10/14/16 Kevin Hancock, Hancock Lumber
Posted by Erik Jorgensen
Kevin Hancock, CEO of Hancock Lumber, joined us on Friday to talk a little about life. Specifically, he spoke of his life and the way in which he turned his diagnosis with a rare vocal disorder into an opportunity for self-reflection and transformation.
He told us the story of his new memoir, Not For Sale: Finding Center in the Land of Crazy Horse, traces his own journey “deep into Indian country, and even deeper into his own soul.” What began as a search to learn non-medical ways to control his spasmodic dysphonia, a rare and uncurable (though controllable) condition characterized by failure of the vocal cords, turned into a form of “vision quest” that permanently changed his outlook on life and leadership.
When the story began, Hancock Lumber was gripped by the Great Recession, and had suffered a 50% loss in sales “without losing a single customer.” Building was dead in Maine, and this meant severe disruptions at his company. At the same time, Kevin’s voice was vanishing, causing him to ask how could the CEO of a corporation do his job without a voice? As it turned out, this forced him to listen and to reconceive how he managed his people, and he became increasingly less directive.
At the same time, he started to visit the Sioux tribe on their reservation, America’s poorest community located in the Southwestern corner of South Dakota. They had a radically flat power structure, with great equality among members – few visible leaders, and a society based on the individual. As he spent more time there, he realized that the partial loss of his own voice was a major opportunity, as it allowed him the chance to disconnect from business, reflect more, listen more, and help others who themselves were voiceless (though generally in a less-literal sense than he).
He realized that his “job” was less about how to “fix” the problems of the Sioux than to listen and forge connections with them. Ultimately he wrote the book, telling the story of his journey. Copies were sold at the end of the meeting and are available at www.kevinhancock.com with all proceeds in excess of printing costs going straight back to the tribe.
It was a most unusual program. The Club awarded Kevin Hancock a Paul Harris Fellowship in recognition of his remarkable humanitarian work. (See Bits & Pieces)
Photo: President Laura, Kevin Hancock and Rusty Atwood.