In the summer of 2009, as the financial markets were coming out of one of the worst recessions since the great depression, I was asked to take over Prudential’s Real Estate and Relocation business (PRERS). The real estate side sells residential and commercial real estate franchises across North America. The relocation side helps families move throughout the world. It serves both U.S. government employees and large corporations. When I took over in the fall of 2009, we were facing a $70 million loss per year. The company had lost $140 million the year before. So as I came into the company, I had the opportunity to travel around and see what the morale was like for the associates. Before I arrived, they had shown the beach scene from Saving Private Ryan in an attempt to motivate our associates. If you remember, there is a scene on D-Day where people are being killed all over the place. Body parts are flying and bombs are going off. The trouble is, our associates interpreted this as: ‘‘Anyplace but here.’’ Some of the folks in my company actually had encouraged me to play it again to show that I was symbolically in alignment with the previous CEO in terms of cost-cutting. I rejected that. I could see that the organization just didn’t have confidence in itself. Morale in our company and among our customers was not high.