Author: Rick Bell

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Branding Is Beautiful When It Comes to Company Culture

Corporate culture is viewed by many workplace experts as vitally important to employees. But in a recent study by global communications and engagement company Weber Shandwick, only 19 percent of employees see a strong match between how the company represents itself and the actions they experience while working there.

branding a company
A new study notes the importance of branding to organizations.

“We thought that this was a stunning and startling finding,” said Leslie Gaines-Ross, chief reputation strategist at the New York-based firm.

Creating a brand that matches a workplace is not be as easy as it may seem but it is important, noted John Williams in an Entrepreneur article. The founder of LogoYes.com stated that for an employer to be able to define their brand they must be able to answer the following questions: what is the company’s mission; what are the benefits and features of the products or services; what qualities do you want customers to associate with your company; and what are their thoughts of the company already.

Kate Bullinger, head of employee engagement and change management at Weber Shandwick, said it is important to tie the employer brand to the company purpose and values. “Employees are more and more driven by joining a company that’s got clearly articulated values and a clear purpose,” Bullinger said.

She added that companies should make sure that their values are articulated well and understood throughout the company, so that the employee experience for match the organization’s values and purpose.

The new Weber Shandwick data could be interpreted as a call to action for companies to build stronger company brands.If a company can connect their culture and brand to have the same purpose and values, it is more likely that a company will produce an organization that operates with integrity and authenticity, said Denise Lee Yohn in the Harvard Business Review. She also wrote that, “without using your brand purpose and values to orient your culture efforts, you’re also likely to waste a lot of money.”

Having a well-developed brand is one of way to sustain a successful business.

“Some companies will spend time on the articulation of their brand, why it’s great to work at this place, and don’t do necessarily the hard work of aligning their programs and policies, said Bullinger. “You think you’re joining a company and once you get into it, there’s no experience that really matches what was promised to you.”

Employment brand must be authentic and not be filled with empty promises, Bullinger said.

“They talk about a great work-life balance, but then there’s nothing that allows for flexible work arrangements or child care,” Bullinger said.

Although the survey found that 19 percent of employees feel as if there is a strong connection with the brand and what they experience, it also found that less than 10 percent of employees believe there is no brand connection with what employers say about themselves and what employees experience.

It starts from within the company and continues to grow out to the public, Bullinger said.

“I think more and more companies are using their own people to be advocates for the brand and that includes on a recruiting front,” Bullinger said.

Employees especially the highly aligned ones are a great resource to get out there and be actually talking about and promoting what the company is doing, and that has a big influence on people Bullinger said.

With websites like Glassdoor, “companies need to accept the fact that their employees are using social media to talk about work,” Gaines-Ross said. “Help provide programs and platforms where employees can easily find information and content and share it.”

Companies should be consistent with their message and the actions they represent.

“You say that you want your company to be focused around the environment and sustainability; are your programs and policies really aligned with that, and if they’re not what needs to be done? What are new things that you might add, or what can you feature?” Bullinger said. “So make sure the employer brand is grounded in the experiences for people.”

Alexis Carpello is a Workforce intern. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

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Announcing the Worst Employer of 2017

Jon Hyman The Practical Employer
The day has finally arrived. It’s time to announce the Worst Employer of 2017.

To remind you, we had three finalists in contention for this … honor:

  • The Cancerous Boss — An employee was diagnosed with kidney cancer and required immediate surgery to remove the tumor. His employer denied the request for a 10-day leave of absence, while telling him she doesn’t “need people with cancer working in her office … this is America and in America you have to work even if you’re sick.” She finished by informing him that “with your illness, people die and I cannot keep you as a worker not knowing what is going to happen to you.”
  • The Horny Head of HR — A male HR employee complained that the female head of HR nibbled on his ear while romantically whispering, “I hope you’re not going to sue me.” The nibble followed on the heels of her repeatedly telling him about her and her husband’s swinging lifestyle, hugging him against his will, peppering him with questions about his sexual orientation, and sending various inappropriate text messages, including a picture of a man reading the book, “A** Eating Made Simple,” a video of a masturbating monkey, and a picture of a man with an erection going through airport security.
  • The Racist Boss — An African-American employee complains to her boss about his repeated racist comments in the workplace (“We’ll just make the Mexicans do it,” and telling his African-America employees, “Y’all are my b******.”). Thereafter, he Christmas gifts her a rhinestone-studded purse of the Confederate flag and several photos of him posing with said flag.
The final vote wasn’t close. The winner tallied an astounding 66% of all first place votes.
The Worst Employer of 2017 is…
The Cancerous Boss
At the end of the day, I think people’s choices came down an issue to which they could best relate — needing time off to deal with a serious medical issue.
As for me, I awarded my first place vote to The Horny Head of HR. While the misconduct may not be the most egregious among the contenders, if this is how your HR department functions, you have zero chance of success as a employer. The Horny Head of HR had the second most first place votes (18%), but finished third overall in the weighted score.
Which leaves The Racist Boss and his rhinestone studded Stars-and-Bars purse as the runner up, to assume the title in the event The Cancerous Boss cannot fulfill its duties.
This brings 2017’s contest to a close. I hope everyone had fun reading during the course of the year, and learned something along the way.
The contest will resume on Jan. 2 with the first nominee for the Worst Employer of 2018 — The Holy Harasser.
Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.
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Building a Community in Your Workplace

Andie Burjek, Working Well blog

The Health Enhancement Research Organization recently released a report listing 24 key elements employers can use to create a healthy workplace culture. Many them sound like what my sources often tell me, and a few of them stuck out to me, notably having a “sense of community.”

Taking a step back, I recently started attending a yoga studio near my new apartment as a way to pass the time. It’s $30 for two weeks of unlimited classes, sure, why not? The first thing that stuck out to me was a poster on the studio wall. “How to Build a Community” it read in big bold letters. Forming a community-based habit was one reason I joined these classes, after all. The studio is walking distance from my apartment and my grocery store is on the walk back from class.

Feeling a part of a community isn’t a passive accomplishment. It’s something to search for. One friend pursued her dad’s Lutheran church after years of going to services at a different domination. Another joined a tap dance crew. It takes energy, time and true interest. Some people need it to feel satisfied; others don’t need it at all. It’s very personal.

The poster listed an array of ways to start building a community, including, “Turn off the TV,” “Leave your apartment,” “Ask a question,” “Support neighborhood schools,” “Sit on your stoop” and more suggestions. Reading it got me thinking how one could incorporate these community-building tips in workplace wellness.

A sense of community, at least on a small scale, is common in most workplaces, according to Dan Krick, a member of the HERO Culture of Health Study Committee and the vice president of organizational development at Hexagon Lincoln. A healthy sense of community can lead to many positive outcomes, like higher work performance, lower turnover and a stronger acceptance of company initiatives such as wellness, quality or safety, he added.

For organizations interested in creating a sense of community, Krick suggested a valuable starting point: ask why. Why do you want to create a sense of community? “It may sound silly, but companies that do this well will typically form a strong sense of community because it ties directly to their purpose or values of their organization,” he said.

Once you’ve addressed why, he suggests that companies “hard-wire” programs and practices that support a community. For example, in the onboarding process a company could discover people’s interests and make immediate connects based on what people have in common. “The biggest catalyst for building a strong sense of community is creating forums for people to connect,” Krick said. “That can be social media, and good old-fashioned events that bring people together for discovery of interests and matching of values.”

Meanwhile, that poster gave me a few ideas that I believe fit into workplace wellness. Turn off the TV? Translation: Employees, it’s OK to put your computer on sleep mode. Leave your apartment? That could mean get out of your cube when you can. Maybe that means taking a walk at lunch. Maybe that means that attending conferences, classes or networking events outside of work to help you develop yourself.

Maybe the workplace will be the community employees turn to for staying healthy and connecting with other people. Great! Maybe other people rely on a different community for that, and that should be acceptable, too.

Another one of these 24 elements that help create a healthy workplace intrigued me as well: recruitment and selection. My first thoughts upon reading this: If you only recruit and select people who fit into your culture of health, are you discriminating against people with health issues or against people who simply wouldn’t have interest in joining a workplace wellness program for whatever reason?

It also brought to mind a colleague’s article titled, “The Pros and Cons of Hiring for Cultural Fit.” It’s a timely topic that dives into the recruiting and hiring process and explains the complexity of hiring someone because they’d fit in your culture.

That being said, I asked Krick for an explanation. He said he prefers the word “selection” over “hiring” because it’s more intentional. “With every selection a company is adding or detracting to its culture, so ultimately adding or detracting to every result area — revenue, profits, safety, culture, wellness, you name it,” he said. He added that the right selection decision is important for both the individual and the company, and that companies owe it to the candidate to we accurately illustrate what kind of organization they might be joining.

“We actually do an injustice to the person being recruited if we select them into a strong culture of well-being when they have a value system that does not align,” he said. “I don’t view that as discriminatory, but rather as respecting that individual enough to not put them in a culture that will not fit them.”

Andie Burjek is a Workforce associate editor. You can find Workforce on Twitter at @workforcenews and Andie at @andie_burjek. Comment below or email editors.workforce.com.

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5 Proven Strategies to Guarantee Your Diversity Initiative Produces Results

Intent does not equal impact. Time and again I see organizations with good intentions embark on an enthusiastic endeavor to increase diversity in their workplace.

Time and time again I also see their nonexistent to negative impacts, from failure to create lasting positive change to crash-and-burn disasters rife with unproductive conflict. Often it’s because they didn’t follow one or more of these five proven strategies for diversity and inclusion success – the “new school” way. The good news is it’s never too late to learn and regroup, and a new year presents ripe opportunity for fresh starts!

Strategy No. 5: Hire an Excellent Training Partner. If you’ve invested lots of money in training but seen low to no meaningful results, or you’ve received feedback that D&I training has led to confusion or increased problems, you may have selected a training partner that was inadequate, or not a good fit for your organization’s culture. Not all diversity training or trainers are high quality, especially now that D&I is more common and sought-after than ever before. Engaging an inadequate training partner wastes scarce resources, and undermines the credibility of D&I efforts. Ensure you’re set up for success before making a game-changing investment by asking: (1) Do we need training? Sometimes leadership coaching, systems change, or data collection is a more appropriate intervention, and a true D&I professional will help you figure this out. (2) Do we need it now? Training usually yields a higher ROI after proper assessment or other interventions. (3) Who do we already have internally with expertise in organizational development, adult learning, instructional design and facilitation? Ask potential internal and external training partners strategic questions to determine expertise and fit.

diversity and inclusionStrategy No. 4: Measure the Meaningful Impact of Training … and Reinforce It. If your D&I training got rave reviews, but you’ve seen no-to-low meaningful outcomes in your culture, systems, or leadership, you may not have set training up for success back in the workplace. Not creating a robust plan for implementation and systems change following D&I training wastes resources. It’s a false belief, even among some training professionals, that the effects of training can’t be measured. This belief undermines the credibility of D&I, and reflects poor stewardship of an organization’s trust and investment of budget, time and talent. Before investing in training, ensure you’re set up for success by asking: (1) What are the specific goals or learning objectives for the training? (2) What is our baseline? In other words, where are we now in relation to our training goals? (3) How will we know whether this training was a success? What metrics will we track, and how will we measure it?

Strategy No. 3: Identify and Measure Meaningful Goals. If you don’t have D&I goals, or your goals are only to start employee resource groups or recruit/hire/promote more people of color or women, stop what you’re doing and focus here. Launching D&I efforts with no clear goals, or old-school goals that are limited to focusing on numbers devoid of meaningful strategy is the best way to ensure D&I stalls, fizzles or disappears. You can’t produce meaningful, measurable business-critical results without meaningful goals, and if you’re not producing meaningful, measurable results, you’re wasting time and money. Meaningful D&I goals address a current, pressing problem or take your organization from good to great. Tackling D&I without them adds tasks and stress to leaders’ and employees’ already-overflowing plates (thus reducing buy-in), and damages the credibility of D&I efforts.

Approaching your D&I initiative like a checklist of best practices from elsewhere without a solid business imperative that’s relevant and urgent to your organization’s success is just as ineffective as approaching any other strategic priority that way. Your goals, challenges and needs may not be the same as your competitors’, or the rest of your industry. You must do adequate assessment and gap analysis before taking action to get better-than-OK results. Start by asking: (1) How will a successful D&I initiative alleviate our existing pain points? (2) How will a successful D&I initiative move us from good to great in critical areas we already care about? (3) How will a successful D&I initiative help us avoid potential future pain points?

Strategy #2: Address Your Culture’s Toxicity to Excellence, Change and Inclusiveness. If you have meaningful, business-critical D&I goals, but you’re seeing low to no desired change or experiencing poor employee engagement, your organization may be too toxic for D&I to take healthy root. Also, if you don’t assess employee engagement in any formal, consistent way, haven’t reviewed your data for over three years or don’t cut your (engagement, turnover, promotion, hiring) data by strategic demographic groups, you’re flying blind. Your training program will fall flat and your investment is wasted if your culture doesn’t support healthy change, equity, inclusion or general excellence. Your core issue might not be about diversity and inclusiveness at all, but rather lack of accountability or effective leadership, which are creating or exacerbating diversity issues

Strategy #1: “Do Diversity” for the Results (Not Just Because It’s the Right Thing to Do). “Rightness and “goodness” are beliefs based on certain values. One’s beliefs and values may be precious but they aren’t facts or universal truth. They may not provide value, results or profit, which are important to organizations. Also, not everyone shares the same values. Expecting that everyone does is naïve, and believing everyone should actually reduces diversity and silences those who challenge or raise questions. Doing diversity based on notions of rightness is also unsustainable, because initiatives based only on beliefs and values are often viewed as nice-to-haves that get cut when leadership priorities shift, or resources become scarce. Believing that doing diversity is right or good isn’t required for it to work. Just as one doesn’t need to believe in internal combustion or the laws of physics to drive a car, the principles of diversity and inclusiveness work regardless of the belief systems of those involved.

Diversity plus inclusiveness gets superior results, as shown by multiple studies including from hard sciences like mathematics and economics. Doing diversity right isn’t about helping “them” (women, people of color, LGBT, people with disabilities, etc.). It’s not about doing the right thing, making others think you’re good people or keeping up with your competitors. Doing diversity right is about getting superior results in whatever critical, strategic priorities you already have. It’s about solving an urgent problem or going from good to great. That’s it. Diversity plus inclusiveness is an excellence multiplier. Don’t treat it as anything less by not implementing these five proven strategies to produce results that matter!

Susana Rinderle is president of Susana Rinderle Consulting and a trainer, coach, speaker, author and diversity & inclusion expert. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

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Chief Diversity Officer: One of the Hardest Jobs in Technology

diversity, gender

Imagine a job whose requirements not only rely on improving product and increasing financial success, but also span across hiring and influencing corporate culture.

While a chief diversity officer might not be the first job that comes to mind, it plays an increasingly crucial role in company output and financial success. According to a 2015 McKinsey report on 366 public companies, those that ranked in the top quartile for ethnic and racial diversity in management were 35 percent more likely to have financial returns above their industry mean than those who were less diverse.

Not only are chief diversity officers the gatekeepers to ensuring a diverse and inclusive workplace but we play an integral role in helping cultivate teams that produce better products, resulting in greater financial success.

The Opportunities Are Boundless

For many years, chief diversity officers have:

  • Partnered with talent acquisition to reimagine how we recruit and interview.
  • Ensured diverse composition of teams to create the best products and services.
  • Required inclusive behaviors as essential management skills.
  • Influenced community philanthropy to have impact on diverse communities.
  • Ensured that companies have diverse suppliers.
  • Worked with human resources to develop a diverse pipeline of leaders.

In some of the more advanced organizations, you see chief diversity officers:

  • Teaming with customers to advance diversity on a national and global basis.
  • Supporting organizations that champion women, ethnic minorities and other underrepresented groups.
  • Collaborating with marketing to ensure diverse populations are addressed both from a customer perspective and from an industry perspective.
  • Collaborating with product development to ensure that diversity is considered in how products are made.
  • Influencing artificial intelligence to ensure the use of diverse data sets that are diverse at the beginning of AI development.

The role is much more comprehensive than most people would ever consider and touches all parts of the business. I have worked in diversity and inclusion for more than 20 years, all the way back to when the very thought of a role dedicated to this topic was a new idea.

The role of chief diversity officer means different things depending on the company’s priorities and goals.

Reason for the Role

If you have more than 1,000 employees at your company, odds are you probably have someone in charge of diversity. And those roles are only going to increase as diversity continues to be top of mind in business. Most companies create this role because there is some desire to have either more women or underrepresented ethnic groups in the workforce. Sometimes that desire is genuine, and sometimes there is feeling that an organization has to do something since everyone else is.

The role provides a unique opportunity to transform the composition of the workforce. Many organizations now recognize the value diversity brings and are prioritizing it. Because we are often not functionally responsible for sourcing candidates, interviewing them or hiring them, we are influencing colleagues in talent acquisition to consider candidates that they had not before.

This is where the question, “Are we lowering the bar?” is inevitably raised, implying that by changing where we recruit, we may bring in candidates who are less qualified. It is at this point our role becomes essential to underline the value of expanding the pools from which we recruit, while challenging prejudices, stigmas, stereotypes and beliefs.

How the CDO Has Evolved

In addition to influencing change internally, we are now leading commentary outside of our companies on change across the country, and even the globe, when it comes to race, sex and class in the news. In the past year alone, chief diversity officers have risen to the challenge of company spokesperson or even been asked to act. From the Black Lives Matter movement to gender-pay equality, anti-immigration orders to the white supremacist demonstration in Charlottesville, Virginia, Brexit and beyond. We are now the champions of the importance of diversity in the workplace and having a platform to encourage change in the face of these events is quite a shift.

Essential Skills

Many people, including many of my colleagues, believe that passion for diversity is the main criteria for this role. It is much more than that. The hardest skill to master is to be committed to the role and results while being detached from each day-to-day experience. Much of our work is facilitating those who are ambivalent — and I emphasize facilitate, not change.

We can create conditions for people to move along their diversity journey, but they need to come along willingly and when the moment is right for them. As a chief diversity officer, every discussion that we have is its own mini-diversity workshop. People are leaving with both an impression of you and of your organization’s diversity and inclusion efforts.

In my role, I have encountered many people who were extremely resistant to diversity at first but after going through the process, became some of our biggest supporters. It requires patience, perspective and being personally centered — in other words, being committed to creating diversity and inclusion, but detached from each individual’s willingness to participate at any given moment.

Battling Misconceptions

There are many articles and opinions about the value of diversity training. I have always maintained that diversity training has value if there are corresponding practices, procedures and policies in the workplace to support someone once they return from the training.

When diversity training has been considered unsuccessful, typically it has been conducted in a vacuum with no support in the workplace. If a company is instituting Six Sigma, they will not only engage in training, but change performance reviews, reward systems, management systems and have large-scale communications of expectations.

If people expect diversity training to have similar impact, they need to be administered with the same level of support and championing as anything an organization takes seriously. When we conduct diversity training at my company, Autodesk, for a group, we make sure that they are in a certain state of readiness and that this training is part of an overall diversity plan rather than a stand-alone activity.

The role of chief diversity officer is complex and challenging, but also offers immense opportunity to create change — from who we hire to the technology we create.

Daniel Guillory is the head of global diversity & inclusion at Autodesk, a San Rafael, California-based 3D design and engineering software company.

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New Year’s Resolutions, NLRB-Style

Jon Hyman The Practical Employer

Have you started thinking about your New Year’s resolutions for 2018?

The NLRB’s newly minted general counsel Peter Robb  has, and employers will be very happy.

According to NLRB General Counsel Memo 18-02 [pdf], issued Dec. 1, Robb will be examining all NLRB precedents changed during President Barack Obama’s administration. The memo specifically directs regional board officials to consult Robb’s office on all cases involving precedent established on workers’ rights in “the last eight years,” and any others involving “significant legal issues.”

He also rescinded seven agency guidance memos that were issued by his Democratic-appointed predecessors (most significantly including the rescission of the NLRB’s controversial 2015 memo on employee handbook policies).

What other targets are on Robb’s radar?
Happy New Year, indeed.
Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.
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Is This the Worst Harassment Training Video of All Time or Is It the Best?

Jon Hyman The Practical Employer

Much of the news lately has focused on how we, as employers, can do a better job training and otherwise educating our employees about workplace harassment.

So, I ask — is this parody the worst harassment training video of all time, or, is it so bad, that it’s actually the best training video?


I think I’m leaning toward the latter — that this video is so brilliant in its awfulness that it might just make a really good training tool, or least part of great compliance and education program.

What do you think?

Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.

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Our Harassment Laws Are Not the Reason for Our Sex Harassment Problem

Jon Hyman The Practical Employer

Last week, the New York Times ran an Op-Ed titled, Boss Grab Your Breasts? That’s Not (Legally) Harassment.

It argues that our lax sexual harassment laws, and the courts that apply them, are responsible for our current workplace harassment problems.

In a case that went to federal court in the early 1990s, a woman presented evidence that her supervisor tried to kiss her on multiple occasions, placed “I love you” signs on her desk, called her a dumb blonde, put his hands on her shoulders and asked her out on dates. The trial court judge dismissed her suit, declaring that this conduct did not meet the threshold for sexual harassment, and the appeals court affirmed the dismissal.

Since then, courts have cited this case and others like it hundreds of times in rejecting sexual harassment claims. Such conduct, these courts have declared, is not serious enough to be harassment.

In fact, courts routinely dismiss cases brought by workers who claim their supervisors propositioned them, kissed them or grabbed their breasts. The judges declare that the conduct does not constitute harassment in a legal sense, and refuse to let the cases go to trial. How did we get here?

Courts are not the reason why we have a harassment problem permeating our workplaces; the reason is employers who have, for far too long, tuned a blind eye to these issues.

Our harassment laws are just fine. Are there anomalous results? Sure. A quick search on Lexis for “sexual harassment” reveals nearly 50,000 decisions. It’s impossible to imagine that they all got it right. I’m certain more than few would make you scratch your head.

Nevertheless, the solution is not to rewrite our harassment laws. Title VII is not and never was intended to be a code of workplace civility. It’s prohibitions against sex discrimination, as interpreted, since 1986, to prohibit sexual harassment, prohibit “severe or pervasive” misconduct that is both objectively and subjectively unwelcome.

Severe misconduct exist when one event that is so outside the bounds of decency that it alters one’s terms and conditions of employment. Pervasive misconduct results from the culmination of less egregious repetitive incidents.

These laws work just fine. Most often than not, courts either decide these cases correctly, or they settle.

Moreover, the alternative is to create a standard that is so lax, and so loosey-goosey, that just about any misconduct will rise the level of unlawfulness. This standard, while potentially appealing to some given the the current climate, would gut at-will employment.

So, if amending our workplace harassment laws isn’t the solution, what is? Or, more to the point, what will help create workplaces in which harassment is not only no longer overlooked and condoned, but expressly prohibited with no tolerance?

To this end, I suggest taking at look at the EEOC’s three-point harassment prevention plan:

  • Taking action to prevent harassment starting at the C-suite.
  • Deploying a different type of training.
  • Embracing the idea of “it’s on us”.

This is not a legal issue; it’s a cultural issue. The laws we have are more than sufficient to address this problem, as long as businesses treat it with the seriousness it deserves.

Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.

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Good Leaders Can Redefine Training to Help Transform Workplace Culture

Only a handful of children will make a varsity team without an involved cheerleader in their lives spurring them on and driving accountability. You’ll likely never see a child make it to the Olympics without a parental figure taking an active role in their training.

training and development by good leaders
An employee’s perception of their company’s culture is directly connected to how engaged their direct manager is in their training.

The same is true of employees. Gallup says that 70 percent of employee engagement is due to the “manager effect.” An employee’s perception of their company’s culture is directly connected to how engaged their direct manager is in their training.

The best training companies feel strongly about assertive, supportive coaches walking alongside employees to unleash human performance in order to redefine training, transform culture and change lives.

The New England Patriots pulled off one of the all-time great comebacks in sport when they turned a 28-3 second-half deficit into a 34-28 overtime win in the 2017 Super Bowl. Some teams might’ve mentally given up trailing by 25 points with less than 20 minutes to play, but the Patriots focused on what they’d done well to that point and tried to amplify that message on the sideline.

Instead of getting down on themselves, they realized that the offense was producing a lot of yards but was misfiring on a few key plays. They focused on those positive behaviors and kept morale up on the sideline by constantly harping on empowering themselves to acknowledge the big successes and fix the small things. As a result, they felt equipped to succeed because they weren’t browbeaten by their failures.

The Patriots’ positive mentality won them the ultimate prize at the end of the day. A proactive training company can equip leadership with these kinds of tools.

Modeling Behaviors

Wealthy people have a habit of learning from other wealthy people. Warren Cassell Jr. is a 15-year-old entrepreneur and published author. He achieved success in such a short time by studying the wealthiest people who ever lived, and executing what they did.

Are the internal and external trainers in your company following what the best do? Are they people who’ve achieved high levels of success, even when the market and circumstances were against them?

A vice president of sales called me and said she was recently looking at different training options for her sales team. I discovered that a few years ago her company hired a sales trainer, and after a year of training she’d seen no real change within her team.

The trainer they hired had been a sales professional and won several awards, but she’d never sold in her team’s tough Midwest market. The trainer couldn’t relate to the down market or overcome the objections sales professionals received. The trainer hadn’t been forced to follow the processes of the truly great sales professionals, so he didn’t. Modeling the right behaviors and beliefs is paramount to success and a key driver to a training company that can change your paradigm.

You’ve heard a strong team is only as successful as its weakest link, but putting that ideology into practice with tangible steps is key to a healthy workplace. And one way to assure the pace never slackens is pairing struggling employees with high-performing leaders to squeeze the most out of their performance.

In their bestselling book “Extreme Ownership,” retired Navy SEALs Leif Babin and Jocko Willink write about the importance of accountability and how it can open leaders and employees alike up to new plateaus of success. In one story, Babin tells of an occasion during SEALs Hell Week when the trainees were split into teams for boat races.

Babin noticed Team 2 won every race, while Team 6 consistently finished last. Team 6 constantly fought amongst itself, playing the blame game and complaining about anything and everything. To fix the problem, the training instructor switched the leaders between the two teams, and Team 6 won the very next race. A motivating leader is invaluable, and a training company should provide ways for your management to have a Team 2 mentality.

Traveling a Different Path

When Glenn Kelman took over as CEO at online brokerage firm Redfin in 2006, the disruption the company’s vision caused the home-buying industry took its toll. While Redfin succeeded in its mission to essentially refund buyers 66 percent of the traditional 6 percent fee real estate agents usually charge, selling agents fought back by blacklisting Redfin and refusing to sell to its agents for undercutting their typical profit.

Kelman’s initial reaction was to hide behind shame, but Redfin quickly pivoted to the offensive. They began using their blog to offer self-deprecating critiques on the industry as well as Redfin’s own business practices, and Kelman even used it to mock himself.

This made some in the industry nervous, but the public loved the transparency and vulnerability, and in 2016, 10 years later, Redfin posted $200 million in revenue. Employees and clients alike love it when companies acknowledge and own their whole journey, warts and all.

Jason Forrest is CEO and chief culture officer at Forrest Performance Group. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

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Workplace Accommodations Don’t Have to be Complicated to be Effective

When employers hear the word “accommodations” they might respond in several ways.

Some immediately see dollar signs, thinking accommodating an employee’s health condition may require a high price tag for multiple pieces of adaptive equipment. Others may think providing accommodations are too complicated and would rather wait until an employee is 100 percent healthy before having them return to work. And, there may be others who are apprehensive about finding and sourcing accommodations, as they don’t know where to begin.

employee accommodations
Employees who received reasonable accommodations for their health conditions returned to work sooner, according to a recent survey.

However, these perceptions are inaccurate and can be potentially harmful for an organization’s overall productivity. An absent employee often can result in reduced output and additional burden on other employees who may have to work overtime or take on additional responsibilities. This can lead to employee turnover or additional staffing issues.

In addition to productivity concerns, there also are serious legal and compliance issues that could ensue from failing to accommodate an employee. Fines or legal action under the Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act could result if an employer neglects to provide an employee with reasonable accommodations that can help the employee better perform his or her job.

A recent survey from The Standard found that employees who received reasonable accommodations for their health conditions returned to work sooner, felt better about their employers and were more effective at their jobs. Ninety-three percent of employees surveyed said they could perform their job more effectively after receiving an accommodation.

As an employer, you can work with your disability carrier to implement a disability management strategy that helps create a supportive environment and allows employees to receive the accommodations and assistance they need to succeed in the workplace. Here are a few insights on how your organization could benefit from this type of partnership.

One issue that can drive an employee’s poor performance is a health condition. While a direct supervisor may see an employee’s performance declining, he or she may not equate it to a health issue.

An employee may be fearful of proactively bringing attention to their condition at work. The Standard’s survey found that 53 percent of employees were too scared to bring up their health condition with a supervisor, while 49 percent felt they were treated differently after speaking with their supervisor.

This disconnect could translate into a less productive or absent employee. Working with a disability carrier and implementing a comprehensive disability management program can help address these concerns and create a supportive environment that helps employees get the accommodations needed to stay at work or return to work. A disability carrier can help implement a process for identifying an employee who needs assistance and helping to train direct supervisors on what to do if an employee does need assistance.

Implementing the Right Type of Accommodations

The most important thing to consider when implementing an employee’s accommodation is that it should be tailored to each employee and his or her unique situation. No two employees or conditions are the same. For many employers, this can sound daunting, but they don’t need to manage it alone.

Some disability carriers have consultants who can work alongside an employer to coordinate an employee’s stay-at-work or return-to-work accommodations. This approach is more common than you may think, as 77 percent of employees were helped by their employer’s disability carrier, according to the survey.

Disability consultants can connect with the employee’s medical team to discuss restrictions or limitations, collaborate with you on a return-to-work plan and determine potential accommodation ideas. Disability consultants can rely on their own expertise, including years of helping other employers with reasonable accommodations under the ADAAA.

This approach can have big results. Employees who took a disability leave and received accommodations required a shorter disability leave by almost 30 days than those who didn’t receive support, according to the survey. Consider how your organization could benefit from an employee who is back to work almost one month sooner.

Finding Straightforward Solutions

Sometimes, simple adjustments are exactly what an employee needs to help boost his or her productivity and help mitigate their illness or injury. Accommodations don’t have to be elaborate to be helpful for an employee working through a health condition. Of the accommodations provided to help support employees’ health conditions or disabilities at work, many were simple adjustments, according to The Standard’s survey:

  • 61 percent said they were provided with flexibility to attend doctors’ appointments.
  • 58 percent were provided with schedule modifications.
  • 40 percent noted they received workstation modifications.

Overall, these accommodations and support can help increase employee productivity. Forty-two percent of employees surveyed felt they could perform their job extremely effectively after receiving support from their employer, while 50 percent of respondents agreed with the statement that they felt more productive after receiving accommodations.

Accommodations are an effective way to help an employee with a health condition either stay at work and avoid a disability leave or return to work sooner after requiring a disability leave. Working with a disability carrier can not only provide you and your employee with the right support, but help boost your culture and productivity overall.

Tom Foran is the vice president of underwriting and product development at The Standard. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.