Visiting the GN Group and ReSound headquarters in Denmark today, I was delighted to see an inspirational poster in their foyer with the statement "Make It Happen."
What delighted me is that the founder of ReSound, Dr. Rodney Perkins, would give a plaque to all of the founding employees at his Silicon Valley startup companies that said "Make It Happen" to inspire his employees with the entrepreneurial spirit to strive to succeed; to not to just talk about what needed to be done to overcome barriers and achieve success but to actually take ownership and "make it happen" themselves.
The recipients of this "Make It Happen" plaque and spirit included those who were the first employees of the hearing aid company ReSound that he founded in the mid-1980s in Redwood City California, the same company that now is headquartered in Ballerup Denmark that I visited today.
I wrote almost 20 years ago about Dr. Perkins' (Rodney's) entrepreneurial philosophy and how "make it happen" embodied so much of how he created his 16+ MedTech startups in Silicon Valley, so won't repeat my thoughts here:
https://thoughtfulinnovation.wordpress.com/2006/03/04/make_it_happen/
I think that Rodney would be happy to know that ReSound--the company that he started over 40 years ago, that has moved headquarters halfway around the world and grown to over 10x the size since both Rodney and I left ReSound--has maintained his spirit of innovation to call on all employees to "Make It Happen".
I am feeling quite wonderful about the long-lasting impact that someone can have from small beginnings, and how the spirit of a company can, unknowingly perhaps, persist for such a long time and continue to be embodied by a completely new generation of employees.