‘I’m willing to take a smaller piece of a bigger pie’

Business editor Henry Unger’s “5 Questions for the Boss” reveals the lessons learned by CEOs of the area’s major companies and organizations. The column alternates with business editor Matt Kempner’s “Secrets of Success,” which shares the vision and realities of entrepreneurs who started their dreams from scratch.

You don’t have to wait until you retire to do some good, especially if you pay attention to an old baseball coach.

While Jerry Eickhoff was building his bank consulting business in 1989, he and his former Georgia State coach, Archie Crenshaw, founded Honduras Outreach Inc., an Atlanta-based nonprofit that organizes volunteer groups from throughout the United States to work on community development projects in rural Honduras. The steady stream of volunteers, totaling 933 this year, each spend about a week in Honduras. They help improve living conditions by building and staffing health clinics and schools, putting in water lines and building latrines, chimneys and cement floors for homes.

Now called HOI because it’s expanding into Nicaragua, Eickhoff has been the CEO for most of the past 24 years. At the same time, the entrepreneur ran and then sold the consulting business, Bank Earnings International. He then co-founded and ran a high-tech company, Enterpulse, which developed websites and later expanded into healthcare revenue systems before he sold out.

Eickhoff, 67, discusses key takeaways from the business and nonprofit worlds.

Q: What early experience helped shape you?

A: My dad was the consummate salesman. He was great at building long-term relationships while selling picture frames to retailers. He was honest about what he was talking about. He was very persistent. And he used humor, which is at the core of what I try to do. It's one of the best ways to defuse difficult situations.

But my dad just became successful after I got out of Decatur High School. We didn’t have any money growing up. We were six kids. There were holes in the sofa. We didn’t invite a lot of people over because we were embarrassed.

I love boating, but we couldn’t afford a boat. I think not having money is what really shaped me the most. We had one bathroom and I had four sisters. It was a dog-eat-dog existence.

Q: While you went to Georgia State University, you worked part-time in banking, getting a full-time job after you graduated. You learned a lot about operations, becoming a vice president after about five years. Why did you leave to start your own business?

A: That's what my wife asked and so did her father. He thought I had lost my mind.

I had entrepreneurial leanings. I was working for the bank in an internal consulting group to cut the cost of different operations — at the branches, in commercial lending and in the trust department. We had a big impact.

It struck me that I didn’t need the bank to do that. I could go out on my own. My mentor at the bank found out about my plans and over a dinner we decided to do it together. We pooled our capital. I left the bank and he would join me after I got our first customer.

After I did, he focused on our internal operation — the nuts and bolts. I was sales. This is where I learned to price for value, as opposed to pricing for effort. We came up with a plan to charge 25 percent of the actual, quantifiable benefit of our consulting, plus expenses.

Our business and reputation grew over time. Our old employees at the bank called us for jobs. We only hired experienced people. It helped us compete against the bigger firms who hired some of their consultants right out of college.

Q: At the same time you were building your consulting business, you got involved in nonprofit work. What happened?

A: My old baseball coach, Archie Crenshaw, had a foundation that bought a ranch in rural Honduras. He called me one day and wanted me to go down with him to see it. I didn't know where Honduras was.

His foundation wanted to use the ranch for volunteer teams to work in the village — put in latrines, water lines and do basic community development.

It was the trip from hell. We broke down on roads in the middle of the night getting to the ranch. When we got there, it was a terrible situation for all the people. They were milking a cow to get milk for the kids. A man had a ladle, and he would switch from putting it into the milk bucket for the kids to laying the ladle down in manure.

It shocked my sensibilities. There was no education of tying manure to parasites to sickening the kids.

This was a two-by-four in the head. I was worried about my business and net worth, but these people had no safety net. I could lose everything and still have a place to get a meal, a place to sleep and a bathroom.

When we got back, I told Archie that basic infrastructure was needed before volunteer teams could be brought in. There was no electricity, no communications, no working vehicle. You need water. We were bathing in the river.

His response was, “if you’re so smart, why don’t you do it?”

So we set up an organization, Honduras Outreach Inc., and I took it on.

Q: You haven’t created a business or organization by yourself. Instead, you’ve always done it with at least one other person. Why?

A: It's as simple as the sum of the parts make the venture greater.

I would try to offset my strengths and weaknesses with somebody who would counterbalance them. I’m willing to take a smaller piece of a bigger pie. I’m a half-entrepreneur. Maybe, I’m afraid to do it all by myself.

In bank consulting, I was the sales guy and my partner was the implementation guy. In the nonprofit, Archie was the big thinker. I describe him as, “Archie Crenshaw, where the rubber meets the sky.”

You just have to trust that the relationships are strong enough. Partnerships can sometimes be a problem, but I was close with the people I would get in business with. You need to have been through bad times with them, not just good times.

You have to think of everything that can go wrong and document how you’re going to handle it. What if it’s a jump ball? Who’s going to make the ultimate decision at the end of the day? Who is the CEO?

And you have to find integrity in a partner. You spend a lifetime building a reputation. You can destroy it by doing one dumb thing.

Q: Do you have any other advice, whether the person is an entrepreneur or a manager in a big company or organization?

A: Yes. Don't be afraid to hire people better than you are. That's the key. You might think they will make you look bad or get your job. There a lot of people who seem to be concerned about that.

But it almost always works out for the better. They’ll elevate you if you learn to trust them and let them do their jobs.

One other thing — debt can kill you. In banking, I saw it from all angles. It’s the biggest risk for any business, and it’s the same for people, too.

Try to minimize leverage. Grow at a normal pace. Be patient.