Matt Hayes has been working in human resources for a quarter century. Some 18 of those 25 years were spent with Ingredion Inc., a for-profit ingredient provider. Two years ago, he made the shift to the nonprofit organization Feeding America. From providing volunteer opportunities to conducting employee surveys, Hayes, Feeding America’s CHRO, has excelled in all aspects of employee engagement.
Workforce: What got you interested in being a leader at this organization?
Matt Hayes: For quite a while in my career I thought about working for a mission-based organization. When Feeding America came along, I learned more about hunger in America and the impact it has in every community. Seeing the work Feeding America does to respond to that challenge, I wanted to join the fight. I’ve gotten to know the organization better and these people are very passionately committed to what we are doing. It’s a fun environment to work in as a regular employee and HR leader.
WF: What equals employee engagement for a nonprofit versus a for-profit?
Hayes: Thinking about Feeding America, we have volunteer opportunities at our 200 food banks and 60,000 agencies nationwide. On the for-profit side, understanding the value proposition you’re bringing your employees is critical to attracting, motivating and retaining talent. Even at Feeding America, where we think our mission is a major differentiator, we developed a model where we have seven factors that looks at employee engagement. It’s things like career advancement and work-life balance.
WF: Is there a new engagement strategy from when you first started?
Hayes: Employees now force-rank what matters most to them among seven focus areas. For example, where does career advancement rank versus work-life balance? Is it a 10, being fantastic, or a 1, this is missing right now? Then the manager and employee discuss the results. We found it helps promote transparent discussions about what matters most to each employee and what managers can do for those employees.
WF: When natural disasters occur, how do you engage employees through volunteer opportunities?
Hayes: We have a senior leader who’s focused on leading disaster response and we engage a cross-functional team to coordinate that effort. The team works to move food to impacted communities. We raise funds nationally to support disaster relief and advocate for federal disaster support in Washington when that’s needed. With Hurricane Florence, we provided 5 million pounds of food to communities in the Carolinas. We raised almost $2 million in funds to support that work. With Hurricane Michael, even in the early stages we worked with Florida’s Office of Emergency Management and the Federal Emergency Management Agency before the hurricane made landfall. We had water and meals staged in critical places. Disaster response is an integral part of our organization and mission.
The onboarding process is among the most critical parts of the employment experience and it sets the tone for an employee’s expectations throughout their time with an organization.
Implementing an effective onboarding strategy shows a new employee that the company is organized and excited for their arrival. Onboarding also doesn’t have to be expensive or time consuming. Here are some ways to enhance the onboarding process without breaking the bank.
Be prepared. In most situations, HR will have about two weeks to implement its onboarding strategy for a new employee to start, which is plenty of time to ensure the team is ready for their newest addition. Make sure managers build a realistic schedule, considerate of sufficient time for questions, hands on training, and breaks.
It helps to include employees in other departments who can loop the new hire in on ways their roles will impact each other. Notify the IT department as early as possible that someone new is starting and when. Ensuring the equipment, software, email address and key card badge are ready before the employee’s arrival streamlines a majority of the initial problems new hires general encounter.
Be thoughtful. Nothing is more uncomfortable for a new employee than having no idea what to expect during the first few days of their new job. They’re likely already overwhelmed with anxiety. “What do I wear? Who will I sit with at lunch?”
Cheryl Strizelka, human resources manager for Orlando-based Design Interactive Inc.
The best way to deal with those kinds of questions during the onboarding process is to answer them directly. Sending an email a few days before the employee’s start date outlining what time they should arrive, what they should wear, that they can expect breakfast and lunch with the team, and that they’ll be able to take off early. This is guaranteed to alleviate most first-day jitters.
A small swag bag for the new employee to dig through on their first day is a great touch. Throw in some candy, maybe a bottle of water or a small gift card to a local coffee shop. Include items with the company logo that you normally hand out to clients or at conferences.
Get integrated. It’s vital through the onboarding process that a new employee starts to feel like they’re part of the team as quickly as possible. To get ahead of the game, email the new hire a week before they start to get some fun facts about their life and post them for the staff to see before the start date. This opens the door for friendly conversation and allows the new hire to relate to their colleagues immediately.
For any employee’s first day, facilitate a 20- to 30-minute all-hands breakfast in a common space so everyone can take a moment to put a face with a name. This doesn’t have to be terribly expensive. Doughnuts for 40 people costs about $25 and the experience takes the edge off typically boring or intimidating introductions.
And ask a manager to plan a lunch and invite anyone who identifies as part of the team’s nucleus. This is a great bonding experience and only has to cost the price of the lunch for the manager and the new employee. To avoid the expense all together, invite the team to enjoy lunch together in the break room to get better acquainted.
Stay organized. During the onboarding process the HR professional should check in with the new hire regularly to make sure they have everything they need or aren’t too overwhelmed. Most new employees feel embarrassed to ask questions and don’t want to seem like a squeaky wheel. It helps to have several points of contact that the employee feels comfortable approaching, including an HR professional, an office administrator and a receptionist.
These friendly faces should offer to make themselves available for any issues the new hire may encounter. To alleviate some of the more common questions, go ahead and give a facilities tour early in the process. Show the employee where the bathroom, water cooler and supply room are. Make them feel at home as quickly as possible.
Follow up. Most crucial to this entire onboarding process is the follow-up. Call a new employee in a month or two after their first day and get their insight into the process. Find out how they’re transitioning onto the team as a whole and ensure they have the resources they need to do their job well. Schedule a session for a group of new hires who started around the same time so they can talk about their experiences together. Every time an employee makes a suggestion, they provide a gift. Use their feedback for future onboarding hacks to create an even better experience for the next round of newbies.
While effective onboarding may seem daunting, or to some, a formality at best, it actually sets the tone for your new hire’s overall employment experience. Companies should invest time and energy into ensuring new employees transition successfully to their new position through an onboarding strategy. While managers technically absorb this responsibility once formal training begins, it behooves human resources representatives to facilitate the onboarding process behind the scenes.
After all, it’s HR’s job to maintain a healthy company culture and overall fulfillment.
Each month Workforce looks at important statistics in the human resources sector. In this month’s edition, we explore performance reviews. The effectiveness of reviews has been been questioned before, and recent stats show that many organizations and employees are ambivalent of how accurately these reviews define employees performance.
Estefany Martinez-Gonzalez and Imelda Lucio Lopez, both crew members at a McDonald’s restaurant in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and both Hispanic, claimed that their employer discriminated against them by requiring them to speak English at work (as opposed to their native Spanish).
Taking the record as a whole, no reasonable finder of fact could find that Lakeshore had a policy and culture of requiring its employees to speak only English. Lakeshore … filed seven declarations demonstrating that the so-called English-only policy could not exist because employees attested that they speak Spanish in the workplace or know of employees who openly speak Spanish in the workplace without reprimand. Martinez and Lopez do not contest either the factual veracity or the legal significance of the declarations. Instead, in support of their argument, Martinez and Lopez cite to two instances where Martinez stated she was told to speak English and one instance where Lopez testified she was told to speak English. Martinez and Lopez cite no disciplinary records in which they were reprimanded because they were speaking Spanish.
Thus, there was no evidence to support the existence of an English-only policy. That said, English-only policies certainly raise legal red flags.
As immigration and immigration reform continue to be hot-button political issues, employers take a big risk when they require all of their employees to speak only English at work.
The EEOC’s position is that a “rule requiring employees to speak only English at all times in the workplace is a burdensome term and condition of employment” and presumptively “violates Title VII.” According to the EEOC, an “employer may have a rule requiring that employees speak only in English at certain times where the employer can show that the rule is justified by business necessity.”
The majority of federal courts, however, have shown slightly more tolerance of “English-only” rules. Generally, courts will uphold an English-only rule if the employer can show a legitimate business justification for the requirement. Examples of legitimate business justifications that have been found to justify an English-only requirement are:
Stemming hostility among employees.
Fostering politeness to customers.
Promoting communication with customers, coworkers, or supervisors who only speak English.
Enabling employees to speak a common language to promote safety or enable cooperative work assignments.
Facilitating a supervisor’s ability monitor the performance of an employee.
Furthering interpersonal relations among employees.
Thus, employers should be careful to limit the reach of an English-only requirement only as far as is necessary to reach the articulated business rationale for the policy. For example, English-only requirements have been struck down as discriminatory where the policy included lunch hours, breaks and even private telephone conversations.
If you are considering an English-only requirement for your business, you should not do so without consulting with employment counsel to ensure that the policy is not discriminatory as written or as applied.
Performance measurement has long been viewed as a necessary but torturous part of the talent management process.
Historically, this process has been shaped by awkward and time-consuming end-of-the-year performance ratings that often feel more like criticism than coaching and rarely result in any meaningful changes in behavior. However, over the past several years the performance measurement process has been evolving.
“The big question today is, ‘Do we even need performance ratings?’ ” said Bhushan Sethi, performance management analyst for PwC. He noted that many Silicon Valley firms have done away with ratings all together, while other companies are rating employees behind the scenes. “They still go through the rating process to figure out raises and bonuses,” he said. But they are eliminating the annual sit-down review.
While some HR leaders applaud this evolution, others believe it is counterproductive. “Proponents of the ‘no ratings’ fad hyped the movement using selective company examples,” noted Marc Effron, founder of the Talent Strategy Group and author of 8 Steps to High Performance. However for every success story, he pointed to companies like medical equipment maker Medtronic, Conagra Brands Inc., and American Airlines, which reversed course and re-installed ratings after their financial performance suffered. Effron also pointed to a 2016 Gartner study that shows companies that eliminate ratings actually see a drop in employee performance because managers don’t know how to manage without them.
Let Robots Do It
While the jury may be out on whether ratings are a necessary part of performance measurement, most HR leaders agree that a once-a-year review on its own is not effective. Instead, they are encouraging managers to provide more real-time feedback throughout the year so employees can adapt their performance and identify opportunities for improvement before their output is affected.
“Employees who want to be higher performers benefit from clear goals and more frequent coaching,” Effron said. But only if it’s done correctly. “Leaders need to improve their capability to set a few, very big, very challenging, very aligned goals for themselves and their team members.”
The demand for more real-time performance measurement has sparked HR technology vendors to embed rating tools, social feedback loops, 360 degree reviews and other performance measurement features in their platforms, or as standalone solutions.
“The trend is toward slick, user-friendly mobile tools to provide real-time feedback,” Sethi said. He pointed to PWC’s own custom-built Snapshots tool, which lets employees provide and request rapid reviews on five performance characteristics, including leadership ability and business acumen. Many of the enterprise software vendors and smaller boutique firms are building similar performance feedback tools to expand their platform.
“It’s the next wave of HR technology,” he said.
Sethi predicts that the next evolution of performance measurement tools will be fully automated, artificially intelligent bots that use machine learning algorithms to rate employee performance based on data, such as sales results, projects delivered, and feedback from managers. An automated solution could take the human bias out of the rating process while freeing managers to focus on coaching their people to improve performance and close gaps on the team, Sethi said. “This would be a much better use of their time.”
The Major League Baseball postseason is well underway with some games taking place during normal work hours.
The Chicago Cubs had their midday National League tiebreaker on a Monday, while Game 3 of Houston Astros-Cleveland Indians in the American League Division Series also was a mid-afternoon start. Games happening early in the day has both hurt and helped workplaces nationwide.
When sporting events occur during work hours, employers could face productivity issues, which can include employees calling in sick, leaving early or arriving late. But there’s an opportunity to flip that thinking and use such events as an employee engagement and retention tool.
Joyce Maroney, executive director of the Workforce Institute at workforce management software company Kronos Inc., studies workplace issues and ways to manage and engage workers. Maroney said one of the ways employers can avoid these issues is by making the sporting event available in the office, whether on TV in a break room or conference room, or an office-watch party with food provided.
“It can definitely be a tool to stimulate camaraderie, just as would be departments having gatherings during the holiday season, or doing a charity event together,” Maroney said. “All these things engage people at work and can make people feel like they’re part of something that’s a little bigger than just getting the job done.”
Maroney may be onto something.
A survey conducted in March 2018 by employee and recruitment agency Randstad U.S. said 79 percent of employees believe sporting events in the office “greatly improves their levels of engagement at work.” In the same study, 73 percent of workers say they look forward to going to work more when they participate in office sports bracket contests like college basketball’s March Madness tournament. Also, a 2017 study conducted by employee time-management app TSheets found that 68 percent of employees said watching games increases or has no effect on their productivity.
Chicago-based staffing and recruiting firm LaSalle Network embraces sports in its office. The big sporting events they consider as employee engagement and retention tools in the workplace are March Madness, the Olympics and the World Cup soccer.
Founder and CEO Tom Gimbel said doing this has resulted in better relationships with fellow employees and clients as they have a viewing party for the annual March Madness tournament.
“It empowers employees because they don’t have to sneak around to participate in something they enjoy,” Gimbel said. “It also makes our clients feel valued. We want them to know we appreciate our relationships with them. It helps builds trust.”
The Super Bowl, arguably the biggest U.S.-based sporting event every year, normally attracts over 100 million viewers annually. Even those who don’t consider themselves sports fans watch the Big Game.
Gimbel said companies that attempt to “squash the fun and energy” coming from a big sporting event are missing out on a great opportunity to engage their staff.
Looking at the current state of Chicago’s core sports teams right now, Gimbel might be planning a little something for his firm in February.
“We’re not ruling out anything for the Super Bowl,” Gimbel said. “If the [Chicago] Bears make it, who knows what we’ll do?”
Gap Inc. was an early supporter of predictable schedules for hourly workers in its stores. In 2015, the San Francisco-based retailer started posting employees’ shifts at least 10 days in advance. It also stopped assigning on-call shifts, a practice that low-wage workers and their supporters claim makes income less reliable and things like child care harder to plan.
That was well before July 2017, when Seattle passed a citywide secure scheduling ordinance requiring that large employers in service industries like retail offer more predictable schedules. However, in the first 10 months the law was in effect, one of the 11 employers that the city investigated based on employee complaints was none other than the global clothing giant.
In February, Gap agreed to pay $20,186.24 in back wages to 268 employees at several of its Seattle stores to settle the complaint, according to city records. As part of the settlement order, Gap also agreed to put local store managers through mandatory training and to allow city inspectors to visit its stores to check shift-scheduling record keeping. In exchange, the city didn’t charge Gap with a violation and dropped further investigation.
The clothing retailer’s situation highlights the plight that service-industry employers could find themselves in as a growing number of cities and states pass laws to make hourly workers’ schedules more reliable and schedule changes less frequent.
Predictable scheduling laws passed in the past few years cover an estimated 740,000 workers and 1,000 employers in at least four cities and one state, according to a July research report from the Economic Policy Institute, an independent nonprofit think tank. In addition, San Francisco, New Hampshire and Vermont have passed laws that give more than 1 million workers the right to request scheduling accommodations, according to the EPI report.
The past few years have witnessed an uptick in city and state laws meant to make work more equitable for low-wage earners and other workers. Predictable schedule laws are the latest manifestation of that trend.
Gap isn’t the only major U.S. employer forced to pay back wages or penalties after failing to comply with newer city or state requirements. Since early 2017, government agencies have collected at least $108,000 from multiple employers for running afoul of the laws.
Whether companies and their human resources departments are compelled to adopt predictable schedules because of the laws or decide to make the switch on their own to gain a competitive edge in a tight labor market, they may find that it’s one thing to embrace the policy in theory and quite another to implement it.
“There’s a gap in communication between corporate and HR and the managers on the ground carrying out the policies,” said Karina Bull, policy manager for Seattle’s Office of Labor Standards.
“Scheduling is one of those applications that are seen as a utilitarian tool like payroll, but can have a major impact on peoples’ lives and work environments,” said Stacey Harris, Sierra-Cedar vice president of research and analytics.
Part of the lag could be attributable to scheduling not having a clear owner within a company. Depending on an organization’s orientation, the function could be run by HR, IT, finance or a combination of all three, said Lisa Disselkamp, a longtime workforce management consultant and managing director at Deloitte who advised the Obama administration on labor-scheduling issues.
Regulations are prompting organizations to take more action, including making modifications to ensure they’re compliant, Disselkamp said.
Adopting better scheduling systems can pay for itself by eliminating costs associated with absenteeism, high turnover and a disengaged workforce, Disselkamp said. More efficient scheduling also provides top-line benefits in the form of additional revenue, especially at companies that have not reviewed labor standards and scheduling in a year or two, she said.
Aside from that, treating employees better by giving them better schedules can improve a company’s public image, Disselkamp said. “It becomes a brand issue. People don’t want to shop at places where they don’t think companies are treating their employees well, especially retail.”
Making Schedules Work for Workers
The past few years have witnessed an uptick in city and state laws meant to make work more equitable for low-wage earners and other workers, including laws enacting higher minimum wages, paid sick leave and paid family leave.
Predictable schedule laws are the latest manifestation of that trend. The laws generally require larger employers in retail, fast food, hospitality and other service industries to give hourly workers some amount of advance notice of shifts and shift changes — typically seven to 14 days. Depending on the jurisdiction, the laws may direct employers to offer additional hours to existing part-time employees before hiring new help or guarantee new employees the minimum hours they were promised when they were hired. Some laws also direct employers to pay employees extra for last-minute schedule changes. In addition to paying back wages, laws may direct employers that fail to comply to also pay fines and in some cases damages.
Anecdotal evidence shows that the laws are already starting to help low-wage earners. “Getting the hours I need means I can count on my paycheck. I always have enough money to buy groceries and save whatever’s left,” said Aubrie, a Starbucks barista, in a statement issued last summer by the activist group Working Washington about Seattle’s new law.
In New York, where a Fair Workweek law took effect in November 2017, “Workers have told us that just having the law in place meant employers’ attitudes changed and that they are already benefiting from it without any enforcement,” said New York City Department of Consumer Affairs Commissioner Lorelei Salas.
Academic researchers studying the impact of laws in Seattle and elsewhere expect to release some of the first data-backed findings later this year or in early 2019. “The real question is going to be whether these laws in general will be enforced and complied with,” said Kristen Harknett, an associate professor of sociology at University of California at San Francisco, and a collaborator on the Shift Project at University of California at Berkeley, which studies service-industry employment. “It’s no small task. Compared to minimum wage, this is much more complicated.”
Some cities have already begun bringing the hammer down on employers that failed to bring their scheduling practices in line with new laws. Since Seattle’s Secure Scheduling ordinance took effect in July 2017, the city has received 200 worker inquiries — not all of which became formal complaints — and investigated 13. By mid-July, the city’s labor standards office had collected close to $100,000 in back wages for 500 affected employees from Gap, Red Robin, Tesla, California Pizza Kitchen, and a Seattle location of pub chain Elephant & Castle. As of mid-September, another 18 investigations were active or pending.
Bull, the Seattle OLS policy manager, would not discuss complaints against specific employers, including Gap. A Gap spokesperson also declined to comment on the investigation, but said there are occasions when store teams go through a period of transition as they get up to speed on new regulations and compliance practices.
Gap “is fully committed to complying with all applicable laws and standards,” spokesperson Lauren Wilkinson said. “We hold our employees accountable for doing what’s right. We’re continually working to make meaningful improvements that benefit our employees and balance the needs of our business and customers.”
Laws Spreading to More Cities, States
Seattle is not the only area investigating complaints. Since New York City’s Fair Workweek ordinance took effect, the city’s consumer affairs department has followed up on more than 115 complaints that led to 69 investigations, and collected $6,175 in payments for workers and $2,000 in fines.
The city’s Fair Workweek law established different requirements for employers in retail and fast food because of those industries’ differing scheduling needs. To date, most complaints have been against fast-food employers, primarily for failing to give new employees an estimated number of hours they could expect to work, as stipulated by the law, according to Salas. Employers also have been fined for making schedule changes without notifying employees within the designated time period, she said.
But because the law is still so new, the city has focused on education rather than penalties. DCA has held 220 training events and had outreach teams walk door to door to hand out business background information and worker notices to post. “Our goal is to get employers to comply, not to fine people left, right and center,” Salas said.
San Francisco’s secure schedules law is part of a package of protections the city passed specific to retail workers. Since 2016 when it became the first city in the country to pass a predictable shift law, San Francisco has launched 11 investigations, all of which are ongoing, according to Patrick Mulligan, director of the city’s Office of Labor Standards Enforcement. He declined to share details about the investigations.
Oregon has investigated three complaints since becoming the first state to enact a predictable shift law, which took effect July 1. Employers under review include a Dollar Tree location in Warrenton for allegedly failing to post information about the new law; a Safeway grocery store location in Portland for an overtime pay dispute, and a Portland-area Domino’s pizza franchisee for allegedly failing to give enough advance notice of schedules, according to state records. As of mid-September, investigations by the state’s Bureau of Labor and Industry were ongoing.
In Washington, legislators were expected to hold hearings on a statewide measure in mid-October. “They’re keeping a close watch on what’s happening in Seattle,” Harknett said.
Creating More Predictable Schedules
Predictable schedule laws do not dictate how employers must create the schedules they are bound to offer, but could lead more of them to automate or improve the existing processes.
The scheduling systems that employers use to comply with the new laws are all over the map, according to city labor officials involved with training and enforcement. That includes bare-bones paper and pencil schedules, Excel spreadsheets and shift scheduling software that can be customized to comply with laws, or a combination of one or more of those, they said.
Larger employers are likelier to use electronic scheduling apps. Fifty-six percent of enterprises with more than 10,000 employees use some form of labor scheduling application, according to the 2018-19 Sierra-Cedar survey. That compares with 46 percent of midsized organizations with 2,500 to 10,000 employees, and 43 percent of organizations with 2,500 or fewer workers, according to the survey, which polled 1,636 global organizations representing 23.6 million workers.
Labor scheduling systems are the least used of any workforce management application with the exception of labor budgeting systems, according to the survey. For example, 90 percent of employers of all sizes use some kind of time and attendance system, twice as many as use a scheduling system.
Employers would be smart not to wait for cities to pass predictable shift laws to act, since they won’t get the employee-side recognition from making the change but will still have to do the work, said Clay Robinson, director of solution architecture at Shiftboard, a shift-scheduling software vendor.
The Seattle-based company has sold its shift-scheduling app to employers in and outside the city limits. Forward-thinking customers use it as a strategic advantage for attracting and retaining workers, Robinson said. “We had a customer that wasn’t inside the city who came to us after the city council approved the law and wanted to offer it to employees in order to be able to say they had taken care of it before they had to.”
Gap has continued to update its shift-scheduling management. After testing several options, last spring the company rolled out an app from Shyft that employees can use to swap shifts. The technology, which the company introduced to all its brands, “helps provide additional flexibility to our store employees while ensuring that our stores are staffed appropriately,” said C. David Ard, senior vice president and global head of people for Gap Inc.’s Gap brand, in a prepared statement.
Among other actions, Gap also changed staffing levels to track traffic instead of projected sales. The company’s brands — which include Old Navy and Banana Republic — also are testing other scheduling systems based on store size and markets.
“There’s no question that store scheduling is an issue that challenges our entire industry,” Ard said. “As a company that seeks to attract and retain the best talent in the business, we recognize the importance of finding ways to enhance and improve the store experience for our employees and customers alike.”
Temporary employees do not leave their legal rights at your door. In fact, they enjoy the same rights as your permanent employees.
Consider, for example, EEOC v. Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA, in which an employer recently agreed to pay $65,000 to settle claims brought by a temporary employee that she was subjected to a sexually hostile work environment and fired after repeatedly complaining about it.
The allegations are not pretty.
LaToya Young began working as a temp at Massimo Zanetti in late January 2015. Within 10 days of starting her placement, a male co-worker began making sexually harassing comments to her:
Telling Young that he had “blue balls” and asking her “Why don’t you help me out with that?”
Telling Young that he wanted to “suck [her] bottom lip.”
Telling Young that he wanted to have sex with her, often using lewd language.
Telling Young that he imagined himself engaging in sexual relations with her.
Telling Young that he would “ball [her] up like a pretzel” and would “have [her] screaming.”
Grabbing his groin area while looking directly at her.
Blowing kisses at her.
Licking his lips and biting his bottom lip while looking at her.
Young complained three times to her supervisor. The harassment continued unabated after the first complaint. After the second complaint, Young alleges that her supervisor warned her that going to HR “would jeopardize her employment.” After the third complaint, she was fired.
According to EEOC Regional Attorney Kara Haden, “Employers must take appropriate action to stop harassment of all employees, including temporary workers.” She adds, “We hope that this case sends a clear message that the EEOC will hold accountable employers who fail to protect all employees from workplace harassment.”
Take heed of this lesson. Your temporary employees have the same civil rights as your permanent employees.
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.
Among the variables that can differentiate a company’s culture is its size. Whether the organization is large or a boutique firm, it’s possible to have a great company culture in either; it just requires focusing on open communication and what makes both sizes unique.
Large companies are often thought of as inflexible and siloed. Creative, marketing and advertising agencies are certainly stereotyped in this fashion as well. While it is often true that a larger staff size is accompanied by more clearly defined roles and responsibilities, such structure doesn’t necessarily negatively affect the company culture.
One thing that a larger agency offers is more resources to provide employees with support. This includes everything from more human resources, better or more mature benefits and compensation packages, and additional professional development and education opportunities. These are a few things that the scale of a large company can offer that many smaller companies simply can’t. More opportunities like these create happy employees because these benefits increase their happiness and well-being.
At large agencies, employees can work with different groups of people to come up with new ideas. If done well, each day is different because employees are interacting with new people in different departments. Employees can thrive in this environment and take advantage of the opportunity to learn from a variety of sources.
Larger organizations also often have more clearly defined measures of success and what they value. This is a critical part of a successful company culture that agencies of all sizes can implement. While large agencies are challenged in upholding some of their values as a result of the scale at which they operate, maintaining values and achieving success is certainly not impossible as evidenced by many Fortune 50 companies that are able to accomplish this.
Going Boutique
Often thought of as less organized and more stressful due to having less hands-on staff to get the work done, boutique agencies have the benefit of being more nimble, allowing quicker and easier interactions between skill sets, and having more on-the-job learning opportunities.
While working at a boutique agency can be stressful at times, they can have strong company culture because everyone works together very closely, which improves relationships and productivity both internally and with clients. There are also more hands-on opportunities to make decisions, see work through to completion and feel ownership over the end product. Employees often value not simply being a “cog in the machine,” but instead being one of the few major players in the success of a project.
Because there are fewer hurdles to organizational change and generally fewer processes and procedures, boutique agencies often have more openness to new ideas and innovative thinking. They’re able to try new ideas quickly, which allows them to determine whether they are a good fit without major disruptions to a national or international workforce.
Because of the size, each person has a specialized role and is able to become an expert in their role. This allows for streamlined communication because there is one “go-to” person.
Generally, smaller agencies are flatter in their structure, giving more opportunity for junior employees to get hands-on experience that simply wouldn’t happen in a larger agency. They also get more one-on-one time with agency executives, which provides the opportunity for quicker learning. The benefits to the company culture are that employees feel empowered to share ideas, and feel more satisfaction in the end product because they often have a larger part in the work and its success.
Begin creating the culture today no matter what size organization you are a part of by encouraging open communication and dialogue. The result will be reflected in employee satisfaction and improved relationships within the company and also with clients.
Part of having a great culture is making sure that everyone on the team understands what is valued, what is expected and what is available to each individual. When leadership prioritizes these things, and the team consists of people who truly value the unique benefits of the organization, a great company culture exists.
Greg Kihlstrom is founder and CEO of Carousel30, a digital marketing agency in the Washington, D.C., area. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.
There’s a lot of mythology about the difficulty of union-management relations. One way or another, I have been involved with union-management relations since 1975. Experience teaches that managing in a unionized setting is not all that daunting if you can follow ten simple rules.
Tell the truth.
Never squander your credibility. Trust is one of the most important factors in union-management relations. Deals cannot get done without trust – and trust requires honesty. Even protective or evasive “white lies” or “sugar-coating” about difficult subjects can erode trust and credibility.
Management runs the place.
The Union does not run the organization and generally you do not need to ask the Union’s permission to do things, yet some workplaces have this exactly backward. Tact, forethought and consideration of the Union’s role are still important, but management runs the place.
Maintain productive behavior.
You always have the right to expect proper performance and to maintain a workplace without serious interference in getting work done. It is a “workplace” – getting the work done is the primary consideration.
Use the “work now, grieve later” rule as a guide.
“Work now, grieve later” is a fundamental rule that says a lot about the basic dynamics within a unionized employer. Decades ago a well-known arbitrator wrote: “The workplace is not a debating society.” Management has a right to expect orders to be followed, not debated. It is almost always legitimate to say, “Get it done, and file a grievance later if you want to.” There are exceptions if the order is dangerous or intentionally degrading or humiliating, but the “work now – grieve later” rule is a useful microcosm of the fundamental power allocation in a unionized work setting.
Rely on your good judgment.
The law of labor relations — and generally all of employment law — has a huge component of simple common sense. Try to be fair, and trust your judgment when in doubt. Good judgment often carries the day when the legalities of a situation are scrutinized later.
Don’t respond in kind to pettiness and provocations.
This requires avoiding grudges and tolerating some abrasive activity without responding in the same vein. Be the adult on the room. Hold your own temper. Do not stoop to the level of the people who misbehave. Good tone and good behavior almost always achieve better results and will always present a better picture if there are legal proceedings, including grievances and arbitration.
Overlook personal attacks, rudeness and anger.
“Protected concerted activity” is very generously construed under the labor laws, and “shop talk” is given wide latitude. Profanity, insults, anger and personal attacks can easily erupt in union-management meetings, and sometimes the misbehavior seems to call for a disciplinary response. But the law often protects the bad speech, and often prohibits punishment even in the name of maintaining respect, decorum or civil discourse. Standing up and walking out is always permissible. Threatening or actually imposing discipline may cross the line.
Do not be afraid to talk things out.
It is difficult to say something utterly irrevocable in the process of union-management relations. There are very few truly “gotcha” or “third rail” words that will destroy management rights. Talking things out is rarely damaging, and more often helps reach solutions (unless, of course, someone is trying to turn the workplace into a debating society). In the process of talking things out, honestly hedging your comments is also almost always OK: “I don’t know for sure, but I think …” or “… I need to check …”
Do not make quick decisions unless you have to.
Snap or immediate decisions can often be traps. “I hear you, I’ll get back to you,” is almost always an appropriate response. Very few labor relations decisions actually need to be made on the spot. Don’t be boxed in by a persistent demand for an immediate decision. Fall back and consult.
Good communication with the union is invaluable.
Make a habit of giving the union a “heads up” before something happens. This may seem like an affront to management rights, but it is actually one of the most valuable management tactics for achieving desired results. This also adds to your credibility. Thinking about and then actually inquiring about how the Union leadership will react and what they may have to react to is always a pathway to better labor relations.
