but the work is handled on a project management model. When a manager takes on a project, he or she is responsible for all aspects of the communication, both internal and external. So I would say we have a team of generalists, as opposed to people who are focused in very narrow channels.

GG: What have you seen as the most significant changes in the role that communication plays in an efficient and profitable business?

GEORGE: At Suncor, it's a bit of an interesting case. Seven years ago, I felt I had to push the communication group into senior meetings on strategic issues. I experienced some resistance to that in terms of, "Gee, why do you need the communication people in here? We'll get to the end of the decision-making process and we'll tell the communicators what's going on and they can write about it." We progressively have brought them in earlier and earlier to the point where today, I think, they have a voice at the strategic table, and people now get concerned when they're not involved. That being said, every one of the communication people in our company would say we still don't bring them in early enough. But I think they get involved much earlier than in other companies.

In general, I would say our communicators have more of a strategic emphasis rather than just the mechanical writing of the facts after the decision is made. I think that this strategic partnership has been very interesting.

GG: And how do you see that as having evolved?

GEORGE: It's not revolutionary. Once the communication group shows that they can add value in a strategic sense to the company, then I think managers are more willing to pull them into issues much earlier. So in a way, it's a building of trust.

GG: Do you think that most organizations generally recognize the importance of good communication? Is it just the successful ones or the unsuccessful ones?

GEORGE: In our industry, we tend to be led by people with engineering backgrounds, and we tend to see this as an industry of assets and not necessarily an industry of change. We've been able to make communication a key part of what we've been doing, and I think this differs from how other CEOs might see it.

In terms of communication's contribution to the bottom line, I know it's been a big part of our success. For example, the day that we announced our Project Millennium, which is a big two-billion dollar project up in the northern part of Alberta, operation share price moved over seven dollars that day. And we didn't expect that. In fact, we had a betting pool among our managers; I think the highest bets that they made were two dollars a share. I believe the market had so much confidence in us because we consistently have delivered on our promises, and we have a commitment to open communication.

Our approach to communication adds credibility for the whole organization, both internally and externally. I can give you another example: A couple of years ago, in getting regulatory approval for a new $600 million mine, we took a very proactive stance in communicating with the First Nations people of the area, with the local communities, with government, and with the environmental groups. At the end of the day, there were virtually no unanswered objections submitted to the regulatory authorities. As a result, we got approval without a public hearing, and we were able to start the project a full two years ahead of schedule. This is a concrete outcome of good communication, which added a huge amount to the value of the company. Our ability to earn money was directly affected by this. I should point out that our approach was not limited to the communication professionals. Our whole community consultation process focuses on open communication.

GG: Do you feel technology is revolutionizing the function of communication, or do you think it's complicating it?

GEORGE: I think it's revolutionizing it. We use the Internet to correspond with our shareholders, with all kinds of stakeholders, and we use the intranet to communicate with employees.

This type of technology gives you instant access. Now, maybe you can get overloaded; I do worry about that, and you can't count totally on either computer systems or the written word. That will never replace meeting with people and talking to them. On the other hand, the fact that people have a place where they can get current information and current thoughts is a big help.

Technology is a great tool, but I don't think it will ever replace face-to-face meetings.

GG: What are the principal changes you see that will contribute to the role of the communicator of the future?

GEORGE: I would certainly prefer communicators who are generalists, who don't get too specifically tied down. I think they have to be strategically oriented as well.

You can't see yourself just as, "I'm a writer for such-and-such a company," or "I manage financial communication," or "I do this or I do that."

What you need are people who really think broadly about communication, who know the stakeholders, and who know how to communicate effectively with each one of those groups. It's a lot more complex than I think people would've thought five years ago.

GG: What do you consider as your principal do's as a CEO and your principal don'ts?

GEORGE: Don't be afraid to over communicate, and that corresponds to one of the primary do's, and that is, resist every temptation you have to not communicate with people.

I also strongly believe that you've got to not only talk about what your vision is, where you're going, but you have to walk it as well. People really sense instantly any kind of a dichotomy between what you say and what you do yourself. As soon as they see that, or sense it, then there's a disconnect.

GG: Have you had any particular problems that you've dealt with that required your communication skills above and beyond your management or your technical skills?

GEORGE: The one thing I would point to that's been quite impressive about Suncor - and I don't take total credit for this - is the amount of credibility our organization has. When we tell people that we're going to do something, or what our goal for this year is, then people really do make a broad assumption that we're largely going to get there. And it's resulted in a higher share price, lower volatility of the stock during down cycles, and more trust in Suncor in terms of dealing with governments or communities or other issues. So it does come back to the same trust issue I was talking about. What's been surprising to me is how important communication has been in the overall process.

GG: Concerning Suncor as an emerging global entity, what are the areas of communication you find most challenging in communicating across many diverse cultures?

GEORGE: You always have to be careful as a North American to remember that you're dealing in countries with different cultures and different backgrounds, so you have to make sure you recognize that. I strongly feel you have to get local help to make sure that those cultural differences are recognized - you don't have to abandon your own company culture, but I think you do have to adapt to the local culture.

I don't think you can necessarily communicate from a central office as well as you might. You can set the general context, but I think you've got to hire really good people, they've got to be on the ground, and they've got to be able to make it work in that culture.

GG: You've already said that you feel there's nothing to replace one-on-one and direct face-to-face communication. based on one-on-one, one-to-six, small meetings, large meetings, the written word, or large group meetings, which do you prefer? Or do you use them all?

GEORGE.' We definitely use them all. Small meetings would be my favorite. When I speak to organizations, sometimes we just do a quick pizza lunch or something similar - we've had some great dialogues. I usually do this two or three times a year at different locations.

It's interesting that after about the second or third time, this is no longer a passive audience. They get really actively engaged. I've had people ask me questions like, "Well, Rick, you know, your strategy is good, but you missed this point. What are you doing about it?" You get a real two-way dialogue going, which has been very helpful. Then the next time I go in, I actually refer back to some of those prior comments. Obviously, I prefer one-on-one, but if you're running an organization, a large organization, you know you can't get that with everyone.

GG: If you were to write a description for a communicator applying for a job with your organization, what would your requirements be?

GEORGE: I think I'd always look first to the trust and the ethical issues, because I think a lot of other things you can work around. We would look for someone who's a generalist, who can do many things, not specifically one job. That may have to do with the size of the company, but also it is part of the whole delegation and goal-setting process we have. We would look for somebody who can be articulate both in written and spoken words. As I mentioned before, I think we would be looking for someone who can think strategically, not just see themselves as the writer or as the person with the pen, but see themselves as interested in where the company's going, interested in the technologies of the business, interested in what the value drivers are. In other words, they should have a much broader interest in the company than just reporting the results.

GG: Would you look for someone from business school, for instance, or would you look for somebody with an engineering background?

GEORGE: I think some of the liberal arts schools turn out some very great students who are good thinkers. They may not be engineers per se, but that doesn't mean they can't understand the basics. They have to be interested in the business, but I think if that interest is there, they can pick the rest up.

GG: Do you have something that you'd like to add that we haven't discussed?

GEORGE: I think the only thing we haven't really touched on is the fact that the most important part of today's organization is its people. I don't care whether you run an oil company that is largely asset-based, or you run a software company, or anything in between.

It sounds a bit trite to say it, but people are the most important asset. But for them to be an important asset, you've got to treat them as part owners. They've got to have a direct interest in the business, and you have to communicate very clearly. I don't know if you've read any of Stephen Covey's work - but some of it I find quite interesting and useful. He says if you communicate very clearly to an organization, it eliminates a lot of inner-office politics. That's because if everyone knows where you're going, and what the goal line is, people won't try to make end runs or other political maneuvers. The people themselves, and their peers, will sort things out quite quickly in terms of what needs to be done to achieve the organization's goals. If it fits with where you're going strategically, then you've gained the authority to move and move quickly. You don't have to take every small decision all the way up to Rick George, and all the way back down. That's a powerful concept, and communication is obviously a very key part of it. You can't do it without effective communication.

Gloria Gordon is editor of Communication World.

COPYRIGHT 1998 International Association of Business Communicators
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