Heat Miser and Snow Miser. Burgermeister Meisterburger. Water pistols that shoot jelly. Holiday nostalgia washed over the ECLARO offices recently with a watch party of some vintage TV specials, but what quickly emerged in the midst of the Rankin & Bass classics “The Year Without a Santa Claus,” “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” was a realization that these tales are as much about corporate growth, disruptors and finding the Right People as they are about the big guy in the red suit and the most famous reindeer of all. Maybe even more so.
Before Silicon Valley had unicorns, before AI was even around to imagine stop-motion animation, a young man named Kris Kringle was the ultimate startup founder. “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” showed us that Kris didn’t just deliver toys, of course—he optimized a non-existent supply chain and scaled a backroom operation into a global powerhouse.
However, as we see in "The Year Without a Santa Claus," even after a business is mature the most successful leaders can still hit a wall. When Santa falls ill ahead of his big night and the “Nice List” starts to feel more like a mounting pile of unread Jira tickets, a hard truth begins to crystalize: You need the right partner to help you build and execute your talent-based plan in order to scale, enter new markets and outpace the competition.
As for “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” it remains a classic tale of the inherent challenges of building a team with the right talent, of seeing potential where others don't, and putting that talent in a position to succeed and, perhaps, go down in history.
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The Burgermeister Bottleneck (and the Outsourcing Cure)
The Winter Warlock was a terrifying creation to generations of kids, by he was not Kris Kringle’s first nor even biggest challenge in getting toys to the kids during “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town.” It was the restrictive environment in the Burgermeister’s Sombertown, both in terms of finding talent and creating systems built for breakout success.
When Kris realized he couldn’t just walk through the front door to deliver his goods soon after he entered the market as a startup, he decided to scale the rooftops and went down the chimney. He’d found a partner—a very out-of-his-element penguin—who offered creative solutions and the talent to help make those solutions viable. Then he built on those solutions with a team that increased overall productivity and efficiency and built a truly global enterprise.
Managing the Miser Brothers: The Friction of Conflicting Departments
One of the greatest operational hurdles in “The Year Without a Santa Claus” is the feud between Snow Miser and Heat Miser that gets in the middle of Santa’s trying to expand with a white Christmas in Southtown. One brother wants the temperature at 10-below, the other wants 101, and there is no aligning their respective sides…well, not unless somebody finds an expert who is able to align the interests of the two.
Enter Mrs. Claus—a business owner who understands that outsourcing key functions can lead to otherwise unattainable results. The brothers are a force of nature with their own agendas, so Mrs. Claus turns to an experienced third party—Mother Nature (spoiler alert: she’s the Miser Brothers’ mom as well)—to ensure the climate remains habitable for these sides with different agendas to unite and help her and her husband’s business grow.
Whether it is capacity planning, project management, staff augmentation or a combination of all three, the right partner ensures those “Hot” and “Cold” departments are aligned and working toward the same outcomes.
Rescuing Your “Island of Misfit Tech”
A train with square wheels on its caboose. A Charlie-in-the-Box. A spotted elephant. Every enterprise has an “Island of Misfit Toys”—legacy software, unintegrated CRMs, half-finished digital transformation projects that don’t quite fit the current roadmap.
The mistake many organizations make is trying to force their “Generalist Elves” to fix these highly specialized “Misfits.” But just like Rudolph, Yukon Cornelius and Hermey the Elf brought specialized skills to save the day in “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,”—and found homes for the unique skill sets of a cowboy who rides an ostrich, a bird who swims and others—your business can thrive when you augment your staff with targeted technical expertise who can also thrive within your corporate culture, comprehend your needs and work the hours you require. (Imagine if Santa’s team couldn’t work Christmas Eve across time zones!?)
Of course, finding that specifically skilled talent isn’t easy without the right talent acquisition partners. Like Santa found out the hard way up at the North Pole, that talent may not be available in your local market, and you may need to go offshore.
No matter what your industry or business size, the right partner knows where to find that talent, how to recruit and vet them, and how to help you hire them and build a team that knows exactly how to get those square-wheeled trains running right.
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The “Santa as Recruiter” Trap
It doesn’t matter how you started, it’s how you get to the next level that makes the difference. In the “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” origin story, Kris Kringle spends his time outrunning the Winter Warlock and the Burgermeister while trying to build a workshop, find a team to help deliver his toys, manage schedules and more. He is the CEO, CFO, Head of Logistics, CISO and Lead Recruiter all at once.
Pretty soon, he finds himself in the Scaling Paradox—the more successful you are, the less time you have to do it all. And you never want to make sacrifices when it comes to sourcing and recruiting and vetting and ultimately hiring and managing the people you need to stay successful.
Rankin & Bass didn’t have ECLARO to take the recruiting burden off their Santa, but you do. While you drive the sleigh, we ensure the workshop stays humming.
Related: 'Twas the Night Before Christmas at ECLARO
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas…All Year Long
In the end of every holiday special, Santa delivers—but he never does it alone. He creates a vision, collaborates with the right partners and ultimately sees the capability and commitment of a global team that believes in the company mission. He embraces the power of outsourcing and offshoring, turns to talent and management experts to help find the perfect fits for his roles and fine-tune his operations, and his organization improves year after year.
And no matter what question he faces, he learns that the Right People—not to mention reindeer, warlocks, elves, penguins, etc.—are the Answer.
Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year filled with promise, prosperity and, naturally, the Right People everywhere in your world!